Bifrost The psychiatrist Cam Bingen comes to arctic Bifrost to learn the new methods of actinotherapy using light. At the Photinic Clinic, he is assigned the hotel singer of folksongs Sunda Vipur as his first patient. She is madly pursued by a spoiled playboy son of, the richest tycoon who dominates the algae industry. Cam rescues her from her wild admirer, who begins to set fire to his father's arctic algae plantations in vengeance and hatred of his parents. Avia Ornithologist Gauge Krave pursues his bird observation studies in the land of Avia, but suffers injury in an air crash. He becomes associated with the head of a mountain bird observatory and his daughter. His condition grounds him in a colony of raptor-worshipers who are breeding giant, dangerous teratorns. The raptor movement of fanatics is recruited by the dictator of Avia. His scheme is to use the teratorns to destroy the farms of small, independent farmers who oppose him. Gauge leads his friends in an attempt to flee Avia and its Auspex secret police before the teratorns are used to destroy the opposition and invade neighboring countries.