A/N: I am stuck inside due to crazy smoke levels (518) so I have had the time to get this out of my head and onto the computer today.
I got four reviews, two requesting that I stick to Cooper's version (well one, and Lacontreras said he/she had never read the book and thus had no idea what happened, so I took that as "go with Cooper's version") and two asking for my version. I have decided to go with Copper's version, but I am also posting another short story for those of you who requested Uncas getting the honor, Moonstone, which will be an alternate ending to this story.

I looked for a English/Lenape Dictionary this week and I found one so the definitions are at the end. Bold is as always English.

Behind me came my friends, but none had my speed. A few inches ahead of me bobbed Killdeer's muzzle, ever I strived to pass it. My moccasined feet pounded the uneven ground, but no sound on the hard packed earth did I create. My bloodshot eyes were trained upon the fleeing back of my cowardly enemy.

Once, and only once, did Magua pause to make a stand upon a small rise in the dry grasses, but a moment later he abandoned the idea. He leaped into a thicket of bushes, and disappeared from my sight. I dashed aside the leaves and tore after him only to be met with a door of bark. Raising my hands before me I burst through it and it fell away, broken and torn. I was now in a long, straight tunnel, at the end of which a dark figure for a moment obscured the light. I did not hesitate in my stride and I but pushed my self the harder.

In the darkness I became aware of myself suddenly. The joy of battle fell away and I was myself, Uncas. No longer was I dead to my senses, I felt the pain of a long scratch which ran from my collarbone to my second rib. I felt the filth which coated me and I wished characteristically for a long, cold swim. I heard the loud steps and heavy breathing of those who labored behind me and the rhythmic slapping of my musket on my back. Fatigue weighed me down in body and spirit. When Magua was dead, what would I be… if I still live?

Just behind me Hawkeye raised a shout of success, and proclaimed aloud, that now we were certain of our chase. Hope filled my weary bones and I stretched my legs farther. The light was closer now, and then I was in a large cavern, dimly lit and filled with cowering women and children I paused uncertainly for a heartbeat. Then I saw my target and I bounded after him as he slipped into another tunnel. The cries of the caverns occupants as they saw my blood bathed countenance echoed eerily in the stuffy air of the dark damp cave.

Ever did I keep my eyes on Magua, always was he far before me outstripping his two comrades even as I did mine. The small light from the cavern vanished behind a twist in the tunnel but though I was blinded for a brief minute my sight returned and the figures of my enemies seemed closer in the midnight of the place. Why had Le Renard come to this place of hiding? This question was unanswerable to my mind for which cowardice was alien and unknown. I could not understand my enemy and thus I could not anticipate his moves.

I came suddenly to a crossing of passages and I stumbled to a halt. Hawkeye and Duncan rammed into my back and I stepped out into the larger apartment. Panting and perspiring heavy we studied the five passages through which the Hurons might have passed. Hawkeye and I exchanged glances. There were five ways and three men. Duncan caught the look and its meaning. Once more we glanced at the passages and to my disbelief I saw a flash of white cloth. I could not understand. My brain was dead, my senses were becoming dull, I was tired and filthy. Why must my eyes play tricks upon me? She is not here, Cora is not here….

"'Tis Cora!" exclaimed the major at my side.

The words penetrated my sudden stupor. Cora. Ila, xkweyòk. Tòm!

"Cora! Cora! Chitanësit, Chitanìsëwakànit!" I echoed, bending forward like a deer and sprinting over the rough stone.
"'Tis the maiden!" shouted Hawkeye, "Courage, lady; we come—we come!"

Over sharp rocks which bruised my feet and under low hanging stalactites which nearly blocked my path I ran. It was into a tight place that I bounded only to be suddenly held fast by my musket which had caught. I struggled and clawed at the strap which held me down I felt like I was choking as I watched Cora disappear and by some inhuman effort I tore myself away, abandoning the rifle.

As I once more gained sight of my enemies and my Ehòlënt, I slipped on some loose gravel and nearly fell. I gained my footing in time for a bullet to cut a shallow gash in my arm.

