The following version of this book was used to create the guide: Weiden, David L. Winter Counts. Ecco, 2020.

Virgil Wounded Horse, a mixed-race Lakota man, works as a vigilante on a South Dakota reservation, attempting to bring justice to those neglected by the legal system. Virgil’s parents are dead, as is his sister, Sybil. Virgil lives with and acts as guardian to his nephew Nathan, Sybil’s teenage son. Virgil is close with his Native community, but has at times been ostracized for his mixed-race background. He lost his faith in Native rituals after he was unable to save his father from cancer through prayer.

Ben Short Bear, a tribal councilman and the father of a woman Virgil once dated, Marie, tells Virgil that a man named Rick Crow, who used to bully Virgil in high school, is responsible for bringing heroin to the reservation. He offers to pay Virgil to stop Rick. Virgil turns down Ben’s offer at first but breaks into Rick’s trailer to investigate, finding evidence that Rick is dealing drugs and the name “Martin Angel” (25) in a notebook.

Nathan soon overdoses on heroin and is hospitalized. This motivates Virgil to investigate the drug network responsible. He plans to go to Denver, as he has found a Denver address connected to Martin Angel. Marie, who dated Rick after Virgil, insists on going along with him. Nathan tells Virgil that one of the dealers who gave him the drugs was named Loco.

In Denver, Virgil and Marie are unable to find Rick or Martin Angel, but meet an undercover police officer named Dennis who is investigating the movement of heroin being produced by Mexican cartels. He suggests that Nathan wear a wire while buying from the dealers on the reservation in order to catch them. Virgil, concerned about Nathan’s safety, opposes this. In the meantime, Virgil and Marie begin to rekindle their romance.

While still in Denver, Virgil learns that Nathan has been arrested after opioids were found in his school locker. Virgil and Marie return to South Dakota, where Nathan has been placed in a juvenile detention facility. Nathan claims that the pills were planted in his locker. Virgil meets with a lawyer, Charley Leader Charge, who tells Virgil that they will have to try to keep Nathan out of the federal system, where he could be tried as an adult.

Marie wants to bring fresh bison meat to families on the reservation as part of the food program she is involved in through her job at the local community center, but has encountered resistance from her superior, a woman named Delia. Marie and Virgil meet Lack Strongbow, a visiting chef who is attempting to help Native people return to a healthier diet of local foods. Virgil believes Lack’s ambitions are unrealistic but remains open-minded.

Virgil meets again with Charley Leader Charge, who says that Nathan’s case will be transferred to the federal system unless he pleads guilty and acts as an informant. After Virgil consults a local medicine man, Jerome Iron Shell, who advises him to be community-minded, Virgil tells Nathan that he thinks he should agree to the deal.

Marie has been applying to medical schools and is accepted to the University of New Mexico, but is hesitant to go as this will take her away from the reservation for a number of years. When she is fired from her job at the community center, she suspects this is meant to cover up something nefarious and convinces Virgil to help her break into Delia’s office to investigate. She finds that Delia and Lack appear to be embezzling funds from the food program through Lack’s business. Marie is distressed by this discovery, but resolves not to draw attention to it, as she fears that a scandal could hurt the indigenous food movement and the program.

Nathan arranges to buy drugs from the dealers. Dennis is one of the officers who will be listening in on the deal, and Virgil goes along with him on the night it is meant to happen. Nathan meets with the dealers at the school, but the police lose track of him shortly after.

Marie arranges with Jerome to hold a yuwipi, a ceremony to help them find Nathan. At the ceremony, Virgil has a vision of the Wounded Knee Massacre. He concludes that he needs to go to the site of the massacre, where there is an abandoned museum. There, he finds Rick Crow. Rick tells Virgil that there is a war between pill dealers and heroin dealers, and that the pill dealers framed Nathan because they figured the police would use him to pursue the heroin dealers. He says that Ben is the leader of the pill operation, which Virgil refuses to believe. He tortures Rick until Rick confesses that the other heroin dealers, including Loco, have taken Nathan to a slaughterhouse, where they plan on killing him. Virgil considers killing Rick but experiences a vision of Sybil telling him to exercise forgiveness.

Ben soon arrives, admits to Virgil that what Rick has said about him is true, and shoots Rick. Marie, who has come along with Virgil, reveals that she has entered the building and overheard her father’s confession. She realizes that Ben was embezzling money from the food program with Delia. Marie shoots Ben before he can shoot Virgil. Virgil goes to the slaughterhouse, where he kills Loco and two other dealers to save Nathan.

In an Epilogue that takes place nine months later, Nathan and Virgil attend a powwow, where Jerome presents them with spirit names. Nathan has been acquitted of any wrongdoing, and it has become clear that Lack was not involved in the embezzlement at the center. Marie has decided not to go to medical school and to pursue a cooking career, training with Lack. Virgil has quit his vigilante work, but he meets a woman at the powwow who asks him for his help in finding her granddaughter, who has been kidnapped by her father. The novel ends with Virgil not knowing what to tell her.