On a college trip to remote Northern forests, one of the students - Marina - encounters a burial site of an ancient witch, and is possessed by the spirits of the past. Now Marina and her companions must take part in the millennia old fight between good and evil, involving lake witches, sorcerers, and ancient forces from the myths.

The film is based on the memories of Patriarch of All Russia Alexy II about his childhood, about his mother and father-priest, about how he went to Valaam with his parents as a child, about the terrible beginning of the war, which cut off his childhood in an instant, about the arrival of German troops in Estonia... Before the eyes of an 11-year-old boy, there are whole strings of complex human destinies. Being next to his father, little Alyosha saw how sometimes it is unfair for an ordinary provincial priest, sincerely, from the bottom of his heart trying to help the desperate, to keep hope and faith in goodness in them...