After decades of peace between the white and Native American communities of early American Wyoming, a young man who was once convicted for raping a Cheyenne girl is found dead, prompting sheriff Walt Longmire, his deputy Victoria Moretti, and friend Henry Standing Bear to investigate.

"What if you woke up lying in the middle of the street in the infamous town of Fort Pratt, Montana, where thirty, young Native boys perished in a tragic 1896 boarding school fire? What if every person you encountered in that endless night was dead? What if you were covered in blood and missing a bullet from the gun holstered on your hip? What if there was something out there in the yellowed skies--along with the deceased and the smell of ash and dust--something...