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</div>It was late in the afternoon when Haseya Santiago walked into the Raven Pub, ordered a double rye, took the drink over to one of the common room's corners and lowered the window shade to diminish the light where she would be sitting.  Hesaya wasn't her real name.  As far as Hesaya knew, no one knew her real name and that was a good thing in her mind.  Over the athletic body, over ancient permanent body paint and scars, the skins that barely covered the personal parts of her body, she wore the illusion of modern clothing:  boots, bluejeans, blouse and jacket.  Her illusion also made invisible the what looked to be a mountain lion jaw that she wore like a necklace and it's skull that adorned the top of her head.  Her dark brown hair was wild, but it appeared smooth and combed to those without 'the sight' or other means to see through her disguise.<br/><br/>Faelyn LaRue, the owner of The Raven had only recently learned that she was back in town.  Until last week, no one had seen her for about twenty years.  Faelyn thought maybe she recognized her from an old photo in an album of people to be careful around.  Haseya Santiago hadn't seemed to have aged a day, but then she hadn't aged a day in the previous twenty or so years before she had last left Oak Creek.  Faelyn might not have known who the 'woman' really was, but she'd heard about what she was and she knew her nickname, 'Nash'.  Of all the strange customers that came into the pub, Nash was definitely near the top of the list.  There could be a couple of people that could possibly be even stranger, but it would be a very close contest.<br/><br/>Seeing Nash in the village of Oak Creek could simply be part of a cycle of time, the owner thought, but it could also be very bad news.   Yee Naaldlooshii were generally some of the most evil beings known by the Dine', but Nash had a reputation for restraint.  Faelyn also knew her reputation for when talking and negotiating failed.<br/><br/>The legend went that she was a survivor of the Navajo Skinwalker Purge of 1878. She was spared by a very powerful Medicine Man, on the condition that she should watch over the Dine' and protect them from the demons that had come with the White Man. She was also free to punish any of the Dine’ that conspired with those demons, as well as any that she thought brought shame and dishonor to the people. Over the decades she worked on the fringes of the societies of the American Indians and White Man.  She worked to curb the excesses of those who had come to the land where the Dine’ lived, both mundanely and magically, sometimes subtly and sometimes not so subtly.<br/><br/>Through the decades, there were reports that guns aimed at Nash, as the White Man came to call her (This was short for Náshdóítsoh Asdzáán, meaning 'Cougar Woman'), would misfire or, if they did fire, had no effect on her. There were tales of the corpses of black witches of the White Man’s culture that were found as if they were mauled by wild animals. There were stories told around the campfires of the Dine’ of the skinwalker that punished those that betrayed the tribe to evil.  There was a rumor that the only way she could be killed was by someone saying her real name in her presence.<br/><br/>American Indians have a reputation for alcoholism.  Nash slowly nursed her drink as if she were waiting for someone.  If anyone had been close enough, they might have heard her softly singing an old song of better days.