The Jackal and The Peacock

The Jackal and The Peacock: African Folktales, Jackal tales, Fabling, Pam, Free Short Stories

Once upon a time, there was a beautiful bird called The Peacock, he could not fly like other birds, but he was beautiful, and for him, that was all he needed. He was no king, but he was created with a beautiful feather crown, his brown eyes were surrounded by greenish-blue flesh with black and white marks, his neck was long, sleek and elegant, and it’s tail made a beautiful robe that the humans tried to imitate when they made their clothes. Every female was in love with The Peacock because of his beauty, and so he walked around with his chest puffed up.

Now the Jackal was jealous of The Peacock and wanted to be like it, but it was a prideful animal, so instead of admitting to his desire, he bullied The Peacock. The Peacock naturally tried to avoid the Jackal, but sometimes he was not so lucky, however when those times came, the other animals protected it from the Jackal.

One day, the Jackal cornered The Peacock while it was bathing in a pond and tried to eat it, There was nobody around to save The Peacock, so he ran, but his feathers were heavy with water and slowed him down, and the Jackal pounced on him. The Peacock closed his eyes, waiting for the Jackal’s bite, but it never came, so he opened his eyes.

The Jackal was stuck in awe of The Peacock’s beauty.

“Are you okay?” The Peacock asked, hoping that he was not.

The Jackal snapped back to his present and clumped his jaw close to The Peacock’s neck but could not bring himself to clench his teeth. So he pulled away.

“Why are you so beautiful?” The Jackal asked the shocked peacock?

The Peacock did not answer because he was still speechless, so the Jackal snapped its jaws, angry. “Tell me.” he demanded, “How did you become beautiful?”

The sun!” The scared peacock said. “I stared into the sun and it made my eyes glow brown, I rolled in the forest and it coloured my body. And I stood on the mountain and caught a rainbow and made it my tail.”

The Jackal took note of everything The Peacock had told him and ran off to do the same.

Now, you should know that the Jackal used to be as beautiful and bright as the fox. When he stared at the sun, it burnt his eyes so that they were pitch black in the middle and surrounded by fire like the sun. When he rolled around the forest, it stripped him of his bright colour and painted him as sand. And when he stood on the hill to catch a rainbow, he fell and was severely injured.

Now that the Jackal was ugly and injured, he had to stay in hiding, so he no longer bothered The Peacock.

The End

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