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Lamia
Lamia are vampires who can age and have children, sometimes referred to as the 'family vampires'. They are born as vampires, rather than being turned and are in some ways seen as superior to made vampires.Note: Lamia characters who belong to the Redfern family can be found under the Redfern page.
Warning: Contains some unmarked spoilers for the series
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Madder Rasmussen
Madder Rasmussen (née Redfern)
Appears in: Secret Vampire
James Rasmussen's mother and wife of Jasper. She's a Redfern by birth, but married out of the family. She's the paternal aunt of Rowan, Ash, Kestrel and Jade.
- Abusive Mom: She often treats her own son in the same detached and clinical manner she uses with everyone. When James was four years old, she helped Jasper arrange for James to kill his nanny to 'teach him a lesson' about getting too close to humans. In the present, she has little respect for James's boundaries; she tries to read his mind against his will to find out his secrets and enables Ash to let himself into James's apartment while he's not there, without consulting her son first.
- Affectionate Nickname: Maddy, which her nephew Ash often calls her.
- Bad Boss: She manipulated her son into killing his nanny, Emma, purely because she thought he was getting too attached to a human.
- Cool Aunt: She's apparently seen as one by Ash, who is rather fond of her.
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette / Raven Hair, Ivory Skin: She's described as being beautiful with jet black hair, but also cold and detached. She's also a vampire (and not one of the friendly variety).
- Odd Name, Normal Nickname: Mrs. Rasmussen is referred to as Maddy by her nephew Ash. While discussing names with Poppy, Ash states he prefers for lamia to keep to their old traditions of choosing names associated with nature (such as plants, animals, and gemstones) rather than choosing more 'human-sounding' names to fit in. When Poppy mentions that Maddy isn't an uncommon name, Ash states it's actually short for Madder (a type of plant).
- Parental Neglect: James states that she "doesn't really care what I do"; in Secret Vampire she only takes an interest in him because her husband told her of his suspicions James was getting too attached to Poppy and she wanted to worm the truth out of him.
- Rich Bitch: She's a wealthy interior designer, and is cold, manipulative and downright cruel (even to her own son), with no respect for human life.
Jasper Rasmussen
Jasper Rasmussen
Appears in: Secret Vampire
James Rasmussen's father and the husband of Madder.
- Abusive Dad: He manipulated his four year old son into killing his beloved nanny, just because he thought it was inappropriate for him to be so close to a human.
- Bad Boss: He and his wife felt that James was getting too attached to Emma, his human nanny, so they manipulated James into killing her.
- Bait-and-Switch: Played for Drama. When James tells him about Poppy’s cancer and expresses that he wants to help her, Jasper seems genuinely empathetic and states that he understands feeling pity for humans at times. James is stunned, believing for a moment that his father is going to approve of his plan to turn Poppy into a vampire…only to soon realize his dad is actually talking about mercy killing Poppy to put her out of her misery. The idea of actually saving Poppy never seems to cross Jasper’s mind.
- Condescending Compassion: Towards humans to an extent, telling James that "one can't help but feel sorry" for them because they're so much weaker and more frail than vampires.
- Lack of Empathy: For humans and even his own son at times. When James tells him that Poppy is dying of cancer, what surprises him is not that his son’s best friend is seriously ill, but that James felt the need to come see him to tell him this.
- Mercy Kill: He did this to Emma after James inadvertently turned her into a ghoul, then buried her body in a remote location. Or at least, James hopes he killed her first.
- Parental Obliviousness: He’s generally rather neglectful of James and has little idea what he does in his spare time. Notably, he absent-mindedly asks James how school’s going, only for his son to remind him that school’s over for the summer.
- Rich Jerk: He's wealthy and successful, and is very callous and self-absorbed, even to his own son.
- The Shrink: He works as a psychologist. How good he is as one is debatable; he’s very wealthy, so he must have some success...but he also uses therapy sessions as opportunities to feed off his clients and hypnotize them into forgetting. It’s also doubtful he genuinely cares about any of his clients' issues, given his viewing humans as little more than a food source.
