To save an old friend's ranch, the Beaudine brothers round up a gang of misfits to drive a huge herd to market.

Eight years ago, Cheyenne Indians attacked the Baudine Family wagon and captured Morgan (Kurt Russell), whom they renamed Two Persons. Now Two Persons, raised in the ways of the Indians, has been reunited with his brother Quentin (Tim Matheson), a doctor and a stranger to frontier ways. Together the brothers set out in search of their sister Patricia, who was also captured and who Two Persons believes is still alive.

During a Cavalry massacre at an Indian village, two brothers, searching for their captured sister, rescue a white woman long ago kidnapped by the Cheyenne. They ride for their lives, haunted by the chant of the tribal Death Song.