Kavan

"'Long have I waited for one that is worthy of my spear.'"Kavan was a ruthless chieftain whose tribe lived in the Balinok Mountains centuries before the arrival of Strahd von Zarovich. Although he was very much alive, Kavan had some traits in common with vampires, he slept through the day and hunted at night, he drank the blood of his prey, and he lived underground.

Davian Martikov stated that Kavan was one of Barovia's native mountainfolk.

In battle he wielded a spear stained with blood. His was the first blood spear, a weapon that drains life from those it kills and transfers that life to its wielder, imbuing that individual with the stamina to keep fighting.

Following the defeat of his people by Strahd's forces, the Gulthias Tree was burnt to the ground and the bodies of the slain burnt in a great pyre. When asked why the native forces had abandoned their insurgency tactics to engage in a clearly doomed pitched battle, Kavan, a captured native, replied simply: “Wintersplinter”.

At Yester Hill Kavan's spirit called out to Narid Ashplantt and asked him to take his spear. Narid dug into one of the ceremonial cairns and located the Blood Spear of Kavan, which is now in his possession.

Kavan's Call to Narid
"Long have I waited for one that is worthy of my spear. I have waited since the early days of the whispering wall. The spear can be yours - retrieve it from me. Now you are Kavan. I fought to be free, for nature, for the natural world. Now you can continue my fight."