Hawkeye leapt in front of me but a second later I was scrambling up loose rocks and cutting my palms on sharp rocks as I flew towards Cora.

I rounded a large stalactite and saw the light of the setting sun before me. My eyes adjusted to the glare of the great light, and I saw that Cora was borne along between two warriors, while Magua led the group on ahead. For a moment the forms of all four were strongly drawn against the opening to the outside world, and then they disappeared. Nearly frantic with disappointment, I increased my efforts, and soon I was breaking forth from the dark tunnel into the light and smells of day onto the side of the mountain.

Above me toiled my goal—a small dark figure. His course lay up the ascent, and still continued hazardous and laborious. For a moment I suffered my eyes to seek that of my companions.

Encumbered by his rifle, Hawkeye suffered Duncan to precede him a little. Both were tired and bloody. Both were determined.

I turned back to the chase. Chitanësit, Chitanìsëwakànit, Cora. Lànktitu xàtash.

In this manner we surmounted, rocks, precipices, and difficulties that at another time, and under other circumstances, we would have deemed almost insuperable.

"Stay, dog of the Wyandots!" I exclaimed shaking my bright tomahawk at Magua as I neared him; "a Delaware girl calls stay!"

Cora turned her head suddenly, for the first time noticing my presence. On her face was a strange expression as she looked between me and those behind me to Le Renard. She seemed to come to a conclusion, for she straightened up proudly and on her face was a look of joyful abandon.

"I will go no farther," she declared firmly. Then wrenching herself from the supporting hands of her captors, she stepped unexpectedly onto a ledge of rocks, that overhung a deep precipice. "Kill me if thou wilt, detestable Huron; I will go no farther." Surprise and understanding crossed my features as I leapt up and up. For as I had looked down upon her I had recognized the look of one who awaited death with joy. Pure, overflowing joy; the joy one has when they see an old friend.

She vanished from my sight as a bush obscured my view. My friends were far behind me.

"Woman," came Magua's words, "choose; the wigwam or the knife of Le Subtil!"

I came out on top of a small ledge, above the group of Mingoes, but the edge was still too far away.

I saw Magua standing above the kneeling form of Cora with drawn knife. I watched as Cora raised her hands to the bleeding heavens, "I am thine; do with me as thou seest best!"

But I knew that her words were not directed to the murderer above her, but her God. She was placing her fate in his hands. She had released her sister, and had chosen death… chosen to die rather than to live with the one she had held so dear.

"Woman," repeated Magua hoarsely, "choose!"

But Cora did not heed his demand. Magua trembled in every fibre, and he raised his arm on high, but dropped it again with a bewildered air, like one who doubted. Once more he struggled with himself and lifted the keen weapon again, giving me the time to leap down upon them.

My cry of anger and excitement resounds over the mountain and Cora turned her eyes and watched me over her shoulder.

Magua recoiled a step, staring up at my falling form with amazement and fear; but my eye were riveted on the man sheathed his knife in Cora's bosom.

The long-knife sliced down.

A hand instinctively rose up to ward off the blow.

Her eyes widened.

The blade met her breast and sunk into her and a breath of sound escaped her parted lips.

The Huron drew the blade away.

Blood spurted from the death wound.

Cora swayed, "Ntèhëm, kàchi ta papëmewtëm."

Magua sprang at the man, but I fell between them. An icy blade slid between my ribs. Magua's blade, but arose and as Cora's words sang in my heart I struck down the man who had dared kill her. Blood spewed down my back and ran in rivulets down my legs into the rock. I turned slowly, wearily, around on the slippery ground. My tomahawk slipped from my nerveless fingers. Mentally I raged at my weakness. A glance sufficed to tell me that Cora was dead, sprawled on the rock in a pool of blood.

Then, with a stern and steady look, I raised my eyes to Le Subtil. There was pain in my back, but the overflowing anguish in my heart dwarfed it like it dwarfed that of the scratch. Magua seized my unresisting arm and passed his knife into my bosom.

…Once…

…My eyes held his. Though I could not so much as twitch, my look cast fear into his heart. I could see it in his black eyes…

I have failed her.

