Arran drove as fast as he dared, he could get all the speeding tickets in the world and he wouldn't care, but getting pulled over would be a problem. He had sent an SOS text to his mother with a brief explanation of what was happening and she was on her way but he would probably still be the first one there.

Exactly what he was going to do he had no idea. All he knew from Cynthia was that there was more than one of them, he didn't know who they were or what kind of powers they possessed or even where they were from. If they were European then just knowing the name Redfern should be enough to protect her, but if they weren't it was no guarantee.

It was early evening and the traffic in the city was infuriatingly slow. Now that he couldn't even focus on driving, his panic started to build. Every second that he spent stuck behind a Toyota at a roundabout with a driver too timid to get on the road was a second hat Cynthia was in danger.

At about two miles from the hotel he parked at the side of a road and started to run. It was a lot further than he usually ran and he certainly wasn't dressed for it, but he kept going. His only plan was to grab Cynthia and get her out, retribution could wait.

By the time he got to the hotel room he could feel his own pulse beating hard all over his body. Panting, he banged his fist on the door, not stopping until it opened.

He barely saw the vampire who opened the door, as soon as he saw that it wasn't Cynthia he shoved the man and sped past him into the room. The only clear thing was Cynthia, sitting on the arm of a worn sofa, looking scared but alive.

She jumped up at the sight of him and he grabbed her into a hug, he couldn't believe that she was ok. He had been so certain that she'd be seriously hurt or even dead and he wouldn't have been quick enough to save her.

He tilted her head up to get a proper look at her and his fingers were met with cool, sticky blood. There was a lot of it.

"Are you ok?" He asked, looking back between the blood on his hands and her. She nodded quickly, still wide eyed.

Arran turned to face the three vampires in the room who had grouped together on the other side of the room. Now that he had a chance to look around he saw that the room was very low quality and the vampires themselves were dressed in old clothes, clearly not men of any significant power.

Arran was reconsidering his plan of getting Cynthia out without starting a fight. Now that he knew she was ok, albeit hurt, he had more room to be angry. He targeted the taller one in the front, the one that looked more sure of himself.

"She told you that she was with me, why did you bite her?" His voice shook, but not with fear.

The three of them shared an uncertain glance, it seemed like the taller one was in charge here, he seemed like he was unsure what the problem was.

"Chill out man," he said in an American drawl, "she's not hurt."

"Arran, I'm fine, let's just go," she whispered, grabbing his hand.

He could feel the tackiness of her blood between their fingers. It made him want to lash out. But she was right, he had a perfect opportunity to get her out of harm's way. He could meet up with his mother and send her after the group of vampires later. She would be a far greater threat than him, an insignificant 18-year-old. He took a breath and made to pull Cynthia toward the door. The tall prick clearly thought that he had won something.

"Little advice, kid," he goaded, clearly for the benefits of his friends, "in the states we're better at keeping our pets tagged. It makes things less confusing."

Arran turned back to face him, he couldn't help himself. To these guys any human not directly under his protection was fair game and anyone who was with him was a pet. He couldn't stand the thought of anyone thinking about Cynthia or James or Naomi like that nor any human being anywhere on the planet.

"What the fuck did you just say about my friend?" Arran was right in his face, the other two were both sitting on the bed, unsure if they should get up.

"Friend? I know you brits are polite but that's the kind of euphemistic shit that winds up in misunderstandings like this. Claim anyone you want and tourists like us won't bother you."

"We do things a little differently in this country. My family run this county, you can't kill here and you can't bite anyone without their consent."

"Across the whole county? That's-"

"Brice maybe we shouldn't upset the locals," interrupted one of the others, a short, plump worried looking man who appeared to be in his thirties. Arran wondered how old he really was.

The vampire named Brice shot the other one an irritated glance but seemed to reconsider his directness. "Who is your family? How long have you even been a vampire, kid? You look young."

"All my life," replied Arran. Even if they didn't know who or what he was, he thought that being born a vampire should carry some weight. He was right.

"Brice for shit's sake, you can't fuck with a natural born," said the vampire who had spoken before. Even the remaining one, who had been heretofore impassive looked alarmed.