Opal Burdock
Opal Burdock (née Redfern)
Appears in: Daughters of Darkness note
Mary-Lynette's neighbour and great aunt to Rowan, Ash, Kestrel and Jade. She was born a Redfern, but became a Burdock by marriage and later checked out of the family altogether after her husband was executed. Solving her murder forms one of the main plots of Daughters of Darkness.
- Cool Aunt: Make that Cool Great Aunt. She kept in contact with her great nieces after taking off and helped Rowan arrange for herself, Kestrel and Jade to come live with her behind their family's back, so they could live a free life away from the restrictive, backwards patriarchy of the enclaves.
- Cool Old Lady: See Cool Aunt. Unlike the rest of her family, she also apparently had no issue with werewolves, seeing as she let Jeremy do odd-jobs and repairs for her and was quite friendly with him, even confiding in him about her husband's death.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Her husband was brutally executed by the Elders for telling a human about the Night World, prompting her to run off to live amongst humans.
- Due to the Dead: Her great nieces bury her in the garden rather than leave her lying in the basement. However, circumstances force them to shift her to the woods.
- Elderly Immortal: She allowed herself to start aging again and so looks like an ordinary old woman, unlike lamia who stop aging.
- Friendly Neighbourhood Vampire: She kept pet goats to feed on and was seen as being an eccentric, but harmless, old lady by the residents of Briar Creek.
- Granny Classic: She was a kindly, if not strange and reclusive, old lady who lived alone with her pet goats. She was friendly and supportive to her great-nieces and Mary-Lynette. Generally ticked lots of the boxes for this trope...well, except for the whole 'drinking blood' thing.
- Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: She was staked with a picket fence.
- Intergenerational Friendship: With her seventeen year old neighbour, Mary-Lynette. The latter often helped her care for her goats and they seemed fond of each other; Mary-Lynette defends her as merely being "eccentric", not "crazy" and is pretty determined to find out the truth behind her death.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: She offers her nieces a place to live when they run away from home and is staked for her trouble by Jeremy, whom she had only ever showed kindness to, because he was paranoid the girls would cut into his hunting territory. As if that weren't bad enough, her body then gets buried, dug up, reburied, dug up again and shifted all around the town. The poor woman can't even catch a break in death!
- Scatterbrained Senior: Rowan implies she's starting to become a bit forgetful. She and her sisters assume it slipped her mind when she doesn't come to pick them up like she promised...as it turns out, she couldn't pick them up because she was lying dead in her own basement.
Hodge Burdock
Hodge Burdock
Opal Burdock's late husband and great uncle to Rowan, Ash, Kestrel and Jade.- Cruel and Unusual Death: He wasn't just staked...but impaled over and over with dozens of stakes. It's not surprising his wife completely freaked out and ran off to Briar Creek, while his great nieces are filled with horror at the thought of being subjected to it.
- Death by Origin Story: His death prompted his widow Opal to flee to Briar Creek.
- Noodle Incident: The circumstances that led to him telling a human about the Night World, which ultimately resulted in his execution.
- Posthumous Character: He's been deceased for several years by the events of Daughters of Darkness.
Morgead Blackthorn
Morgead Blackthorn
Appears in: Jez and Morgead's Night Out | Huntress
"You can give up anytime, now. Because I'm going to win and we both know it."
A member of Jez Redfern's gang and her childhood friend/rival. He later turns out to be her soulmate.
- Beautiful Dreamer: Jez affectionately comments that he looks "younger and more vulnerable" when he sleeps.
- Belligerent Sexual Tension: With Jez.
- Birds of a Feather: With Jez; they're both stubborn, hot-headed and fearless, not to mention they both had to grow up quickly due to losing their parents.
- Bonding over Missing Parents: He and Jez bonded as children over the fact they're both technically orphans; Jez's parents were killed while Morgead's mother abandoned him.
- Childhood Friend Romance: Eventually with Jez.
- Color-Coded Eyes: Has bright, piercing "glacier" green eyes, matching his cold and standoffish personality.
- Cynicism Catalyst: His neglectful mother running off to Europe with her new boyfriend, leaving him behind, and receiving no help or sympathy from the local Elders.
- "Darkness von Gothick" Name: His first name begins with "Mor", which can be related to "mort", the Latin word for death, while his surname of Blackthorn is also rather gothic-sounding (and fits with the lamia tradition of nature-related names).
