A donkey story

First appeared here.

The donkey didn’t come home that evening, and the family knew the dangers lurking in the dark. Hyenas prowled the countryside, and a lone animal was an easy target. The villagers quickly gathered, flashlights in hand, and spread out across the hills, calling for the missing beast. Hours passed, and just as dawn began to break, someone spotted a strange silhouette in the distance, larger than a donkey, unmoving but twitching slightly.

As they approached, they gasped. The donkey stood firm, its jaws locked around the neck of a lifeless hyena. Blood stained its side where the predator had latched on, but the donkey had fought back. In desperation, it had turned and bitten down with such force that it snapped the hyena’s spine. The men could hardly believe it. They tried to pull the hyena from its mouth, but the donkey refused to let go, gripped by lingering terror.

Finally, they pried the carcass free. At that moment, the donkey bolted, galloping home in sheer panic. The men, exhausted from their night-long search, broke into laughter. Their donkey wasn’t a victim, it was a warrior. They agreed on the spot: the beast had earned its freedom. From that day on, it would no longer work but would live out its days grazing in peace, the unlikely champion of the village.