Cursed City by Kate Golden: Chapter-by-Chapter Book Summary

This Cursed City book summary covers Kate Golden’s Harker Academy Book 2. Whether you need a full recap before Infernal City or just want a refresher on what happened, this chapter-by-chapter breakdown of Cursed City has you covered. The summary of Cursed City below includes full spoilers.

CURSED CITY TROPES: Dark Academia | Forced Proximity | Found Family | Love Triangle | Reluctant Allies

Jump to Chapter Recap of Cursed City: 10–17 | 18–26 | 27–35 | 36–44 | 45–53 // Harker Academy Book 1 Summary

Cursed City Book Summary

This Kate Golden Cursed City book summary contains full spoilers for all 53 chapters.

Cursed City Chapter 1

Viv stumbles into Deacon’s club, Fever Dream, bleeding and barely conscious. She manages to tell Deacon that his brother Reid has been captured at the docks by Finn, the High Thane’s son, who plans to kill Reid. Deacon takes off with Ward to go after his brother. Meanwhile, Baz heals Viv with his blood and puts her to bed.

Hours later, Viv wakes up sore but alive. After she checks her phone and Reid doesn’t answer, she decides not to wait any longer and tries to leave. A young vampire bartender steps in to stop Viv, then turns on her. The bartender wants to sell her out to the Brood for money or a membership brand.

Viv and the vampire tear through the guest room fighting until Viv spots a broken piece of the bathroom door she could use as a stake. Before she can reach it, the vampire grabs her injured back and drops her. Right as things look hopeless, Deacon walks in and drives a wooden clock through the vampire’s chest. Then Deacon makes a pun about his aim.

Cursed City Chapter 2

Deacon tells Viv that Reid is probably alive but is being tortured for betraying his own people. He also explains that the hunters Harker sent to the docks after Viv’s earlier text to Fiona almost caught Deacon.

Meanwhile, Deacon plans to keep Viv locked up until he figures out how to neutralize what’s embedded in her back. He warns her that it will drain her within a few months. She tries to convince him to let her help find Reid, even offering herself as bait in a trade with Finn. Deacon shuts the idea down, saying Finn would never honor the deal. 

When Viv suggests that Deacon approach Finn directly for information instead, Deacon responds with a sharp warning never to imply that he should humble himself before the High Thane or the High Thane’s son.

As Deacon and Ward head for the door, Viv argues that without her blades she’s defenseless against anyone who might try to capture her inside Deacon’s own club. Deacon returns the blades, and Viv immediately throws herself through the window.

Cursed City Chapter 3

Viv survives a nine-story fall and sprints back to her apartment, where she finds it cordoned off by police. She senses a Brood demon disguised as a cop heading inside. She chases the demon up the stairwell and ends him with a dagger before he reaches her door.

Inside, Penny is shaken but unharmed. Viv finally comes clean about everything. She tells Penny that she’s a deviant hunter, that monsters are real, and that the Brood targeted Penny to draw Viv out. Viv also tells Penny that the man she killed at the docks was her father’s murderer. Without hesitation, Penny agrees to leave.

Viv and Penny sneak out through the fire escape. They take a cab to the Windsor, which conceals Harker, the secret hunter school Viv attends. Fiona meets them in the lobby and tells them that she’s been made interim dean. Fiona leads Viv and Penny through the gateway into Harker. She warns Penny that crossing over will permanently change what Penny can see.

Once inside, Viv asks Sophia to look after Penny while Viv speaks with Fiona alone. Fiona tells Viv that the Elders know Driscoll was working with the Brood and that Reid is officially presumed dead. Viv insists that the Brood took Reid rather than killed him. When Fiona asks whether Viv knows who carries the syrabraxa spell, Viv admits that she’s the host.

Cursed City Chapter 4

Viv tells Fiona her father was an aeon. Driscoll and the High Thane had hunted him previously, before shifting their search to Viv. Fiona admits she has no idea how to remove the syrabraxa without the person who originally cast the spell. She then lays out what happens next. Viv and Penny will stay at Harker. The Elders can never learn what Viv is. Penny’s mortality must remain secret, because the Elders would kill her to protect their world. Fiona also makes it clear that searching for Reid isn’t an option right now.

After a brief call to her mother, Viv returns to her friends and tells them everything. She breaks down over what Reid gave up for her. The group pulls together quickly. Peter digs into the syrabraxa and compiles a list of foreclosed properties where the Brood might be holding Reid. Penny cracks the lead. She recognizes one address: a shuttered Cineplex in the Fens, owned by Penny’s father. It’s a place one of her kidnappers mentioned. Everyone agrees it’s worth checking out.

Penny works out a cover story to explain her absence to her family and insists on coming along because she knows the building’s layout and access codes. Viv talks Penny out of it and leaves her with Peter while Viv, Sophia, and Elliot head out.

