Part 3
Drusilla purred with contentment she had never felt before, her hand stroking Cordelia’s long, brown hair with delicate, careful movements so as not to wake her from her sleep. Miss Edith was tucked tightly in the sleeping girl’s embrace, the doll’s head lying in the crook of her arm. The vampire trailed a finger down Cordelia’s throat, stopping at the light pulsing of the jugular and felt the throb of life just under the skin.
“Not for dinner my pet,” Drusilla cooed with a light, quiet giggle knowing the little girl had no idea she was a vampire yet. “We must get you some special little girl things, mmm new clothes for Princess. All in sky blue, make you look like the sky I shall and your Daddy will make us some tea”
Cordelia woke up with the sound of talking, eyes snapping wide open and mouth growing into a gigantic, beaming smile when she saw Drusilla lying next to and watching her. Green eyes blinking owlishly and ruby red lips flicking up at the corners when Cordelia opened her eyes. “Mummy’s special Princess, all awake she is”
The six year old rubbed her eyes with her fist and yawned, “Morning mommy, what’s for breakfast? Is there Wheeties? Or some chocolate?” her old mommy never let her eat chocolate especially for breakfast but maybe her new mommy would. Then again, maybe not but there was no harm in asking!
“Ooooh! We shall go see what Daddy got for you last night” Drusilla responded lightly, “You shall have to mind your manners and say thank you to Daddy”
“I’ll give him a big hug and kiss. Promise” Cordelia promised solemnly as she sat up, “What shall I wear today? I only have my stupid pink sundress and I wore that yesterday, can I have a dress like yours but in sky blue?” she asked in the way only a child could.
“We shall see Princess, why don’t you go and wake Daddy hmm?”
***
The bedroom door blasted open, she raced in at a 100 miles per hour and dove on top of the sleeping lump in the bed. Cordelia bounced with heightened excitement and shook the vampire clean out of his sleep, giggling happily while she did it.
Who the hell had the fucking gall to wake him up at this ungodly hour?!
“DADDY!” Cordelia hollered loudly continuing to bounce up and down on the vampire under the covers. “Wake up Daddy! You have to make me breakfast, mommy said so”
Angelus growled dangerously, stirring slowly, two ochre eyes and a gleaming set of fangs stared at the girl bouncing on his bed. “Get out before I kill you, you little brat” he snarled at the gutsy but annoying little brat. Seeing the eyes, ridges and fangs on the grumpy man, Cordelia immediately stopped bouncing, hollering, and shaking him and sat completely still in silence. Her lower lip popped out in a wobbly pout, her hazel eyes filled with frightened tears and she nodded.
“I-I was just looking for my Daddy, sorry mister. I-I’ll go now and leave you alone”
The childish fear was delicious to him, sitting up Angelus decided to make the most of this opportunity in scaring the little girl some more. Cordelia was halfway to his door when he called out to her. “C’mere kid” he ordered.
“No, I’m going to find my Daddy” she replied, her voice full of tears as she tried to process his face in her head. She didn’t understand, her mother had told her vampires weren’t real but he was a vampire, she saw his fangs. They were big and long and sharp, if she didn’t get out of here and warn her mommy then he would kill them all. Like Dracula did on that movie she wasn’t supposed to watch. “Sorry I woke you Dracula, you can go back to sleep and I won’t do it again”
“Kid!” Angelus ordered louder and dangerously, “My name is not Dracula and get back here NOW!”
“No, you’re a vampire and I’m gonna tell my Daddy of you and he’ll kill you to death HA!” Cordelia shot back with as much smugness as she could gather and bolted from Dracula’s bedroom as fast as she could. “Mommy! Daddy! Dracula’s here and he’s gonna kill me!” she hollered as she hurtled along the hallway back to her room and ran inside, slamming the door shut.
“Mommy, Daddy! HEEELLLPPP DRACULA’S GONNA EAT ME!” she screamed as loud as her lungs could manage. She could hear Dracula’s heavy footsteps bounding along the hallway towards her bedroom, she looked around the bedroom for a place she could hide where he wouldn’t find her. A-HA! Dracula would never go in the sunshine!
Cordelia scuttled towards the window, yanked the heavy drapes open and stood in the bright sunlight, waiting for Dracula to try and eat her now. “He wouldn’t dare come into the sunlight, stupid vampire. I bet he’s not even strong, I bet he can’t count to a hundred like I can and I bet he can’t speak French and Latin. In fact, I bet he’s so stupid he couldn’t count his own fingers”
“What the bloody hell is going on?” Spike’s voice boomed from outside Cordelia’s bedroom, when he heard Angelus snarling about dead, little brats and heard the kid’s screaming; he had pictures of finding the cute, little girl in pieces along the hallway.
“Your little snotty, nosed brat ran into my bedroom and woke me up that’s what the fuck is going on” Angelus furious voice rang out in reply.
“The little pixie woke you up?” Spike tried his hardest to process this in his head and wished to God he’d been a fly on the wall to see that. “What’d you do to her?”
