Fifteen years earlier, Nathalie and Marc had come to look for Alice in an orphanage in Romania. Nathalie hadn't recognized the infant that the director had presented to her during a first visit. Taken by a feeling of unease, she had entered by chance into a secret room where she had discovered, with horror, dirty children, left to their own devices, and had recognized Alice among them. But a mysterious force pulled her out of the room. Now, when it's time to celebrate Christmas, the mother and her teenage daughter find themselves alone, snowbound in their chalet cut off from the world.