Set in 1977, the novel features a large cast of upper-class characters and continues the story from Raven's Alms for Oblivion novel sequence.

Wealthy scholar Ptolemaeos Tunne intends to research the link between the physical brain, and the immaterial mind and soul.

He attends the christening party to scout a list of youths to be test subjects in his experiments, obtaining permission from the children's parents via coercion and blackmail.

Thea accidentally runs into Jeremy and Carmilla together and, upset at realizing that the two are involved, she decides to travel home to care for her father.

Their captors blackmail Gregory into writing and publishing a damning memoir against the Israeli occupation, in exchange for their freedom.

Marius, afraid that the force occupying Tessa will shortly be coming for him, asks Jeremy, whom he trusts, to sleep in his bed as protection.

That night, Marius discloses to Jeremy that he recently saw a terrifying apparition of Tessa wearing a distorted, evil expression, outside his window.

Tunne summons many of the novel's characters to his home to reveal the final piece of the puzzle: Marius invented the supernatural claims about Tessa out of shame and fear of his own obsessive masturbation, itself attributed to the boy's physical discomfort due to being uncircumcised.

Marius’ parents agree to a circumcision, and Lady Canteloupe laments the countless other young boys suffering the same fate in silence.