- Deadpan Snarker: Almost everything he says is snark-laden. Frequently engages in Snark-to-Snark Combat with Jez.
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Pale, with black hair (and a vampire).
- Everyone Has Standards / Never Hurt an Innocent: Despite generally looking down on humans, he mainly targets violent criminals and in the short story Jez and Morgead's Night Out, he's shown to be genuinely disgusted and disturbed by the crimes of the Serial Killer the gang picks as their latest victim. See also Wouldn't Hurt a Child.
- First Guy Wins: Although Jez was infatuated with Hugh, she later realizes Morgead is her One True Love.
- Friendly Rivalry: With Jez. Although they're often quite hostile to each other, they still respect and care about each other. Becomes very friendly indeed by the end of Huntress.
- Green-Eyed Monster: He admits that part of his dislike for humans stems not just from culturally-ingrained prejudice, but from envy, as from what he can see humans tend to have everything he doesn't "family, security, food every night".
- Hates Being Alone: His reaction to Jez leaving for a whole year without explanation and without contacting him once certainly suggests this. It's strongly implied he has abandonment issues stemming from his mother leaving him.
- Hell-Bent for Leather: Like Jez, he has a habit of wearing leather jackets and can be pretty badass when he wants to.
- How Dare You Die on Me!: After Jez nearly dies, he yells at her that if she doesn't come back to life, he'll follow her over and kill her.
- Minor Living Alone: He's lived by himself since he was in his early teens.
- Number Two: To Jez when she was their gang's leader.
- Parental Abandonment / Parental Neglect: His mother had no interest in raising him, leaving him to his own devices, before abandoning him altogether when he was in his early teens.
- Second Love: Technically to Jez. She loved Hugh (or thought she did) before being reunited with Morgead and realizing she'd actually been in love with him all along, especially when he makes his feelings clear to her.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: With Jez, before their Relationship Upgrade.
- Wouldn't Hurt a Child: He expresses a great deal of reluctance to actually harm eight year old Iona Skelton. He chews out Thistle for burning her and also leaps off a building to save her and Jez.
Raven Mandrill
Raven Mandrill
Appears in: Jez and Morgead's Night Out | Huntress
A member of Jez Redfern's gang.note
- Darkness Von Gothick Name: A vampire named Raven.
- Heel–Face Turn: Possibly. In the end, Morgead states that she's "interested" in joining Circle Daybreak.
- Statuesque Stunner: She's said to be tall and presumably beautiful, due to being a vampire.
- Those Two Girls: With Thistle. Jez states they always stick close together.
Thistle Galena
Thistle Galena
Appears in: Jez and Morgead's Night Out | Huntress
A member of Jez Redfern's gang.note
- Creepy Child: She's a vampire, who either looks like a child or is a child. She's creepy either way, especially considering what she does in her spare time.
- Darkness Von Gothick Name: Her first name is Thistle and she's a vampire.
- Little Miss Badass / Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: She’s part of a gang that hunts violent criminals for sport.
- Series Continuity Error: Huntress states she's a lamia, but Jez and Morgead's Night Out states she's a made vampire.
- Those Two Girls: With Raven. Jez states they always stick close together.
Nissa Johnson
Nissa Johnson
Appears in: Witchlight
A supporting protagonist in Witchlight. She is a member of Keller’s team, helping to find and protect Iliana Dominick.note
- Action Girl: Alongside Keller, she’s one of the best fighters in Circle Daybreak. Her vampire strength and speed certainly helps in this regard.
- Ambiguous Situation: It's unclear if she's a lamia who is seventeen years old, or a made vampire who looks seventeen.
- The Big Guy: Of the team in Witchlight. As a vampire, she’s equal in strength to Keller, if not more so, and tends to be practical and straight-thinking. She's one of the best fighters on the team and their getaway driver.
- Boyish Short Hair: Has this hair style.
- Curtains Match the Window: She’s described as having “mink-colored” hair (a shade of brown) and eyes “a shade or two darker”.
- Friendly Neighbourhood Vampire: She’s dedicated to saving the world and is generally quite friendly.
- One-Steve Limit: Averted. She has the same first name as Blaise Harman's mother (although she's not mentioned by name in the novels).
