Dracula attracted a lot of attention, walking through the lobby while carrying a wriggling, raspy thing in his arms. The girl sounded like a hoarse banshee, faint and scratchy "raaagh!" noises leaving her. For a sick child, she had a lot of spirit.

That was admirable, really.

"Is there a… problem?" one guest asked awkwardly as he passed the front desk, Mavis watching him.

"No, no problem at all, don't mind us."

"Don't eat me!" the child rasped. One of the only things he'd actually heard her say.

"Oh, stop it," Drac said as they reached the elevator. He tugged his cape away from her face, letting him see her properly. "Nobody's going to eat you." He smiled. "You wouldn't even taste that good."

Judging by the look of wide-eyed horror, his half-joke didn't land at all.

"Never mind." The elevator doors opened and he stepped inside, bundling her tighter in case she tried to make another getaway. "But really, you are in so much trouble now."

Slowly, the girl's bravado seemed to vanish, and he felt her trembling.

The fact made his heart crack a little. He hadn't been trying to scare her. Dracula sighed as the pair waited out the elevator ride. "Alright, maybe not too much trouble. But you gave everyone heart attacks and you could have been hurt. We're trying to help you, girl."

She said nothing. But she did slump miserably, hiding the lower half of her face in the fabric wrapped around her. She wouldn't be able to escape now. She'd already been caught, and now they'd be guarding her even more fiercely.

The vampire was still talking as the doors opened with another ding. "I know you don't believe us, but it's the truth." He stepped out, heading back for the room she'd been kept in.

She curled up tighter, already dreading going back in there.

What kind of torture would they put her through now that she tried to run?


"Wait, 'keeping a child?'"

Mavis lifted her hands, shushing her uncles. She glanced around just to make sure nobody had overheard them; fortunately, nobody did. She turned back, lowering her voice to a whisper. "It's just because there's no other choice. We can't bring her to a hospital, we don't know where else she can go. We're just helping her until we can find her parents."

One of Griffin's lenses arched downward a bit. "Why can't she go to a hospital?"

Mavis paused for a moment, biting her lower lip. No, no, this was okay. They'd have to find out sooner or later, it was safe for them to know. "She's a selkie," she whispered. "Ericka found her in the lake."

"A s-"

"Shh!" Mavis's eyes widened as she frantically motioned for Frank to quiet. "That's why we can't send her anywhere. We don't know if we can trust anyone else with her."

"But a selkie… she probably thinks she can't trust you."

"I know…" Mavis sighed, lowering her hands. "But there's no other choice." She looked towards the elevator, thinking of the look of fear on the child's face, her poor little limbs with bruising, how quickly she'd run out of energy, how red the inside of her throat had looked when she took a quick glance… "I just hope something changes soon."


Johnny grinned and held the spoon of chocolate syrup out. "Okay. Let's try this again."

"I can't believe we let you talk us into this," Dracula grumbled. He sat in the armchair by the bed, the girl still wrapped up like a burrito, holding her still. Ericka hovered next to them, ready to help, and the girl… looked like an angry cat.

Dennis had crashed and fell asleep shortly before Dracula and the girl had gotten back to her room, which freed up Johnny to help. And by 'help,' apparently he meant 'laugh at them and try his own original idea.'

"I told you to try the bubblegum one, Ericka," he had said, mixing chocolate and cough syrup into a teaspoon.

"I thought honey would be easier on her throat, ugh…"

"Well, we tried Plan Ericka, now let's try Plan Johnny."

And now he sat in front of them, aiming the spoon at the girl's face. "Come on, kid, it doesn't even taste bad. It's chocolate, literally everyone loves chocolate."

She just glowered at him.

"You can't even taste the medicine. You won't even notice!"

The 'angry cat' look intensified. Ericka got the feeling if the girl could hiss, she would have. "Maybe we should try something else…" she began.

Johnny sighed loudly, turning his head away and slouching his shoulders, the spoon lowering. "Yeeaah, you're right, she's obviously too smart to - now!"

In the few seconds he'd been speaking, the girl had started to relax, just a little bit. Enough to ease her shoulders and unclench her jaw. But on "now!" Ericka quickly leaned in to put her hands on either side of her head, and Johnny took advantage of her brief moment of shock to pop the spoon into her open mouth.

The girl grimaced, eyes going wide… and then she paused. Frowned. Swallowed.

Then shook her head and made an exaggerated face, sticking her tongue out.

"Oh, don't act like that," Drac scoffed, inwardly relieved that it had actually worked. "You're fine."

"I'm telling ya. Chocolate syrup trick. Worked all the time when I was a kid."

"Right, and how many sheets did the chocolate stain?"

"Oh, c'mon, Drac, it's fine. See, not a drop spilled anywhere." Johnny twirled the spoon between his fingers like a revolver before shoving it into his pocket. (Drac winced.) "Give it about five minutes and you'll start to feel a difference, kid, trust me."

The girl gave him a withering look. But they did notice that some of the discomfort left her expression, as if the medication was already soothing her throat.

To Drac, it almost looked like the faces Mavis would make with the old tonic recipes, how she'd try to keep the twisted, sour expression even as her throat slowly began to feel better.

Something in his chest pinged.

Ericka sighed and knelt down next to the chair. She put one hand on the girl's face, gently making her look at her. "Hey," she said. "We're sorry we had to do that. But we're not trying to hurt you. We want to help you."

The girl just stared, eyebrows rising.

"We're going to help you get well, and we need you to cooperate with us. If you'll let us help you, we promise, this will go a lot easier, and we won't try to trick you again."

That stare of hers intensified. She hugged the cape tighter around herself.

And somehow, that image made something click in Drac's brain. He adjusted his hold on her, and sighed. "Would it help if we told you where your coat was?"

She snapped her head up to look at him.

"We're not holding you hostage. We're keeping your coat safe. It's hanging in our closet, in the next room." He saw her eyes dart from his face to the door, gears turning in her head. "We're too far away from any oceans and rivers. We can't send you away yet, you're not strong enough. Just let us help you until we find your parents. Okay?"

Something shifted in her expression at the mention of parents. She looked away.

"You don't have to like us," he went on, not noticing how intensely Johnny was looking at the three of them, "but trust us?"

A long silence that seemed to stretch on forever.

And then the tiniest, barest of nods.