On a Navajo reservation someone murders one of its "living treasures," that is people who hold and teach the cultural and religious wisdom of the tribe. The case is taken up by tribal policewoman Ella Clah, formerly of the FBI.

In 1835, after being turned out by his mean-spirited uncle, Chris Dahlberg decides to harvest some of the timber on his grandfather's land in Minnesota and float the giant logs down the Mississippi River to market in St. Louis.