INES JULIETTE DUVAL
EARLY LIFE
The Duvals were a once-prominent family of apothecaries and cathedral perfumers, blending oils, incense, and healing tinctures for both clergy and nobility. Their name was whispered with both reverence and fear. They claimed their lineage traced back to court alchemists in the House of Valois and had long held secrets of scent, memory, and soul.Her father, Émile Duval, was known for crafting perfumed elixirs that cured melancholy—and allegedly stirred madness. Her mother, Sabine, was silent, cold, and always veiled. Rumors said she never aged. Ines grew up in rooms filled with dried herbs, flasks of animal blood, myrrh, and graveyard roses. She always knew: memories can be bottled. Desire can be distilled.TRANSFORMATION
Ines was transformed during the summer of 1810, at the age of 24. After a scandalous, forbidden affair with a visiting Hungarian nobleman named Valentin Harcsa, she was lured to Paris under the promise of elopement. Instead, she was betrayed—gifted to an ancient vampire as payment for a blood debt. She was meant to die in ritual sacrifice, her blood used in a rare aphrodisiac serum. But instead of draining her completely, the vampire tasted her essence and chose to transform her—driven by the unique potency of her blood. He called it “the perfume of grief.” She awoke changed—starving, confused, and overwhelmed by scent. She couldn’t remember who she was, or where she belonged. All that whispered to her was the name Duval.In Avignon, Émile Duval was often spotted weeping beside a gravestone that bore no body—only a name: Genevieve Adeline Duval, 1786–1810. His beloved daughter had vanished one July night, never to be seen again. The city whispered of foul play, of lovers and betrayal, of something ancient waking beneath the stones. But no body was found. No killer was caught.
Only the scent of her perfume lingered in her empty bedroom. The Duval home was abandoned and knocked down not long after. Genevieve was never seen again, but sometimes, in the vault beneath her boutique, when she passes a certain scent,
she remembers briefly— a garden in Avignon. A warm hand. A love that maimed her.Ines is obsessed with memory. Not just the memories of others—but her own, fractured the night she died. Stolen. Rewritten. Rewound. What remains are fragments. Now, every fragrance she creates is an act of resurrection, each one trying to reconstruct a feeling, a betrayal, or a ghost of her past. She doesn't just bottle emotions. She chases what she’s lost.GROWTH
For decades, Ines wandered Europe as a ghost, eventually realising that she had to rebuild a life for herself. In Vienna, she studied under a forgotten olfactory chemist. In Venice, she learned to trap dreams in oils. In 1912, she created her first true magical perfume—Lament No. 1 (later refined to become Lament No. 2)—based on a pianist she loved and drained during the final note of a nocturne. She realised then: perfume was her weapon. Not brute seduction. Not force. But scent. Scent as memory. Scent as control.In 1923, under the cover of the Belle Époque’s dying glamor, she opened her first shop in Paris: Nocturne Parfumerie. The boutique became a whispered secret among the elite, its velvet-curtained interior smelling of antique sorrow and burning roses. It has never closed since.
NOCTURNE PARFUMERIE
OVERVIEW
Ines owns “Nocturne Parfumerie”, a luxury fragrance house with a cult following. Unbeknownst to her customers, her perfumes are laced with subtle enchantments—obsession, lust, memory loss, mind control. Each scent is based on a victim. These perfumes are also how she tracks her prey. Nocturne Parfumerie is the #1 cult luxury fragrance house in Europe, with flagship boutiques in Paris, Milan, and Tokyo. The brands motto is, “Memory is the most seductive scent.”Each fragrance is inspired by a memory, emotion, or sin—packaged only in small bottles. They are sold in extremely limited releases (only 666 bottles per run).FRAGRANCE LIST
Lament No. 2 – evokes longing and loss (infused with the ashes of a doomed romance)
Velour Sang – a deep red musk with blood-binding properties
Mirage d’Amour – creates obsessive attachment in those who smell it
Le Pacte – allows a mortal to see glimpses of a past life… but never the whole truthEvery perfume contains trace amounts of blood—Be it her own, or that of her lovers, enemies, and occasionally, willing devotees. It’s the true source of their emotional potency. Each fragrance is also laced with subtle magic—used to manipulate memories, emotions, desires, or even control minds.INES’ INVOLVEMENT
Ines is a reclusive yet revered icon in the luxury fashion and fragrance world. She is known for her haunting beauty, timeless grace, and piercing blue eyes. She claims that the sun “doesn’t suit her complexion.” Every blend released is personally approved by Ines herself—each one tells a story, often based on her own experiences. Her personal scent, known only as Ines, is not for sale—but it’s said that anyone who smells it dreams of her forever. The original vials of every perfume ever made, along with the items or remains used to create them are kept in a locked vault beneath her flagship store.