“Nothing! I did nothing to your little brat”
“He’s lying Daddy! Dracula threatened to kill me if I woke him up again” both vampire’s heard the hollered words from behind her door. “He’s a vampire, kick his teeth in, go on Daddy! Doitdoitdoit!”
Spike heard every word, hung on to the Dracula word like it was a gift from the Devil himself! “Dracula threatened to kill you eh, Pixie?” he edged closer to the door so Cordelia could hear him.
“Yeah he did, and he also threatened to rip my throat out” okay so she was fibbing, but who wouldn’t when faced with Dracula himself?! “He said “I’m gonna rip your throat out and kill you if you wake me up again” and I said “Sorry mister, I was just looking for my Daddy” I did say I was sorry, I never meant to wake him up honest. And he said he would kill me so if it’s anyone’s fault, it’s Dracula’s!”
“My name is not Dracula you little hell spawn, it’s ANGELUS!” Angelus snarled through the door at the brat behind it. He was tired, cranky and he didn’t need this in the middle of the night. He didn’t need to be dealing with a six and a half year old insistent on calling him Dracula.
“See, now you are lying” Cordelia retorted “Dracula would never call himself by a name that’s Latin for Angel. Liar-Liar pants on fi-re, hair sticks up like telephone wi-re!”
Spike and Angelus looked at each other, how did she know that?
“Is he dead yet Daddy?”
“Sadly not Pixie” Spike was the first to speak after a few moments of silence “But he won’t eat you or rip out your throat pet”
“Damn right I will” Angelus countered; his voice now shade less dangerous since, the kid had sparked his interest about how she knew what his name meant in Latin. He took an unneeded breath and tried to calm down. “Open the door br… Kid”
“I’m not a kid and I’m not opening the door unless Van Helsing gets here first so there”. Both vampires could picture the huge tongue pulling that likely followed those brave words.
“Come on Pixie, Drac ain’t gonna hurt you luv. Daddy’ll see to that” Spike told her soothingly, glaring at Angelus and daring the other vampire to contradict his words.
“Where’s my mommy? I want my mommy. MOMMY!”
“She’s downstairs, making you some Wheeties Pix so why don’t you open… Oh sod this” Spike sighed, “Move away from the door pet” he warned just before he kicked the door wide open.
“EEEEEEEKKKK!” Cordelia squealed loudly and darted into the sun drenched patch by the window. “Daddy quick get in the sun, he can’t eat us that way. Quick!” she urged as much as she could, trying to get Spike to stand in the sunlight where he would be safe.
Angelus smirked as he looked slyly to the blonde vampire standing next to him with a weird look on his face. “Your daddy’s a Dracula too, Kid” he told her bluntly and reveling in the drawn in gasped breath, the widening of the child’s eyes and the wobbling of the lower lip.
“You liar, you evil dead liar” Cordelia yelled at him, “You’re only saying that cus he’s not a grumpy, old man who threatens kids. If he was a vampire, he’d still be better than you because you’re nothing but a big dead bully”
Spike was loving this girl more and more! “How’s about I get your mum pet? She can sort Drac here out for you” he told her and started to walk away.
“For the last time” Angelus glared at the brat “My name is not Dracula you little scrat”
“Big dead bul-lee! Big dead bul-lee!”
“Stop it”
“Stop it!” Cordelia mimicked suddenly changing her tactics seeing as that would make him more annoyed at her.
“Hey!”
“Hey!” she copied instantly and Spike started to shake with laughter, covering his sniggers by lighting up a cigarette. “Daddy, he won’t go away and why aren’t you running? Oh I get it, you’re not scared of a stupid vampire are you? I knew you wouldn’t be but why aren’t you kicking his puny teeth in?”
“Cause Pix” Spike told her, locking blue eyes onto the questioning large hazel one’s of the little girl. “I’m a vamp too pet, so is your mummy. Welcome to the bloody house of vampires. Don’t worry your pretty, little head though Daddy’ll protect you!”
“You can’t be a vampire” Cordelia’s lower lip wobbled again, “Vampires eat little girls, and I know I’m not little but I am a girl… And you were gonna eat me to!” Plump tears began to fall down her heart-shaped face, she wiped them away angrily and gave the best death glare she could manage. “I won’t let you eat me, I’ll stand in the sunshine until you both go away. MOMMY!”
Drusilla heard the final scream of Cordelia and hurried back up to the young girl’s bedroom, her eyes flashing deadly revenge if the girl had been touched or harmed in anyway by either Spike, Angelus or Darla. Cordelia was her princess and hers alone, there would be hell to pay if a hair on her head had been stirred.
“Hush my Princess” came the soft whisper from the female vampire as she approached the bedroom where both Spike and Angelus were standing outside, the males unable to get in due to not yet being invited.
“M-mommy? Dracula threatened me, he said he was gonna kill me and daddy said that he was a vampire too” Cordelia huddled against the drapes in terror that both delighted and annoyed Angelus.
