But in much of the world, if someone began practicing witchcraft, he would most likely bring himself to the notice of vampires long before he realized his danger. In areas where they became established, vampires were always watching for witches, presumably because witches pose a special threat to vampires. Quite possibly vampires sometimes left grimoires on shelves specifically to bait potential witches into revealing themselves. Whether purposefully or instinctively, vampires hunted the holy—and later the Pure. But for their entire history, whenever they could, they also actively hunted witches.
Thus, by the time the miasma was broken, there were only a few practicing witches in Europe, the Middle East, the Mediterranean region, or the Americas. And in those regions, all the witches left were profoundly paranoid. That was why they survived, and why they took several years to begin making themselves visible after the black dog/vampire war destroyed the miasma.
In our own world, belief in various kinds of witchcraft was widespread in many, perhaps most, cultures. Today in our world, not only has Wicca developed in some areas, but a belief in evil witchcraft has surged in other regions. In recent years, in a (real) ongoing tragedy, tens of thousands of children in Nigeria, Congo, Angola, and other parts of Africa have been abused or thrown out of their homes for being witches. Reasons for this vary. In some areas, accusations of witchcraft are the only acceptable excuse not to take in a relative; in others, exorcists identify child-witches (for a fee) and perform the exorcism (for another fee).
Much of this is not true in the world of Black Dog. As is often the case, the world of Black Dog is both better and worse, kinder and crueler, than the real world. In the Black Dog world, there were no medieval witch hunts, no Salem witch trials, no Wicca. The Wizard of Oz exists, but Glenda the Good is not a character in the movie. In all cultures, fairy tales and folk tales feature evil witches, almost never good ones. But in the modern day, particularly where vampires were most influential, there is far, far less belief in witchcraft and witches of all sorts.
Even those who are more aware of the supernatural—for example, black dogs and their human kin—know at most only that some kind of demonically influenced witchcraft exists in some areas where vampires have been less powerful—that is, of course, primarily in some parts of Africa and Polynesia. Only in those regions have ordinary people retained not only belief in, but also defenses against, witchcraft. Ironically, because witchcraft was never thoroughly suppressed in Africa, effective methods of dealing with witches were also retained, and thus Sub-Saharan African countries are not plagued with the witchcraft-accusation tragedy seen in our world today, even though they do have other problems with real witchcraft.
All this came about because of vampiric influence. Both the miasma that prevented people from seeing and understanding the supernatural, and because vampires always hunted witches in every region they ever had under their sway.
Now, of course, the vampires are all gone. Now anyone who fancies himself or herself a practitioner, anyone who encounters the right kind of very old book in some dusty library, anyone who happens to think that summoning evil spirits sounds like a great way to wreak harm on an enemy...well, in most regions of the world, there’s now no one hunting witches and no folk memory of how to guard against witchcraft.
Really, that’s just bound to lead to trouble.
Black Dog Short Stories II Page 20
