Prologue
Oregon Territory 1858
The sun lit the valley below with a warm glow as the sun sank low in the sky. She stood on the hill with her arms huddled around her waist, tears spilling down her lightly freckled cheeks. The prairie blue grass swayed languidly in the wind, as if laminating the loss of such a great man." Pa would have loved the sunset." , Mercy thought, "What am I gonna do now that he is gone?"Her Pa was the only thing she had left in this world.
In 1848, her father, Padraic Malone saved his pregnant wife, Erin from the famine and sank every dime he had into his dream of leaving Ireland and owning his own farm in Mercy was born her mother health began to decline. Upon the insistence of her mother, The Malone family continued their trip against the doctors advice. Her Ma's health was never was the same and she died from consumption shortly before reaching the Valley, leaving her Pa to raise Mercy on his own. Her mother's long illness drained what money they had left leaving Padraic and Mercy with nothing but the land and each other. Forcing Padraic to the mountains for work, logging to support himself and Mercy. It was enough to live on but left nothing to start the farm.
Padraic raised Mercy to be just like him strong and capable. She could shoot and chop wood, and ride a horse just like any other man. She could read, write and was well versed in numbers, as her father believed that if you knew your business you could not be cheated. She looked just like her mother Pa always said, with an un-tamable mass of flame red tresses always escaping its' bonds, sage green eyes, slightly slanted at the corners and a smartly upturned nose lightly seasoned with freckles. He had big plans and Mercy was raised on tales of his dreams. Dreams of a small profitable farm. A future he could leave for Mercy. Instead he took out a loan to start planting wheat and died before he could even reap his first harvest. It took three days to find his body and they said it was an accident, that he fell from the trail on his way home.
"He put every thing he had into this dream, Mercy bemoaned. and she could lose it all before his body was even cold. We buried him only today and Silas Needly was already calling in the loan. Couldn't he at least let her mourn?" No one in nearby Cottage Grove cared what happened to the Irish immigrant Padraic Malone and his strong willed daughter.
Mercy straightened as the sun dipped below the horizon. She swiped her tawny cheeks with the back of her hand and tucked a flaming curl behind her ear."Well, I have no time to waste if I am going to find a way to save Pa's land.", she told herself as she strode towards the house. "My land. " Mercy corrected, tears welling in her eyes again, No one in this town may care what happened to the Irish immigrant Padraic Malone and his strong willed daughter but someone, somewhere would be willing to help; I just have to find them! With determination Mercy sat at her desk and began her quest to save her fathers dream.