Fantastic Rider on Fire by Sharon Sala! A Lost Child of the Kiowa Nation is Found! Personal Favorite for 2025

But something more than instinct was guiding her trip...

Night was a shield for those who needed it, and kept secrets better than a best friend ever could. It protected, and at the same time, left the weak more vulnerable.

Kiamichis Mountains, Oklahoma

Adam was looking out the window, his eyes narrowing sharply as he squinted against the light. Franklin thought that Adam looked a lot like his father. Same strong face—same far-seeing expression in his eyes, but he was taller and more muscular. And he’d been beyond the Kiamichis. He’d lived a warrior’s life for the United States government. Franklin set his coffee cup aside, folded his hands in his lap, and closed his eyes. It was good that Adam Two Eagles had come home.

Within an hour after arriving back at his home, Adam began the preparations. He drank some water before going out to ready the sweat lodge. On the way down the hillside, he got work gloves from the tool shed and a small hatchet from a shelf. A sense of peace came over him as he worked, gathering wood and patching a small hole in the lodge. Tonight, he would begin the ceremony. 

If Franklin and Leila had made a baby together, the Old Ones would find it. He hurried back to the house, gathering everything he needed, then walked back to the small lodge above the creek bank. He undressed with care, shedding his clothes a layer at a time. By the time he’d dropped his last garment, a slight breeze had come up, lifting his hair away from his face and cooling the sweat beading on his body. The first star of the evening was just visible when he looked up at the sky. He checked the fire. Ideally, there would be someone outside the lodge continuing to feed the fire, but not tonight. Tonight the fire that he’d already built would serve the purpose. He lifted the flap and crawled in. Within seconds, he was covered in sweat. He sat down cross-legged, letting his arms and hands rest on his knees. With a slow, even rhythm he breathed in and breathed out. Then he closed his eyes and began to chant. The words were almost as old as the land on which he sat. The hours passed and the moon that had been hanging high in the sky, was more than halfway through its slow descent to the horizon. Morning was but an hour or so away. Inside the sweat lodge, all the words had been said. All the prayers had been prayed. Adam was ready. He crawled out of the lodge. When he stood, the muscles in his legs tried to cramp, but he walked them out as he then moved behind the lodge and laid another stick of wood on the fire. With the sweat drying swiftly on his skin and his mind and body free from impurities, he reached into his pack and took out the carving, as well as the hairs he’d cut from Franklin’s head. Some might have called it a prayer—others might have said it was a chant—but the words Adam spoke were a call to the Old Ones. The rhythm of the syllables rolled off Adam’s tongue like a song. 

The log he’d laid on the fire popped, sending a shower of sparks up into the air. Adam felt the prick of heat from one as it landed on his skin, but he didn’t flinch. Still wrapped in the cloak of darkness, he lifted his arms to the heavens and began to dance. Dust and ashes rose up from the ground, coating his feet and legs as he moved in and out of the shadows around the fire. He danced and he sang until his heartbeat matched the rhythm of his feet. The wind rose, whistling through the trees in a thin, constant wail, sucking the hair from the back of his neck and then swirling it about his face. They were coming. He tossed the owl and the hairs into the fire, and then lifted his hands above his head. As he did, there was what he could only describe as an absence of air. He could still breathe, but he was unable to move. The great warriors manifested themselves within the smoke, using it to coat the shapes of what they’d once been. They came mounted on spirit horses with eyes of fire. The horses stomped and reared, inhaling showers of sparks that had been following the column of smoke, and exhaling what appeared to be stars. One warrior wore a war bonnet so long that it dragged beneath the ghost horse’s feet. Another was wrapped in the skin of a bear, with the mark of the claw painted on his chest. The third horse had a black handprint on its flank, while matching handprints of white were on the old warrior’s cheeks. The last one rode naked on a horse of pure white. The wrinkles in his face were as many as the rivers of the earth. His gray hair so long that it appeared tangled in the horse’s mane and tail, making it difficult to tell where man ended and horse began. They spoke in unison, with the sounds getting lost in the whirlwind that brought them, and yet Adam knew what they’d said. They would help. As he watched, one by one, they reached into the fire and took a piece of Franklin’s essence to help them with their search.

