Edinburgh, 1800-1815. Hoping to find a husband for her daughter Dana, Pastor Cullen’s widow sends the timid and reserved young woman to live with her sister in Edinburgh. Endowed with a lively imagination, Dana bears the scars of an illness contracted in childhood and a walleyed look, physical traits that have fuelled nasty remarks from unkind people more than once. In spite of this, her attractive cousin Timmy, a dashing young man, falls under her spell. Romance blossoms between the two young people, raising expectations of the announcement of an impending marriage. But Dana will meet the reclusive surgeon Francis Seton and the course of her life will immediately be thrown into upheaval as he does everything to hide the relationship he had with her brother Jonat, who died 10 years earlier under mysterious circumstances. But secrets become heavy to bear and tragic events unravel little by little the surgeon’s dark past. . .