Even as a child, Vanessa struggled with her own contradictions, and it's gotten no easier as an adult. She was afraid of the dolls she had to play with ( “Those eyes staring at you, just waiting to come to life. Who thinks that's healthy for a child?” ), and yet grew to appreciate taxidermy as an older girl and young woman ( “I put mirrors behind the glass eyes, so they would spark.” ). Such attempts to turn her fears into a strength are common for Vanessa, but they rarely pan out the way she intends. Her inner conflict runs too deeply, down to her soul.

It would be difficult for the average passerby to notice any such conflict, however. Vanessa carries herself with a very specific poise, controlling everything in her life that she can: fashion, posture, diction, and who she allows to get close (the latter is often a failure). She uses this control over herself to an intentionally obscure degree, knowing that the mystery she can present will draw certain types in. When necessary, she can use this to manipulate them to her own ends, as with Ethan Chandler and Dorian Gray both. ( Dorian: You have exceptional composure. [...] Poise, I mean. | Vanessa: Control. | Dorian: Yes. What if you were to abandon it? | Vanessa: I couldn't. ) The illusion of control also helps her cope with her inner demons, both psychological and real.

She knows the dangers of losing control, that she risks her soul whenever she gives in to her primal, often sexual urges. It keeps her afraid enough to place most people at a distance, but she still wants. For all her perfect fashion and poise, Vanessa desires touch; to be loved and known and accepted. She'll go so far as to not wear gloves at parties (scandalous!), hinting at the desires beneath. She denies herself the sexual urges as much as she can, but she still seeks out stimuli. Exciting ventures, yes. Friendship...risky, but yes, how she wants that, too. She can love deeply, and wants love in return, but she doesn’t know if she can trust what love does to her. Her love lingers with her guilt, as she continues to write letters to Mina that she will never see. She will hold her friends, kiss and comfort them; she will tease them with a twinkle in her eye as they blush and both laugh together, but no matter how dear her friends are, there will always be just a sliver of distance between their spirits. It’s a trace of enigma that she's reluctant to let go of, save eventually around Sir Malcolm or Ethan Chandler. With others, she uses the mystery innate to her presence, enforcing an illusion of control over people as much as herself.

Once someone has her love, though, she will do anything for them. She will risk her life for them, she will kill for them, and she will kill them if it's the kindness that they need. As much guilt as she feels over betraying Mina and sending her down her path of unholy torment, Vanessa doesn't seek her forgiveness; she's ready to kill her beloved Mina to free her from Dracula's embrace. As much as she resents Sir Malcolm for being the one to trigger the darkness within the young Vanessa, she loves him with a ferocity that sends her with murderous intent into an ancient witch cult. Her love can consume her, it never truly leaves her, and so she's reluctant to hand it to just anyone.

Raised as a Roman Catholic, she’s well acquainted with religion and believes that God has a plan. Unfortunately, she also believes that darkness will never stop following her, because it’s in her very soul now. She’s sinned to the point of murder, her essence tainted by Verbis Diablo, and part of her resents that despite all of her prayers, God never seemed to listen. Outwardly, she will preach God’s word and openly defy the Devil even while acknowledging her dark path, but within there is turmoil. She knows herself, claims not to fear it, but fear it she does. She wants God, but some part of her wants the Devil more.

That part of her manifests in selfish or even vengeful behavior at times, especially when she has a goal in mind that she deems far more important than anything else. Others haven’t suffered like her; they don’t know and so they can’t begin to understand. She doesn’t think herself a martyr, because she has not yet been taken, but she does believe that her suffering is solitary, and that when it manifests in its full force, these resentments towards others are unleashed. When possessed, it isn’t all Lucifer or Amunet; it’s also Vanessa unleashing a pain that she buries too deeply. When the others engage in torturing a young vampire for information on Mina, Vanessa does nothing to stop it. She will do what needs to be done to achieve her own ends. ( “We here have been brutalized with loss. It has made us brutal in return.” )

At her best, she can show incredible empathy towards those who suffer or seem lost, in part because she can see herself in them. On her own, she doesn’t seek out good deeds, but when guided towards them she will feel glad for any kindness offered to others. Part of that is selfish, too, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t kind; just that her kindness is difficult to shake from an ever present melancholy. She is forever in her own world─in the demimonde─and she often doesn't have any room left in her thoughts for the every-day concerns of most people.

Vanessa claims that her soul belongs to God, but at the same time admits that her soul is lost to the night. Which is it? This is her need as a human versus her want as an old god, and she’s unable to separate them or understand from which soul these desires come from. It's both her shame and her desire manifest. The truth is that she doesn't want a normal life, even while she envies those who revel in normalcy. She wants to want it, she knows it's what she should want, but in certain moments she can’t deny the Demon within. Just as a priest reminds her, the glory of suffering is uniquely hers. She’s not so quick to let go of her twisted divinity.

