chapter 13 : New life.
Harper stood in front of the others completely stunned.
"Don't talk and listen or...look..." He moved straight in a blur to be behind them and they turned to look at him in great terror as Harper's face turned vampiric with his canines growing longer.
Harper: I don't plan on wasting time answering absurd questions.
"The god you believe in doesn't exist and only magic has made everything you observe in nature and creatures like me. You were taught to believe in fables..." he said moving quickly behind Swanson while everyone else flinched.
"The freedom you seek, you'll not find it in one place. The west that you want to reach and imagine wild and free will be covered by the shadow of the civilization that you despise. Neither you nor your descendants will be truly free. The only freedom is the power that goes beyond human laws, vampires do what they want where they want." He said appearing between Hosea, Dutch and Arthur before moving towards Charles and Lenny.
Harper: A vampire does not have to worry about rejection or oppression due to his skin color, he is above humans. Those who want to oppress him become his prey, (looks at Charles) We are more in connection with nature than humans, we are predators capable of doing good or evil as we please."
" (to Sadie) We can take revenge on those who have harmed us, like those who took your husband away from you. (to John) Or your wife…" He said moving between Jon and Sadie.
He looked at Karen before slowly walking towards her.
"We have the strength to protect or kill those we want when we want…to live forever without fearing the weight of the years and to remain beautiful and beautiful forever…close to those who are important to us…" He finished his sentence by stroking her cheek as she closed her eyes .
Harper: If you take me for a monster from legends then know that a monster would have killed you all a long time ago. I always have my free will, I choose why I kill or why I save. There are some drawbacks but the rest is just freedom. I think pretty highly of you so I'm going to offer you the choice to become vampires like me or not. You are completely free to accept or not.
Hosea: (breathing irregularly) What if we refuse ?
Harper: I will erase the memory of those who refuse, they will never remember this conversation and I will give them the means to peacefully rebuild their lives elsewhere.
Javier: I accept, amigo. I want to be like you.
Hosea: Javier?!
Lenny: Is what you said true ? I will be strong enough to face those who despise our people and chained our ancestors ?
Harper: You will do to them what you want. However, you and I know that they are not all the same and that evil has no skin color.
Lenny: I accept.
Harper: Charles?
Charles: I...I don't know...that kind of thing, there's always something to regret...I just want a quiet life, far from all these problems.
Harper: There is no place without problems in this world.
Charles:…
Sadie: I could really kill all those dogs from the gang that killed my Jake.
Harper: Every last one.
Sadie: I accept.
Dutch: I accept.
Hosea: DUTCH!!!
Arthur: I accept.
Hosea:…
"I accept…" Karen said as she approached Harper before grabbing his hand to entangle their fingers.
Harper: Mr. Marston, your child only has you. I would understand if you wanted to go away and take care of him.
John: That's what I want too.
Harper: Well, those who want to stay human and leave stay here but those who want to become vampires come to my side.
Hosea, John, Swanson and Charles stood in front and the others joined Harper. He asked them to say their goodbyes and went to the big house to make preparations and woke Tilly to explain everything to her.
Jack was woken up and she went out with him to find John outside. Harper returned to compell them, give them a few thousand dollars each to start a life elsewhere and Tilly decided to leave with Jon to take care of Jack.
Harper: Tilly, are you sure of your choice?
Tilly: I owe that child at least that much if my powers couldn't protect his mother when needed.
Harper: (comes closer) Are you sure?
Tilly: Yes.
"Very good…" He replied before letting them go under the sad looks of the others he looked at them and asked them to follow him. His revenge on Tilly, he'll take it later when she least expects it, it wasn't fun to do that now.
They arrived at the large room where on the table there were metal cups with which they used to drink their coffee from but instead of coffee, there was Harper's blood inside.
"It's my blood, it's thanks to that that you can transform yourself. Drink it to move on to the next step…" He said and they looked at the containers, some with hesitation and some with disgust but they drank anyway.
Dutch: What now?
"Now, you die..." Harper replied as a wide smile spread across his face before with terrifying speed he began snapping their necks one by one, those who panicked didn't get time to stress for a long time because they died in a second.
