She cracked her eyes open, vision adjusting to the new light and new identity.

Emerald green silk curtains surrounded her, hanging from long mahogany bed posts, billowing in the room despite the lack of an open window. She turned on her side despite the aching in her body, that she couldn't feel, to see a small white teacup with golden edges and an elaborate floral scenery painted upon the porcelain, a red lip print on its rim. Her fingers pressed upon her own lips to see if it was her own lipstick smeared upon it, she reached down and wiped her hand on the duvet - one of the duvets. There was a decent amount of pressure pushing down on her, she was under many thick layers of blankets and duvets. Next to her there was an old, and entirely unnecessary, fireplace, radiating a warmth she couldn't feel onto her, and her bed. Beside it, a huge, almost wall length window smattered with condensation at the foot of her bed. The starry sky just beyond her, one she didn't recognize.

Moonlight, milky and diffused, flooded in through the tall windows, illuminating the lavishly decorated room, reflecting off the various golds and satins scattered throughout. She tilts her head downward to look at herself and spots her hands, they weren't hers, they seemed to belong to an 18-19 year-old woman. Long slender well-manicured fingers, delicately decorated with a currant red nail polish, thin lines in a darker shade of red forming an elegant pattern on the French tips. She'd never paint her nails currant red, in fact, she'd rarely paint her own nails in her past life, painting others? She enjoyed doing so, because it was a soothing past time done with her many play things. She enjoyed pampering them and bonding with them, holding their hands to do their nails was a calming almost intimate act for most she had ownership over. She did think it was a pretty color, but she had red hair in her past-life, and scarlet red eyes; she was a vampire, even a tiny bit of extra red felt gauche to most members of her race.

She focused her hearing as she can hear a hushed discussion in the next room. Legs swung from the center of the bed to hang off the edge of it, she wanted to at the very least make a quick getaway if the discussion was something dangerous that would cut her still vulnerable and new life short. The fingers of her left hand clasped around the ribbon on her nightgown, fiddling with it as she eavesdropped on the conversation.

"Yeah, but is she okay? We did everything we needed to under the orders of her retainer, but will she be okay?"

"Who knows how long she's been in the snow… Depending on how long she had been left lying there before anyone saw her, then well-" He was cut off.

"I think it's best if we wait for the doctor's response on the young mistress' situation instead of wildly throwing around conjectures, he has yet to speak."

There was a silence as they waited for the aforementioned doctor to speak.

He cleared his throat after a few moments of silence, "she doesn't have a pulse."

There was a shocked hush before panicked conversation among them.

"Y-you mean she's dead?! She was still breathing when I found her!"

"W-we did everything, we wrapped up her body, we got her warm and they said she would wake up!"

"Oh-no, no, no that can't be! Big sis wouldn't succumb that easily, she- she wouldn't die just like that…"

"Where is the vice president? During such a trying time when his superior is dying, he's nowhere to be found."

"Callum would normally have rushed over for this, since there's a chance he'll get that promotion he always wanted, sad he wasn’t here to receive this good news, eh?" In an attempt to lighten the mood he tiredly laughs in the hopes others might join in, no one does.

The vampire furrowed her brow as she realized they might be talking about her, and places two fingers on her neck to check her pulse just to be sure, since she normally always lacked a pulse just as she had awoken. Nothing. She glances around and sees her reflection in the mirror hung on the wall to her left; sleek obsidian hair parted down the middle, slightly smeared ruby red lipstick, and skin of alabaster white. Her features were accentuated by dark arched shapely eyebrows, mossy green eyes framed by thick lashes, and a beauty mark underneath her right eye, she wiped at it to see if it was real, it was.

Picking up a handkerchief on the bedside table, she could feel her hands shake while holding it, she couldn't feel the cold, she couldn't feel the warmth of the tea either. Many sensations are lost when someone becomes a vampire, she knew that, she never knew how it felt to experience those sensations though as she was, like all blood moon class vampires, born of the will of the universe, something that just came into existence. This time was no different, her body involuntarily shook and shivered but she couldn't feel why her body was doing that.

