I'll Be Damned

by Erin Hayes

  No one said that pregnancy would be easy.

  No one ever said it would be this hard, though. I just wish that I had been more prepared for all this.

  I cover up my mouth with one hand while I bring the other down on a vampire neck. Thankfully, the vampire’s head cleaves off with the one stroke, and once again, I’m covered in their blood.

  I cannot control it anymore.

  I fall to my knees and empty the contents of my stomach, which taste far worse coming up than they did going down.

  “If you need, Hazel,” Lizzie says, patting me on the shoulder, “I can take care of this.”

  I shake my head while the world swirls a little bit. “No, Lizzie. I’m all right. Simply wanted to make sure that the vampire was dead.”

  I’m all right, I tell myself. I’m not the first woman ever to be pregnant, and I’m certainly not the last. We’re all here because a woman was strong enough to carry a child for nine months. Mother did it four times.

  I’m honestly not sure if I have that strength in me.

  “I have to do this,” I say, as I get to my feet and clutch at my abdomen. I can already feel the bump from the child growing inside me, so small and tiny. I doubt that anyone would notice. Yet I can tell the changes in my body. I can tell that my corsets feel tighter around my belly, and I can see the small swell of my stomach, which is different than it was eight weeks ago.

  I’ll most likely stop wearing corsets after a few months. I don’t want to think about my child being constricted by the too-tight contraptions. I’ll already be the subject of a scandal once my pregnancy grows more pronounced. I might as well dress comfortably.

  Amusingly, I’m as concerned about what society will think of me without a corset as I am of having a bastard child. Life is funny that way.

  “Well, our vampire is certainly dead,” Lizzie muses, looking at the body that I’ve just beheaded. “Do you want me to dispose of it?”

  I shake my head and call my magic to my hand. “I can do it,” I tell her.

  Ever since I entered the Void and spoke with Catherine, my magic has been steadily growing in strength and in power. Almost as though I’ve unblocked whatever magic has been tucked away inside me that night that I burned down the Holmes’ residence.

  I send the flames to the vampire’s body, and it ignites without trouble, swiftly burning to ashes. I wish that I’ve had this power the whole time. It would have certainly made life easier.

  Lizzie shakes her head appreciatively. “You’re an entirely new Harker,” she murmurs.

  “I’m the person I’ve always been,” I tell her as I roll my shoulders. “I’m just able to harness more of my powers now.”

  That and be the Harker that could follow in Catherine’s footsteps. I think about those lonely months and the self-doubt that plagued me after she died. The vampires that taunted me for not being a true Harker.

  Not anymore. I feel my powers growing, just like my unborn baby.

  At the thought of my baby, my hand goes to my belly and stays there. I promise to make the world as safe as possible for her, so that when she takes my place, she won’t have the same troubles I have.

  And if I have a boy, then it will be even safer for him. Possibly not so for the rest of us, but I cannot worry about it until I give birth.

  Until then, though, I need to find Mister Holmes and Adelia and stop them before it’s too late. Before he finds a cure or the serum brings the paradise that she envisions. I don’t believe that his intentions are aligned with hers.

  If anything, I believe she’s using him.

  I shiver, thinking about it, hoping that it doesn’t come to that. Being with child, it seems, makes me more cautious than ever before. I’ve yet to start showing to others, but I already feel as though I’m more vulnerable even as my powers grow stronger.

  “Let’s make a report to Scotland Yard,” I say tiredly, straightening and getting to my feet. My whole body aches at the thought of going across London to make a formal report, however, protocol demands it. And I’ve just lost my dinner, so I need to find some food soon.

  Lizzie knows this and nods sympathetically. “Yes,” she says. “Let’s go.” Yet she watches me for a long moment without moving.

  I peer over at her. “What?”

  She shakes her head. “I’m proud of you,” she says.

  I give her a quizzical look. “For what?”

  “Well.” She gestures distantly. “You make a plan and you stick with it. And while I can say that I don’t necessarily agree with your methods, I do understand why you’re doing it. And I’m proud of you for that, Hazel. Catherine would be proud.”

