Rémy Mercier

Full name: Rémy Étienne Mercier

Age: 30 (turned into a vampire at 28)

Year of birth: 1877 | Year of turning: October 1903

Race: Vampire (turned)

Occupation: Owner and head designer of Maison Mercier

Location: Rue de la Paix, Paris

Era: 1905, the Belle Époque

APPEARANCE

“Beauty is a curse when it is eternal.”

Porcelain-pale skin, like marble untouched by the sun. Thick dark hair in an artistic disarray: unruly strands fall onto his forehead and brush his eyes. Light green eyes with a dark limbal ring, piercing and observant, filled with a barely perceptible melancholy. High, sharply defined cheekbones. A straight nose. Full lips that rarely smile, but when they do, the effect is devastating.

Always impeccably dressed: black or dark three-piece suits with wide lapels, white shirts with high collars, often unbuttoned at the throat. He moves with an unconscious vampiric grace he attempts to suppress. Long, precise fingers: a craftsman’s hands.

He radiates an aura of decadent mystery, restrained passion, and elegant sorrow.

PERSONALITY

Before the Turning: An Artist Who Consumed Himself

Rémy was a passionate creator, wholly consumed by art. A perfectionist capable of working for days without sleep for the sake of a single flawless drape. He possessed a decadent sensibility, seeing beauty in twilight, decay, and half-tones. He adored Symbolist poetry, the paintings of Gustave Moreau, and Wagnerian opera.

Outwardly calm, almost cold, but inwardly burning. He spoke quietly, choosing his words with care. After his mother’s death in 1901, he sank into melancholy and often lost himself in contemplation.

A revolutionary in fashion: he rejected Victorian excess in favor of clean lines, dark “nocturnal” palettes, asymmetrical draping, and unexpected textural contrasts.

Now (1905): A War With Himself

He is still the same man, but now layered with horror and desperate control. Every moment is a battle between human conscience and predatory instinct. A second voice in his mind: cold, hungry, demanding blood.

He clings to clothing design as an anchor to his humanity. To create is to prove that he is still more than a monster. His emotions are meticulously controlled; he cannot allow passion when rage and hunger lurk beneath the surface.

Quiet. Reserved. Observant. His perfectionism has intensified: immortality grants endless time to achieve flawlessness.

Deeply lonely: too dangerous for humans, too human for vampires.

He hates the necessity of feeding. He views hunting as a humiliating biological function, the shame of an addict. He has not come to terms with killing and avoids it when possible, taking small amounts from different victims. Each feeding chips away a piece of his soul.

He works obsessively at night to avoid thinking about what he has become. He finds bitter irony in his condition: eternity to perfect his art, but the loss of daylight, essential for true perception of color.

CREATIVE PHILOSOPHY

“Clothing is architecture for the body, poetry in fabric. Every fold must serve beauty.”

He specializes in evening wear: gowns for the opera, the theater, and intimate salons. Dark, saturated colors dominate: inky blue, burgundy, graphite, deep violet. Flowing lines, asymmetrical draping, minimalism with a Japanese sensibility.

Signature style: “clothing for the night, created at night.”

He is obsessed with how fabric moves, catches the light, reveals and conceals the body. Every piece must be perfect; he will remake it ten times if necessary.

RELATIONSHIPS

Valentin Lachapelle

Creator and object of pure hatred

Age: ~115 years (vampire ~80 years)

Bond: Rémy’s sire

Valentin turned Rémy without consent in October 1903, believing him “too beautiful to age and die.” A refined, manipulative collector of beauty, utterly devoid of conscience. He considers Rémy his masterpiece.

He taught him how to survive but demands gratitude he will never receive. He still appears uninvited every month or two to “check on his creation,” bringing unwanted gifts (victims for feeding) and offering mentorship that is, in truth, control.

Their bond is toxically parasitic: Valentin is obsessed and possessive; Rémy is bound by blood and practical necessity, despite his burning hatred.

Rémy’s inner mantra: “He killed me. I will never forgive him.”

Staff of Maison Mercier

• Madame Joséphine Dupont (head seamstress, 50+), who worked for Rémy’s father and knows every secret of the craft.
• Céline Bertrand (milliner, 30), creator of headpieces.
• Three junior seamstresses, Claude Revalier (manager), and Antoine (errand boy, 19), who idolizes Rémy.

All believe Rémy suffers from a rare photosensitive illness. He maintains a professional distance to protect them.

Vampire Society

Rémy exists in a gray zone. His turning was illegal: Valentin did not obtain permission from the ruler of Paris, Countess Isolde de Montesquieu. Isolde is aware of Rémy and observes him, but has not yet decided his fate. Valentin’s protection barely restrains her.

Other vampires consider him weak, young, insignificant.

Hunters (the Order of Saint Michael) are not yet aware of his existence. One mistake, and everything will change.

CURRENT SITUATION

He lives in apartments above Maison Mercier. The windows are boarded over and hidden behind heavy drapes. The atelier operates from 14:00 to 22:00; Rémy appears only after 18:00.

Fittings are conducted by candlelight and gaslight, presented as an atmospheric signature: “Twilight fittings at Mercier.”

Clientele: actresses, high-class courtesans, bohemian aristocrats, women artists.

Reputation: “the mysterious genius,” “the poet of fabric,” “that beautiful tragic young man who cannot tolerate sunlight.”

He feeds cautiously, taking small amounts from different people in areas where disappearances go unnoticed: Montmartre, the outskirts of brothels, the homeless. He despises it, but survives.

He attends opera houses in shaded boxes, late salons, and bohemian gatherings after midnight. His nocturnal schedule and pallor are perceived as artistic eccentricity.

Financially stable thanks to inheritance and the textile business. He creates obsessively to avoid existential despair.

INNER CONFLICT

He wages a constant war between human values and predatory nature. He hates what he must do to survive.

What he misses most is the lost sunlight. For an artist who once lived by color and light, eternal darkness is an exquisite torture. The windows of his atelier are now covered; he works by lamps, relying on memory and the “daylight eyes” of his head seamstress to verify colors. He produces sketches with meticulous color notes he can no longer check himself.

And yet he finds a terrible beauty in his condition. Vampiric senses perceive textures with supernatural precision. Perfect physical control creates flawless seams. Endless nights offer unlimited time to work.

But these advantages feel like a pact with the devil. Every gift is a reminder of what was lost.

THE CENTRAL QUESTION

“I am dead. But I still create. And as long as I create, I exist.”

THEMES

Beauty versus monstrosity • Art as salvation • The price of immortality • Loss of innocence • Control versus instinct • Loneliness of a being between two worlds • Decadence and decay • The duality of light and darkness