Cursed City Chapter 5

Viv, Elliot, and Sophia arrive at an abandoned movie theater they suspect is tied to the Brood. Viv senses no demons nearby, but the group still needs a way inside. Before they can figure one out, Penny shows up uninvited after following them from school. Viv resists letting Penny stay, but Penny quickly wins the argument by using her biometric ability to disable the security cameras and open the gate.

Once inside, the group splits up to cover the building faster. After an hour of searching and coming up empty, Viv suddenly experiences a sharpened new hunting sense, apparently a side effect of the syrabraxa. Through it, she identifies a specific deviant nearby and recognizes the presence as Deacon’s. 

Viv races to warn Penny, but a massive werewolf reaches the projector room first. The werewolf shifts back to human form and turns out to be Ward. Deacon arrives right behind him and admits he followed Viv to the theater. He also confirms that the building is a Brood hideout, though he found nothing useful about Reid inside.

Sophia and Elliot burst in, and the standoff quickly turns dangerous, with both sides drawing weapons. Just as Viv orders Penny to run and a fight seems inevitable, Viv senses something else closing in on the group.

Cursed City Chapter 6

Viv and her group are watching from a projector room when they spot a group of Brood demons in the theater below, dragging a gagged man through the aisles. Viv confirms that Reid isn’t among them. She tells Penny to hide, and then the group jumps down to fight despite Sophia’s objections.

The brawl is messy and scattered. Everyone tears through the Brood in their own way while Viv tries to break away and track down Finn. At one point, Deacon grabs Viv and pulls her sideways, causing one of Sophia’s arrows to lodge in Viv’s shoulder instead of hitting him. Viv punches Deacon in the face for it. The group eventually finishes off the last of the demons together.

After the fight, Ward brings over the man the Brood had been questioning. The captive turns out to be a recently turned vampire, not a mortal. He tells the group that the Brood recruited him to find a hidden hunter school somewhere in the city, and he insists he knows nothing about Reid. Deacon presses the vampire for any information about Finn, and the vampire gives up one useful detail. Finn shows up at a townhouse south of the Chasm on Friday nights.

That’s enough for Deacon. He kills the vampire anyway to prevent word from getting back to Finn that Deacon is looking for Reid.

Cursed City Chapter 7

After leaving the Cineplex, Viv confronts Deacon and Ward on the street. Viv quickly senses that something has shifted. Deacon seems to want something from her rather than trying to force her back to his club.

Viv asks Deacon why he killed the vampire earlier and why he’s been hiding his search for Reid from the High Thane. Deacon admits she’s right, then turns the questioning around and asks how Viv knew he was in the projector room before anyone saw him enter. Viv explains that the syrabraxa embedded in her back has amplified her aeon abilities to the point that she can identify specific deviants rather than simply sensing their presence.

That answer seems to be what Deacon was waiting for. He reveals that Finn visits a private club called the Manor on Friday nights, and Reid might be there. They agree to go on Friday and use the party as cover while they search for Reid. When Viv tries to secure a deal guaranteeing freedom for herself and Reid, Deacon brushes off the request without committing. He also refuses to bring her friends because the club is for members only. When Viv points out that she isn’t a member, Deacon tells her she’ll be going as his whore.

Cursed City Chapter 8

Viv sneaks out of the Windsor alone on Friday night, deliberately leaving her friends behind to protect them. Deacon finds Viv on the street almost immediately, pulling up on his motorcycle and offering her a ride to the Manor. They bicker on the way there, and Viv only agrees to ride with him after he points out that they need to arrive together to make their cover story believable.

Outside, Viv and Deacon find what looks like an ordinary brownstone in a neighborhood called South of the Chasm. Then Deacon whispers a password at the door and passes Viv off as his hired escort, which gets them inside. The Manor turns out to be a chaotic party packed with wealthy guests, open violence, and rampant sexual activity. Viv is rattled, but she stays focused, quickly steering the conversation back to the search for Reid before the threat posed by Finn makes the situation worse.

Cursed City Chapter 9

Viv and Deacon arrive at an exclusive sex party. Deacon explains that he hired a real escort to get them past the door check, since the venue verifies guests against an approved list. They run into Lance, a celebrity, who propositions Viv. She turns Lance down, and she and Deacon move on.

Using her tracking ability, Viv leads Deacon to a back room, but it contains a consensual scene with no sign of their targets. In the next room, they find Finn with a woman. Before Viv and Deacon can act, Finn pulls the woman through a door and locks it with magic.

Viv and Deacon slip into the room and find themselves trapped. When Viv senses Finn returning, Deacon tells her to get on her knees so they can pass as a couple hooking up. Finn buys the act and leaves, but he calls Deacon his cousin on the way out.

After Finn leaves, Viv demands answers. Deacon confirms that Finn is his cousin, which makes the High Thane both his uncle and Reid’s uncle. This revelation casts doubt on Reid’s claim that he never knew the High Thane’s identity. Deacon suggests that Reid may have stayed quiet to prevent someone worse from taking over, and it becomes clear that the High Thane has damaging leverage over Deacon personally.

Viv pushes Deacon to agree to work with her if they find Reid. Deacon ignores Viv and heads down the hall on his own.