{ in which the lady is a monster }
mircalla, the countess karnstein
MADEMOISELLE LA COMTESSE DE HORREURS
Mircalla Karnstein is better known as Carmilla, the lady monster of Sheridan Le Fanu's novella of the same name - you can find it online in its entirety here. A Styrian daughter of privilege in the late seventeenth century, her native tongue is Austro-Bavarian and her ways are archaic. A noblewoman by birth and vampiric con artist by present nature, she has seduced and destroyed generations of girls not entirely unlike herself.
(summarized here.)
APPEARANCE!
FROM GOD OR SATAN, WHO CARES? ANGEL OR SIREN
As described quite helpfully by Laura in the novella: I told you that I was charmed with her in most particulars.
There were some that did not please me so well.
She was above the middle height of women. I shall begin by describing her. She was slender, and wonderfully graceful. Except that her movements were languid, very languid, indeed, there was nothing in her appearance to indicate an invalid. Her complexion was rich and brilliant; her features were small and beautifully formed; her eyes large, dark, and lustrous; her hair was quite wonderful, I never saw hair so magnificently thick and long when it was down about her shoulders; I have often placed my hands under it, and laughed with wonder at its weight. It was exquisitely fine and soft, and in colour a rich very dark brown, with something of gold. I loved to let it down, tumbling with its own weight, as, in her room, she lay back in her chair talking in her sweet low voice, I used to fold and braid it, and spread it out and play with it. Heavens! If I had but known all!
I said there were particulars which did not please me. I have told you that her confidence won me the first night I saw her; but I found that she exercised with respect to herself, her mother, her history, everything in fact connected with her life, plans, and people, an ever wakeful reserve. I dare say I was unreasonable, perhaps I was wrong; I dare say I ought to have respected the solemn injunction laid upon my father by the stately lady in black velvet. But curiosity is a restless and unscrupulous passion, and no one girl can endure, with patience, that hers should be baffled by another. What harm could it do anyone to tell me what I so ardently desired to know? Had she no trust in my good sense or honour? Why would she not believe me when I assured her, so solemnly, that I would not divulge one syllable of what she told me to any mortal breathing.
PLAYED BY: Vivien Leigh
PERSONALITY!
WHO CARES, IF YOU MAKE, --FAY WITH THE VELVET EYES
The phrase 'narcissistic sociopath' springs to mind. Carmilla is her own favourite person, and she is interested in other people only as they relate to her and what she wants - she's a con-artist, using her appearance of youth and beauty in combination with an alleged invalidism and her social status to insinuate herself into the homes of the wealthy or noble (yes, she's relentlessly classist, a product of her privileged background) and take advantage of their kindness. Usually by eating their neighbors and/or seducing and murdering their daughters. She sees herself as a romantic heroine, as the protagonist of her own story; she believes that she deserves to get what she wants, to be obeyed, to be adored and admired. Likely, this is an extension of what she was taught in her childhood - the Karnsteins were a wealthy, powerful family who were rumoured to produce a lot of less than pleasant individuals (to say the least), and Carmilla was raised in the lap of luxury with that nurturing toward cruelty and selfishness. She's a predator - an unabashed monster who doesn't actually see any contradiction in how she presents herself as a languid and sweet-natured young lady - and she was in large part likely that already before she died. It's worth noting that even her obsession with Laura reflects a kind of twisted narcissism; Laura's mother was descended from the Karnsteins, making her a distant relative of Carmilla's.
She's obsessed with control; she refuses to be emotionally, physically or practically at anyone else's mercy, and some of this is potentially rooted in familial abuse during her childhood and/or adolescence, judging by implications about the nature of the Karnsteins and her own behaviour through canon. She has a short, easily piqued temper and will lash out violently at the slightest of provocations, then turn on a dime and coax back to her side whoever it was that witnessed her tantrum. ("Tantrum" really is a good word for it; she's full on foot-stomping, hair-pulling, shrieking and childish pressing her hands over her ears to ignore you. ...when she's not flipping out and murdering some bitches.) She tends to be quite secretive - never gives out her real name, keeping her story as vague as possible and cultivating an air of cultured mystery - and seems to enjoy nothing so much as a good bit of high drama. As far as she's concerned, her enormous entitlement complex is the sun around which the world revolves, or it should be, and she reacts badly to being denied anything. She expects to be taken care of, she expects for it to be on her terms, and she can be so lovely when she's getting her own way. She's a charismatic young woman who is terribly good company when things are going the way she wants them to; she's attentive, indulgent and pleasant as long as she's happy. The problems start when she's not happy any more, and the problem is that it's not that easy to keep her happy. It is, in fact, dangerously easy to misstep with her.
