Eugainia de LaCroix                                      The Living Holy Grail
                Morguase of Kirkwall and Brodgar                    Shepherd of the Grail
                Prince Henry Sinclair                                     Her Protector
                Admiral Antonio Zeno                                    Venetian Merchant Adventurer
                Mimktawo'qu'sk                                            Hunter/Warrior
                Keswalqw                                                    Clan Mother, Mimktawo'qu'sk's  Aunt
                Sir Athol Gunne                                            Prince Henry's Liegeman

Scene 1:      A meadow by the sea, at the margin of a grove of young birch trees.
                    
    MORGUASE
    (Off)
Stay back, My Lord.
                

(Enter EUGAINIA, tall, blond, regal, pregnant --  in the full bloom of her beauty,  is supported by her elderly nurse/companion, MORGUASE, a woman of wood, stone and earth)

    EUGAINIA
Prince Henry!

    MORGUASE
This is no place for fainting men, Eugainia.

    EUGAINIA
In the name of God and Goddess;
Set me down.

    MORGUASE
No!  I will not.
A child born beneath these pale striplings
Will be pliant and weak of will.
    (Directly to EUGAINIA)
Goddess of spring, in your verdant Maiden flesh,
Lead us to a silver fir or noble, seasoned Oak.

    EUGAINIA         
I am weary beyond bearing.

    MORGUASE
When they should increase, your  contractions slacken and slow.
        
    EUGAINIA
I beg you Morguase, let me sink into this strange soil —

    MORGUASE
No! If you do —
I fear thy sweet cauldron has soured, Child —
If you lie down you will perish.     
            
    EUGAINIA                
Take this knife and cut it from me.  God wills it!

    MORGUASE        
Hush! Here . . . Where there’s no oak, a good rock serves a royal birth.
Place your hands on my knees.  
Squat, Child. No, no. Facing me.
Yes.  Lean back. Just so.  Pull strength from this great stone.

    EUGAINIA
God’s blood boils within me.
    (Grunt)
I am being split in two.
        
        (MORGUASE slumps)

    MORGUASE
Niniane!  Impudent girl! Come here!

    EUGAINIA
Morguase. . . ?

    MORGUASE
Send to the kitchens for honeyed barley water, girl.

    EUGAINIA
Niniane is back at Castle Rosslyn —

        MORGUASE
Look! The maidens of the hall, spindles whirring,
Turn the finest threads for your first . . .

    EUGAINIA
Morguase.  
    (Crawls to her)  
I beg you. Hold to your senses for the sake of the Child —

    MORGUASE
My heart . . .   
    (Rises, staggers, falls)   
I fear it bursts within.
        
    EUGAINIA
    (Hand to MORGUASE’ chest)
Mother Goddess, Father God,
Christ Lord Jesus, Virgin  blest;
Pass Thy healing strength through me
To this good woman’s anguished breast.

    MORGUASE
Enough, Eugainia.  I am quite recovered.

        (MORGUASE rises, falls)

    EUGAINIA
Morguase? Lord Henry! Morguase —  
    (Assaulted by a strong contraction)
My Lord Sinclair!  Come quickly.  

        (Enter PRINCE HENRY SINCLAIR.  His tunic displays the red cross of the Knights Templar)

    EUGAINIA
The Shepherd of the Grail has fallen.

    HENRY
What ails her?

    EUGAINIA
Her heart has lost its meter.
Pray with me.

        (HENRY kneels)

    EUGAINIA
In the name of The Lord Christ, my progenitor;
In the name of His Good Wife, the Lady Magdalene;
In the name of the Goddess and Her Druid servant Gods:
Hurl me back through time . . .
Oui . . .   
Raise me up, cast me back
Yes, and further back to time beyond remembering;
Ah, oui . . .   
Yes. Just so.
    (Her sacred voice emerges; a resonant, mysterious force)
Sacred rain. Ruptured earth.
Purging fire. Fractious wind.
Sun and moon, propitious stars,
Endless spheres of space and time.   
I, Thy Daughter, evoke the Mystery;
Goddess of earth, God of sky . . .
Fuse Thy precious essences in Me.

        (Beatified, EUGAINIA shimmers. MORGUASE rises, strong, refreshed, healed)

    MORGUASE        
Lord Henry; you witness a miracle.

