In 1870, mountain man Barnaby Skye, noticing the landscape changing from the slaughtering of buffalo and the government's relocation of tribes to reservations and despite the hesitation of his two Native American wives, decides it is time for a change.

During a trip back to the village of his Crow wife, Victoria, she is abducted by a deadly band of Blackfeet, and Skye must risk his life to rescue her, following a trail that takes him back to Canada, where he is still wanted by the British Navy for deserting his ship, four years ago.

"The frontier is full of adversity, from blood-hungry warriors to the vicious beasts of the mountains, and the one name that all men of the frontier praise and whisper as if in prayer is Barnaby Skye. Elkanah Morse went west from Lowell, Massachusetts, with one goal in mind: to study the ways of the far tribes. But entrance into their world is not easy. Only one man is capable of bringing him to the native peoples safely, only one man who knows exactly...

In September 1868, three travelers on the Bozeman Trail need routes that avoid the great Northern prairies and the Sioux warrior Red Cloud.

When a dour fifteen-year-old Shoshone is prompted by a total eclipse to rename himself after a dreaded totemic bird and stirring discontent on the Wind River Reservation, schoolteacher Dirk, the son of Barnaby Skye, struggles to mediate a dangerous uprising.