Warm Blood

prologue

prologue

1692

The thick putrid smell of flesh skimming under a hot flame was so rich that I tasted it and so nauseating in a way that you truly couldn't escape. But perhaps, that was insensitive of me considering I could decide to leave whenever I so pleased; the same couldn't be said about the former woman in her late teens withering into an unrecognizable mess of bone and ash as the crowd of eager on-lookers cheered for her demise. Hanging her was not enough, apparently; her body had to be burned to circumvent any possible resurrection. Beyond her remains was a queue of similarly damned witches bonded by shackles, all donning matching looks of despair and anguish.

A dense cloud of fog hung in the sky, touching the heads of all the monstrous elm trees surrounding the clearing in the center of town made specifically for this chilly February night. The darkness was nothing new to me, I preferred it actually, but it was definitely new to the commoners of Salem who clutched onto their dear lanterns so tightly as if they were afraid they might fall.

It wasn't in my intention to attend the public executions, but the town had recently erupted into a contagious fever over the presence of witches in our ever-so-small community. Accusation flew here and there over deeds that were so trivial that it was almost comedic.

Because witches didn't exist.

In my 300 years of life, I had never seen nor heard of any such thing.

Regardless, Salem was convinced of the devil walking among them with no regard to the real monsters that nightmares were made of.

Me.

Aside from the clamor that surrounded the questioned holiness of the village's women, Salem wasn't particularly exciting. It was, however, the perfect place to lay low for the moment's being while on my journey to uncover what was so spectacular about this new land. The land that man killed for.

I didn't know what drew me here. It couldn't have been for the power since for as long as I could remember, I had always detested man's hunger for things that didn't belong to them. Things they didn't need. Things they couldn't have.

It shortly dawned on me that I didn't have a reason, nor did I need one. I had nothing to lose and nothing to gain by being in this stolen land. All I had to do was simply exist and keep moving for as long as possible because the moment I started to feel happiness was when desolation came.

I was no longer happy, no longer sad, no longer anything because my experiences taught me better. I knew how to survive because I was not foolish enough to let my emotions drive me.

At least, not anymore.

Deciding now was the perfect time to feed, I slipped out of the crowd without any resistance. People didn't notice me unless I wanted them to which was what allowed me to peacefully co-exist among them as I fed from them.

I needed to drink blood in the same way that humans needed to eat food to survive; although, it was an activity that I tried to prolong for as long as possible—not that I cared for my victims, but more so because I didn't want to draw attention to myself. Otherwise, it'd be me burning at the stake instead of those innocent girls.

All of the buildings in Salem were made of a rotted wood that would take only moments to collapse if a treacherous storm were to pass through. The streets were carved out of a sandy dirt—though it didn't stop patches of unpatterned grass from growing—which ran through the center of the village, connecting the top of the hill to the stream down below. Most of the houses were relatively vacant save for a few persons who weren't interested in the executions, namely the companions and kin of the soon-to-be deceased whom I had already decided would be my dinner. Perhaps, I would be doing them a service by sparing them from the feeling of loss.