The longer she remained in that body the more it gradually lost those sensations, even though her mind couldn't perceive them, they were still there, the shaking gradually lessened and she picked up the warm teapot and poured the warm water into the teacup while listening to an argument that was beginning to pick up in the next room.

She had been killed in many worlds, each time awakening in a random body in a random place, after she had awakened in them those bodies gradually acclimate to her presence and after 10 years or so, they stop aging. They were always dead when she got there, and it always took a few minutes before she gained their memories. Masquerading as a stranger is difficult to do.

She dipped the handkerchief in the warm tea and ran the wet part along her lips, trying to remove as much as the red lipstick as she could. Her lips were unhealthily pale, and chapped, the severe temperatures from when this girl collapsed must have done a number on her.

There was the sound of a door beyond hers opening up, and then within less of a minute someone being knocked to the ground, her sight drifted to the door as she waited for someone to go in, no one did. The discussion continued in its intensity while she sipped on the tea, focusing on starting a fake heartbeat, to get a pulse going while she felt some strength gradually return to her body.

Getting up on shaky knees, she took slow steps with small strides while she went to the wall and rested most of her weight on it as she was still too weak to stand on her own. She'd gain all those crucial memories pretty soon, so she was planning to disperse all thoughts of her death soon.

There were words of 'inform the marquis', and 'inform the prince' and other stuff like, 'make an announcement tomorrow' and 'don't. we'll end up ruining morale so early in the school year' from beyond the door.

She managed to gain a tiny bit of strength back as she was halfway to the door, accidentally knocking over the dressing screen that was near her desk as she attempted to trudge across the room.

There was a temporary hush and then another fervent discussion as conjectures wildly flew in the next room. Someone knocked on the door and a distinctly feminine voice called out, "Young Mistress?"

She tried to respond but the sound coming from her throat was too feeble to be heard. She tried to clear her throat but all that happened was a wheeze before a weak cough.

The loud voice that started an argument and ended up being knocked down earlier spoke again, "she's obviously doing it to get back at the prince because of an argument they had earlier." Another argument ensued as people chastised and criticized the speaker.

She felt her eyebrow twitch, this person literally died of hypothermia and this dick wad is insinuating that she'd fake it, even with all the memories of the dead girl bouncing around in her mind there was very little indication that she'd fake her death due to an argument.

Aurelie yawned and tears pooled at the corner of her eyes, her hands instinctively clung to her body to fight off the biting cold despite her incapability of actually feeling it. The same man who insulted her earlier then spoke again, "She's faking."

The door flew open, and there was a silence where no one spoke or took a breath at the sight of her fragile form standing in the center of the moonlit bedroom.

The moonlight backlit the sickly form of the marchioness to reveal the alluring silhouette her nightgown vainly tried to hide turning the rather modest chiffon nightgown into something more provocative. Her teary half-lidded gaze swept along the people beyond the doorway as she tilted her head in confusion, each person her eyes swept over had their breath caught in their throat when she looked at them. Obsidian tresses flowed down her back and tumbled over her shoulders, framing her face and hiding what so little skin the nightgown revealed.

There was an audible gulp that broke through the silence and woke people up from their stupor.

Her retainer, Elias, cleared his throat from the back of the group, "As we can see, the young miss hasn't passed on. You are all disturbing her recuperation, I will have to escort you all out."

The men quickly averted their vision, many of them had a pink tinge to their cheeks, especially the silver-haired one who burst through the door, Callum. No one had really believed her to be alive after the doctor pronounced her dead, so this sight and the fact that she was alive has shocked them to silence, the former more than the latter, but they'd never say that aloud.

A slightly chubby girl walked into the room and placed a hand on her shoulder before quickly pulling back, "She's burning up!" Her voice sounded exactly like the one who had called her big sis, but this girl was her future-in-law rather than a blood relative, and Callum's cousin. The girl glanced back at the retainer and the maid, "I'll go get the school's doctor again."

Aurelie was helped by her maid, Helene, return to her bed.