MY SUGAR MUMMY IS A BEAUTIFUL VAMPIRE

Grey hair, huge muscular form and a piecing gaze peered through a thick fog in the middle of no where.

Reggie stood at the city's edge, casting one final glance over his shoulder at the towering spires and gothic architecture. The vampire city was once his home for centuries, but now a strange sense of unfamiliarity hung like a shroud over the familiar streets and byways.

Something had changed, shifted in a fundamental way. He could taste it on the night air - an undercurrent of tension, of recent turmoil barely restraining itself beneath the surface. Reggie felt unmoored, a stranger in his own realm.

With a weary shake of his head, he turned and melted into the enveloping shadows stretching out beyond the city limits. His course was set for the imposing silhouette of the Shelley manor on the hill. If anyone could shine a light on these mysterious events, it would be Rose's family.

The journey passed in a breathless haze of inhuman speed. Within moments, Reggie was breezing through the wrought-iron gates and up the winding drive toward the opulent manor house.

As always, the ancestral home of the Shelleys exuded a sense of ageless grandeur and sophistication. Candles flickered in every window, their amber glow gilding the palatial architecture and meticulously manicured grounds. The very air seemed hushed with a reverence befitting such illustrious occupants.

Reggie had barely rapped the heavy knocker against the thick oak door when it swung inward with a creak of unoiled hinges. A liveried butler inclined his head in a deferential manner.

"Reginald. What a surprise to see you here." The words carried a vague undercurrent of shock, as if the mere fact that he required an invitation to this house was vaguely insulting.

Reggie brushed past the servant without comment, allowing himself to be led through the cavernous receiving hall toward one of the manor's many opulent drawing rooms.

The chamber he entered blazed with gilded candelabras and a cheerfully crackling fire. Bookshelves lined every wall, towering enough to make even a vampire feel dwarfed by the weight of accumulated knowledge they contained. At the room's center, an regal figure rose from a tufted chaise lounge, smoothing the folds of her silk dressing gown.

"Reginald." Gladys Shelley's cultured alto carried a distinct chill, like a disapproving dowager greeting an unwanted caller. "To what do we owe this unannounced visit?"

Reggie felt his shoulders tighten infinitesimally before forcing them to relax. "Good evening, Lady Gladys. I've come seeking for your daughter, Rose."

One perfectly arched brow inched upward in a look of disdainful incredulity. "Seeking Rose here?" Her gaze filtered with a derisive glint. "Was it not you who kept her hidden from her family all this time? Are you not her protector?"

Reggie opened his mouth to protest, but Gladys was already pressing on in that same frosty tone.

"In any case, Rose and her..." she curled her lip in distaste, as if the very thought of Damien left a bitter tang on her tongue, "...proud companion departed shortly after the tragic events that befell our city."

An uneasy silence stretched between them, taut as a tensed cord. Reggie felt nonplussed by her oblique statement, thrown by the clear undercurrents swirling beneath her words.

"I'm afraid I'm uncertain as to which tragic events you refer," he confessed at last, keeping his tone carefully modulated. "Perhaps you could elaborate?"

Gladys regarded him with an inscrutable look, as if weighing whether he was worthy of receiving such clarification. At length, she seemed to reach a decision with a tiny shake of her head.

"I've entertained you long enough, Reginald. You'll have to seek your answers elsewhere, I'm afraid." She hitched her shoulders in a refined shrug. "You've quite overstayed your welcome here."

The curt dismissal hung in the air, potent and absolute. Reggie knew better than to protest or linger; he gave a shallow bow and saw himself out of the manor's receiving hall.

Out in the moonlit embrace of the grounds once more, Reggie paused to rake a hand through his hair, perplexed. What in the blazes was happening back in this city? More importantly, where had Rose disappeared to - and what events had transpired to send her fleeing with Damien in tow?

The dull crunch of booted footsteps drew his attention, and Reggie turned to find a strapping, soot-stained figure rounding the manor's facade. He recognized Dumpheries, Rose's trusted friend and weaponsmith, straight away.

"Well, as I live and breathe!" The brawny vampire's gruff shout shattered the night's quiet like a cannonblast. "Reginald returns at last! Tell me, is Rose back with you?"

Reggie shook his head with a rueful smile, clasping the bigger man's offered hand in greeting. "I'm afraid not, my friend. Actually, I've come looking for her. Any idea where I might pick up her trail?"

Dumpheries furrowed his brow in thought, absentmindedly brushing soot from the breast of his leather smock. "Can't rightly say, to be honest. Last I heard, Rose departed with Damien straight after..." He trailed off, sudden hesitation creasing his features. "Well, after the unpleasantness."

Reggie lifted his hands in a placating gesture, recognizing the guarded look that had clouded Dumpheries' expression - the same shroud of secrets that seemed to veil every utterance about these "tragic events."

"No need to tread carefully on my account, old friend. Perhaps you could elaborate on this unpleasantness?"

When Dumpheries still appeared reluctant to divulge details, Reggie pressed on in a more circumspect vein. "I only just arrived back in the city to find a strange pall hanging over everything. The Shelley matriarch was hardly her usual...ebullient self when I paid them call."

Recognition flickered across Dumpheries's bluff features, prompting a bark of humorless laughter. "Aye, I'd wager Lady Gladys wasn't too pleased to see your face darken her threshold." His gaze sharpened as he studied Reggie with sudden intensity. "Didn't much care for the way her daughter spirited away all those years, if you take my meaning."

Reggie allowed himself a tired chuckle at that. "I gathered as much from our frosty reunion. Though I got the distinct sense there was more afoot than mere familial grievances..."

Dumpheries nodded, seeming to reach a decision as he waved one brawny hand. "Aye, you've the right of it there. Came close to losing everything, we did - the city, our entire realm." His gruff timbre lowered to a confidential register. "Damned near succeeded, too, if not for Rose and Damien's heroics."

"Heroics?" Reggie's ears pricked up, homing in on that tantalizing detail. "What precisely are you referring to?"

The burly smith blew out a juddering breath, spreading his massive hands in a gesture of futility. "Where to even begin? I suppose it started with that madwoman Dravena raising an army of vampires against the nobles. Vampires turning on their own kind..."

Reggie felt his brows inching upward in shock as Dumpheries launched into a breathless recounting of the grisly events from months prior. Damned attacks, brainwashed vampires, an insurrection that brought the entire vampire civilization to its knees...until Rose and Damien stepped in to quell the uprising at its volatile source.

"...even the outsiders attacked the city," Dumpheries concluded with a grim tone. "If Rose hadn't stood against that abomination, we'd all be carrion by now."

Reggie absorbed the tale in numb astonishment, his mind still struggling to process the enormity of what had transpired during his absence. An entire civilization brought to the precipice of destruction by madness and betrayal...

"Good God," he muttered once Dumpheries had lapsed into silence again. "And here I thought maintaining the human Milarus was challenging."