Grail Quest by D. Sallen Page A

the village by the falls. She seemed fascinated by our adventure. “I think Chief right. You have bad enemy now. He try to kill you. You must kill him.”
    “We don’t have to worry about him coming here. We told them about Coyote witch. They think there are ghosts here. Think red-haired girl is witch.”
    The red-haired girl certainly has bewitched me. Her sensual proximity, her strength and forest skills, had me thinking maybe a wife wouldn’t be such a bad thing after all. Back in England, I’d never entertained such a thought with the various maidens and wives with whom I’d enjoyed physical congress. And here I was going goofy over a girl I hadn’t even slept with, yet.
    And then there was Coyote. Would I still want her if he had pleasured her with his ‘bone-thing,’ and not just his tongue? Could I cope with that situation if she was my wife? Sure, he hadn’t entered her, and as far as I knew hadn’t broken her maidenhead. But as much as I wanted her, did that really matter? What if she really is a witch?
    Where before I was jealous and merely despised Coyote, now my feelings toward her made me hate him. I wished I knew more about defenses against a witch.
    We had not fired our weapons since the incident on the mountain with the jumping jacks. To conserve ammunition I didn’t want to shoot if we could avoid it. Moyock and I no longer had any problem getting through the thicket to the outside world. We roamed farther afield for game we could trap or bring down with arrows.
    Using the type of fish trap I’d learned from the Powhatan, we caught a number of unknown fish. Leahna said we could eat anything we caught. Moyock’s training as a youth came in handy for setting traps on land. Leahna also gave us advice on the game hereabout. She used her bow and arrows to bring down anything from squirrels to deer.
    With saplings, and the thongs Leahna cut out of deer hides, we built racks over the fire pit at the front of the cave to smoke the game and fish we brought in. Not wishing to denude the thicket concealing the cave, from some distance away, we hauled firewood on our shoulders. Out and about Moyock and I ran across signs of other people in the neighborhood.
    One afternoon we ranged far to the north of the cave looking for game. Catching sight of a fat looking doe, we crept closer to her. Moyock brought her down with an arrow. He approached the deer and was startled to see two arrows in her. A strange Natural came towards us. I was out of his sight in the woods, but he saw Moyock and yelled at him.
    Moyock hollered back at him. To me, “He says he saw the doe first, and I should leave it to him. I said it was my arrow that killed it.”
    While haranguing at Moyock, the stranger came closer. I couldn’t understand his words, but I understood his irate tone. When Moyock didn’t back off, the stranger snapped an arrow at him. Moyock dodged and notched his own arrow. Then I stepped out in plain view and glared at the stranger. He stopped and appeared to look bewildered. It wasn’t the first time my strange appearance had brought confusion to natives. Playing a game, Moyock dropped his bow, bowed to me and loudly begged me not to shrivel up the stranger’s soul. I grandly turned to the man, raised my arms and with a deep rumbled yell gestured for him to be gone. He hesitated and then took off like his tail was on fire.
    Our roundabout route took us through some new territory to the west of the cave. We spotted some hide bundles tied onto clusters of branches. Nearby, the remains of a mangled bundle lay on the ground. Closer examination revealed sundered skeletal remains of a human being. “Probably graves of Leahna’s people,” said Moyock.
    Back at the cave, Leahna was running around bare breasted in only an apron. For my piece of mind I wished she kept her dress on.   We described the man who challenged Moyock and how we’d scared him off.
    “That funny. I not know who man is. When I see man in woods,