Budapest, 1881
Carlotta Giudicelli´s dressing-room was full of roses.
They filled the baskets, they framed the vanity mirror - marvelous flowers in red and yellow and pink hues. Carlotta picked up a single red rose, not quite as magnificent as the one in her black lace mantilla, and this beauty was tied off with a black ribbon and a note signed as "From Count de Ville." Carlotta smiled.
Sudden draught snuffed the candles.
Carlotta looked around her. She heard the distant voices of celebrating patrons and managers outside her dressing room. She stepped toward the door but then she felt the touch of icy air in her feet and around her ankles and turned around.
White mist was spilling through the cracks of the window into the room. It crawled over the red floral carpet and made a milk-colored pillar which started to become solid.
Carlotta cursed mildly in Spanish - she was not foul-mouthed, dirty creature.
"Hell! Vladislaus…?"
The mist take a shape of a most beautiful redhaired woman. Her hair was not hennaed like Carlotta´s was, and she was wearing the flowing pink robe, which always made Carlotta think of wild roses.
"No," Aleera said and smiled, adding mockingly; "ángel de la música."
Carlotta sighed. "What do you want?"
"Is that rose from him?"
Carlotta knew Aleera´s jealousy. She was not scared of other vampire, though."Yes. Why did you came, Aleera?"
"Master sent me to make sure that you are not late in the ball."
Carlotta smile was a mocking grimace. "I just need to change my clothes." She would not need bath - as a vampire her body didn´t produce any dirt. "We will be fashionably late."
It was all Hallow´s Eve, just before the midnight.