Vladimir Korsakov receives a letter from a university friend, who now serves as an official for special assignments under the Vladimir governor. The young man is desperately, mutually in love with the heiress of a secretive noble family, but dark clouds hang over their happiness. The friends go to an estate lost in the remote, foggy marshes of the Murom district, where the bride’s parents worship a terrifying imperishable saint, “the One Who Put the Crows to Shame.” And they also have far-reaching plans for the new relative…