Sorry this is so late, I've been ill! Hopefully I can get back on schedule now. I'd love some reviews if you'd like to leave any. Enjoy!
SPOILERS if you're not up to date on YD5, and it won't make much sense either.
Disclaimer: This is a shameless rip-off of a CBBC programme I in no way own.
Renfield and Wolfie stood in the courtard together, surrounded by long strands of hair that seemed to be forming tumbleweed-like balls to roll away on the breeze.
"Sunlight. As it turns out, the antidote to my hair restoring potato juice... is just sunlight."
"Does this mean I can't have a long bushy beard any more?" Wolfie sounded quite crestfallen, so Renfield patted his shoulder in comfort.
"Not until you're older, I'm afraid, Wolfie." The boy peered up at him curiously.
"Will you have long hair again, Renfield?"
"...Not until I'm younger. Come on, let's go and have dinner and then I'll let you look through my wigs and costumes. I might have a beard in there somewhere you can borrow."
"So, Dad. Here's the thing. See, this... guest, we've got coming."
"The sculptor, yes. No, no, over there." Ingrid rolled her eyes and walked out, leaving Vlad to move a bedside table to the other side of the bed.
"Yeah, the sculptor. Her name's... Sally." His father dropped the pillow he'd been fussing over.
"The Sally, the breather Sally, the one we agreed never to mention again?"
"My mum, Sally, yes."
"I expressly forbid you not to find her-"
"But I did. And she'll be here soon."
"Vladimir! What if she recognises me? What if she's been pining for me all these years?"
"I doubt it, since she's coming with someone called George."
"She- what? Well- you shouldn't have invited her, Vladdy!" The bell at the front desk rang.
"Too late. Stay out of sight." And he sped downstairs to beat Renfield to it.
The woman standing in the foyer was facing away from him, looking around with interest at the school building – he supposed he should say the hotel, now, if his father was really going to go ahead with this – and he took the opportunity to just look, trying to gather his courage. This was his mother. He cleared his throat awkwardly and she spun round.
"Welcome. You must be Sally."
"Yes." It took him a moment to realise that he should introduce himself.
"I'm Vlad. It's... great to have you here." He hesitated for a moment. "Is... George parking the car?"
"George? No, George can't drive." As she spoke, a young girl made her way through the front doors and looked around in awe.
"Wow. This is really creepy."
"...And this is George," Sally – his mother – concluded. "My daughter." Vlad was stunned into silence again, so it was fortunate that Wolfie chose that moment to come trotting down the stairs, kitted out in a bellboy uniform Vlad suspected Renfield was wearing an exact copy of.
"Welcome to our hotel. I'm Wolfie. Everyone else here is a vampire, but I'm half-werewolf, half-vampire. Can I show you to your room?" Sally agreed, charmed, and before Vlad could react, they were disappearing up the stairs, George advising Wolfie that although it was a really cool idea, she didn't think you could be a vampire and a werewolf and that he needed to change his story.
Vlad had a little sister. And his mother was here.
Ingrid appreciated a good sculpture as much as the next girl, but nothing was going to make her socialise with breathers. Instead, she'd spent the last hours of daylight repacking her suitcase before taking off the moment evening fell. Landing at the Council entrance ready for her networking weekend, she was surprised to find Warnock standing at the door taking cloaks and handing out name-badges with a long-suffering air.
"Morgan said if I wanted you to be a delegate so much, I could help with your duties," he told her as she handed him her cloak with a grin. "I don't suppose you'd care to join me?" She almost told him to flap off, but it occurred to her that checking people in would also be an excellent chance to get a handle on who she'd be dealing with over the weekend.
"Move over, then. Let's get this over with so we can go and introduce a few influential coffin-lodgers to the future." She paused to smile sweetly at a new arrival and hand over his badge while Warnock hung up his cloak. "...Or at least the recent past."
"She's still exceptionally beautiful," his father was saying, "for a breather, of course."
"Dad, just stay away from her. If she sees you, we're for it." Vlad strode off down the corridor, intending to see how his guests were settling in.
"You spoil all my fun, Vladimir!" He ignored the shout that followed him, knocked, and stuck his head around the door of the guest room they'd prepared earlier.
"Is everything OK in here?" Wolfie was still sitting in there, to Vlad's surprise, and neither Sally nor George seemed to mind. The latter, however, sprung to her feet.
"I can't bunk in with Mum, she snores. Wolfie said I should tell you."
