Eight-year-old Alan McLachlan is sitting in his house eating leftover bean bread when soldiers come and round up his family from the cornfield where they are working. His family members are marched off to a stockade in preparation for Removal to Indian Territory. Alan is left alone to fend for himself How can a little boy survive on his own? And how will he ever make his way to Indian Territory to look for his family? Josiah Miller has won the McLachlan homestead in the Georgia lottery and moves into Alan's uncle's house. He tries to be kind to the boy. But Josiah's wife doesn't want Alan around and reports him to a former soldier. Alan is forced to run from the valley that was his home, and he collapses on the side of the road, hungry and dehydrated. Pharaoh, a slave from Belle Montagne, finds Alan, takes him to the plantation, and gives him a home. Pharaoh has morals similar to Alan's own father, and he raises Alan to be a man of good character. Memories of his family fade, and as an adult, he marries and has a life of his own. He's contented, until sectional tensions cause an armed conflict that leads to Alan's losing another home and renews his dream of finding his family.