A) Vocabulary Words/Terms:
1) Grouse: a medium to large game bird with a plump body and feathered legs, the male being larger and more conspicuously colored than the female.
2) Briar: a Mediterranean shrub or small tree.
3) Cleave: to adhere closely; stick.
4) Welt: a red, swollen mark left on flesh by a blow or pressure.
5) Imminent: likely to occur at any moment; impending.
6) Putrefy: (of a body or other organic matter) decay or rot and produce a fetid smell.
7) Rime: frost formed on cold objects by the rapid freezing of water vapor in cloud or fog.
8) Parabola: a symmetrical open plane curve formed by the intersection of a cone with a plane parallel to its side.
9) Inelegant: not elegant; lacking in refinement, gracefulness, or good taste.
10) Confection: a sweet preparation of fruit or the like, as a preserve or candy.
11) Wastrel: a wasteful or good-for-nothing person.
12) Veneer: a thin layer of wood or other material for facing or inlaying wood.
13) Mica: a shiny silicate mineral with a layered structure, found as minute scales in granite and other rocks, or as crystals.
14) Mettle: a person's ability to cope well with difficulties or to face a demanding situation in a spirited and resilient way.
15) Sorrel: a European plant of the dock family, with arrow-shaped leaves that are used in salads and cooking for their acidic flavor.
16) Contortion: the act of twisting or deforming the shape of something.
17) Tamarack: an American larch, Larix laricina, of the pine family, having a reddish-brown bark and crowded clusters of blue-green needles and yielding a useful timber.
18) Instinctive: prompted by or resulting from or as if from instinct; natural; unlearned.
19) Portico: a structure consisting of a roof supported by columns or piers, usually attached to a building as a porch.
20) Mammoth: a large extinct elephant of the Pleistocene epoch, typically hairy with a sloping back and long curved tusks.