From the introduction: Its late in 1811 when your wagon train is forced to head up the mountain side somewhere in the Oregon country's cascade mountains. You have to avoid a particularly nasty storm, or at least that is what your scout and mountain man has told you. Now you try in a vain and futile way to take this load of furs and group of settlers through these mountain woods. The goal: to reach Fort Astoria where the Pacific Fur Company's ship Tonquin is waiting for you, payment on delivery. That's when the storm turns north and you start to pray. The snow traps you there in dense woods of evergreens with only the howls of the coyote to pierce the harrowing sound of the wind. After the first day, you find the smoldering remains of one of your folk, only no one is missing. Under flickering lantern light the doctor asks his strange companion, the native turned white man, why he has tears in his eyes. His answer frightens you all: "One of us is the Coyote Spirit. One of us is a murdering trickster god, trying to do anything to return to the world in human form. We can't let it." It’s the impossible words of a mad man, or so you all thought that second day. However, now it’s the fifth day and stranger things keep happening. Surely this is your last chance to escape this madness and return to the world of the sane, if only the snow wasn't so deep and your feet weren't so cold...