In the years where Dadak was searching for The Land With No Cages, there came a time where he and his companion, Catbuk, encountered a patrol of slavers. The jungle was too thick for their vehicles, so the convoy drove their captives onwards with whips and prods. The pair hid, as the wails and cries of those chained passed. The mournful sounds faded into the undergrowth, as they crawled out of their secret pockets.
“We must free them, Dadak,” Catbuk protested.
“I know, my boy”, Dadak replied, “But not yet. Follow them, and return here when they make camp.”
His companion nodded, and made haste after the feathered ones and their captives. He followed their march all through the day, weeping as he saw his brethren driven to exhaustion. The captors called a halt at sundown, pitching tents for themselves, the Xhuva left to huddle into each other for warmth.
Catbuk returned to where he left Dadak, and came to find him sat on the floor, stuffing clothes from his pack with foliage. Thinking the day had come when Dadak had finally gone mad, Catbuk began to wail, berating his companion for giving him hope that his brethren would be free. Dadak raised up his hand, silencing Catbuk mid-sentence, “Catbuk, first listen to my plan, and then let me know if my senses have gone astray”. Dadak pulled him close, and whispered to his companion.
“Now, my friend, you run as fast as you can, first to the east, and then to the north. I will wait until midnight, and then we shall begin”. Catbuk sprang away, giddy at the plan Dadak had concocted, as Dadak made his way towards the camp.
At midnight, in the pitch darkness, Dadak began to sing. An old, Xhuva work-song, with the slurred words of a person who had drunk too much liquor. A clamour went up around the slaver's camp, the guards squawking and cawing about an escapee, and the Xhuva braying out warnings for the unfortunate soul. Taking up arms, the guards ran out the camp towards the singing voice.
At this point, Dadak changed his song, from the old work-song to one of insults, mockery, and jibes, riling up the guards and invigorating their search for him. Soon, the Rissi came upon the outline of the singing Xhuva, and fired, puncturing the air with criss-crossing light. As they neared the smoking remains, however, the song was struck up anew, from another direction. The guards shrieked in frustration, as they found the decoy, and rushed towards the renewed singing.
The whole night they spent rushing towards Dadak's insults, screeching at his mockery, with laughter hurled from his hiding place in the treetops. He lead them on this merry chase until he grew bored, and disappeared, leaving the captors clueless, bereft of his song.
As they returned to camp, irritably snapping at each other in their defeat, the Rissi found it empty. Anything that could be torched was gathered up into a pyre, and a great pile of shackles and chains was found at the centre of the bonfire. Those that they had captured were nowhere to be found. Catbuk had been hard at work while the guards were distracted, and each one swore they could hear laughter, a pair of voices, mocking them.