    HENRY
Ah, my Lady.  Are you not The Christ reborn?

    EUGAINIA
I am Goddess.  He was God.
Morguase . . .  How should I nurture the Holy Child,
How should I live, without the Shepherd of the Grail at my side?

    MORGUASE        
Live you will, my dear, because live you must.
Lord Henry. Fetch sprigs of willow to ease her pain;
Bring yarrow for cleansing, Caulophyllum to speed the pulse —
Lady’s Mantle will loose the gate.

        (EUGAINIA groans)
            
    HENRY
Morguase,  I am not schooled in women’s affairs.

    MORGUASE
If her contractions do not increase in frequency and power,
The sacred cauldron of the five trees will putrefy.
She will die.
        (MORGUASE stumbles, rallies)
I’m alright . . .  Tend our Lady.

    HENRY
Admiral Zeno!

    MORGUASE
You call that papist viper to this scared place ?

    HENRY
I will not have you wandering these wild woods alone;
Put your ancient grievances aside, Morguase,
If not for your own sake, then for your Mistress.

      (Enter ANTONIO.  He is small of stature, dark and fluid, cloaked in wealth and power)

    MORGUASE
My very soul recoils —

    ANTONIO
The ancient witch’s charms are undiminished —

    MORGUASE
Papist butcher!

    EUGAINIA
In the name of God and Goddess.  
Morguase, please . . .  help me!

    MORGUASE
Come, come, Venetian; you have no place here.
Close your gaping yaw and follow me.

       (MORGUASE exits with ANTONIO )

    EUGAINIA
Lord Henry. Can you abide my agony of  blood?

    HENRY
Our Temple Knights once held that men bring evil to the place of birth,
As to the ‘venal’ act,  at life’s first pulse.
I hold no such fiction to be true.
My heart is agony, as though my own child writhed in torment.
My senses reel at your agony of blood.
I will not desert you.   

(In the birch trees behind them, beyond their field of vision, a barely perceptible figure stirs, moves forward, then dissolves in absolute immobility)

    EUGAINIA
The Shepherd of the Grail will not survive this day.        
I have seen it.

    HENRY    
Forgive me, My Lady. Will you ?    

    EUGAINIA                
This same blood spilled upon the Holy Rood by the Prince of Peace,
Lost to the sons of men?
A thought beyond bearing.
Not possible.  No.  It cannot be.
My blood’s a long unbroken chain,
Bound forward link by holy link to time yet unimagined.
Bound back, then back, yet back again beyond the birth of eternity.
In moments of prayer and meditation,
I feel the sacred past pulse through me:
Back past our Lord Muhammad, Blest be his name;
Back to my ancestors, My Lord Christ and His beloved wife
The Lady Mary Magdalene.  
Back to the Royal House of David;
Beyond Solomon, to the Ancient Ones,
Yet further back, beyond our ancient Goddess kin,  
To the Ones Before Time.
Back to the One True Mystery.  
God and Goddess incarnate; The Two Made One.

    HENRY
Just so, my Lady.
    
    EUGAINIA
    (Hands on belly)
Why do you linger, little stranger?
You are afraid. I cannot re-assure.
Who will mother you?
Prince Henry.  I am afraid. Take my hand.   
If I die, God wills it.
If this child dies unborn,
All that for which hundreds and thousands of men and woman
Have suffered, bled and burned perishes with me.             
                    
    HENRY
In your veins runs the very blood of God;
You are  the last. You are the Sacred Vessel.

    EUGAINIA
I am the Holy Grail.
Lord Henry. A moment may soon come
When I give you an order, an order you must obey.
    (Reveals dagger)
No, Lord Henry.  No!  Do not object.
If it comes to this, you will release the Holy Child.

    HENRY
Do not ask this of me.
    

    EUGAINIA
I am not asking.
As you were father to me when I had none,
So be the earthly father of this reluctant child.            
    HENRY
My Lady, please —

    EUGAINIA
Whom do you serve?

    HENRY
The Kingdom of The Holy Grail.
    (Kneels)
Madam. I serve Thee.

    EUGAINIA
Swear.
        
    HENRY
My Lady . . .  

    EUGAINIA
Prince Henry Sinclair; Liegeman to the King of Norway.
Earl of the Orkney Isles, Baron of Rosslyn;
Protector of Scotland; protector of the Holy Grail . . .  
Whom Do You Serve?