Your wants are irrelevant unless it suits her to indulge you, and then only as long as what you want in no way contradicts her desires. You can have things your way as long as your way is still her way. Mercifully - for her, probably - she does have a good sense of timing in terms of what will get her the farthest. She's capable of reining in the extremes of her personality, to a point - she can sigh and smile and suffer in noble silence (...that's her interpretation) in order to endear herself and gain a foothold and some elbow room that she will, inevitably, later exploit. The tantrums don't start immediately; she waits until people want her to be happy to start stomping her little feet when she's not. Carmilla wants attention and affection, she wants to be coddled and looked after, but she wants the illusion of helplessness while she pulls the strings of the situation. Coming onto the barge and finding her powers dulled to a point that will feel, to her, as if she has been made into the invalid she presents herself will likely inspire an initial (and very likely lingering) sense of panic and unease in her own skin, then foster a resentment towards whoever she chooses to blame for the situation. (Laura, General Spielsdorf, Laura's father, her warden - she's a creature of the immediate, in many ways, so the Admiral will be less likely to become an object of ire for the simple reason that the Admiral is not in front of her to be angry at.)
Her superiority complex is from which all of this stems - she feels better, prettier, cleverer and always, always more deserving than you are. Let me put it this way: if Carmilla had the ability to influence vast societal change, it would suddenly be very clear to men all over the world that misandry was never a real thing before, because the stark contrast of how generally worthless she would render them would drive the point home. (This is but one of many reasons why she should never go into politics. ...admittedly it's low on the list, beneath 'would be terrible at politics' and 'doesn't care about your petty international conflicts, busy getting her nails done'.) Her opinion of herself is immense, and other women become slotted into the narrative that she creates for that perception of her own existence - men are set pieces, tools, entertainment. When she takes a male lover, it's not about romantic or sexual gratification (which she's not really going to get from them), but about manipulation or some kind of gain. She believes her connections with women to be more intimate and meaningful, but ultimately - and this is why I'm bringing her sexuality up - they are still about her ego. This is best made clear in how intense the initial connection and how swiftly she tires of it; it's a story-book in her head, not something real, and ultimately the object of her affection will step out of the set bounds of Carmilla's narrative and enrage her, or she won't and Carmilla will simply tire of her, destroy her, and seek out new amusements, new baubles and toys. She decides the way in which they 'failed' her and moves on.
It is really hard to satisfy someone who is emotionally still functioning like a toddler, but in her softer moments she can be someone who people want to please and care for. There's a palpable sense of loneliness and isolation about her that comes about particularly in her gentler moments and those quieter moods aren't entirely a put-on - her fury at being denied ties back into that melancholy that she's been carrying for a long time now. Those softer moments often carry a kind of sweet weariness and she shows her age there more clearly than at any other time; for all that Carmilla is a relentless, spoiled monster, she's also an intelligent and complex woman who has been around for a very long time. I think that given the opportunity to age into the modern world, she might develop in a lot of interesting ways just on her own and seeing her deal with women on the barge who are either familiar with feminism or have simply grown up in age where they have had opportunities and choices that would never have been open to Carmilla will be interesting to me - Carmilla is curious, as long as she can avoid feeling slighted by the implication of ignorance on a topic. She does like to be an authority, and while she can find herself coaxed into study of a given topic, it's largely a solitary pursuit for her; she doesn't like to be seen to need to do these things. There's a perfectionism about her and about how she chooses to present herself to the world; Carmilla's not immune to the high expectations placed on women and femininity in any time period, though she's not presently going to think of it in quite those terms. She's currently able to contextualize those expectations into proof of her own superiority, because she considers herself the pinnacle, and she's got the kind of cruel pettiness that would have her flaunt a waistline created by the kind of tight-lacing human women just aren't capable of without massively dangerous health side-effects. The idea of women in competition doesn't bother her because she thinks she's winning, and women she takes an active interest in are sort of moved to a different category in her mind, her affection for them proves their worthiness, etc.
