We packed our bags and were headed towards the chateaux’s lobby. But before we could get there we encountered Viktor walking in the opposite direction.

“Oh, hey Viktor.” Ria happily waved at our resident German vampire.

“Hallo.” He smiled back and stopped next to us.

“Aren’t you driving back home with us, Viktor?” I asked, putting down mine and Emma’s bag for a second.

“Nein, I will stay here for a bit longer.” He shook his head.

“You’ve been pretty absent the last couple of days.”

“Ah, are you missing me already, Aurora? Feeling a bit lonely.” He smirked.

“Not really.” I looked to the side.

“Tsundere.” Em whispered in my ear, to which I glared at her.

“No, I would like to have chatted with you three a bit more, but the Conclave is a time in which I see a lot of my friends again.”

“Understandable.” I stopped pouting and gave him a nod.

“Did you like your club visit yesterday?” Em asked.

“Hmmm.” He rubbed his chin. “I think next time I will go without Aileen… she pulls too much attention from the Damen…”

“Was I not enough for you!?” Alex’s voice rang out from behind us. I looked back and saw her standing at the corridor’s junction, she must’ve just walked around the corner.

“N-nein! That’s not what I meant!”

“You’ve done it now, Vik.” I laughed. “Do you want to use my cane, Alex?”

“Thanks for the offer, Aurora, but I won’t need it.” She walked towards us, but before she arrived Viktor quickly hid behind us.

“I think I have to go now.” He skedaddled away. Emma and Ria were giggling at him as he disappeared around the corner.

Alex, instead of pursuing her target, decided to stop next to us as well. “I hope you had a nice stay. It was nice meeting the three of you, although I’d like to chat a bit more the next time.”

“We have all the time in the world to get to know each other better anyway.” I shrugged.

“That’s true.” She smiled.

“Have a safe trip home. Now I need to go catch that blasted German.”

“Good hunting.” Em waved as Alex started to move on.

“Don’t hurt him too much!” Ria called after her.

“I’ll try.” Alex turned around at the corner Viktor disappeared at and waved us goodbye before walking out of sight as well.

When we arrived at the lobby, Alessia was already waiting for us.

“Charles will be here shortly.” She smiled as she walked us out of the door.

“Hey, Alessia, when do you want to do the first lesson?” I asked as I looked around the courtyard.

“When are you free from school?”

“Hmmm….”

“We have a holiday soon.” Emma helped me.

“Ah! Right! ….When was that again?”

“In three weeks, we have an entire week off... You should really know this, Auro…”

“It’s just that I’m such a good student that I don’t even think about taking holidays.”

“Yeah, right.” Em shook her head.

Alessia laughed. “Well, would you like to come over then? Of course, your girlfriends are always welcome too.” She looked over at Em and Ria.

“I would like to… but…” Ria’s mood sank a little. “My parents…”

Em gave her a hug. “We will figure something out with them.”

“Bad situation?” Alessia asked while Em was comforting Ria.

“Mhmm.” I nodded. “Her parents really, really, really don’t like me.”

“Ah…”

“Yeah…. It’s why we really needed to have the extracurricular activities letter. But if it’s going to be during the holidays, that’s going to be a lot harder.”

“Hmm, that sounds very tough indeed, but I think you girls will definitely get through it together.” Alessia puts her hand on my shoulder. “And what about Emma’s parents?”

“They are great.” Ria replied while almost being smothered by Em’s hug.

“Yeah, just as she says, they are fantastic. Especially her mom, she’s incredibly sweet.”

“I thought so. When I connected to Emma I could feel a great amount of love for her family.”

At that moment, Charles rolled up with the car and quickly stepped out to help with our luggage. Alessia gives us a hand as well.

“Does anyone want to sit in the front?” Charles asks, opening the doors for us as well.

I looked at my girlfriends. “There’s plenty of space in the back, isn’t there?”

Em and Ria nodded.

“Alright.” Charles smiled and closed the front door. He patiently waited for us to get in. Ria sat in the middle, with Em and me on her sides.

