Rada Dunn is used to the solitary life of the arid valley north of the little town of Peace. Nothing much happens there and her bean and wheat crops provide her with just enough to keep her away from the rest of her kind...which is how she's come to like it. But when she comes upon human remains that have recently been burned so intensely that they are merely sticky black bones, her serenity is shattered. And when a desperate stranger in city clothes...