Mircalla, the immortal Countess Karnstein, two hundred and seventy four years old and the scourge of the European empires, was leaning over the Seine on Lover's Bridge and crying. She had not seen her love, her Elle, in a hundred and two years but the pain of her loss remained.
She had always loved Paris, that most beautiful city of lovers and lights. It was a city that was filled with joy, with life. It brought her hope in some of her darkest moments, and Mircalla had known darkness. She had known seven decades of the deepest darkness imaginable, alone in the earth with only her hunger for company.
It was no wonder, then, that she had returned here after her long entombment. This bridge was famous throughout the world for the romance it offered. Mircalla herself had stood in this spot many times before, watching the river traffic down the Seine and gazing down at the Ile de la Cité. The lights were enchanting.
She wiped a tear from her eye and thought back to a hundred years ago. She had surprised Elle one day, sweeping her off her feet and bringing her to this very spot. They had been living just outside the city at the time, close enough that a day trip was easy. They had brought champagne and bought fresh bread, roaming the city until they found a little park to picnic in. Later there had been stargazing, holding each other beneath the dark sky and whispering promises of love to each other.
The vampire dropped her head. Then Maman had demanded she hand Elle over to her, Carmilla had tried to flee, and Elle had died in agony. She had died screaming, hatred and fear in her eyes the whole time, and Mircalla had been unable to do anything, wrapped in the heaviest of chains in the coffin that would be her home for the next seven decades.
Maman had given her the most disappointed look, chastising and condemning her in equal measure. She had not drunk Elle; no, that pleasure went to Mircalla, for Elle's was the first throat that was slashed to fill the coffin Mircalla was to languish in.
For the next seventy years Mircalla had drowned in the blood of the lover she could not save.
She had had a long time to think, when she was lucid. That much time spent immobilized and starving, terrified of your own thoughts and praying to any deity that would listen to the pleas of such a cursed creature as she – that made a mind drift into the ether. She had dreamed, grand epics where she burst from her confinement and snatched her love from the certain doom she faced.
She had dreamed up horrors no man could name, watching Elle die a thousand times over, tasting the blood from her veins decades after the last drop had run dry. She had seen lovers, friends, even family she had not set eyes on in centuries perish in torment under her own fangs, and she had seen Maman standing over it all, eyes gleaming in pride as her eldest child wrought havoc upon the earth.
The dreams sometimes cleared, mind fighting its way past the hallucinations to face reality. These were the times Mircalla had dreaded most of all, for these were the times when she could rationally assess the abject failure that had been her entire existence. What good was she, this monstrous beast that stalked the earth in search of prey?
None at all, she had concluded. For the first decade she had raged, righteous fury against Maman and Elle and even her long-dead parents storming against the inside of the coffin. It had taken seven months for her vocal cords to repair themselves fully once she had calmed, and with her fury spent she had realized that the only being to blame for her predicament was herself.
It was she who had betrayed hundreds of women to Maman, she who had deceived Elle and allowed Maman an opportunity to bring about her destruction, even she who had wandered from the ball where she had died and allowed herself to be slain. Everything she did led to ruin.
Seventy-three years into her long confinement, she found herself in the first clear moment she had had for over two years, and she came to the realization that it was for the best she be imprisoned. Surely the lives of everyone in the light were better off for her absence?
Eight months later fire rained from the sky and the first sounds Mircalla had heard in over seventy years that were not of her own making reached her ears. These were the sounds of war, explosions sending her prison tumbling end over end as the concussion blasts tore through the earth. The box twisted and buckled, shackles long rusted through shattered, and the first breath of air Mircalla took smelt of death and agony.
This brave new world she had woken to was one built on the deaths of sixty million innocents, more blood than Mircalla ever imagined flowing in rivers across the ground. Cities were razed, children executed for the crime of merely existing, and the grand future the philosophers of the nineteenth century had envisioned revealed itself as one of horrible progress.
Mircalla had drained four young soldiers, wearing uniforms of some drab olive color and bearing the accent of her native Austria, and walked off the battlefield to never return.
The world was a wretched place. It was only fitting that she be allowed to return.
Leaning against the railing of the Ponts des Arts, her features hardened. Even this masterpiece of art and technology had not survived the test of time unscathed. The German bombs had damaged the structure itself, sending cracks and fractures through the entire thing. Mircalla gave it a decade at most before it collapsed.
She looked at the pendant cradled in her hand. Elle had given it to her, all those decades ago. A delicate key, woven silver, graceful and beautiful. Elle had pressed it into her hand as they lay under these same stars, murmuring promises of love, happiness, a future. She had said that it represented the key to her heart, that it would nevermore be closed to her. Mircalla had kissed her, tears spilling from her eyes and wetting both their cheeks. She had thought it impossible to be so happy.
Being proven right was truly an awful feeling.
She threw the pendant from the bridge, watching as it turned end over end, glinting in the sun, before vanishing below the river's surface. Against her will one last tear fell. Mircalla wiped it away and vowed to lock her heart away from humanity, with all of its cruelty and betrayal and death. There was nothing to be gained from love that she couldn't get herself with a stake through the heart. Better to choose the moment of her own demise than to lay that demise in the hands of some bumbling human.
"Well, Mircalla, it's good to see you finally learning from your mistakes."
Every muscle in the vampire's body locked. She had not heard that voice for nearly eighty years, when it had told her that her internment was her own fault, for her own good. She turned slowly. "Hello, Maman."
The older woman looked the same as she always had. Stern features, undercut with a classical beauty and clothes that were the height of fashion as always, gazed down at her. Mircalla felt like a child for a moment, her long decades in the dark and the hundreds of years she had lived before then falling away, leaving the terrified girl who had woken up in her own grave and clawed her way out of the ground.
