Thirty-two-year-old mixed blood John Strobaw, known to the Sioux as Medicine Hair, returns to his Turtle Crick Farm after a six-year exile on the Pine Ridge Reservation. Grief-stricken at the loss of his mate and lover Matthew Brand, known as Shambling Bear, at the Battle of Wounded Knee, he struggles to become a farmer again while fighting an internal battle to let go of the past and face his future. Will that future be with his best friend Winter Bird or with Pretty Face, an outrageous flirt who hasn’t yet decided who he is?<br><br>But before he can come to grips with this, John faces several battles. Will his former friends and neighbors accept him now the Indian War has come to an end? Can John forgive those same friends and neighbors after the murderous ambush of the Sioux by the 7th Cavalry at Wounded Knee? Or survive the hostility of an Indian-hating sheriff named Charles Landreth and protect himself against the mindless fear and loathing for Two Spirits, men who love men?

Wastelakapi…Beloved

“That’s all right, Rachel Ann. Yes, that’s when Matthew died. In the middle of the battle.”


“Did you fight? You know, did you shoot anyone?”


I nodded. “To protect myself, I did.”


The boy was lost in his own thoughts for a bit. Then he roused. “I went to war, too, you know?”


I cocked an eyebrow at him. “How so?”


“The boys at the school. They tried to beat me up and told me to go back to the reservation.”


My heart slowed and became heavy. “I didn’t know.”


He straightened his back. “But I showed them. I fought them back. All of them.”


His mother spoke up. “That’s why we went to Teacher’s Mead. The teacher couldn’t or wouldn’t keep her pupils in hand.”


“I thought it was because the wives made you uncomfortable.”


She lifted her head from the needlework. “That, too. It was better to go back home.”


“Sorry. Maybe if Matthew and I hadn’t gone—”


“Hush up. Your being there didn’t make a bit of difference. It was our blood they objected to. The boys and their mothers too.”


Chapter 8