Growing up in Victorian England, Vanessa was best friends with Mina Murray. The two girls were inseparable, doing everything together from sharing a bed (probably not like that but also maybe kinda like that) to practicing taxidermy (like young girls do). One evening, Vanessa spotted Mina's father Sir Malcolm Murray having an affair with her own mother. It awakened something within her, and a part of her enjoyed watching the sexual deviance. Years later, Vanessa’s repression over her conflicting feelings for Mina and against Sir Malcolm finally boiled over. She grew more sexually reckless, beginning by kissing Mina’s brother and culminating in Vanessa seducing Mina's fiancé right in front of her. The families were forever torn apart. She prayed for her sins, but instead of God, “another answered”.

Not long after, Vanessa fell ill. Unbeknownst to her family, she had been possessed by the Devil. At a mental asylum, she underwent hydrotherapy (torture), and befriended an orderly. At one point, Vanessa was visited by visions of Lucifer and Dracula using the orderly’s guise, but she used her own powers through Verbis Diablo to scare them away (“You think you know evil? Here it stands”). This reveals that even though later on she is taught the language of Verbis Diablo, she already innately knew it. She nearly succeeded in convincing the doctor she was normal afterwards, but failed when he asked her about religion. After a trepanning, she was released back into her mother's care, and the memories surrounding the orderly became repressed. Vanessa was partially catatonic for awhile, but in the end the surgery was unsuccessful, and her mother died of a heart attack after seeing Vanessa possessed and having sex with Lucifer.

Some time after, Vanessa had a vision of Mina, who begged her former friend to find and save her. Determined to find Mina and understand her own powers, Vanessa sought out Joan Clayton, the Cut-Wife of Ballantree Moor, an infamous abortionist and hedgewitch (self-labeled a Daywalker) living in the moors of England. Under her tutelage, Vanessa learned more about her powers and others who would desire them; she also learned herbalism and other Daywalker skills such as blood totems. Joan taught her more about the Verbis Diablo, but cautioned her on its use or it could consume her soul. Joan told her that her magic was innate rather than learned, but it still needed to be honed; Vanessa had more raw power than Joan had ever seen, but she needed to learn to protect herself. ("I knew it the first time I felt you, this danger. I wanted to scream and bolt the door, curl up in my little bed and sleep and sleep. But you came closer. I felt you every step across the moor. ... I felt you walking to my door. Felt you standing there. By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.")

Witches in service to Lucifer (Nightcomers), led by a woman named Evelyn Poole, schemed to separate Vanessa from Joan and deliver the former to Lucifer. Evelyn helped convince a mob to execute Joan by burning her alive before they branded Vanessa's back with a cross and left her traumatized and alone. Joan had left the land to Vanessa in her deed, but Vanessa was too broken-hearted and bitter to stay. She also had a newfound purpose from the knowledge that Joan had bestowed upon her.

She left the moors soon after, eventually taking her new knowledge and seeking out Sir Malcolm to make amends for her past sins. The two agreed to work together to find Mina, despite old animosities towards one another.

( CONT. )

Vanessa: We here have been brutalized with loss. It has made us brutal in return.

Vanessa: Don't ask permission. If you want to do something, do it because it is your desire, not my allowance. You must risk rejection.

Dorian Gray: You have exceptional composure.
Vanessa: Do I?
Dorian: Poise, I mean.
Vanessa: Control.
Dorian: Yes. What if you were to abandon it?
Vanessa: I couldn't.
Dorian: Why?
Vanessa: There are things within a soul that can never be unleashed.
Dorian: What would happen if they were?
Vanessa: They would consume us. We would cease to be, and another would exist in our place, without control, without limits.

Vanessa: You're a terrible woman.
Joan Clayton: Not half so terrible as you. I knew it the first time I felt you, this danger. I wanted to scream and bolt the door, curl up in my little bed and sleep and sleep. But you came closer. I felt you every step across the moor. They felt you, too. They'll be here soon. I felt you walking to my door. Felt you standing there. 'By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes.'

Dr. Frankenstein: What is love but a kind of creature awaiting to be undone? A malady. What does it bring any of us but confusion and bedevilment? The Egyptians were hardly unique in that.
Ferdinand Lyle: Yes, but to them it was quite literal. They called it the Scorpion's sting, a kind of eternal infection that had no end, not in time or death. The Gods Amunet and Amun-Ra were immortal and their love was without end as well. According to the myth, if they were to become conjoined, 'All light would end and the world would live in darkness. The Hidden Ones would emerge and rule.'

Priest: (to Vanessa) If you have been touched by the Demon, it's like being touched by the back hand of God. It makes you sacred in a way, doesn't it? Makes you unique, with a kind of glory. The glory of suffering, even.

Lucifer: (to Vanessa) I want you to be the mother of evil. I want you to rule the darkness with me at my side. Looking over a black, scorched, dead world; where there is no more pain because there are no more hearts to feel. We have eaten them all, thee and me. And together, we will conquer God, topple him from his bloody throne, and rule in his stead everlasting.

Vanessa: My God is merciful and He will not abandon me.
Lucifer: He already has. You're not even a blade of grass to Him. Let us be as we were. Before there was time, there was thee and me. Before the scorpion crawled and the adder hissed. Back to when the Old Gods sang. And there was only thee, and there was only me. Give yourself to me freely. Be what you are and always were.

Vanessa: I am nothing. I am no more than a blade of grass. But I am. You think you know evil? Here it stands.