After the Church of Dagon, Dark Confederacy, Crimson Coven of Salem and Twilight Order, my next Dracula’s America posse takes me into the Louisiana bayou. The Congregation are Voodoo worshippers sworn to defend the remnants of the Free South, drawing supernatural power from the mysterious Loa and directing much of their fury against the Dark Confederacy. Where Lucien Beauregard Saint Clair and his followers seek to command the dead, the Congregation believes that the relationship between the living, the dead and the spirit world must be respected.
The Congregation began among the isolated settlements of Bayou Noir, where Voodoo traditions had survived war and upheaval and where the presence of the spirit world had long been accepted as part of everyday existence. That isolation ended when followers of the Dark Confederacy entered the bayou searching for an old burial ground believed to contain the remains of powerful Voodoo practitioners. They intended to open the graves, raise the dead and carry whatever secrets they discovered back to Blackthorn Hall.
The people of Bayou Noir resisted, but the Confederates forced their way into the cemetery and opened the first grave. In doing so they attracted the attention of powers they neither understood nor controlled.
At the centre of what followed were the brothers Étienne and Mathieu Baptiste, sons of a local boatman and a respected Voodoo practitioner. Both had experienced the presence of the Loa since childhood, although their relationships with the spirits developed very differently. Étienne was cautious and contemplative, receiving warnings through dreams and strange fragments of knowledge, while Mathieu’s encounters were more immediate and unpredictable. Their mother taught them that being noticed by the Loa was not a privilege to be celebrated, but an obligation that carried responsibilities of its own.
Both brothers eventually became Vessels, capable of allowing the Loa to act through them. Étienne approaches this role with considerable caution, regarding himself as little more than a doorway between worlds, while Mathieu is more willing to surrender himself to whatever spirit answers the call. Neither believes that he commands the Loa. The spirits possess their own personalities and purposes, and whatever assistance they provide inevitably carries expectations in return.
When the Dark Confederacy violated the cemetery, both brothers answered. Witnesses later spoke of voices emerging from the darkness, water moving against the current and figures appearing among the cypress trees where no living person had stood. Most disturbing of all for the Confederates, the corpses they had raised ceased obeying their commands and turned upon them. By sunrise the survivors were fleeing Bayou Noir.
Étienne subsequently disappeared into the swamp for three days before returning with a warning. The attack had not been an isolated incident. The Dark Confederacy would continue disturbing graves, raising the dead and imposing its own twisted vision upon the shattered South. The communities of the bayou could wait for them to return, or somebody could carry the fight beyond Louisiana.
Thus the Congregation was born.
Étienne and Mathieu were soon joined by Voodoo practitioners, hunters, boatmen, former soldiers and gunfighters from across the bayou. Some understood the Loa intimately, while others understood little beyond the wisdom of showing them respect. What united them was the belief that the Free South belonged to the living and that the dead should not become soldiers for men unwilling to accept that their war had ended.
For my posse, the two Baptiste brothers also solve the problem of having two Vessel miniatures. Rather than leave a duplicate figure unused, both now have a place within the developing story. Étienne provides the calmer spiritual centre of the Congregation, while Mathieu offers a more unpredictable connection with the spirit world. Eventually their hunt will take them to Blackthorn Hall. Lucien Saint Clair may command the dead, but the Loa have not forgotten them.