  I smile, thinking about my older sister. Even if everything were to turn to shit right now, I know that I’ll have Lizzie’s help and Catherine’s blessing. And that’s a lot more than many, many people have in this world.

  “Thank you,” I tell her, as I wrap my cloak around me to hide the blood. She does the same, although her clothes are nowhere near as stained as mine.

  We head down the street, toward the Thames and Scotland Yard. It’s not that far of a distance, yet I feel so ill from my pregnancy, that even a short walk feels like forever. I pay more attention to the nice establishments that we pass, anything to clear my mind, and a thought occurs to me.

  We’re near Cavendish Square Gardens, which is a nicer area of London than where most vampire attacks happen and closer to my home. Generally, they’re in the East End or in Whitechapel or any number of dodgier areas. From a twisted perspective, I understand why—vampires don’t want to draw too much attention to themselves. The Whitechapel murders, for as sensationalized as they are in the media and the ensuing paranoia that happened after, would have had the whole city in even more terror had they occurred in a nicer area. Had they not occurred to whores.

  I gulp down some air, thinking about the fallen women of the city. Having played my part as one for Jared, I’ll never judge them again. They do what they have to do.

  Just as I did what I had to do.

  Still, though. It seems as though vampires are appearing in nicer sections of London. Like they want to draw attention to themselves.

  I’m further lost in my thoughts as we turn a corner, and there’s a crowd of people standing in the streets, looking at something up against a brick wall. Carriages are stopped, and people stare in shock and horror. I spy a few mounted policemen on their steeds, trying to draw the crowd back so they can investigate. One man breaks off from the crowd and pukes into the streets.

  Whatever spectacle they’re looking at, it must be terrible.

  I frown at Lizzie, and she shrugs, just as confused as I am.

  Surely there hadn’t been a vampire attack here. I glance at the street signs. We’re at Oxford and Regent Street. Surely no vampire would be brazen enough to do something in such a public space.

  I run forward and grab the stirrup of a policeman on horseback. “Step away, m’lady,” he says, rounding his horse to face me. “There has been a murder—”

  “I’m the Harker,” I tell him, cutting him short. “Tell me what happened.” He gives me a hard look, and I can tell that his eyes trail from my face to my hair, which I’m sure is a mess from my hunt.

  He swallows nervously, and nods. “Yes,” he says. “You have to see this.” He swings a leg over the rump of his horse and lands on the street. “This way.”

  He leads both Lizzie and me and his horse to the side of the building. He yells at the people to disperse, and they move out of the way of the horse, but little else. We push our way past them, until we clear the throng, and I see exactly what everyone has been looking at.

  And I immediately feel like retching again.

  There’s a dead woman propped up against the wall, a prostitute, if I go by her state of dress and her makeup. However, her eyes are wide open and unseeing, and her head lists to the side. It has been nearly torn off, and white bits from her spinal column stick through the hole in her neck.

/>   It gets worse. Her entire abdomen is gone, like someone had taken a shovel to it and ripped it from her body. Her entrails line the street, and blood is everywhere, painting the area around her in red.

  Including some of the wall. No, I realize as I step closer. Someone has taken her blood and written something there. A message meant for me. And as I read it, I gasp and cover my mouth with my hands.

  BABY HARKER NEXT

  I hear the policeman asking me questions, and all of them seem cursory. “Do you know what this means? Is this about you?”

  Lizzie grabs my arm and grounds me for a little bit. But not enough. “Hazel…” she starts, but her voice trails off, and I push past her to vomit again.

  Out of all the times I’ve vomited before, this feels like the most appropriate.

  I wipe spittle from my mouth with one hand while my other goes to my belly. I look up to see Lizzie’s pale face as she crouches next to me.

  “They know,” I tell her hoarsely. “They know that I’m with child. How?”

  She licks her lips and shakes her head. She looks like she’s about ready to be sick herself. “I don’t know,” she says. “I don’t know.”

