The Rise of Varkryn

My mother was a hunter.

I didn’t know that until I was old enough to understand what it meant. Old enough to understand that the woman who sang me to sleep at night had spent her childhood learning how to kill things like my father.

Things like me.

But that came later. Before I was born, before the fire, before everything fell apart—there was just a woman walking home through the snow, and a beast bleeding out in the forest.

This is the story they told me. The pieces I gathered over years of questions, of silences, of things my father would and wouldn’t say. I’ve filled in the gaps myself.

I don’t know if I got it right.

I don’t know if it matters.

Bulgaria – The Stara Planina Mountains, 1987

The snow was falling thick by the time Elena left the village.

She pulled her coat tighter and adjusted the basket on her arm. Bread, cheese, a bottle of rakia for her father. The path through the mountains was familiar—she’d walked it a thousand times. Every tree, every stone, every bend in the river memorized.

She wasn’t afraid. She was a Vetrov. Her family had hunted the things that preyed on humans for six generations. She’d been trained to track, to fight, to kill.

The growl came from her left.

Low. Close.

Her hand went to her knife. Silver-edged. Forged by a smith in Sofia who knew what the Vetrovs hunted and charged accordingly.

The creature stepped out of the trees.

Elena froze.

It wasn’t a wolf. It wasn’t a man. It was something in between—massive, standing on two legs, fur matted with blood. Golden eyes, wild with pain. Claws longer than her fingers, leaving deep gouges in the snow as it staggered forward.

A Lycan.

She should run. That’s what her father taught her.

She didn’t run.

Because the Lycan wasn’t attacking. It was standing there, bleeding from wounds across its chest and arms. Silver wounds—the edges black and festering, not healing the way they should. Whoever had done this knew what they were hunting.

The beast was watching her. Waiting for her to decide whether to kill it.

Elena lowered her knife.

“You’re hurt,” she said.

The Lycan didn’t move.

“I can help you.”

Still no response.

She took a step forward. The beast tensed. Its claws extended.

“I’m not going to hurt you.” She sheathed her knife. Held up her empty hands. “See? No weapons.”

A long moment passed.

Then the shift began.

Bones cracking. Reforming. Fur receding into skin. A man emerging from the beast, naked in the snow, steam rising from his body.

He was tall. Broader than any man she’d seen. Ice grey eyes. Scars covering his chest and arms, layered over the fresh silver wounds. But the wounds were already starting to close—his healing kicking in, pushing out the silver like splinters.

He was looking at her like he was waiting for her to scream.

She didn’t.

“My name is Elena,” she said. “Elena Vetrov.”

Something shifted in his expression.

“Vetrov,” he repeated. “The hunter family.”

“Yes.”

“Your kind has been hunting my kind for centuries.”

“I know.”

“And you’re offering to help me?”

“You’re bleeding out in the snow.” She pulled her basket higher on her arm. “I have bandages at my family’s cabin. A mile from here. Needle and thread. Whiskey, if you drink it.”

He considered this for a long moment.

“Silas,” he said finally. “Silas Varkryn.”

Varkyn. She knew that name. Every hunter knew that name.

“You’re the last one,” she said.

“I am.”

The cabin was small. One room. A fireplace, a bed, a table with two chairs. Elena’s family had used it for generations—a place to rest between hunts, to patch wounds, to wait out storms.

Silas sat on the floor because the chairs were too small for him. Elena knelt beside him, cleaning the silver wounds, watching as they knit together before her eyes.

“Hold still,” she said.

“Holding still.”

“You’re healing fast.”

“Lycans heal fast. Silver slows it down. Doesn’t stop it.”

She threaded the needle. Started stitching the worst of the wounds.

“Who did this to you?”

“Hunters.”

“My family?”

“No. Different hunters. From the south.”

She tied off the stitch. Moved to the next one.

“Why were they hunting you?”

“Because I exist.”

She looked up. Met his eyes.

“That’s not a reason.”

“It is if you’re a Varkryn.”

She didn’t ask what that meant. She already knew. Her father had told her stories about the Lycan kings who ruled the forests for centuries. About the coalition that overthrew them. About the hunting parties that had been chasing the survivors ever since.

“How long have you been running?” she asked.

“My whole life.”

She finished the last stitch. Tied it off. Sat back on her heels.

“You can stay here tonight,” she said. “Rest. Heal. In the morning, I’ll bring you food and water.”

“And then what?”

“And then we’ll see.”

He stayed for one night. Then two. Then a week.

Then a month.

They fell into a rhythm. Elena went to the village during the day—bought supplies, maintained the appearance of a normal life. She came back in the evening and found him waiting. Sometimes in human form. Sometimes in his Lycan form, patrolling the perimeter, making sure no one had followed her.

They ate dinner together. She cooked. He watched.

“You’re staring,” she said one night.

“I’m observing.”

“Those are the same thing.”

“They’re not. Staring implies rudeness. Observing implies interest.”

Heat crept up her neck. “What’s so interesting?”

“You. The way you move. The way you cook like you’re fighting a war. The way you hum when you think no one is listening.”

“I do not hum.”

“You hum. Old Bulgarian folk songs. Badly.”

“I will stab you with this knife.”

“You could try.” He almost smiled. “But you’d have to catch me first.”

Three months after they met, she told him the truth.

They were sitting by the river. Her feet in the water. His on the bank—he didn’t like the cold the way she did.

“My family sent me here to find you,” she said.

He didn’t react.

“They heard rumors of a Lycan in the area. They wanted me to track you. Hunt you. Kill you if I could.”

“I know.”

She looked at him. “You knew?”

“I could smell the silver on your knife the night we met. I could smell the wolfsbane in your blood—your family’s been dosing you with it for years, haven’t they? To make yourselves immune.”

“Then why did you let me help me?”

“Because I wanted to see what a hunter would do when she found a Lycan that wasn’t a monster.”

“Is that what you are? Not a monster?”

“I don’t know anymore.” He turned to look at her. “What do you see?”

She thought about it. About the last three months. About the man who walked her home through the snow. Who told her stories about the mountains. Who listened to her talk about the village like it was the most interesting thing in the world.

“I see a man,” she said. “A man who’s been alone for too long. A man who deserves better than what the world has given him.”

He didn’t speak for a long moment.

“What are you going to tell your family?” he asked.

“That I couldn’t find you. That the rumors were false.”

“And if they don’t believe you?”

“Then I’ll tell them the truth.”

“Which is?”

She took his hand. His fingers were warm despite the cold. Rough with calluses. Strong.

“The truth is I fell in love with you.” She looked into his eyes. “And I’m not going to let anyone hurt you. Not my family. Not the hunters. Not the covens. No one.”

He didn’t say anything.

He pulled her close and kissed her.