 Then, as suddenly as they’d appeared, they were gone. Adam dropped to his knees, then passed out.

~~~

It was wonderful to again connect with Sharon Sala on Facebook... I have missed interacting with my many friends there... Now, it seems so different since I essentially had to start over... I've ordered Sharon's upcoming book, but I am so happy I got Rider on Fire to start back reading her wonderful books...

This multi-genre book starts as a thriller as a DEA Agent, Sonora Jordan deals with her life as a child who was "dumped" the day after she was born... A child who never knew who she was...

DEA agent Sonora Jordan was running after a drug dealer when she fell into the twilight zone. One moment she was inches away from grabbing her perp, Enrique Garcia, and the next her gun went flying as she fell flat on her face. 

The shot that would have hit her square in the back went flying over her head. Instead of the heat and dust of Mexico, she was in the shade of a forest and hearing the sound of moving water from somewhere up ahead.   

She lifted her head, and as she did, she saw a tall, older man standing on the porch of a single-story dwelling that was surrounded by trees. His skin was brown, and his hair was long and peppered with gray. There was a wind chime hanging by his head that looked like a Native American dream catcher. The chimes were different shapes of feathers. It was so foreign to anything she knew, she couldn’t imagine why she would be hallucinating about it and wondered if she was dead. The man lifted his hand, and as he did, she had the strongest urge to wave back, but she couldn’t seem to move. She couldn’t see his face clearly, yet she knew that he was crying. A sad, empty feeling hit her belly and then swallowed her whole. 

By the time she realized she wasn’t dead, only face down in the dirt, the vision was gone. If that wasn’t enough humiliation, her perp was nowhere in sight. “Oh crap,” she muttered, then breathed easier when she saw Agent Dave Wills coming back with the perp she’d been chasing. Garcia was handcuffed and cursing at the top of his voice.

~~~

Sonora had grown up essentially, alone, even though she had people monitoring her as an orphan... She would be placed in homes of one sort or another, but she only speaks of one particular foster mother who would lock her up every time a man came to visit... She could hear the two adults, but didn't understand what was happening... After years, she had become afraid of the dark, which has never left her, even while she had grown to become one of the best agents in her DEA section...

She was last involved with the Garcia family, a drug cartel from South America, led by the oldest living son. During the DEA raid, two brothers were taken, one of whom was killed--by Sonora. Garcia came on the hunt, immediately pledging retribution--funny, isn't it, how criminals feel that being caught should result in retribution even though they were the ones doing something illegal... In any event, DEA officials soon learned that he was now in the U.S. and told Sonora she would have to leave the area... Of course, Sonora resented this. But, on the other hand, she soon began to believe it was a good thing...

And it had to do with the vision that had occurred during the fight with the two Garcia brothers... Of course she had no where she could or should go, so she went to a world map and started drawing a line, until she felt it was time to stop... She was heading to Oklahoma...

But something more than instinct was guiding her trip...

She loaded up what she could carry on her bike--but first she had to get it back from a guy she used to date. The only thing she found out much later was that he had asked to give her a message before he died... "I didn't tell him anything..." Garcia will appear once in a while as he chases her...but I'm going to switch to the "fantastic" part of her book...

You see, Sonora was not Latino as she thought; she was Kiowa. Her father was ill with cancer and he'd asked his friend to try to find her... Adam had left his tribe and joined the U.S. Military Services, but had been drawn back to his home to take the place of his father as Healer for the area. So, of course, he knew what he had to do... Adam would need to contact the Old Ones for help!

It was Adam she first met in a nearby town and it was he who suggested he follow her to where she was meant to be... I have to say, I love supernatural stories and this one is simply fascinating... You see, Sonora has found her father, her tribe, a home, and a very, very handsome Kiowa Brave--Adam--to whom she is attracted! And the feelings are very mutual, especially since Adam had been having dreams of her, not knowing who he was dreaming of... Believe me, this romance story is easily worth the purchase!

But it gets even better... As Garcia is catching up on her... As Her newly found father is feeling the pain of the cancer... And as Sonora, who was alone all of her life, is suddenly meeting two men who will be the most important men in her life, for a special happily ever after! Don't miss this one!

Sah-nay-mah aka Snake Woman with son Andrew Domebo, in Oklahoma Territory - Kiowa - 1895

(Photographer unknown)

Snake Woman (aka Bertha Sahananah) was born on the Kiowa, Comanche, and Plains Apache Reservation at Fort Sill in Indian Territory in 1875. She married Eagle Bone Whistle (aka Charley Domebo), and their first child Andrew was born in 1895. They would raise seven more children

Mrs. Bertha Domebo died in 1947.

#NativeAmerican

~~~

It was exciting to find this picture of a woman of the Kiowa Snake Clan on Facebook! It "allowed" (LOL) me to share one of the supernatural events that showed that Sonora, although alone, was never alone. For, of course, Sonora was never separated from her Clan, her Tribe... And, proof was illustrated when, at 16, Sonora went with friends for a tattoo, and was drawn to one particular picture... The one below is as close as I could find of that picture... and, yes, it was placed on Sonora's back...but much longer... WOW!

God works in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform...

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