  I glance back at the body. I’m going to have to deal with this and feign ignorance over what it means. I don’t want the police to know about my condition. Not yet.

  But I don’t have much time until they will.

  “I have to find them,” I say through gritted teeth. “I have to find them and kill them.” I look back at the horrifically scrawled words. “Before they come after my baby.”

  Find out what happens next in Damned if I Know, Book 2 of The Harker Legacy

  Vampire hunter Hazel Harker faces down vampires and the consequences of her decisions in the second book of The Harker Legacy. Pre-order today to get it the day it releases!

  Want more of the Harkers and vampires? Read on for a sneak peek of Damned if I Do, book one of The Harker Trilogy.

  I don’t like walking down dark alleys, especially at two o'clock in the morning in a city as big as Houston. You either go down one because you're looking for trouble, or you're trouble yourself.

  Tonight, I'm trouble.

  I shove my gloved hands into the front pocket of my black AC/DC hoodie, idly gripping the classic wooden stakes that I keep in there. They’re there more to keep me company than anything else, to calm my frayed nerves, which I've needed ever since that horrible night my sister was taken from me.

  My phone, protected by an Otterbox, is nestled in the back pocket of my shredded black jeans, playing the Ramones through a single earbud in my left ear. Though I know it's bad to hunt keeping only one ear alert, I get nervous when it’s just me and my thoughts.

  My well-worn Dr. Martens don't make a sound as I power-walk up and down the alleys of Rice Village, a shopping district adjacent to Rice University and a stone's throw away from MD Anderson Cancer Center.

  I know MD Anderson all too well. When my father was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer five years ago, Meghan and I used to make the drive with him from Austin to the Cancer Center to treat the tumor. The damn thing metastasized and he succumbed after an awful four months. Even now, I still get chills just being two miles from the hulking hospital.

  Meanwhile, Rice Village has all the hallmarks of a college trap. Cheap pubs and international restaurants line the streets along with a hodgepodge of old and new shops. It looks like it would be a nice area in the daytime, somewhere where you can buy Jimmy Choos and a burrito in the same block.

  At nighttime, however, the threat of danger is very real.

  It is two a.m. and the bars are just now letting out, meaning that there are drunk college kids who are getting in way over their heads.

  I keep my sixth sense active, feeling through the air for any vampires around. My vampy sense, as I call it, does let me down on occasion, so I pay attention to all of my senses. Just in case.

  It doesn't fail me tonight.

  There. Two of them, about forty yards from me.

  I take off at jog, turning the corner around an Indian restaurant nestled between two bars. The narrow space between the buildings is crowded with dumpsters, initially hiding the vampires from sight.

  Then I hear it, the mumbled protestations of a student too drunk on beer and glamour to fight back. There's a light sucking noise that makes me grind my teeth. I squeeze my left hand into a fist to the point where the tendons feel like they're about to snap.

  I need to get my emotions under control.

  I pull out both of my stakes and hold them in my right hand, take a deep breath, and step out to face them.

  "You know, if you guys didn't get greedy, I wouldn't have to find you like this," I announce. Under ordinary circumstances, I would just come up and stake the bastards, but tonight, I want them to talk.

  According to my informant, they have information that I desperately need about the vampire who killed my sister.

  The man and the woman that I'm addressing snap their heads up at the sound of my voice in the otherwise quiet alley. The victim, a boy around my age, slumps between them, twin bite sized marks on either side of his neck. They were both feeding on him at the same time, like he was a family-style restaurant.

  The rage swells within me, and I fight to hold it back.

  The vampires appear to be in their late twenties. To common bystanders, they may look like swinging lovers who invited a third wheel for a little fun in between the dumpsters. Until you notice that the whites of their eyes are red with bloodlust and crimson drips from their mouths. Then they bare their long fangs at you and you definitely no longer believe that they’re human.

  With bravado, I take out my ear bud and tuck the wires into my back pocket. I shift the stakes between both of my hands, making sure that the vampires see the weapons.

