The end of the 19th century. The novel’s main character, Ivan Matveyevich Suzdalyev, ends up in an unpleasant situation and is forced to duel. He survives, and his opponent—a guardsman—is defeated. But it’s too early to rejoice: the killed man’s fellow soldiers are ready to line up to avenge their comrade.
While passions haven’t died down yet, Ivan Matveyevich decides to join an expedition to the Far North. And in the Arctic he encounters phenomena that are hard to believe. The hero is literally plunged into the otherworldly, where realistic dreams of the past intertwine with nightmarish visions of the future, and the ball is ruled by a shaman and a witch. Ivan doesn’t immediately realize that he has left the reality familiar to him, and now he is an ajvugadch—an intermediary between worlds.
Will the hero manage to break free from the captivity of illusion? True signs of the late 1800s, the color of the Arctic, mysticism and humor, fantasy and genuine dramatic tension—all of it awaits the reader in the proposed book.