The year is 1755 and the drums of war beat along the western frontier as European powers once again begin to struggle for domination of the continent. They both court the Indian tribes in an effort to acquire their loyalty against the other. Sporadic fighting flickers and spreads like a growing wildfire. In the southeastern mountains, the clouds of war are only a rumor. How far would anyone go to cause these clouds to storm across the western frontier of the North Carolina colony?
Violent deaths threaten to rip the fabric of peace between the English settlers and a Cherokee village, planting the seed of mistrust. This is compounded by unexplained circumstances which stretch the conceptions of legend, myth or reality.
Russell Franklin is a man with personal demons which have kept him roaming across the Appalachian frontier accompanied by Wahya, a Cherokee warrior. Is it by chance or by Providence he stumbles into this mountain community in the height of its turmoil? Will he, along with the others fighting for survival, be able to halt the tides of war and in the process find the answers he unknowingly seeks? Or will it all be a vain attempt to catch fleeting shadows?