Albania during the time of Italian occupation. An Albanian organization, the so-called Ballists, cooperates with the Italians helping them to find partisans. The young peasant Vlash Zeka hunts the half-wild horses roaming in the Divijaka forests and the Karavasta marshes. His hard life becomes even more difficult when the Ballists start persecuting him, because his brother who joined the partisans has killed one of their spies.