    HENRY
I serve Thee.  My Lady, I —

    EUGAINIA
Swear!

    HENRY
    (Weeps)
I swear by Christ the Lord, by God his father,
By Allah and his prophet Good Muhammad;
I swear by The White Goddess and Her dark Twin, The Black Madonna;
If your soul departs, and your child lives
I swear, My Lady:
The Royal and Holy Blood will reign again.    

    EUGAINIA
    (Offers him the dagger)
It has been spoken.

    HENRY
    (Takes it)
God wills it.

(The figure in the forest steps forward. He wears moccasins, deer hide leggings and a chamois ‘cache-sexe’. His torso is decorated with beautifully executed sun bursts,  serpents, etc.  Smaller serpent  forms climb his forearms.  He carries a bow, quiver and an  artfully wrought stone-headed spear.  He approaches, offering sprigs of willow.  HENRY rises, puts hand to sword hilt.  EUGAINIA stays his hand. The young man smiles, sets the willow branches on the ground, slips quietly back into the woods)

    EUGAINIA
Let me rise — no, I must squat.  
Steady me — was he vision, man or God?  

    HENRY
A young man. Real enough.

        (Enter MORGUASE, angry and confused; she grasps uprooted plants, her face and gown smeared with earth)

        MORGUASE
These weeds are all unknown to me . . .  

        (Enter ANTONIO)

    MORGUASE
Venetian viper!! Clement’s evil rises from you
Like stink from barbarous death. Stand back!

    ANTONIO
Your serving woman mistakes me for some scarlet Prince of Rome.
I am a humble merchant, M’am —

    MORGUASE
You want my death — he wants my death!
I have seen it!

    ANTONIO
The old witch is mad, Lord Henry.
She dug the earth, chewed grass and bush,
Crawled about, sniffed the soil like a rooting swine,
Then fainted dead away.

    MORGUASE
Yes, I fell.  You knew my weakened state and baffled me
With taunts and jibes ‘til such a rage o’er took me —

    ANTONIO
She lies! I tried to raise you up. You turned on me —

    MORGUASE
Liar! Viper! Brute! You purposefully provoked this killing rage in me!

    ANTONIO
I stand amazed —

    MORGUASE
We may worship but one God, you said.
That there are no other gods to worship, you said.
One God made all the world?
One God, one male God rules heaven and earth?
My ancient Goddess? Her Druid priests?  
No longer living? Oh, My Lady . . .   
Can this be?  Has she deserted us?

    EUGAINIA
Your ancient Goddess squats before you,
Infused of late with the blood of the Christ.
    
    ANTONIO
Heresy.
(Crosses himself, sinks to his knees,
back turned on Eugainia.  He Prays)
Intercede, Holy Father, on this poor child’s behalf —

    MORGUASE
Silence!  Your astonishing Roman tale tells
That through women all evil enters the world.

    HENRY
Come, Morguase.

    MORGUASE
Don’t touch me! Cruel boys grown to murderous men:
You torture us, burn us for witches;
You slaughter our sons, rape our daughters;
You butcher our nurslings in your unholy wars.
You drove the Goddess from the earth.
Serpent! Deny it if you dare.

    ANTONIO
The King of Kings dispatched your pagan Gods,
To free the world of Goddess tyranny —

    MORGUASE
    (Attempts to rise, stumbles and falls enraged)
Ahaaaa! Papist! Devil!
Who would you be, you peddler, without the power of the Pope at Rome?

    ANTONIO
Your lady’s pagan sacrament has been obliterated
At The One True God’s behest by The One True Church of Rome.  

    MORGUASE
God hacked and burned our sacred groves of oak?  No.  It was you.
God broke our bodies with rack and wheel?  No.  It was you.
With hammer and spike, God nailed us to the bloodied gates
Of your unholy Christian hell?  
No.  It was you.  Roman men.  Christian men.
Men!  So you might gain ascension over us!  
    (Crawls to Eugainia)
But we are still here; we rose and still we rise
Through Phillip the Cruel and grim Pope Clement’s acrid smoke,
Up to the uncharred air where God and Goddess make us whole again.

    EUGAINIA
Your face is fire.  Your hands are ice.  
Morguase? Morguase! Can you hear me?

