My namesake means “son of Vasile” but I never met the bearer of that name. Vasile died a few nights before my birth, when our peasant home was rampaged. My father tried to defend my pregnant mother and my older sister, Mala. My father and Mala were killed outright. The wise-one, Vadoma, burst in with the sun itself and drove the vampir away, but not before it corrupted the blood of my mother. I was born a few days later when the sun was highest on the day of the snow moon. Vadoma, my grandmother, tells me my skin burned in the sunlight and I cried out with vengeance. She says the sun both blessed and cursed me. I was born dhampir.

“Children stay in bed, or evil shadows will come born on Ustalav fog and carry you away to that dark land,” my dàki dey would say to me. Dàki dey is “grandmother” in our old Sczarni tongue. She was a wise woman, follower of Desna. Local Varno villagers and distant city dwellers would come to her for cures for their ailments. When women were distressed during childbirth, she would be the one they called on. Years she tried to teach me the ways of our ancestors, especially after the assault on my family. My mother never spoke of that night and ten years later the fog stole her from us. Dàki dey, Vadoma, was my only connection to my past. That and the vengeance that coursed through my veins. The reason she couldn’t teach me was because I was always thinking about how to slay my maker. I dreamed of stakes deep in his heart. As a child, I would sneak out at night when Vadoma was asleep to create intricate traps in which to catch vampir, but I only caught neighborhood strays. The older and stronger I became, the more I trained. Most of the others stayed away from me, afraid I would become bloodthirsty and lash out at them. Andrzej, was a man of earth and fire. He saw my passion to slay the cursed creatures of Ustalav. Despite being a young woman, with my eagerness to learn and my dhampir strength, he decided to teach me how to wield a sword and shoot a bow. He had lost his sons a few years prior to a pack of werewolves. After the loss of his sons, Andrzej turned toward the light of Sarenrae, and taught me about her brightness. Together we found renewed purpose.

The years passed. I grew in strength, while Vadoma and Andrzej grew in age. Then one day my grandmother confronted me: “Persephone, you need to set these nightmares aside. It is time for you to settle down. I have met with our village matchmaker, and we’ve decided that Boiko would make a fine husband. He is a goat-herd and needs a strong wife to bear him children.” “Dàki dey, Boiko is a drunk who likes to waste him money away on free women while his goats make more kids. You know that I only have one purpose: to find this monster that slayed my family. There is no other reason for this curse. I cannot even go out in the daylight. What kind of wife would I make?” Despite being the wise woman that she was, my dàki dey was growing weary with age and needed to pass on her arts. I understood this, but I could not be the one. Perhaps my sister Mala would have been. I left a gift for her and for Andrzej behind, picked up my belonging in the deep of night, and left Varno to hunt down my maker.