The Early Nights of New Orleans: Jonas versus Cosa

For three years, a small trickle of non-Setite Kindred managed to get into the city. Some of these were Samedi that went about their own devices, but most were Camarilla members trying to find a niche. Jonas let the other Followers of Set ‘sharpen their teeth’ on these Kindred. The Setites saw to it that all of the other clans were kept weak and ineffective, but it was soon to change. 

Simon de Cosa suddenly appeared in New Orleans. The Brujah elder had truthfully been there all along. He had arrived with the first of the Camarilla that arrived but went into hiding immediately. He watched the Setites corrupt the other Camarilla that entered the city and work their way into controlling the city’s mortal institutions. Now ready, Cosa summoned his allies to the city. 

Jonas noticed quickly that something was interfering with his hold on the city. Several of the his pawns began slipping through his fingers. So he moved his people about quietly to discover what was going on. In a relatively short time, he found the cause of this disturbance to his control. 

Secretly, Jonas was delighted to finally have a worthy opponent. He and Cosa began a conflict that would last until the next century. 

The two of them threw everything that they had at each other in a fierce conflict for control of the city. For the most part history itself was a background. Neither one of them tried to take direct control of the most powerful mortals or large mortal affairs for fear that it would attract all the wrong attention. They had both already discovered that the group known as the Society of Leopold had established a large presence in the city with the help of the Catholic Church. 

The secret war continued until 1755, when the British took possession of Acadia (modern day Nova Scotia and New Brunswick). Many of the displaced peoples of this, the Cajuns, migrated to Louisiana. Unfortunately, among these were Black Spiral Dancer werewolf kinfolk. Many werewolves followed their kin to the bayous of Louisiana. The newcomers discovered the already resident Uktena tribe and the large network of Cairns that they protected. The two groups broke out into open bloodshed. 

The battle between the two groups of werewolves spilled into the city. This gave the Uktena their first look at the vampires that inhabited New Orleans. The Uktena werewolves and their allies proceeded to attack the resident Kindred as well. The lupines seemed to be able to find the Followers of Set particularly easy, and they became the brunt of the attacks. 

Though Jonas took severe losses at the beginning of the conflict, but he managed to gain a great deal of tactical expertise because of it as well. He learned to mix Sabbat mass embraces and religious brainwashing techniques with Camarilla tactics of using ghouls and ranking mortals as intermediaries in the conflict. The fighting did cost him a great deal in the way of control over mortal institutions. He would come to realize just how costly later on. 

Cosa and his allies went to ground for the most part during the conflict. Hiding themselves and their influence as best they could, they attempted to wait out the storm. 

After several decades, the werewolves pulled back the majority of their most ambitious attacks. Jonas and Cosa returned to their ongoing conflict and were only occasionally harassed by the werewolves. Although the lupine caused fires of 1788 and 1794 were large exceptions to this (Jonas and Cosa made sure some severe firebug laws that were put in place after these incidents). 

The war raged on, that is until the Louisiana purchase.