    MORGUASE
They’ve poisoned the well —
Flaming balls of tar o’er sail the walls
And set the court aflame.
Listen! They batter the great door.
I hear the voice of the unborn Child;
“Run, Mother of God,” it cries.
“Flee the dying world!”

    EUGAINIA
And so we have, my dear . . . Lord Henry, tell her.

    HENRY
Rest easy, Morguase. We fled Castle Rosslyn
And Edinburgh two months ago.
Papal Rome is two thousand leagues behind us.

    EUGAINIA
Hush, my dear. Hush. We are safe.

    MORGUASE
    (Rises, entranced)
Look! It is Herself.
The Goddess emerges from her last standing Oak,
Branches of Silver Fir and Lady’s Yew in either hand.
She speaks . . .    
“Eugainia, my daughter, my successor:  Go,  
Where water, rock and tree sprites lead you.
Let the Goddess be refreshed in the forests beyond the western sea.”

        (MORGUASE dies)
    
    EUGAINIA
Morguase?  Morguase?
God in heaven help us.
Birth and death besiege the same moment.
Bring her to me. Bring her!

    HENRY
        (Brings MORGUASE body to EUGAINIA)
My Lady.  The sprigs of willow.
What are we to do with the willow— ?

    EUGAINIA
I need Morguase.
    (She weeps)  
Morguase.  You have deserted me.
            

(The young man appears with a woman in her middle age dressed in soft, beautifully decorated doeskin, which covers a tight and supple body)

    KESWALQW
Keswalqw.  I am Keswalqw.  I can help this  woman.

    HENRY
    (Quietly)
Admiral Zeno . . .   do not provoke a conflict.
Sheathe your blade.

    EUGAINIA
Kes-wal-qw . . .  ?  I am Eugainia.  
Come, good soul.  Attend me.                
    KESWALQW
Mimktawo’qu’sk.  Take these men from this place.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
Yes, Aunt.  
Come, kin-friends.  
Birthing blood will weaken us . . .   
We . . .   Us . . .   Men . . .    
Aunt?  They do not answer me.

    KESWALQW
They do not speak our tongue.    
Take them to the village.
Go!
        (Places fresh herbs in EUGAINIA’s mouth)
Come, little sister. You are safe.

    EUGAINIA
This woman, Keswalqw, is sent by God.
I have no fear.

        (HENRY bends to remove MORGUASE’ body)

    EUGAINIA
No!  Leave her.

(MIMKTAWO’QU’SK leads the men off. EUGAINIA strengthens.  One hand clutches MORGUASE, the other KESWALQW)

    EUGAINIA
Bless you, Keswalqw.  
I know not who you are, or what you give me;
But the sweetness of your face
Et les beaux yeux  —  Ah. . . .   Oui. Mais oui!    
Les yeux . . . la source crystal de l’eau sacr—
Geese in flight, the full moon sailing—
Les rivires vivant avec les pches d’argents—
Oui. Seas of thunder, great with whales—
 

        (KESWALQW chants softly under)

    EUGAINIA
The scented earth alive and seeded.
Oui . . .
Blessed infants fat and milky.
Desse sur terre e Dieu en ciel;
Your names be praised —

        (EUGAINIA gathers strength, becomes focused, certain)  

    EUGAINIA
A gush of  Blood!
The sacred river flows! Oui. Ah, oui . . .

    KESWALQW
Akaia!

    EUGAINIA
Oui.  Oui.  Oui.  I am delivered.

    KESWALQW
Akaia!  Akaia!

        (The child is born. KESWALQW receives it)

    EUGAINIA
Keswalqw.  Please . . .  

(KESWALQW shows EUGAINIA her mis-shapen, still-born child. EUGAINIA faints. KESWALQW bites and knots the cord, wraps the little corpse in softened skins. She holds the bundle aloft)

    KESWALQW
Akaia!  Akaia!    


                    
    End scene.
                                    
                
    
Scene  2:      A meadow by the sea;  KESWALQW and MIMKTAWO’QU’SK prepare a sweat lodge.  ATHOL GUNNE, a big, shaggy, kilted, hairy bear of a man, enters carrying an  oak table.  He nods and smiles. MIMKTAWO’QU’SK and  KESWALQW return the pleasantry.

    KESWALQW
This one seems friendly enough.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
Who are these strange white-as-ghosts bear men?