“I will send you a message to discuss the precise date of your next lessons.” Alessia said, holding the door open for a little bit longer.

“Sounds good to me.” I smiled, after which my girlfriends said goodbye to Alessia as well. She then closed the door, so Charles could begin driving.

The drive back home was quiet and pretty relaxed. So much so that after forty-five minutes both Em and Ria had fallen asleep against each other, leaving me by myself, staring out of the window. The rolling forests with hills and valleys, together with the occasional vineyard, slowly made way for the countryside. Farmers were harvesting their first winter crops, but apart from that I already started missing the vistas from the chateaux. I might be a city girl, but the area around the castle had just been incredibly impressive.

“I heard you were going to be our new boss.” Charles looked at me in the mirror. He’d been quiet for most of the trip back home to give us a bit of space, but he must’ve seen the boredom creep up on me.

“Apparently so.” I laughed softly so as not to wake my girlfriends. “Will take a while before I have learned everything there is to learn, though.”

He nodded as we took a right on an intersection. “I think you will do fine. The staff was at least very happy with how you treated them, and that’s always a good start.”

“Well, you people are human too… uh, hmmm… I’m a vampire now, so… you know what I mean…”

Charles laughed. “I do. But it is always appreciated.”

The rest of the ride home, we just keep chatting about pretty much every single casual conversation topic you can think of. The weather, the traffic on the road, the news that was silently playing on the radio, etc. While it was not terribly interesting it did keep the both of us reasonably entertained while the two cutiepies next to me were resting. It’s only when we finally turned the corner into the street of my marvellous residence that I tried to wake up my girlfriends.

I gently shook Em by the shoulder and poked Ria on the cheek. “Hey, we’ve arrived at my house.”

“Hmm? Already?” Em only barely opened her eyes and then rubbed them with the sleeve of her hoodie.

“Yeah. You slept all the way here.”

“I wasn’t even that tired...” She stopped rubbing her eyes and looked at Ria who was still sleeping on her shoulder. “Ria.” She moved a bit to see if that would wake her up, but to no avail.

In the meantime Charles had parked in front of my house and was walking over to open the door. “Does Miss Du Bellay not want to wake up?”

“Apparently not.” I took my keys out of my pocket, now adorned with a small blue bear, and got out of the car. “I can carry her to the house, though.”

“I will do that, Auro, you can just open the door for me.” Em said.

“You sure?”

She nodded. “I’m pretty strong too, you know.” Em scooped Ria out of the car with relative ease, while I quickly ran ahead to open the door.

“I’ll put her on the sofa for now.” Em said as she passed me.

I nodded and ran back to the car to help Charles with the luggage. “Thanks for driving us by the way.”

“Don’t worry, it’s my job.” He smiled and closed the trunk again.

“Funnily enough, you’re not the first driver who’s said that to me.”

“You don’t become a driver if you don’t like driving.” He took Ria’s luggage and rolled it to my house, while I carried the other two pieces.

“I suppose that’s true.” I laughed.

Once Charles left Ria’s coffer in my hallway, he said goodbye and left. I locked the door behind him and walked to the living room. Shima immediately ran over to me and started meowing.

“Yeah, I missed you too.” I picked up my little tiger and cuddled her. She started purring intensely. But just as quickly she jumped out of my arms to go and cuddle up on top of Ria who was now sleeping on my sofa. Em had gone over to Shima’s new automatic feeder to check up on it.

“Wow, this Amicat 5000 thing is quite something. It’s still pretty much full.” She tapped the top of the machine with her finger.

“I will put some fresh water in it though, that can never hurt.” I walked towards her and took out the water tank. “Have you messaged Helen yet?”

“Yes, she’s a bit busy right now, she had to go get groceries. She can be here in an hour or so.”

“Alright.” I nodded as I refreshed the water. “Want something to drink in the meantime?”

“Maybe just some grape juice, but I will get it myself.”

“Just make sure you get the right bottle.”

“I know, I know.” She giggled as she almost took the wrong bottle.