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For, deep in the secret shadows of that dreadful place where this vile hag, Catharine Montour, ruled it in Catharines-town, dwelt also all that now remained of the Cat-Nation Eries People of the Cat a dozen, it was rumoured, scarcely more and demons all, serving that horrid warlock, Amochol, the Sorcerer of the Senecas.
Now into the circle, one by one, came those who had dreamed and must be answered not as in the old-time and merry Feast of Dreams, where the rites were harmless and the mirth and jollity innocent, if rough for Amochol had perverted the ancient and innocent ceremony, making of a fourteen-day feast a sinister rite which ended in a single night.
His arm reaches even into the barracks of Clinton! Because to Atensi the sacrifice of these two would be grateful the maiden Lois and your Loskiel. Only the pure and guarded pleasure her. And these two are Hidden Children. One has died. The other shall not escape us. She shall die strangled by Amochol upon his own altar!"
What could the degraded acolytes of this Red Priest do against a consecrated Sagamore of the Lenape against an ensign of the Enchanted Clan? Else why do you wear your crest or the great Ghost Bear there rearing upon your breast?" "It is true," he murmured uneasily. "What spell can Amochol lay upon us? What magic can he make to escape us?
A child may safely play in the forest now from the upper castle and Torloch to the Minnisink." "Has Amochol gone?" "To make strong magic for his dead Cats, little brother. The Siwanois hatchets are still sticking in the heads of Hiokatoo's Senecas. Let their eight Sachems try to pull them out." "So you have managed to wound a Seneca or two?"
But the Andastes, astounded and terrified, only cowered together in a swaying pack. Restraining Lois with all my strength, I said to the Mohican: "If Boyd comes not before they take her, concentrate your fire on Amochol, for we can not hope to make him prisoner " "Hark!" motioned the Sagamore, grasping my arm. I heard also, and so did the others.
And the million stars were the lights of camp-fires. And the love-song was the Karenna. And the water you beheld was the river culled Chemung." The girl seemed stunned, standing there plucking at her fingers, scarlet lips parted, and her startled eyes fixed upon the white-draped sibyl. "Executioner! Bend your bow!" cried Amochol, with a terrible stare at the Sorceress.
For what was done to Loskiel and to the Praying Mole, will be done to you all on the last day of this month, when the Dream Feast is held at Catharines-town! You shall die. And others shall die not as you, but on the red altar of the Great Sachem Amochol! Strangled, disemboweled, sacrificed to clothe Atensi!"
"Are we to miss this?" said Boyd, restlessly. "Listen to that firing! The devil take this fellow Amochol and his Eries! I wish we were yonder with our own people. I wish at least that I could see what our New Yorkers are about!" Behind us, Boyd's twenty riflemen stood craning their sunburnt necks; and my Indians, terribly excited, fairly quivered where they crouched beside us.
Indeed, if my Oneidas remained with me at all beyond Tioga I might deem myself lucky, in such dread and detestation did they hold that gloomy region where the Wyoming Witch brooded her deadly crew, and where the Toad Woman, her horrible sister, fed the secret and midnight fires of hell with the Red Priest, Amochol. A grey hawk was circling above us mewing.
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