As the days passed, Carmilla's displays of affection increased in frequency and intensity. Elle never said a word against any of it, but it made her blush whenever Carmilla kissed her, or left a hand on her leg for just a little too long. Elle was no longer able to meet the eyes of some of her keener servants. She knew what was doing was wrong, but it just felt so good. Carmilla just felt so right. In both word and deed, Elle loved everything that Carmilla did, and she could never bring herself to tell Carmilla to stop.

"I am such a coward," Elle sighed.

"What do you mean?" Carmilla asked, sounding hurt that Elle would speak so negatively of herself.

"You shower me in kisses and affection. You have feelings for me, do you not?" Elle replied.

For a moment, Carmilla said nothing, but then she began to nod, and with that all-too-familiar voice, husky and fervent, she agreed.

"I do, Elle, I do. I love you more than anything in the world, and it would bring me great pleasure to know you feel the same!" she said.

"But that's just it, Carmilla!" Elle exclaimed. "I don't know if I do."

"You don't know if you love me?" Carmilla sounded hurt and Elle instantly felt bad.

"I mean, I do," she amended. "But I am afraid."

"Of what? You know I'd never hurt you," Carmilla promised, taking Elle's hand into her own.

"I know you wouldn't, but what of the rest of the world?" Elle asked. "What if someone were to find out?"

"You needn't worry about that, darling," Carmilla promised softly, kissing Elle's cheek and dragging her lips across her friend's skin. "I won't let anybody hurt you, ever. I promise you that."

Just for that moment, Elle's fears had been assuaged, and she felt a little bit braver. But it seemed that all good things had to come to an end eventually. Scarcely a month later, a horrifying truth came to light.

"Your guest, Carmilla, is not all that she claims to be!" Elle turned to see an elderly woman flagging her down from across the marketplace.

"Wh-what? H-how do you know Carmilla?" Elle was frightened, but curiosity drove her to the other woman.

"It doesn't matter how I know her! What matters is what I know!" the woman insisted urgently. "She is a vampire!"

At first, Elle had nearly laughed, certain the old woman was just delusional, but as she began to argue her case, more and more evidence came to light. But what frightened Elle more than finding out that Carmilla was a vampire was realizing that maybe Carmilla didn't love her after all. One of the things the woman told her was that vampires did not have the ability to love. The closest they could get was a twisted obsession.

"They feel nothing for anything or anyone, except themselves!" the woman insisted. "If she showed you any sort of affection, it was only because she saw you as valuable to her, not because she actually cared about you as a person!"

So… all of Carmilla's words and promises, and her kisses and caresses… it had all only just been a lie.

ooo

"I should've known. I should've realized! I should've suspected… But I didn't! I didn't… I was too afraid…" Elle paced her library, waiting for Carmilla to arrive. It scared her to death to do this, but she had to. She had to be sure! And the only way to do that was to confront the vampire herself. "I should've known someone like her could never really love someone like me… It was too good to be true…"

But right until the very last second, Elle held out the foolish hope that Carmilla would be able to assuage her fears one last time. Maybe it was all just a big misunderstanding! Maybe Carmilla wasn't really a vampire after all, and maybe she still loved Elle just the same! But alas, it was not to be. One little slip on Carmilla's part confirmed the mysterious woman's claims. Carmilla was a vampire.

"You're a monster…" Elle breathed, hardly able to believe it. Carmilla had never loved her at all. All of her talk of a new life, that had been nothing more than Carmilla's continued attempts to keep Elle complacent. She'd only ever told Elle what she wanted to hear. And Carmilla's honeyed lies had worked perfectly.

But the greatest pain of all was the shame. Even if Carmilla's love had been a lie, Elle's had not. Now, she felt like a damn fool! And even more than that, she'd agonized so much over her relationship with Carmilla, so to find out that all of it had been born of a lie nullified all of Elle's efforts to make peace with herself and her sexuality. After coming so close to accepting herself for who she was, it all felt dirty now, knowing Carmilla's two big secrets.

Elle cursed herself again. She should've known. She should've known that her sinful desires would come back to haunt her eventually. She had just been too much a coward to believe it at first. But now? It seemed as if society had been right after all. There was a reason same-sex attraction was considered unnatural. Only unnatural, demonic creatures like vampires would ever consider such a backward lifestyle. Just as their status as undead was a perversion against life, their homosexual desires were a perversion against love. Elle just hadn't wanted to accept it until now.

