Darren woke up to yelling. He kept his eyes closed.

"-absolute idiots! I told you to get a creature for the lessons! And what do you do? You kidnap an innocent eleven year old!"

The woman yelling had a British accent.

Eleven year old? What? He should look about thirteen right now. Then again, the other vampires had always said he looked like a ten year old, maybe they weren't exaggerating quite as much as Darren thought.

She was answered with a deeper, male voice, traces of shame in it. It was one of the people who'd kidnapped him, Darren recognized the voice.

"But Ma'am, he was feeding-"

"I realize that he's a vampire, you imbecile, but did you forget the peace treaty we have with the vampires!?"

Nope, they definitely meant him.

There was a moment of silence, then the one of the kidnappers uttered, "Shit."

The woman huffed in frustration, apparently done yelling. Darren relaxed a bit. A treaty with the vampires was good, they wouldn't hurt him more, probably.

He didn't even know how he'd gotten in the kidnappers' path, he should've sensed them long before they ambushed him. For some reason, he'd been woken up when they jumped him in the middle of the forest and not long, long before like he should have.

"You are going to wait until this boy wakes up," The woman said sternly, "and you are going to apologize to the poor boy."

"Yes ma'am." The two muttered in shame.

She sighed. "Here, help me get him out of the cage. Spells have little effect on a vampire."

Darren only had a moment to feel surprised as he realized these were the magicals Mr Crepsley had told him about, before his revelation was interrupted by hurried footsteps coming their way.

It took a few more moments for the people next to him to notice, and that probably only happened because they saw the person approaching.

The perks of having super senses.

"Filius!" The woman sounded surprised. "What's wrong?"

"Minerva!" The one Darren assumed to be Filius greeted, sounding out of breath. Darren was caught off guard at the unexpectedly high pitched, but definitely male voice. "A new name just appeared in the first year register!"

"What?" Minerva now sounded shocked. "This late?"

"Yes." Filius sounded confused. "I tracked the name, thinking that maybe the child just entered the country, but imagine my surprise when it led me to Hagrid's.. hut..."

He trailed off, presumably having finally noticed Darren laying in the cage. "Erm."

"This is a vampire those two ministry morons kidnapped." Minerva explained, huffing in indignation. Then she fell silent. "Filius, you don't think-" She cut herself off, disbelieving.

"What are the chances of that boy's name being Darren Shan?" Filius asked weakly.

"But- is that even possible? It's unheard of!"

At this point Darren's curiosity got the best of him, and he sat up, finally opening his eyes. "What's unheard of?"

A moment of silence later, he muttered a quiet, "Ow," as he'd hit his head on the ceiling of the small cage.

This seemed to break the shocked silence as Minerva, a older, stern looking woman, rushed over to open the cage.

"Oh my, I'm so sorry." She spoke hastily. "It seems a Creatures Collection Unit forgot our alliance, and had kidnapped you."

Darren nodded in acceptance, stepping out of the cage. It really was a horribly small cage. "Sure, apology accepted. But, what's unheard of?"

"Ah, yes." She hesitated. "Would your name happen to be... Darren Shan?" She looked to the small man next to her, which Darren guessed to be 'Filius', since he was the only other person left in the small room. The two kidnappers must've left at some point. The man nodded to confirm she'd gotten the name right.

"Yeah- s, it is..." Darren trailed off awkwardly. Halfway through his casual "Yeah," he'd remembered the etiquette Paris had taught him. He was a prince now, and he would be one of the vampires representing the entire race, so he had to learn to act the part.

"Well, then," she said, standing a little straighter, "Mr Shan, you are hereby officially invited to Hogwarts, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

I'm just amazed I remembered Paris' name. It's been at least four years since I read Vampire Prince. (That's also my excuse for any OOCness, btw)