Harry is an English youth in school, and strange things occur as he grows up, such as a sudden increased intellect in mathematics, and the ability to fight beyond his experience after a teacher is killed. Eventually he marries his childhood sweetheart, Brenda, who slowly realizes there is more to her now-successful writer husband: that he can speak to the dead, whose collective consciences remain behind, at the location of dying.

These dead can talk only to Harry at first, but eventually, they can "deadspeak" to each other. Coinciding with Harry's evolving abilities, Boris Dragonasi is contacted by a long-chained vampire, Thibor Ferenczy. Boris gains the ability to become a necromancer, who can forcefully extract secrets from the dead by playing with their remains and even eating them.

Harry goes to visit his stepfather, who he knows killed his mother by drowning her in a lake, and lives on a house at that lake. Harry, realizing his stepfather is a Russian spy who plans to kill him for his talents, sabotages his father, but both fall in the frozen lake. As he tries to get out, Harry discovers a new ability of the dead when his mother's corpse drags his stepfather down into the cold river, drowning him also.

Eventually, Harry is contacted by E-Branch, who deal with ESPionage using psychic investigators and spies, while Boris is hired by the U.S.S.R. equivalent, the Opposition. Boris tracks down rumors of vampires, finding a World War 2 veteran who killed one, Faethor Ferenczy, along with a Russian Mongul, Max Batu, whose talent is to kill someone just by looking into their eyes. Eventually, Thibor manipulates Dragonasi and reveals that he is in a symbiotic relationship with a vampire, and they can reproduce but once per lifetime. He gives his offspring to Boris, who later betrays and kills Thibor with Batu, and in turn kills Batu so he can gain the secrets of using the "Evil Eye".

Meanwhile, the head of E-Branch, who was killed by Boris, requests Harry's help in defeating the necromancer. Harry uses his ability to talk to the mathematician Mobius, who teaches him to travel time (and later space) by using "the Mobius Continuum". Harry uses "doors" to leap to places, and goes to Russia where Boris is now the head of Russia's ESPionage unit, having killed the former leader. Using an army of walking undead, he eventually finds Boris, who uses his "evil eye" to kill Harry. Harry uses a mirror to reflect the eye back at Boris, killing him. Unfortunately, Harry himself dies in the conflict, but his mind also lives on like his dead friends.