'I look out of the windows where the lights of Roma glow gold through the delicately twisted iron of the balcony. I am offered the world and I am still restless and empty. Then I sit on the chair in front of the dressing table and examine my reflection. The diamonds around my throat sparkle rainbow rays of light. They speak of infinity. But yet I do not.

I look at the cold beautiful girl in the mirror and begin to remove the make-up. Like Turandot, I am like ice yet I burn. Burn right through to the bone. And I feel nothing as I stare into her dark eyes as the last traces of smoky eyeshadow are wiped clean.'

After her near death in a horrible stage incident whilst performing the lead role in Carmen, Hungarian mezzo-soprano Natalija relocates to Roma. She begins to create a new life of success in the Italian opera houses and finds someone kind and loving to help her heal.

However, her old love emerges full of vengeance, furious that Natalija has taken someone new, especially since her own career in Hungary has been left tarnished after Carmen. Natalija realises her fragile new existence is little more than an illusion as she is once again immersed in the dark side of the Opera World.