Lady Mary Atlas, former Consort of Azgard, has survived the utter annihilation of her nation and is now taking refuge in a submarine with a band of followers.

After she awakens from a nightmare, Maguari, a member of an otherworldly race known as the Mist-Weavers, appears to Lady Mary. He urges her to write the story of the peoples of Azgard so that they will not be forgotten and so that those who follow might learn the spiritual lessons behind worldwide destruction.

When Lady Mary wavers, he suggests she start with the story of her dearest friend, Helen Andros. She agrees and begins…

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Lt. Helen Andros is an illegitimate, presumed orphaned physician with a gift for healing. She always wears about her neck a green gemstone from her mother with hidden potentials that Helen does not yet know about, although she frequently touches the stone for reassurance and comfort. Helen is also a despised half-breed: unusually tall, black-haired like the dominant Toltecs, the race of her unknown father, pale-skinned and blue-eyed like the conquered and oppressed Turanians, her mother’s people.

The sole medical officer for the 163rd Regiment, Helen is secretly in love with her commanding officer, Colonel Jackson Orlando. The colonel, who loves her in return but does not dare speak about it to her or anyone, has insisted that Helen go on holiday leave after serving for nearly a year with no break. Having been the object of sharp discord among her relatives, Helen is terrified of meeting her mother’s family for the first time. During festivities at the Andros farm, she encounters Lord Justin Atlas, one of her second cousins, also a half-breed, and the only man Lady Mary ever loved.

A political crisis threatens when a state hostage becomes gravely ill. Lord James Mordecai, the Lord Protector, dispatches Orlando to fetch Helen back from the farm to treat Prince Harnak. Resenting the pressure Lord James applies to induce her to agree to the risky assignment, Helen unwisely is insubordinate in her reply to the nation’s highest-ranking military officer and her Supreme Commander.

While Helen manages to save Prince Harnak’s life, the Lord Protector, angered by her insolence, reviews her service record. At first he is appalled to find out how many times Lieutenant Andros has been put on report and is determined to discipline her for unsatisfactory performance as an officer. When he sees an image of Helen wearing the green stone, Lord James is shocked, and immediately suspects that she is his daughter. He gave that very same stone and necklace more than thirty years ago to his secret love: a Turanian woman named Miriam Andros.

Secret agents of the Lord Chancellor, who for political considerations refused to provide the hostage with medical treatment, catch Helen alone and unprotected inside Shambhala, the capital city of Azgard. A half-breed born in a foreign land, she is put on trial and sentenced to die.

In an effort to save Helen, Lord James has Orlando investigate Helen’s background, which yields a letter from Helen’s presumed dead mother that names Lord James as her father. If he will acknowledge her publicly, he can save her life because she then will be considered a subject of Azgard from birth. Helen thus would have committed no capital offense by entering the Sacred City, which was off limits to anyone foreign-born without certain permissions.

Lord James’ tough decision to acknowledge a daughter he never knew he had touches off a political firestorm between warring factions striving for power and dominance during the mental incapacity of the Exalted Lord, Kefren Poseidon. It also leaves Lord James extremely vulnerable to his political enemies, who include the heir to the Kingship, Prince Seti Poseidon, and the prince’s primary supporter, Ezekiel Malachi, Supreme Lord of the Temple of Kronos.

In a first move against Lord James, the prince’s other ally, Lord Tarkon Polaris, who is Lady Mary’s maternal uncle, makes an unprecedented motion to remove Lord James from the Protectorship on a supposed temporary basis until Lord James has made restitution for his forbidden relationship with a Turanian woman. As a counter-move, the wily Consort, Lady Naomi Palladin, cajoles Enoch Atlas, Prince of Westar and Lord Justin’s father, into going public with a proposed marriage between Lord Justin, the prince’s second son, Lord James’ newly acknowledged half-breed daughter.

The Consort suspects Prince Seti of poisoning his brother, and wants to make use of Helen’s medical training to examine and monitor the king in secret to determine his condition. Helen agrees to do it on the chance that it might help Kefren recover, even though it will put her at risk of death again if she is caught touching the king without his express consent. Helen also sets out to devise an experimental procedure to heal Lord Matthew Shinar, who was beaten severely after their close friendship from their medical school days was exposed during her trial.

Although spared from execution, Helen is not safe now that the powerful Temple knows of her existence. Malachi vows to find another way to kill her to keep her from ever mastering the special intuitive abilities that he believes only half-breeds possess and that he fears will undermine his institution’s political power and spiritual authority.

Nor is Helen happy. She and her father both have been profoundly wounded by her mother’s secretive behavior. Not even wise counsel from Judith Altair, best friend of Helen’s mother and a much sought-after advisor to the powerful, can keep the two from clashing out of pain and fear instead of coming together in love and friendship.

With help from Maguari, an otherworldly Mist-Weaver and energy-master, Judith finally is able to call her long-dead friend to her in spirit. During a healing meditation, Judith learns about the vision of destruction and hope that impelled Miriam to bear a half-breed, and witnesses the green stone’s power.

As The Vision ends, the danger is growing for Helen, Lord Justin, and Helen’s father.