Satisfied, he looked at them smiling before taking a jewel from each of them, it was still daytime so he went to perform a creation ritual for objects that would allow them to resist sunlight.
When they all woke up, Harper was in the room with them. It was exactly 5 a.m. and they had been dead long enough for Harper to have some semblance of concern.
It was the first time he created vampires but even for him, the gang members' waking time was unusually long.
Harper: Good morning everyone...
Arthur: You...you killed us...
Harper: This was the necessary step in your transformation and now you must complete it by nourishing yourself.
He pointed to the ten men present in the room, they were there by mental compulsion and asked them to approach to feed and complete the transition, they did indeed approach but hesitated to do so and Harper seeing them as it only made him smile.
They reminded him of his own state when Zakaria transformed him so he did exactly what Zack had done with him, he slit the throat of one of these men to collect the blood in his hand and throw it in their faces with precision before pushing the man towards them.
Without even looking further, he turned around to walk towards a man who was sitting there, it was his evening meal which he began to eat.
These men were outlaws and Harper was preying on their leader right now. He glanced back and saw the others rushing to feed on their prey, there were 7 vampires to 10 humans. He stood up to move towards one of the other humans and bite its neck when Karen joined him in biting the other side of Harper's prey's neck.
They then looked at each other without saying anything before Karen rushed towards Harper to start kissing her energetically and with great savagery her desire had increased tenfold and she wanted Harper for a while already, he grabbed her by the hip and quickly took him to the large bedroom upstairs where they began to make love.
As for the others, they wanted even more blood and Dutch wanted to get out but a restraining spell was placed by Harper and an invisible barrier prevented them from leaving the building, they would have to wait until he finishes fucking with Karen to do anything. When they got down there, it was daylight and the others were hiding in the corners to avoid the sunlight.
"Apparently, you've just encountered the first disadvantages of your new life." He said amusedly as he walked down stairs .
Lenny: You never told us the sun could burn us now.
Sadie: Why did you hide this from us?
Harper: I told you there would be downsides. Your first enemy will be daylight, then vervain which is toxic to our species, wooden weapons can seriously injure or weaken us but we can be killed if our heart is destroyed or if we are decapitated. Oh yes, you'll no longer be able to enter someone's home without being invited.
They all started talking at the same time but he ignored them to go to one of the corners to retrieve a box containing the jewelry he had taken from them.
"This is a solution to the first problem. In this box there is a jewel belonging to each of you, they have been enchanted to allow you to walk in the light of day without fear of being burned. I added a little special touch to it…" He said as he opened the trunk to take Karen's necklace and he made her wear it before taking her hand to walk towards the sun's rays and nothing happened to her.
The others saw this and quickly went to the box to get their jewelry.
Dutch: Why couldn't we come out earlier, we need more blood.
Harper: If you couldn't go out it's because I didn't allow you to. Let me be clear, I lead our happy little group now and you will do whatever I ask of you.
Javier: You made us like you, why should we obey you if we are equal.
Harper: (Laughs) Equal ?! The older we get and the stronger we are, I could slaughter you with one hand while dressing if I wanted to and what's more...
A severe headache attacked them, they began to bleed from their eyes and ears. The pain was horribly excruciating and left them totally incapacitated.
Harper: I have added some modifications to your jewelry, it will now be impossible to remove and disobeying my orders will cost you immeasurable pain, even worse than what you just experienced.
I intend to give you what I promised you, but you are still young vampires and you have no idea yet how out of control you are. An objection?
Others :…
"Very good, I'm even quite surprised at the docility of some people. Now throw these bodies far into the swamps to feed the animals. We need to get you used to some things…" he said smiling and they looked at each other before doing what he said. They couldn't wait to get out and enjoy their new abilities.
Over the next week, Harper accustomed the new vampires to their new existing one. He taught them how to feed properly and imposed a rule on them which was to kill those who deserved it but if they wanted to feed on innocent people, they had to drink a small amount of blood and hypnotize the victim so that they would not remembers nothing.
They had no choice because if they drank more blood than necessary from innocent prey, their rings would give them horrible aneurysms. The enchantment made on their jewelry was terribly powerful.