The English and Mohawk have been allies against the French and their Indian partners for better than a decade. Even so, English settlers that have pushed the westward limits were not welcomed. Considered illegal aliens by the Mohawk, the Shumway family was marked for eviction. Abducted, little Mel is given to a native family to replace a son lost in battle. Renamed Iron Knife for his remarkable ability to endure physical pain, he is raised as a warrior and trained in the ways of the shaman. The King of the Red Shirts emissaries, Captain Eustis and Lieutenant Munroe, ransom the young man and take him back to colonial Boston where he becomes part of an alien society at odds with itself.