"Oh! Well, er... we can't have you being kept awake all night. Come with me, and we'll see what other rooms are available."
As it turned out, George was quite hard to please, and having tried out Vlad's coffin – 'lame', the Count's coffin – 'uncomfortable', and Wolfie's room – 'smells of boy' she soon decided that she'd rather stay in her mum's room after all.
"What's your name?" She asked, as they were walking back towards the room.
"Vlad." She shook her head.
"No, your real name!"
"Er... Vlad." She grinned at him.
"Oh, I see. Stay in character. That's good. Hey, we've got the same freckles!" She grinned, holding her wrist to his, and he realised she was right.
"Yeah, I bet loads of people have. Let's find your mum. I should get Wolfie out of your hair, too, get Renfield to make you some dinner. I'll fetch you a menu." This last was addressed to Sally – his mum – as he firmly took Wolfie's arm and led him downstairs.
Every single council member at the networking weekend seemed to be competing to be the most boring vampire alive. Additionally, it turned out that only the first night was devoted to actual networking, while the second was given over entirely to a hunt she wasn't invited to. Having discovered this an hour before dawn, Ingrid was left with no choice but to collect her suitcase and return home.
When she did, the place reeked of breather. She found her father, after a brief search, hiding in an empty classroom.
"Dad? What's going on?"
"Hm? Oh, nothing. I was just... trying to visualise what we're going to do with this room. I thought maybe an ebony frame for the bed-"
"Don't treat me like an idiot. I don't have that many of your genes. There are breathers in the school. Why?"
"Oh, that's... just... Renfield, he's particularly disgusting today-"
"No. Female. Try again."
"He's trying on a new perfume-?"
"Fine. I'll find out for myself."
Vlad was standing by, ready to take his guests' breakfast orders. Renfield had almost had a meltdown over dinner the previous evening, so he hoped they wouldn't want anything too complicated.
"Do you think Adam would want toast or cereal?" George asked, and her mother shook her head.
"I really don't know, George. Maybe we'll ask him some time." Wolfie, who had been hovering around since the entire household had risen at the crack of dawn, piped up curiously.
"Who's Adam?"
"My big brother," George told him, and Vlad choked. Another sibling?
"You've got an older brother?"
"I gave him up for adoption when he was just a baby," Sally explained, "George has never met him. But he'd be about your age now, so he'll be eighteen soon, and we're going to try to find him. Make sure he's alright."
"You're... going to look for him...? That's... that's great. Excuse me, I just need to check something with the kitchen."
He left the room, but he didn't go to the kitchen. Adam? He would have been called Adam... and now they were going to try to hunt him down. And they were going to find vampires, and hate him, and...
"Dad. We've got to get rid of them."
"I'll say. Ingrid's home."
At that moment, there was a scream from downstairs.
Ingrid had walked into the dining room to find the breathers waiting for her.
"Well, this is a turn-up for the books. Delivered directly to the table."
"Hello!" The smallest breather smiled at her. "Do you live here too? I love your costume."
"It's not a costume, it's designer. Now stay still while I bite you."
"Oh, I know you want to practice," the older breather interrupted, "but can it wait until we've had breakfast and I've spoken to Vlad about the sculpture?" Ingrid frowned, realising at last that these breathers were here for other reasons than their nutritional value.
"...Fine," she said at last, "but if anyone asks, I terrified you and you screamed."
"Oh, I can do that," the little one assured her, and promptly let out an ear-splitting screech. "There. Now it's not even lying," she said with a wink.
"George! Keep the noise down a bit, hm? We're guests here." The older breather looked up at Ingrid with a smile. "I'm Sally, and this is George."
"Ingrid... Count." She raised an eyebrow. "Charmed, I'm sure. Have-?" She was spared the necessity of asking where her brother was, however, by his sudden appearance in the doorway, alongside their father.
"Leave them alone, Ingrid-"
"She really scared me," the little one – George – said, trying to be helpful.
"Ingrid!" But while Vlad rounded on her, the woman – Sally – was staring at the Count as if she'd seen a ghost.
"It's you. It's... you, I-" Then she was turning to Vlad, eyes scanning him eagerly for- well, something Ingrid couldn't begin to guess. "You, are... are you my son?" Vlad's heartbroken expression said it all, but Ingrid couldn't help asking all the same, barely noticing as Wolfie attached himself to her legs, unsettled by all the confusion.
"Vlad? Are you her son?"