In New Orleans in 1899, Marie Christine, a racially mixed woman, is in prison without a trial to face death. The prisoners ask her to tell her story. Three of the prisoners, acting as a Greek chorus, follow her as she tells of her mother, also named Marie Christine, who was a practitioner of voodoo magic and used it to help people who believed in the craft. Her mother warned her that although they know magic, they are still human and can make great mistakes.