  Hopefully, I won’t have to summon my magic sword from the palm of my hand.

  "You got greedy, didn't you? Lucky for you, you've got some information I need, so we can talk if you care to. The question is, what are you going to do next?"

  The male vampire's eyes go wild and the female backs up like a cornered dog. The student collapses in a boneless heap. I now have his assailants' full attention.

  I hope he's okay.

  "You're…" the female vampire says, her eyes flitting across me. I know that she sees a young, pale, punk girl standing before her with black and red dyed hair and a grim expression. She recognizes me before she can finish her sentence.

  "The Harker?" I supply, using the title that my sister once had that I now carry like a heavy burden. "Good guess. I'm the newly appointed one."

  I raise up my stakes. "Now. What do you two know about Anthony?"

  They know the name. I can see the fear in their eyes, fear that I've seen before whenever I track vampires that have heard of him. He's like a slippery eel, an underground crime lord of an already-underground sect of society. Most vampires have never heard of him. Those that have would rather die than talk.

  Which means that I've yet to find a vampire who actually knows his current whereabouts.

  I hope to change that tonight. I need to change that tonight.

  I’m running out of time. I’m dying.

  Unfortunately, instead of answering my simple question, the male vampire lunges at me, swinging his claws in a downward motion in an effort to tear off my face. I spin out of reach with ease, grab his arm, and swing him face-first into the brick wall on my left side. He hits it with a sickening crunch, his nose breaking from the impact.

  "This would be so much easier if you would just answer my question."

  At the sight of her comrade in a heap, the female vampire screeches, reminding me of a banshee. Lucky for us, it sounds similar to cars peeling out, so I'm not too worried about attracting unwanted attention.

  She pulls up the unconscious college student and wraps her hands around his head and shoulders. "Stop, Harker," she hisses. "Stop, or I'll kill the bloodbag."

  I sigh
tiredly. "You're not going to tell me about Anthony?"

  “No. Of course not,” she growls. “He’ll kill me if I say anything.”

  “Are you sure?”

  "Fuck off, Harker. Or I kill him."

  I hate ultimatums. And I hate that she isn't going to tell me.

  I choose a third option.

  I heft a stake in my right hand, testing the weight. I don't even aim as I throw it towards her. As far as I know, I'm the best at this little technique, throwing with one full spin before it hits my target.

  It catches her square in the chest and by surprise. Her eyes widen with the knowledge that her extended life is at an end. She hisses once at me, as if protesting her fate before she falls to the ground.

  A quick death. More than she deserves.

  Then I notice that the male vampire is gone. In panic, I throw out tendrils of my vampy sense, trying to find his whereabouts.

  As if on cue, I get my answer.

  Out of nowhere, I'm punched so hard in the face, I bounce off a brick wall. My right shoulder hits it with a loud pop, like a balloon exploding. I cry out at the impact, both in pain and anger that I was so stupid for losing track of one of the vampires. I dislocated my shoulder when I was fourteen, and since then, I know what one feels like. My fingers begin to tingle in an instant and I lose all mobility in the arm. That means that it’s either dislocated or broken.

  My assailant doesn't give me time to evaluate my injury or fix my shoulder. His solid mass barrels me with the force of a freight train, toppling both of us to the concrete.

  In the split second his weight hits me, I have to make a difficult decision. When I impacted with the wall, I also dropped my stake, meaning that I need to decide if I’m going to summon my sword or try to fight back, mano a mano.

  I hold up my left hand to catch him as he throws himself at me, knocking me backwards. He lands on top, his teeth snapping inches from my nose a second before his entire body seizes up. From the palm of my hand, a wide, shiny, glittering broadsword blade has emerged, piercing him all the way through his torso. I affectionately call the blade Glimmer, although it’s the legendary sword that all Harkers carry within their bodies and pass on to their successors. It’s a part of me, an extension of myself that I inherited from my sister Meghan when I became the Harker in her place. Even though I don’t have an open wound from it, it hurts me every time I use it.