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

The sheriff pretty well had everything in hand by the time Kilpatrick puffed and wheezed his way onto the scene. While the sheriff and the prosecutor put their heads together, Caleb confided quietly to Bacon and me that someone in the governor’s office up in Bismarck was pressuring the county prosecutor to file charges for Landreth’s death despite the way the evidence looked.


Bacon frowned. “That’s bad. I’ve pretty well got Romo stalemated, but if there’s pressure like that on him, he might go ahead despite the fact he can’t win in court.”


“In a fair trial, you mean,” I said.


“True. I sure wish a little more of your white blood showed in you, John.”


“I play what I’m dealt.” I nodded to the dead man on his back in the dirt, “Including this one.”


When Kilpatrick finally confronted me, I did not see someone disposed to take my side of the story into account. “Strobaw, why am I always having to deal with you? Every time I turn around, you kill another white man.”


Chapter 100