LIEUTENANT COLONEL GEORGE ARMSTRONG CUSTER
Driven to succeed at any cost, his destiny was bound inextricably to the savagely beautiful Great Plains—and to the very people he came to conquer.
GENERAL PHILIP SHERIDAN
A seasoned commander and Civil War hero, he’d witnessed firsthand just how fierce the “Boy General” could be—and tried to protect his friend Custer from himself.
TOM CUSTER
An incorrigible lady’s man, rogue, and hero in his own right, he worshipped his famous brother to a fault and would take his stand beside him no matter what.
ROMERO
A half-breed scout, his loyalties were divided between his Mexican and Cheyenne heritage—and the white man’s army he was paid to advise.
LIBBIE CUSTER
As Custer’s beloved wife, she understood the soldier in her husband—but not the complex man who yearned for the one thing she could never give him.
MONASEETAH
Daughter of a proud people, she lost her family to the pony soldiers only to lose her heart to the fiercest and most famous of them all—Custer.
LONG WINTER GONE
Dedicated to my friends,
for all your time and tears, work and worry …
I’ll never be able to repay what you both have
given me from the heart and core of your beings.
Indian women soon got to know the white men very well indeed. Many became wives, mistresses, casual bedfellows. The relationships that evolved were about as intimate as human contacts could well be. Yet, there was a gulf that was never bridged: a chasm, not just of race but of archaeological time, that perhaps no civilized white man has ever succeeded in closing between himself and a primitive woman.
WALTER O’MEARA
“I was wondering,” an Ankara chief mused, “whether you white people have any women amongst you.” I assured him in the affirmative. “Then,” said he, “why is it that your people are so fond of our women? One might suppose you had never seen any women before.”
HENRY M. BRACKENRIDGE
PROLOGUE
“THE hell of it is … I can’t seem to put my finger on what’s gnawing in my goddamned gut,” Philip H. Sheridan growled.
As he tore the moist stub of a cigar from his thin lips, a bit of dead ash fell on the lapel of his dark blue army tunic. He brushed off what he could with a quick swipe of a hand, smudging the gray into the uniform like a street beggar. Lieutenant General Sheridan studied each one of his staff in turn.
Lieutenant Colonel Michael V. Sheridan was the first to speak, answering his older brother’s question. “I don’t understand what’s eating at you, Philip. Custer won the victory we were certain could be won.”
“And a stunning success it was at that, General,” echoed Major Nelson B. Sweitzer of the Second Cavalry.
“No mistake about that, Nelson.” Sheridan used his cigar to jab home the point. “Still, a voice inside troubles
