A powerful, visionary epic from a celebrated voice in speculative fiction.For millennia, the Imperium has held sway over Pangaea. The pure dreams of its great dreamers are used to elevate and pacify the consciousness of a society strictly divided by caste. Here eroticism is repressed for a higher cause, and sex is a shameful remnant of ages past. But when Pangaea's most beloved dreamer is brutally assassinated, it's clear that a dangerous group of revolutionaries is dreaming the old dreams of violence, uninhibited sex...and freedom.For although Pangaea is the most benevolent of tyrannies, it is a tyranny nonetheless. Here an elite "pure" scientist and a lowly birthtank worker share a forbidden passion; a grief-stricken Imperial officer embarks on a fanatic crusade; a sensual erotician possesses powers beyond her understanding; and an "impure" terrorist and his vengeful daughter wreak a path of unspeakable destruction. As mysterious earthshocks shake Pangaea, they are drawn together by the outlawed Orb of Eternity--a feared and ancient oracle whose ambivalent message heralds either redemption...or apocalypse.