The Civil War, the war between the states, has been over for ten years. But in the mountainous terrain of Thieves County along the Kentucky / West Virginia border, there is still no peace. For years, two families, the Carpenters and the Webbs, have been taking the law into their own hands, in a deadly feud that has robbed each side of its share of sons. It is a warm summer night, Paul Carpenter and his younger sister Isobel are stealthily making their way across the fast running mountain brook that separates their land from that of the Webbs.