"We were not cursed by the moon. We were cursed by what we loved beneath it."
— Kael Rowan the First
Long before the wolves learned to walk as men, before the Hollow had its first name, the mountains belonged to Kael Rowan — hunter, protector, and killer of kings.
He was not born noble, nor immortal. He was chosen by the wild.
The Rowan clan lived on the mountain's edge, a family of woodsmen and warriors bound by loyalty to the forest. When the plague of blood spread through the valleys — when men began to thirst for flesh — Kael took up arms against them. He hunted the first vampires, calling them the pale thieves of the night.
But the moon had other plans for him.
The Woman in the Woods
During one hunt, Kael tracked a pale creature deep into the old woods. He cornered her by the river, expecting fangs and fury.
Instead, she was weeping.
Her name was Selene, a vampire who refused to feed. She claimed she had once been human — a healer, cursed for saving a dying man by sharing her blood. She did not hunt. She hid.
Kael should have killed her. Instead, he carried her home.
For months, they lived in secrecy, their hearts bound by what they both feared most: the hunger within.
She taught him that monsters were not born—they were made by pain.
He taught her that not every beast needs to feed.
They fell in love beneath the moon, believing the world would forgive them.
The world did not.
The Breaking of the Moon
When the Rowan clan discovered Selene's nature, they dragged her to the mountainside and burned her at dawn.
Kael fought to save her, killing his own kin before the flames took her.
In her final moments, Selene whispered something into his ear:
"Then let the moon take you too."
And it did.
When her ashes touched his skin, his blood boiled. His bones snapped, his heartbeat roared through the valley like thunder. His body twisted, reshaped by rage and sorrow.
When he awoke, the man was gone.
Only the beast remained.
The Birth of the Wolves
Kael's howl that night shattered the sky.
Those who heard it and carried guilt in their hearts began to change too — their bodies bending under the moon's light, their eyes burning gold.
They became the first Children of the Fang, bound to Kael by blood and grief.
He tried to protect them from themselves, to teach them restraint.
But rage is a language older than words.
The wolves spread across the Hollow, hunting vampires, burning homes, killing any who bore pale skin.
Kael's attempt at redemption had become another curse.
The Alpha's Oath
When the moon rose red for the second time, Kael stood alone on the mountain peak, covered in the blood of his own pack.
He called upon the moon — not for power, but for silence.
He swore an oath:
"Let my line bear this curse so no other man shall.
Let my sons be beasts, and my daughters be haunted.
Let me live to remember every life I took."
The moon answered.
It marked his bloodline with gold eyes and restless hearts.
They would forever shift between man and beast—servants of the moon's balance, never its masters.
Thus began the Rowan Bloodline, sworn to guard the Hollow's borders and to remember the cost of vengeance.
The Covenant's Price
A century later, Kael was called to the frozen lake by Aurelia Voss and Lucien D'Arcy.
There, he sealed his fate in the Covenant of Silence, knowing peace would cost him the only thing left he still had—his rage.
It is said that when Kael pressed his blood into the ice, the wind carried Selene's voice through the forest:
"Now you understand."
And for the first time in a hundred years, Kael did not howl.
He bowed his head and wept.
The Alpha's Legacy
Every Alpha since bears Kael's mark — the crescent scar across the chest, said to appear at birth.
Every heir of the Rowan clan feels his burden in their blood:
The hunger to protect, the instinct to destroy, and the longing for something that cannot exist — peace.
In the present day, Kael Rowan's descendants still roam the woods of Blackridge Hollow, their loyalty to the Covenant fractured but unbroken.
When they hear the wind cry through the trees, they say it sounds like his voice.
Elias Thorn's Note (From the Town Archives)
"The oldest Rowan tomb bears no name, only claw marks on stone."
"Under a full moon, the scratches glow like silver."
"Some say the Alpha still roams the mountains, watching for the day the moon forgives him."
Closing Words
Kael Rowan was never a monster.
He was a man who loved something forbidden—and was punished for it.
The wolves that followed were not his army; they were his regret given form.
And though the moon took everything from him, it left him one mercy:
He will never die until love finds him again.