Various timelines unfold across time and space in Eλλas, “as it was then known” (it is now known as the Milky Way). Pandara and Koravo are two lovers from Ksevia, a city in Tristulle. Ksevia’s commune is presided over by Arkdemus, guardian of The Graphia Cometa text, aided by Lohrnum, a drug that promotes “balance and harmony.” Political unrest erupts and threatens the Yuit—“the collective mind of Ksevia”—and the wider universe. Pandara and Koravo escape into the city’s surrounding forest, a mysterious landscape integral to the populace’s birth and death cycles (“when someone steps out into the wilderness, a child is born”). As Pandara and Koravo wander deeper into the “unfolding, distant dream of Sirrung,” they encounter Seprator, who warns them of “a dangerous journey” and a prophecy yet to be fulfilled. Koravo’s dream about Pandara becoming lost in a labyrinth comes true when the two are separated into dreamlike, shifting states, unable to communicate. The lovers must reunite to save each other and their city. Trautman’s novel details an expansive realm and many characters across its narrative strands. Readers will be intrigued by the jumps in time and place; in this universe, “All times exist right now, all times except for the future. The future is a constantly gyrating sphere of possibilities.” The author sacrifices character development in favor of in-depth worldbuilding, leading to some tangential plotlines that distract from the novel’s central quest, but the novel’s structure is cleverly replicated by the in-story puzzle box architecture—readers will be kept guessing by this pacy novel. The short chapters effectively flesh out the wider world where democracy is under threat, though the political landscape is overshadowed by the emotionally layered core relationship.