Maman moved forwards, drawing the younger girl into a hug. Mircalla stiffened even more, confused and more than a little scared, before she gave in to her instincts and relaxed into the embrace. It had been so long since she had felt this, the embrace of her mother.
After a few entirely too short moments, Maman pulled back. She ran her eyes over every inch of Mircalla's body, examining the girl minutely. "This haircut, what is it? You got rid of that long hair of yours? This makes you look like a commoner, filia."
Mircalla dropped her eyes. "I had to cut it, Maman. After… After everything, it was unsalvageable." She avoided her maker's eyes, only stopping her hands from twisting around themselves with sheer willpower. Her mother hated it when she fidgeted.
The woman gave a little irritated huff. "That's quite a shame. Now, Mircalla, darling, we need to talk about what you're going to do." She looked around pointedly, sneering down her nose at a young couple strolling down the Quai de Conti. "You certainly can't continue on like this."
Frowning, Mircalla met her mother's eyes. "Why not, Maman? There's nothing better for me to do. I might be happy here, one day." She didn't verbalize the rest of her thought: I might get over Elle here, one day.
Maman scoffed. "Happy? You? Honestly, Mircalla. I would have thought your little indiscretion would have taught you better than that. You can't be happy on your own. Do you not remember that girl, oh what was her name… Ellen?"
The vampire's eyes widened. She had not expected this. She had expected Maman to pretend like the whole incident had never happened, burial and all. This, though… Mircalla wasn't sure she was prepared for this.
She took a deep breath, feeling the anger over Elle's death bubbling inside of her once more. "Elle. Her name was Elle, Maman. You ripped her insides out in front of me as I watched and buried me in a box, drowning in her blood, for what you thought would be eternity. The least you can do is remember her name, and Maman, she loved me!"
Her mother's hand connected with her cheek and Mircalla dropped, one of her cheekbones snapping under the tremendous force. "Oh, carissimi. Now look what you made me do." She crouched down in front of the stunned vampire. "That girl didn't love you, puella. Did you not see her, at the end? She saw your true face, how monstrous you truly were, and she hated you. I know you know this. Anyone who sees your true self will hate you, amica. I am the only one who will stay, who will love you despite your flaws."
The elder vampire gently grasped Mircalla's arms, helping her to her feet tenderly. "I was only trying to help you, darling girl. You needed to learn." The younger girl's eyes were still wide, hand clasped to her cheek. "What have I always told you, Mircalla? Mother loves you, more than anyone else in the world."
Mircalla nodded hesitantly, all of her anger vanished like so much smoke. It made sense; Maman was telling her things she had known all of her life. Hadn't she just been thinking the same thing herself? That she was evil, disgusting, not worthy of love?
But… Elle. Even if she had hated her in the end, was that really worthy of the torment Mother had subjected her to? Mircalla had loved her, fragile human that she was, and Mother had torn her apart.
Her mother's next words interrupted her thoughts. "I would like you to return to Styria. It's almost time for the next cycle to begin." Mircalla's shock must have shown on her face, despite her efforts to remain expressionless, for her mother continued. "I adopted a new child while you were… indisposed. He's a good boy, but you are my eldest, filia, even if you are a disappointment. Come back with me. Redeem yourself. We can be a family again."
The shock kept Mircalla from replying for several moments. Mother had… replaced her? She had replaced her, but she still wanted her to return home? The confusion was plain on her face.
Mother sighed. "Mircalla, my darling daughter, the choice is yours. You can stay here and languish, or you can return home and perhaps finally make me proud." Her face lost some of its warmth. "If you choose to stay away, though, it will be for good. You will no longer be any daughter of mine."
Mircalla flinched as if struck, the idea of losing the only family she had had for centuries horrifying her on a visceral level. The thought of Elle nagged her still, though, preventing her from blurting out the unequivocal yes she so desperately desired to.
One of her mother's eyebrows arched. "Think on it, Mircalla. Can you afford to lose your family?" She cupped the girl's injured cheek gently. "I'll expect you in Styria no later than March. And remember…" Her hand pressed down viciously. "The choice is yours."
She vanished, a single plume of black smoke twisting in the breeze before blowing away.
Mircalla stood in stunned silence for an hour after that, thoughts chasing each other in circles around her mind. She had so many conflicting emotions that she didn't know how to process, but in the end it came down to two thoughts. Two thoughts that were in direct conflict with each other.
Mother wants me back, and Mother killed Elle.
She couldn't ignore the latter. Elle had been her greatest love, the woman she had intended on following to the grave. Mother had killed her, tortured her and killed her and sealed Mircalla away beneath the earth. This was not something she could forget.
Still, though, she was not capable of surviving without a family. Oh, physically, she would be fine. She was more powerful than some vampires twice her age thanks to some arcane ritual Mother had subjected her to soon after she had been reborn. She would survive, but inside she would be empty, lost and alone and miserable. She had no doubt that she would meet the business end of a stake after a decade or two.
It was decided, then. She would return to Styria and to Mother and she would spend the rest of her eternity snaring girls as her mother's immortal errand girl. The idea of that life was depressing, true, but at least she would have Mother. There was apparently a brother now, too. Perhaps he would be another support for her, a second pillar in case she ever got on Mother's bad side again.
And, who knew. Perhaps in the course of her chores a few girls here and there would get away. Mother already thought she was worthless; she would hardly be surprised. It would aggravate her, that was certain.
It wasn't nearly enough to make up for Elle. Nothing would ever make up for that. Mircalla would repent for that until the day she died again, but this was all that she could do without rousing her mother's wrath once more. It would be enough, for now. It would have to be.
Mircalla smiled. There was great satisfaction in small revenges.
The moonlight glinted off bared fangs, and then there was nothing but a pillar of black smoke.