He left armed with several loaded muskets and a set of very impressive, but usually concealed, fangs. He passed through the settlement of New York, which had grown to twenty-five hundred people, stopping long enough for refreshment and to hear the locals' favorite story about the Dutch and their wall.
He arrived in Philadelphia in the fall of 1774, but stayed only long enough to find out that, again, political unrest was in the air. He continued southward. So long as he hugged the coast line there was enough to eat and little danger from Black Swan, who were much more likely to be encountered in cities, or from aboriginals who were much more likely to be encountered away from cities.
Of course it was easier to be a vampire in a city, but easy doesn't mean much to a dead vampire.
Seven hundred miles later he reached Charleston. He'd eaten along the way, of course, but often thought that vampire can't live by blood alone. He wasn't starving, but he was irritable because of a deprivation of amusements.
Near the slave market he found a building much like a stable with padlocked doors. He pulled the lock off one and grinned broadly at what he found inside. Eighteen slaves, all female, all unclothed, all bound. If anyone heard their screams in the middle of the night, they wouldn't have thought much of it. It wasn't that unusual for slave traders to whip or otherwise abuse the merchandise. It was, in fact, the main reason why many were attracted to that line of work.
When the owner of the women arrived the next day to prepare them for the auction block, he found the lock torn from its hinge. The room was a grisly scene indeed, covered in blood, body parts and entrails.
Baka had fed on two or three then killed the others just to keep them from spreading rumors about vampire. That would be the fastest way to garner Black Swan's attention.
That night in Charleston was one of the memories Baka worked so hard at keeping away by staying busy. Words could not describe how much he hated the hands and teeth that had killed those women. His hands and teeth.
After Baka's personality fully reemerged, he had become insistent about atheism. Of course there was not a god in the sense of a compassionate, caring being with enough power to influence the suffering of the world! If there was, the vampire virus would never have been allowed to mutate, grow, and spread. It delivered atrocities to its victims and desolation to its hosts, creating hell on earth. He was fond of saying. "There may be a supreme dark one, but certainly there is no counterpart. If you don't believe it, look around you."
Baka liked Charleston and spent as much time there as he felt was prudent before moving on. He had heard a lot about New Orleans and wanted to go there, but he didn't want to go overland if he could help it. So he arranged guest passage on a small clipper to take him down the coast, around the Keys and to New Orleans by way of the Gulf of Mexico.
New Orleans had more vampire than he'd ever seen in any one place. That was especially odd since there were no underground accommodations anywhere in the city - not even for graves. But many made good use of crypts, sometimes renovating to the extent of clearing out remains and making themselves as comfortable as possible.
It was a good place for vampire because it met several of the extant criteria: concentrated population, night time pedestrians, and plenty of women.
After a few months Baka had seen what there was to see in New Orleans. He became restless and was ready for a change of scenery and pastimes. He missed Europe and was curious to see what they had been up to in his absence. In 1819 he returned to Angland by steamship.
The SS Savannah left the port of Savannah for Liverpool. The entire trip took less than a month. The journey was so fast and the ship held so many people that he was actually able to make the crossing without eating every woman on board. Times were indeed changing.
***
CHAPTER_9
Stagsnare Dimension, Present Day.
Archer turned to Rothesay. "Are they sure this is necessary?"
Rothesay gave Archer the stony, blue-eyed scowl that never failed to make his underlings hope he didn't notice them. It was his gift.
"You're questioning the leadership that got us this far?"
"No. It's just that the price could be the lives of Ralengclan and we started this thing believing in the proposition that every life of a clan member is precious."
"I think you overstate the risk. The last three batches of prisoners sent through the device were returned unharmed."
They had been using the prisoners of war as test subjects for the reconstruction of the interdimensional transport. The first few attempts had been disastrous, but they had finally reached the point where they could send people on a round trip and bring them back alive.
"I'm not just talking about the risk of transport to another dimension. There's no way to guarantee that nothing will go wrong with a mission to assassinate a Laiwynn royal - if she's even alive - and we don't have any reason to think that's true."
"No reason? You know they have a way of being both resourceful and resilient. And we can't afford to take the chance that any of them lived."
"It's one girl. How frightening can she really be?"
Rothesay laughed softly, but without humor. "It seems it doesn't take long to forget what life under the Laiwynn is like, does it?"
Archer turned away. "It's moot anyway, isn't it? My opinion isn't going to be taken into consideration. I'm just the mechanic, right?"
Rothesay thought about feeding his ego some gornishit about being an invaluable scientist, but decided that would be a waste of time and there were more important things to do. "Right." Rothesay opened the door and twelve soldiers filed in.
Archer recognized one of them and smiled. "Did your wife get her flute back?"