by Alan Nafzger & Lilly Tabbytite (Comanche)
Once upon a time, five wolves, all brothers, traveled together. They would share whatever meat they found while hunting with the coyotes. Coyote noticed the wolves gazing up at the sky one evening.
"What are you looking at, my brothers?" Coyote inquired.
"Oh, nothing," the oldest wolf said.
The next evening, Coyote noticed that they were all staring up at something in the sky. He inquired of the next oldest wolf as to what they were looking at, but he refused to answer. This went on for three or four nights. No one wanted to tell Coyote what they were looking at because they were afraid he would intervene. Coyote once asked the youngest wolf brother to tell him something, and the youngest wolf told the other wolves, "Let's tell Coyote what we see up there." He's not going to do anything.
So they informed him. "There are two animals up there." We can't get to them because they're way up there. "
"Let's go up and see them," Coyote suggested.
"How are we going to do that?"
"Oh, that's simple," Coyote said. "I can show you how to get up there with no problem."
Coyote gathered a large number of arrows before shooting them into the sky. The first arrow became entangled in the sky, and the second arrow became entangled in the first. Each arrow was stuck at the end of the one before it, creating a ladder that reached down to the earth.
"We can now climb up," Coyote said. The oldest wolf brought his dog, and then the other four wolf brothers arrived, followed by Coyote. They climbed throughout the day and into the night. They climbed all day the next day. They climbed for many days and nights until they reached the sky. They stood in the sky, looking down at the two animals the wolves had spotted from below. It was two grizzly bears.
"Don't go near them," Coyote warned. "They'll rip you apart." But the two youngest wolves had already arrived. They were followed by the next two youngest wolves. Only the oldest wolf resisted. Nothing happened when the wolves approached the grizzlies. The wolves sat down and looked at the bears, who sat down and looked at the wolves. When the oldest wolf saw that it was safe, he came over with his dog and sat with them.
Coyote refused to come over. He didn't believe the bears. "That makes a nice picture, though," Coyote thought. "They all look pretty good sitting there." I'm going to leave it like that for everyone to see. When people see them in the sky, they will say, "'There's a story about that picture,' they'll say, and then they'll tell a story about me."
So Coyote left it alone. He shot the arrows as he descended, making it impossible for anyone to return. Coyote admired the arrangement he had left up there from the ground. They still have the same appearance today. Those stars are now known as the Big Dipper. If you look up, you'll see three wolves making up the handle, with the oldest wolf, the one in the middle, still carrying his dog. The two youngest wolves form the bowl's underside, while the two grizzlies form the other side, which points toward the North Star.
When Coyote saw how they looked, he wanted to sprinkle them with stars. He drew pictures of stars all over the sky and then used the leftover stars to create the Big Road across the sky.
Meadowlark came over when Coyote was finished. "When I'm gone, tell everyone that when they look up into the sky and see the stars arranged this way, that I was the one who did it," he said. That's my job. "
Meadowlark is now telling the story. Concerning Coyote.