A mathematician and a poet fall in love and try to learn the truth about the famous 19th century mathematician Fairweather I. Unfortunately, both of these things are against the law of The State, a caste-based society, and so the mathematician is sent to the penal colony called "Hell" on an icy planetoid, where he meets Fairweather II, whom he discovers led a rebellion which was defeated. In this world, Jesus Christ became a revolutionary agitator and was never subjected to crucifixion. He assembled an army to overthrow the Roman Empire, and established a theocracy that has lasted until the twentieth century.
