Witch of the Palo Duro

Tay-bodal, a Kiowa herbalist and doctor, is the protagonist of this well-researched but weakly plotted historical series. Recently married to the testy Crying Wind (Death at Rainy Mountain, 1996), Tay-bodal is a young man unallied with any clan. He's best friends with Skywalker, a powerful seer and close advisor to Crying Wind's cousin White Bear, a war chief. Late in the autumn of 1866, the Kiowas prepare their winter camp near Palo Duro, a vast canyon in northern Texas, as trouble looms: shifting political alliances require unpopular arranged marriages; Skywalker disappears; several horses owned by White Bear's favorite nephew, The Cheyenne Robber, are killed in the canyon, where herders claim they saw a witch; the young wife of He Goes Into Battle First dies mysteriously; Crying Wind is accused of witchcraft after she accidentally overmedicates a sick baby. To find the source of the trouble and save his wife, Tay-bodal requires a craftiness worthy of an Italian Renaissance prince in the face of intricate Kiowa social customs and political rivalries. It all gets so complicated that it takes Tay-bodal 12 pages to explain the mysteries to the tribal chiefs. Nevertheless, Medawar ably contrasts the scientifically minded Tay-bodal with his more mystically inclined tribesmen, making her series notable in that the gifts that distinguish its Indian protagonist have much more to do with logic than with second sight. (Nov.)