VAMPIRISM!
RHYTHM, PERFUME, GLIMMER; MY ONE AND ONLY QUEEN
Carmilla suffers from an 'amphibious vampirism', which means she'll require a leaden, stone coffin in which to sleep submerged in blood (for roughly six hours a day) - this is as important to her comfortable survival as the actual drinking of blood, and forcing her to sleep in a bed or in an empty coffin would have genuinely adverse affects on her health, as opposed to the feigned illness she thinks will get her attention and coddling.
Most of the time she appears to be human, if sickly; her pulse is disturbingly slow but present, she doesn't lack a reflection, and she can walk in the sun (though she rarely if ever rises before one in the afternoon). She has two small, sharp fangs that can easily be witnessed if you have an occasion to check her teeth - she doesn't have a "game face", as some vampires do, they're just her teeth and they're always there. Her health and healing rely on a steady supply of fresh blood and the aforementioned amphibious sleeping arrangements.
She has the usual run of superior senses - sight, smell, taste, hearing - and vastly superior strength, which includes a capacity for inducing a permanent numbness in any limb she's given the opportunity to get a grip on. This effect may lessen in time, but will never fully heal. It is a deliberate injury and not something Carmilla can cause accidentally just by holding hands. Like some other predators, she can lull her victims into a thrall-like state of drugged calm and unwillingness to move (even, in some cases, as they might be registering that it would be an awesome idea to do just that); the sharp bite of her teeth may or may not jolt them from this state, but by that point it's frequently too late. She appears to be more than just capable of superior speed, but also what appears to be teleportation - my interpretation of this, in conjunction with her ability to move through locked doors like they aren't even there, is that she has the ability to travel through shadows. She also has a distinct psychic presence, able to influence dreams, manipulate the people around her and maintain an awareness of her surroundings.
Carmilla is additionally able to transform into a black wild cat roughly five feet in length. As far as her weaknesses go, Christianity doesn't appear to be able to harm her, but displays of it agitate her to the point of a barely-suppressed hysteria, provoking vicious fits of temper. She has a kind of predator's aura, where prolonged exposure to her may provoke a contradictory response of adoration/abhorrence; it's as though the longer you spend time with her, the more your lizard brain starts screaming THIS BITCH WILL KILL YOU, RUN. (Your mileage may vary on what kind of response this will actually provoke in other characters if it comes up; obviously there are people out there who might find that in and of itself appealing.)
Aboard the barge, Carmilla's powers are severely limited and she currently retains nothing she's capable of using offensively.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS!
THE WORLD LESS HIDEOUS, THE MINUTES LESS LEADEN?
This, Carmilla is certain, can be no form of justice.
Her body feels clumsy, alien to her; her mind is wrapped in soft wool and though she struggles with it, there is no breaking through. She's heavy in her own skin, bewildered by it and angry, and she is alternately as one made deaf and yet startling at the smallest sounds that come to her so unfamiliarly. The slow beat of her heart in her breast stirs something in her like a kind of sense-memory, a panic that rises in her throat and reminds her of when she had been once made too weary to cry out. For so long she's remembered only how pleasing it was to be made a pet of, she's mouthed tiredness and feigned the listless hand-- she's forgotten how it was to be betrayed by her own body.
She will not forget again. It's as the sickness that came on her was, making her traitor against herself and just as there was one who was at fault then, there will be such a one now. In the centuries since her death and resurrection such illness has been an impossibility-- so this has been done to her, this is the crime of another and just as she was freed once, she will be freed again. This is what she focuses on to the exclusion of all else, even ignoring the quiet indignity of being confined to her own mausoleum, the high ceiling of the Karnstein chapel above her head as it hasn't been for so very, very long.
Her leaden coffin rests, closed, on the other side of the stone room like a taunt. It will sustain her, now, but no more than that-- she gains nothing from her rest but to wake again to her reduced station.
The blood that soaks into her skin when she lies there only ensures that she cannot sink into the release of insensibility.