Thirteen-year-old Hannah Forrest and her sister, Emily, age five, are the only members of her family to survive a Cholera epidemic in the Nebraska Territory in 1858. Hannah must protect her sister and herself from thieves who try to burn them alive in their cabin. Then, when Emily is captured by evil men called Comancheros who want to sell her and their other captives to the Comanche Indians, Hannah has to accept help from an Otoe Indian woman and her son to save Emily and the Indian woman's granddaughter.