…Twice…

…My heartbeat slowed, but I felt the moonstone in my pouch at my waist like a dead weight. Pain fell away from me, death was near–just around the corner…

I shall never tell Dancing-feet of her son's last moments. I will never see the boy grow into a man.

…Thrice…

…The sun fell behind the mountain, cloaking all in darkness, but the bloody sky held enough light for me to see the fair features of the daughter of the English colonel, Cora Monro as I fell to the ground…

I still wear her mother's moonstone. I never returned—

A/N: Here is an excerpt from Cooper's novel which finishes this scene. Since Uncas is dead I could not continue it from his POV:

"Mercy! mercy! Huron," cried Heyward, from above, in tones nearly choked by horror; "give mercy, and thou shalt receive it!"

Whirling the bloody knife up at the imploring youth, the victorious Magua uttered a cry so fierce, so wild, and yet so joyous, that it conveyed the sounds of savage triumph to the ears of those who fought in the valley, a thousand feet below. He was answered by a burst from the lips of the scout, whose tall person was just then seen moving swiftly towards him, along those dangerous crags, with steps as bold and reckless as if he possessed the power to move in air. But when the hunter reached the scene of the ruthless massacre, the ledge was tenanted only by the dead.

His keen eye took a single look at the victims, and then shot its glances over the difficulties of the ascent in his front. A form stood at the brow of the mountain, on the very edge of the giddy height, with uplifted arms, in an awful attitude of menace. Without stopping to consider his person, the rifle of Hawkeye was raised; but a rock, which fell on the head of one of the fugitives below exposed the indignant and glowing countenance of the honest Gamut. Then Magua issued from a crevice, and stepping with calm indifference over the body of the last of his associates, he leaped a wide fissure, and ascended the rocks at a point where the arm of David could not reach him. A single bound would carry him to the brow of the precipice, and assure his safety. Before taking the leap, however, the Huron paused, and shaking his hand at the scout, he shouted,—

"The pale-faces are dogs! the Delawares women! Magua leaves them on the rocks, for the crows!"

Laughing hoarsely, he made a desperate leap, and fell short of his mark; though his hand grasped a shrub on the verge of the height. The form of Hawkeye had crouched like a beast about to take its spring, and his frame trembled so violently with eagerness, that the muzzle of the half-raised rifle played like a leaf fluttering in the wind. Without exhausting himself with fruitless efforts, the cunning Magua suffered his body to drop to the length of his arms, and found a fragment for his feet to rest on. Then summoning all his powers, he renewed the attempt, and so far succeeded, as to draw his knees on the edge of the mountain. It was now, when the body of his enemy was most collected together, that the agitated weapon of the scout was drawn to his shoulder. The surrounding rocks themselves were not steadier than the piece became, for the single instant that it poured out its contents. The arms of the Huron relaxed, and his body fell back a little, while his knees still kept their position. Turning a relentless look on his enemy, he shook a hand in grim defiance. But his hold loosened, and his dark person was seen cutting the air with its head downwards, for a fleeting instant, until it glided past the fringe of shrubbery which clung to the mountain, in its rapid flight to destruction.

2A/N: Tragedy is what many writers thrive on. It is the mother of fan fiction. It is also beautiful and inevitable and human. I'm glad that you have read this far in my story, and I hope that if you are one of those people, you can give me a list of every typo, misspelling, and inconsistency that you have found in this story. My goal in writing (at the moment) is to improve and while doing so, bring J. Cooper's characters back to life, so Chingackgook, Hawkeye, Uncas, Cora, Alice, Duncan can live on...

These are the Lenape translations; the order is Lenape word or phrase / literal definition / my meaning or use:

Ila, xkweyòk. Tòm / You are brave, woman. Bite him / You are brave, woman. Defy him!

Chitanësit, Chitanìsëwakànit / One who is strong, moral / Strong-one, Moral-one (as a name, like Dark-hair or Open Hand)

Ehòlënt / Beloved / Beloved

Lànktitu xàtash / The little one was light sister / The Light-hair's sister.

Ntèhëm, kàchi ta papëmewtëm / My heart, don't to go around weeping / My love, don't weep for me.