        (SIR ATHOL exits)

    KESWALQW
Sahkahwaychkik, The Old Ones, spoke of white-as-ghosts spirit persons.
Perhaps they have come back to walk among Lnu’k, the People.

(SIR ATHOL returns with two elaborately carved oak chairs.  He  sits, head back, arms akimbo, legs splayed, absorbing the sun)

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK    
These bear men, like this ochre-headed one . . .  
They are all hair — hair on their faces and here and here.
Oouff! And they stink like bears.

        (SIR ATHOL nods and smiles. They nod and smile back)

    KESWALQW
They are bears,  I think,  Spirit bears, questing in human shape,
Come to us for our medicine — for the wisdom of the People.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK    
Come for a good bath too, maybe.
Phew! I wish he’d sat up-wind of us.
He does seem friendly.
And just your type, Aunt.

        (SIR ATHOL exits)

    KESWALQW
My type!

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
You like them large and friendly. Yes?

    KESWALQW
Yes. And clean, and hairless.
I am beyond all that now.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
Oh?  That’s not what Wosoqotesk tells me.

    KESWALQW
It’s true.  Wosoqotesk leaves my sleeping robes a happy man.
But lately I think; why such energy for such a little pleasure?

        (SIR ATHOL re-appears with poles and a canopy, which he erects over the table)

    KESWALQW
They have been here before, these White as Ghosts Bear Persons.
These kin-friends. These Nikmaq.  
They came in the time of my mother’s mother.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
This tale is new to me.

    KESWALQW
This tale is not for everyone.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
Not everyone will be chief of The People.

    KESWALQW
Time will tell. Their land across the sea lost its medicine.  
A great sickness fell from the stars,
Terrible wars rose from the earth beneath them.
They came across the great eastern sea,
Came in their great canoe; built the great stone house of the two rivers.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
The great stone house of death.
Why was I not told this tale before?

    KESWALQW
Am I telling you now?
The spear you carry, Tooth of Wolverine, was found by your father’s father,
Found in the great stone house.

     MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
E’e!  This?  Found in the great stone house of death?

    KESWALQW
One by one, the sickness —
The blistering sickness they brought with them — ended their lives.
The few who survived, enough to man their great canoe,
Returned to the land across the sea.
The People were afraid, afraid of the great stone house of death.  
But one young man, your father’s father, he dared to enter.
Among their whitened bones, he found your spear —

      MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
Tooth of the Wolverine.

    KESWALQW
The spear had good medicine.  Strong medicine.
It flew through the air like a living creature.
Flew of its own accord and never missed its target.
It helped the People. It helped the animals.
Brought swift death to moose and bear and caribou;
Killed seal and walrus, whale and wolf and man: quick, kind.  Clean.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
That was then. Its medicine is weak now.

    KESWALQW
Before the white as ghost persons died, they dug a great well by the sea.  
They buried strong medicine in the World Below the Sea.  

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
What strong medicine did they bury in this great well?

    KESWALQW
They say it was the severed head of their Great Father’s messenger.  

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
There is a tale from the Six Worlds —

    KESWALQW
Yes, yes; inside the selfish head of an outcast warrior
There was good medicine — it is the same tale.
They said they would come back, come back with their Creator.
That was a long time ago.

        (SIR ATHOL surveys the landscape)

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
This hairy bear man and the Enry’ Orkney’, they wear the same red cross.

    KESWALQW
The same cross the woman who was my grandmother’s mother
Marked on her breast in the time of summer feasting.
Marked with red ochre in the feast time on Apekwit
Before the blistering sickness fell upon the strangers.
Soon a child came to her,
A child with sun-color hair.
A child with eyes the color of the sky.  
Its white as a ghost’s skin frightened her.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
White skin and sky color eyes, yes.
Now and then such a child is born to the people.

    KESWALQW
Since then, yes, but not before.
        
    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
There is nothing to fear in the eyes of such children.
Is there, Aunt?

    KESWALQW
There is something to fear in the eyes of all people Mimktawo’qu’sk.
But more than that, in the eyes of all, there is much to honor.
Much to love.

    MIMKTAWO’QU’SK
That is truth, Aunt.
Are we to love and honour these white as ghosts persons?

    KESWALQW
We will wait and see.  
We will wait and we will see.