And to think! She'd just come to terms with the fact that she was a… a… well… a lesbian. Now here she was, finding out that the very girl she'd fallen for was a literal demon. But again, perhaps she should've known. What good Christian girl fell in love with someone of the same sex? Elle was soon just as disgusted by herself as she was by Carmilla.

ooo

After that, Elle surrendered Carmilla to the strange woman from the village. She claimed that she would take Elle traveling in Carmilla's stead, since Carmilla was not safe to be around. But in yet another ironic and karmic turn, that woman betrayed Elle just as soon as Elle was done betraying Carmilla. But perhaps… perhaps Elle deserved it.

"A cowardly fate for a cowardly person," she muttered as she entered the dark, underground chamber. She quickly realized that she was not the only one there. Alongside the woman from the village, the woman who had kidnapped her and taken her here, there were four other girls, all just like her.

"Well, the party is just about to begin," the woman sounded satisfied as she brought the five girls together.

"Party?" Elle echoed, tongue heavy and voice not quite her own.

"Yes, party," the woman replied, then she gestured dead ahead and, suddenly, the entire chamber was flooded with light. There was a giant pit, and light brighter than the sun was emanating from it.

Elle instantly sensed danger and every part of her was begging her to run away, but at the same time, she suddenly felt deeply compelled to step even closer to that hypnotic blaze.

"Party. I want to go to the party," Elle droned softly, unseeing and unthinking. "Party… Light… So beautiful…" And she was vaguely aware of the other four girls muttering the same thing, sounding just as subdued as she was.

Elle finally reached the edge of the pit. She leaned down and recoiled at once as she saw Carmilla's face looking up at her, frozen in a silent scream. She heard the phantom scream her name once, then the vision vanished. But it was just enough. It woke Elle up and, suddenly, she was in control again. This was her chance to escape! To run! To be free… To live again… But she didn't take it. She was too scared to even try.

It was as if Carmilla's scream had broken her trance, but with the trance gone, Elle was left with nothing. Nothing except cowardice. Just as it had always been. So when the time finally came to choose fight or flight, Elle choose to freeze. She was scared of the pit, yes, but she was even more scared of the woman who'd brought her to it.

Her cowardice pushed her on one last time, and when hers was finally up, she jumped willingly into the bright, endless light. But why not? She had nothing else to live for. No other reason to stay. Carmilla was gone, her father would surely figure out the truth, and her name would be disgraced forevermore. But even if she'd managed to escape all of that, surely the woman from the village would hunt her down until she'd been recaptured. So truly, her life was over. There was no rhyme or reason in going on. So Elle jumped. She wasn't pushed, or mind-controlled.

"Maybe it's better this way,"Elle thought sadly. "My pain will finally be over, and I won't be able to hurt anyone else ever again. No one will miss me anyway. This is the punishment I deserve."

She had no place among the land of the living anymore. Not after all of her cowardice and betrayals. And according to society, she would have no place among them after all of the things she'd shared with Carmilla, love and blood both. She was corrupted now, a stain that needed to be purified and cleansed. If this was how she could remove herself from the equation, then so be it.

But as cruel fate would have it, Elle would one day come to regret her decision to jump. She would regret not at least trying to fight or flee. But that was what cowardice did to a person. It trapped them and then blinded them with every "what if" and "if only". Now, Elle was left with nothing. Nothing except cowardice. Just as it had always been. And that was how it would always remain. Just like the light emanating from the pit, it would be bright, burning and everlasting.

AN: Sorry this was so sad. As you can see, it was based off the Carmilla webseries, but it tells Elle's story, because I feel like she's super underrated. IMO, the movie vilified her beyond what was reasonable. I enjoyed her role as an antagonist, but they seemed forget that her anger was justified. And she was probably a victim of fear, not just a monster hellbent on revenge and selfishness.

For example, one thing I really wanted to focus on was the idea that she wasn't just afraid of Carmilla being a vampire. Instead, what really scared her was trying to make peace with her sexuality only to realize that the person she'd fallen for was actually a vampire. So in this story, Elle wasn't just mad at Carmilla. She was mad at herself, too.