Vienna, 1899. At the threshold between empire and decay, science and superstition, Sigmund Freud is summoned under discreet circumstances by representatives of the Austrian court. A venerable noble house, old even by imperial standards , has become the subject of quiet alarm. Several members of the family suffer from identical dreams: visions of forbidden unions, blood rites, and events that no living person could remember, yet which recur with obsessive clarity across generations.

Freud accepts the case with confidence. The aristocracy, he believes, provides fertile ground for neurosis: repression cultivated by lineage, ritualized morality, and incestuous proximity disguised as tradition. He hypothesizes a shared pathology, perhaps suggestion, hysteria, or inherited moral corruption, expressed through dream imagery.