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

About two miles out, we came across a ha hadeep enough to provide shelter. I put most of the men and horses out of sight at the bottom of the gully. One by one the other three scouts rode in to report on the position of the column. The fact that Middleton was still with them worried me.


At first light, we glimpsed horsemen in the distance. An obviously distressed Landreth, one of his deputies, Iron Head and four warriors rode with me up out of the ha hawhere we stood waiting with the deep ditch between us and the approaching column. At about a tenth of a mile out, the officer at the head of the blue coats bawled an order and the column turned north, putting a line of blue between us and Middleton’s bunch. I didn’t draw a breath until the officer yelled another order, and every second man in the unit turned to face the rancher.


Chapter 35