Thirteen Spiral Stars

Vingta walked and ran for a living, so he insisted on the best double-soled sandals and fine elk-hide leggings. After serving for a dozen years as an official long-distance runner for the most powerful man in the canyon, he knew defending his feet and legs from the endless prickly and rough things that defined the Anasazi landscape of a thousand years ago was more important than defending himself from other people.

That is, until an unfamiliar feeling pierces his heart when he meets a strange foreign girl, Uva. Her hair all wrong, and her manners a mess, yet when she smiles at him, he becomes a barefoot, defenseless toddler.

When Uva chases after a mysterious potter girl-carrying his pack of trade goods, no less-he has no choice but to follow. And when they discover how a simple but striking symbol on the girl's pots threatens to upturn the power structure of the entire Anasazi world, Vingta does all he can to protect Uva (as if she needs it) and to help the threatened Tuwa, legendary master skywatcher of the Twins.

This historical thriller, with more than a hint of romance, can be read as the first in the The Last Skywatcher Series, or enjoyed after reading the prequel, The Next Skywatcher (which features a much younger Tuwa). The story of the Anasazi in the year A.D. 1093, with their culture lurching toward collapse, has never been so richly told.