Kate opened her eyes. Her head was groggy and ached terribly. Her back felt like it was broken in half. Scott was leaning over her and his face was barely three inches from her own. She tried to sit up, only to fail and be helped by her older brother.

"What happened?" She asked quietly. The last thing she could remember was thinking that she was going to die at the hands of Dracula.

"He threw you back in and you hit the wall pretty hard. Are you OK?" Ever the one to worry only about the safety of others, his eyes watched her carefully. Just like Dad, she thought.

She nodded and looked around them. The air as not clear, but murky; it had an odour, and unpleasant smell of decay, of old rotting things, and of dead things left unburied, and because it was cloudy with dust, everything seemed to move, to simmer, especially in the darker gloomier corners.

Only the one window that they had just leaned out of would be able to let the light in on them, but it was simply a hole, no glass covering it, so it would get easily cold later in the night. The floor was covered in wide wooden planks, soft and rotting. There was enough old furniture in this room to furnish several small houses. Dark, massive wardrobes, and chamber pots, and many other things. Only everything that seemed of value was draped over by sheets where dust had accumulated to turn the white cloth a dingy grey. Dozens of old leather-bound trunks with heavy brass locks and corners lined one entire wall, each trunk stuck all over with world travel labels. Big trunks, fit for coffins.

Subdued by the immense room, and Dracula's threat, until now, Serena let out a howl that took Kate swiftly from her observations and back to the here and now, which was where she didn't want to be. Dracula's voice echoed in my mind. Any loud noise I can hear from outside this corridor will result in punishment. That is what he had said to them, and with this thought in her head, she ran over to hush her sister.

Serena hit at Kate, and Scott, as they tried to calm her, yelling how much she wanted her home, but the more we tried to help, the louder she screamed. In the end, the only solution was Scott covering her mouth, but it was already too late.

The door burst open so quickly it made them all jump, causing Scott to remove his hand from her mouth. "Stop that child screaming this instant!" Dracula commanded. Kate knew, just from looking at his stone cold face, that he would know exactly how to shut Serena up, and at once. However, sitting on Kate's other knee was a little boy whose eyes grew wide as he stared up at the vampire – someone who threatened his twin. She jumped down from Kate's lap despite her efforts to keep him still, and was now standing in front of him. Planting her small feet wide apart, Serena threw back her head and really let it go! It reminded Kate of one of the singers in the opera Momma had taken them too a few years so, her former cries seemed like weak mewing from a small kitten, but now she was a tigress, enraged.

Kate was impressesd, awed and terrified at the same time of what happened next.

The tall scary vampire seized hold of Serena's hair, lifting her up enough to make Alex pounce on him. Faster than they could wink, he ran to bite Dracula's leg. Kate cringed inside, knowing that they were all in for it now. Dracula simply gazed down at him, then shook him off like one does a small annoying lap-dog. But the bite did make him release Serena's hair. Down she dropped to the floor, to quickly to scamper to her feet, and take a quick swipe, just missing the Dracula's leg with her foot.

Not to be outdone by his twin sister, Alex raised his little white shoe, took careful aim, and then kicked the vampire's leg as hard as he could manage. In the meanwhile, Serena scuttled over to the corner where she crouched down and wailed like an Irish banshee in ancient legends set on fire! It was indeed a scene worthy of remembering and recording.

So far Alex hadn't said a work, or uttered one cry, as was his silent as resolute way. But no one was going to hurt or threaten his sister – even if that 'no one' stood close to six feet, and weighed in close to two hundred pounds. And Alex was small for his age.

If Alex didn't like what was happening to Serena or the potential, now almost certain, threat to himself, Dracula didn't like what was happening to him either! He glared down at his small defiant, angry face, which was tilted up to his. Dracula waited for him to cower, to take to scowl from his face, and the defiance from his brown eyes, but he stood determinedly from her, daring, challenging her to do her worst. Kate and Scott only stood there watching, amazed at his bravery, but then Alex did not know about their parents previous meeting with him and what this monster was capable of.

Dracula's thin and colourless lips tightened into a fine crooked pencil line. Up came his hand – a huge heavy hand flashing this chunky gold rings. Alex didn't flinch, his only reaction to this very obvious threat was a deeper, more fierce scowl as his small hands knotted into fists raised in a fighting technique. Did he think he could fight her and win? Kate tried to call Alex's name to stop him, but her voice was so choked it was only a whisper.

Decided on his course of action now, Dracula delivered his round, defiant baby face a stinging slap so hard it sent him reeling! He stumbled backwards, then fell to the floor, but was up in a flash, spinning around to consider a fresh assault against the huge mountain of hateful flesh. His decision was then a pitiful thing. He faltered, reconsidered and common sense won out over anger. He scampered over to where Serena crouched, half crawling, half running, and then flinging his arms around her, they knelt, holding one to the other, cheeks pressed to cheek and he added his siren howl to hers.

"They are your siblings – shut them up!" Dracula screamed over them.

However, the buttercup twins, one started, were practically impossible to quiet. Reasoning never reached their ears. They only heard their own terror, and like horses running as fast as they could, they had to rundown from pure exhaustion.

But this wasn't their room; there was no time for them to wind down. This one room wasn't their own mansion, and in here the twins held their captive audience painfully enthralled. They screamed until their faces went from red to magenta, and then on to purple. Their brown eyes, so much like their mothers, went glassy and unfocused from their combined efforts.

Apparently, until now Dracula had been held mesmerized by such a display. Then whatever had held him motionless released its spell. He came alive. Purposefully he strode over the corner where the twins were huddled. Own he reached to seize them up ruthlessly, by their scruffs, two yelling children. Holding them stiff-armed away from him, as they kicked, hollered, and flailed their arms, trying to ineffectively inflict some injury on their tormentor, the twins were hauled up before Kate and Scott. Then down on the floor they were dropped like so much unwanted trash. In a loud firm voice that punctured through their yelling, he stated flatly. "I will whip you both until the blood runs from you skin if you don't stop yelling this very instant."

That inhuman quality, plus the cold force of the appalling threat, convinced the twins, and Scott and Kate, that he meant exactly what he had said. In astonished and horrible belief the twins stared up at her – and with open mouths they choked of their cries. They knew what blood was, and pain came with it. It hurt to see them handled to brutally, as if he didn't care if frail bones broke, or tender flesh was bruised.

Kate's P.O.V

It was then, on the first of many nights in that cold dark room, that I first questioned my faith. I floundered in a maelstrom of uncertainty, aching inside, not knowing who or what I was, if I had the right to be living on an earth the Lord reserved for those born with his blessings and permission. In the space of a few moments, we had been separated from everything we held dear to out heart: our home, our friends, our possessions, and most of all, our mother and father. How I missed them so. That night I no longer believed that God was the perfect judge. So, in a way, I lost God too.

Daddy always said that he was the left had of God, once best friends almost, he had told me I had angel blood, which is why I looked nothing like my mother or my father, and hadn't Dracula called me Angel Valerious a few days ago? If Dad was that close to God, and I was an angel of heaven, why was this happening? As far as any of us were aware, we had not sinned or betrayed God. We were taken unwillingly by a creature of hell to be treated poorly in return for my death, for I knew in the bottom of my heart that that was what this was all about. Me. He wanted me so badly, he was willing to destroy everything I loved to do so, I understood this from the moment Momma told me. What I didn't understand though, was why God was letting this occur.