“I didn’t hurt her, what’s she crying about?” he asked haughtily and tightened his robe, sending a look towards the little girl inside the bedroom. Cordelia looked back with the biggest pout he ever saw. “Put the pout away or you’ll trip over it kid”
“You’re so ugly that I bet your mother had to tie a pork chop around your neck just to get the dog to play with you!” Cordelia snapped, jumping more into the sunlight when Angelus snarled at her. “Mommy, he’s scaring me”
“Bad Daddy” Drusilla cooed to Angelus, running a sharp fingernail down his cheek, “No hurting of Princess, I shall be ever so cross if you do. She’s my little girl, all mine” Angelus grabbed her hand in a hard grip.
“Dru” he warned in a singsong voice, increasing his grip to almost hurting point… “OW! What the hell…?!” Angelus suddenly felt a stinging kick to his ankle. Snapping his head down, he saw Cordelia scuttling back inside her bedroom. “You scrawny little munchkin, that hurt!”
“It was supposed to you big dead bully, only coward’s hit women and only big dead bullies threaten girls” she snapped back from the safety of the bedroom. “Momma, Daddy I’m scared of that man”
“Peaches isn’t anything to be scared of Princess” Spike told her, “I bet you could hurt him a lot more than he could hurt you pet. ‘Sides, he ain’t so tough, he can only threaten girls remember ducks?”
Spike’s words caused a thoughtful look to cross the little girl’s heart-shaped face as she contemplated his words deeply. Angelus stood outside the bedroom, unknowing he hadn’t been invited, his patience growing thin and his temper on her verge of snapping. After Darla’s little game last night in the park and after only two hours sleep, he really was cranky. “Look Kid” he tried through gritted teeth and a forced swallow. “I won’t kill you or rip out your throat, which I never said to you by the way, if you stop whining and come out of your room like a good, little girl”
“Liar” Cordelia accused the second he stopped speaking “You would to eat me, Dracula always eats the girls. If you didn’t know that then what kind of Dracula are you anyway? If my Daddy is a Dracula than he would know to eat girls, he’s not stupid like you are”
“My name is not…”
“Dracula, I know. Geez, I heard you the first time I may only be six and a half but I’m not deaf” Cordelia retorted quickly, cutting his words off. She shuffled on her feet and looked between all three expectant vampires, “So… are you all vampires and drink blood and stuff?”
“Yup” Spike replied with a smile that caused his cheekbones to rise incredibly high and his blue eyes danced with merriment of the whole fiasco. If he hadn’t actually lived to see this, he never would have believed it happened, it was too surreal.
“Wow, I wonder what my old mommy would say to me now” Cordelia thought of the only thing that made any sense to her at the minute. “She always told me vampires weren’t real, they were just stuff out of fairy stories and they’re not. Just goes to show grown-ups are stupid and don’t know everything. In fact, I bet Under-The-Bed monsters are real too”
Drusilla brushed past Angelus and walked, invited, into Cordelia’s bedroom with a graceful glide, her eyes upon the little girl. “Hush my sweet” she cooed softly, Cordelia became calm almost immediately much to the surprise of the other two vampires. “Not hurt my Princess, mmm… Such a soft and sweet little girl you are. Mummy will take such good care of you my pet… Shush, mustn’t let bad Daddy scare you”
“I didn’t mean to wake Dracula” Cordelia told her, “He said he was gonna kill me and he scared me a-and then daddy said that you were a Dracula too. Is he lying?”
Drusilla let out a childish giggle and knelt down to face the frightened young girl, her hand caressed the side of Cordelia’s tear-stained cheek. “Princess cried tears of fright, Mummy will dry those tears all away and then daddy shall give you a big cuddle he will. Nobody will hurt my precious pet, there’ll be no monsters under your bed and things won’t go bump in the night.” The little girl seemed to understand the way the vampiress talked, almost like they communicated on a childlike level which was understandable.
When a person was driven to the point of insanity, they regressed to a childlike state and that is exactly what had happened to Drusilla before Angelus turned her. But there was still no-one who could understand the babbling vampire, no-one that is except for a pint-sized pixie by the name of Cordelia Chase.
“Do you promise Mommy?” Cordelia asked hopefully with her lower lip wobbling again, “Are you sure there are no monsters under the bed?”
“We shall see my Princess” Drusilla took the little girl’s hand in her cool one, insisting she get down on her knees too. The vampire and girl crawled, giggling, towards the bed Cordelia had slept in and both peered under it. “No monsters under the bed see? Mummy was right all along”
Angelus watched with a bored look on his face, his lip curled up in a sneer and hands on his robe covered hips. He took this opportunity to taunt Spike, “I guess I should congratulate you on parenthood” he remarked casually, not expecting the answer.
“Bout bloody time an all mate,” Spike repressed a smirk at the expression on his grandsire’s face when it became obvious he wasn’t taking the bait. “Always wanted to be a Daddy, looks like you became a granddaddy Angelus again… Wait a minute, if you’re my granddaddy won’t that make you the Pixie’s great-granddaddy?!”
“Spike. Shut. Up” Angelus growled at the thorn in his side, turning back to the scene in the bedroom, he saw Drusilla leading a calm and giggling six year old out of the bedroom by her tiny hand.
“Bad Daddy” Drusilla snapped on her way past him.
“Bigdeadbully!” Cordelia sniggered and Angelus made a choking motion with his hands.
