Successful writer and scholar Jonathan Merrick falls under the spell of the irresistible, bewitchingly beautiful Ligeia. Shes fighting a fatal illness and she will stop at nothing to defeat death, her one true enemy. She steals other peoples souls and on her quest to immortality she tricks Jonathan into supporting her work, breaking him apart from his fiancé Rowena and pulling him into her dark, mysterious world. They settle down in an old manor by the Black Sea where Ligeias everlasting presence slowly drives Jonathan to madness.