Spots 
Six-year-old Laura sleeps in the secluded schloss in Styria when a breathtaking female visitor enters her bedroom. The phantom lies beside her on the bed, comforting her before sharp needles pierce her breast. Though no visible wound remains, the unsettling memory lingers into her adulthood as a harbinger of terror.
News arrives that General Spielsdorf's young niece has died of a sudden, mysterious illness, canceling her planned visit to Styria. That evening, an elegant carriage overturns outside Laura's castle gates. A highborn woman leaves her frail, unconscious daughter Carmilla to recover at the schloss for three months.
Laura and Carmilla instantly recognize one another from identical childhood visions experienced twelve years prior. Carmilla displays intense, languid affection toward Laura while keeping her own lineage and past completely secret. Her passionate emotional outbursts shift unpredictably between tender love and sinister intensity.
Carmilla follows a strange daily routine, remaining asleep until noon and locking her bedroom door from the inside every night. She declines to participate in family prayers or religious discussion, growing visibly agitated at any mention of sacred rituals. Her languid walks through the grounds conceal a disturbing, predatory fascination with her host.
An itinerant restorer cleans a batch of heirloom portraits belonging to Laura's family line. One painting, dated 1698, depicts Mircalla, Countess Karnstein, a long-dead ancestor of the local region. The portrait matches Carmilla in every physical detail, down to the small mole on her neck.
A fatal wasting sickness sweeps through the nearby village, taking the lives of several young women who report nocturnal visions of a shadowy phantom. Laura soon experiences a heavy, unexplainable exhaustion that settles over her mind as night falls. A sensation of cold atmosphere and impending dread fills her bedchamber.
Laura wakes in darkness to witness a giant, soot-black feline beast pacing across her bedroom floor. The creature leaps onto her bed, inflicting a sharp pain in her neck before shifting into a female form. Carmilla appears at the foot of the bed, then vanishes through the locked chamber door without opening it.
Laura suffers physical decay as her strength drains away each night. She feels a burning sensation like hot needles pressing against her neck, accompanied by hypnotic dreams that paralyze her body. Despite her growing physical weakness, she remains helplessly drawn to Carmilla's comforting presence.
A physician arrives at the castle to examine Laura's failing health and discovers a small blue spot over her jugular vein. He quietly alerts her father that Laura suffers from a deadly nocturnal parasite. He insists that Laura must never be left unaccompanied, particularly during the nighttime hours.
Laura travels with her father to the ruined village of Karnstein to seek spiritual counsel. En route, they encounter General Spielsdorf, who is stricken with grief following the tragic death of his ward, Bertha. The General reveals he has traveled to the region specifically to hunt down the monster that preyed upon his child.
General Spielsdorf recounts how a mysterious guest named Millarca entered his home under circumstances identical to Carmilla's arrival. Bertha rapidly deteriorated under Millarca's presence, experiencing the same punctures and nighttime paralysis currently afflicting Laura. The General realized too late that an ancient force was feeding on his ward.
A doctor hid inside Bertha's room at night and witnessed Millarca in her true form drinking the girl's blood. Before the men could strike her down, Millarca slipped away into thin air, leaving Bertha to die hours later. The General vows to locate the Karnstein crypt to destroy the fiend permanently.
An old woodman near the Karnstein ruins directs the party to the long-forgotten burial place of Countess Mircalla. Carmilla suddenly appears among the crumbling stone walls, prompting General Spielsdorf to recognize her instantly as Millarca. He raises an axe to strike, unmasking her true identity before Laura's eyes.
Carmilla stops the General's swinging axe with superhuman force before evaporating into the shadows of the ruins. Baron Vordenburg, an authority on vampirism, joins the party with historical documents detailing the destruction of the Karnstein bloodline. He leads the men toward the hidden tomb where Mircalla rests.
An official commission opens Countess Mircalla's tomb, discovering her body immersed in blood, warm and breathing after a century and a half. The officials drive an oak stake through her heart, sever her head, and burn her remains to ashes. The ashes are cast into the river, eradicating the vampire's curse from the land.
Laura spends a year traveling through Italy with her father to rebuild her shattered health. Though the physical wounds heal, the psychological shadow of Carmilla lingers in her memory forever. She continually recalls her visitor with a haunting mixture of profound affection and terrifying horror.
A young woman in isolated Styria falls under the hypnotic, lethal spell of a mysterious nocturnal guest.