"I'm not a natural born, I'm a Redfern." If they didn't know to fear the family name, Arran was going to find a way to make sure that they learned.

"And why exactly should I care about that?" Asked Brice, drawing himself up to his full height and looking down at Arran as his cohorts looked panicked.

There was a calm knock at the door and Arran could hear his name being called beyond it, it sounded like backup was here.

"I'd say a rather good reason for you to care about that is about to walk through the door," he actually found himself smiling, Celyn would be able to sort this all out. She'd be able to scare them into not hurting anyone else, at least not here. "Cynthia, would you mind getting the door?"

She moved over to the door slowly, looking more dazed than scared now, and let Arran's mother in.

Celyn strode into the low budget hotel room, each of the American vampires flinched and stepped back. Despite not being a household name in America, Celyn Redfern exuded power. She was wearing all black motorcycle gear with a helmet in one hand which she tossed onto the bed as she reached it. Arran had no idea why she was dressed like that but it certainly helped the image.

"Is she ok?" Was the first thing that Celyn said, gesturing to Cynthia. Arran nodded and she turned her attention to the three vampires at large. "Were you planning on killing her? And before you answer, if I think that you're lying to me I'll ask my son to read your minds or failing that I'll drag your arses to court and put you under a truth serum."

"I'm not afraid of you, lady. I don't know who you are but I know there's been no crime here, the human is fine," spat back Brice.

"Oh I thought you might not be from around here, that's ok you don't have to be automatically scared of me," she said as she shrugged her backpack off over one shoulder and reached inside. "I brought a gun, it's usually a fail safe way of getting foreigners up to speed. I asked you a question, I would like an honest answer."

Arran had seen guards in council buildings carrying guns before, ones loaded with bullets that realised chemicals that burned a vampire from the inside faster than they could heal. This one looked older, more rudimentary. Like a water gun made of old metal. Arran's memory flashed to his uncle's missing hand, an accident with the first attempts at a vampire gun had dissolved the entire extremity in seconds. Even the fumes from the excess chemicals had started to corrode his exposed skin all the way up his arm and across most of his body.

"Yes, we were going to kill her," stammered the portly vampire, his eyes on the mean looking gun.

"Thank you for your honest answer, I'm sure that we can sort out compensation and punishment at the nearest council building. If you cooperate this won't take long." Celyn smiled sweetly, but she didn't lower her weapon.

"Oh you can't be serious, what would it have mattered if we'd killed her?" Complained Brice, clearly troubled by the idea of having to pay out. "We'd have been discreet, she's just one human."

Celyn appeared to consider this, she nodded thoughtfully. Then she shot him.

A spurt of thick liquid hit him in the chest and clung there, destroying the fabric on impact and eating into the flesh below.

Arran's first instinct was to cover his mouth from the fumes and to block as much of Cynthia's body with his own as he could. Whatever the chemical was, it was less volatile than the one that had maimed Lex, there seemed to be no effect on the rest of the room. Arran was still glad that he had blocked Cynthia from seeing what was happening though, it was grotesque.

Brice had tried to get the substance off of his chest and melted his hands in the process. He was still desperately moving but his death hung in the room with certainty. There was no surviving this. His two companions smartly avoided him as he crawled to them for help before collapsing still on the floor.

Arran couldn't believe what he'd just seen, he'd never witnessed anyone die before and that had been disgusting.

Everyone in the room stared at Celyn in shock.

"What?" She asked in a puzzled, casual tone. "He's just one vampire."

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So many people have said that Celyn is their favourite character and I actually agree, I thought that she was based off of me but then I was looking through an archive of texts from my dad when I was a teenager and I realised she's actually loosely based on my dad. Anyway, she's a really complicated character but you haven't really seen her in action yet, part of me didn't like writing this because I want her to have peace in her lovely house and just look after her children, but alas, she's not like that all the time. Sometimes she's got to kill a dude. 

Anyway, to make up for the horrible weaponry in this part, here's a very 'Celyn Redfern' message my dad sent me last week for you to enjoy <3