Free Vampire Brat by Angie Sage

must have done a Wanda-style squeak or something because suddenly the cupboard door opened behind me. I nearly screamed.
    Wanda stuck her nosy nose out and whispered, “Are you all right, Araminta?’
    â€œNo,” I told her.
    â€œWhy? What is it?”
    â€œWhat do you think it is? There’s a werewolf coming. Can’t you hear it?”
    Wanda listened. Scuffle…scuffle…She went kind of pale. “Get in the cupboard,” she hissed, and she grabbed hold of my sleeve and tugged me in. I didn’t think we’d both fit, but it is surprising how small you can make yourself when you have to. Wanda pulled the door closed. It wouldn’t click shut properly, but she held it so that it stayed closed and then weboth kept really quiet…and listened.
    Scuffle…sniff…scuffle…sniff. The werewolf was really loud now. It was right outside the cupboard. It snuffled a bit, sniffed a bit, and rustled the dog biscuit bag. And then it started to scratch on the cupboard door, which would have been all right if at that point Wanda hadn’t decided for some crazy reason to try and burrow into the back of the cupboard. Suddenly there was nothing behind us—and we both fell backward into the dark.

12
FANG
    I landed on top of Wanda, which was okay as Wanda is quite soft to land on. I looked up and saw the high brick roof of the secret tunnel that runs through the basement and I felt really relieved—we were safe. But then I saw the werewolf eyes. And this time they were right above me .
    It was too late to ask Wanda to swap places so I just yelled “Help!” and Wanda kind ofsqueaked. The werewolf eyes got closer and I realized that these were different werewolf eyes. They glinted silver, not green, and they looked much, much bigger. This was bad. And what was worse, I did not even have my Combined Werewolf and Vampire Trapping Kit with me—just when I needed it.
    The only thing to do was to make a run for it. Just as I was wondering if I should take Wanda with me or leave her behind as bait, a greenish glow began to light up the tunnel.
    Suddenly Edmund’s ghostly voice said, “What are you doing here?”
    â€œEdmund!” squeaked Wanda. She wriggled out from underneath me and jumped up. “Oh, Edmund, you’ve saved us,” she said as if he was some kind of hero. Which he was not , since he hadn’t saved us at all.
    The glow from Edmund meant I could see the werewolf very well. It was a huge wolf and it was horrible . Its mouth was hanging open, its tongue was lolling out, and its great big fangs were ready to bite us..And what could a runty ghost do about that?

    Well, what the runty ghost did was to go up to the werewolf, scratch its ears and say, “Hello, Fang, where have you been?” And the werewolf sat down and wagged its tail just like a dog.
    â€œOh, Edmund,” said Wanda dreamily, “you are so brave .”
    â€œI am not brave, Wanda,” Edmund said in his funny accent. “Now I must go and find Sir Horace. I shall return soon.”
    â€œEdmund,” wailed Wanda, “don’t leave us with a werewolf.”
    Edmund laughed. At least that’s what I think the weird noise he made was meant to be. “Fang is not a werewolf,” he said. “Fang is Sir Horace’s faithful wolf cub.” And then he floated away and left us alone—with Fang.
    â€œShall I say hello to Fang too?’ whispered Wanda, who would copy everything Edmund did if she could, although I think she would find it hard to float upside down along the ceiling.
    â€œIf you want to,” I said.
    â€œFang is so nice,” she said. “He’s got such soft ears.”
    â€œHow can you possibly know that?” I asked. “He’s a ghost .”
    â€œI just do know that,” said Wanda, busily scratching thin air. “You can tell they would be soft if he was a real wolf.”
    â€œIf he was