The Vargans

The culture of Varga is based on the extended family. Their titles are family titles that have become official positions in their informal lifestyle.

Key points of the culture:

They are clannish. One's family can live among them for generations, and while accepted and befriended, never become a Vargan. However, mixed blood children are always considered Vargan. It seems they only acknowledge a blood tie. Accepting that one cannot join their family, they are arguably the friendliest people in Dômus Môdé. Remember that one can never pick on only one Vargan. As a family, when one Vargan is in trouble, all Vargans respond.

They are meat-eating hunters. They hunt with a feral joy; whether it is food in the wild, or knowledge of the world. They experiment with anything that catches their fancy and will learn everything they can about it. It is the hunt they enjoy, not the killing. They have a saying:

It is desirable to love the hunt; it is understandable to thrill at the kill; but it is unacceptable to enjoy the killing.

This is a concept that gives an insight into their culture and which can be misunderstood or oversimplified rather easily. They have been known to hunt an animal, to the point where they could kill it, and let it go. They only kill when they need the food. Then they do their best to not waste any part of the animal.

They adore children. The Vargans have a low birth rate, but a high survival rate. They have been known to sacrifice themselves to protect children, even the children of their enemies. In their legal system, most any crime can have extenuation circumstances, but deliberately hurting a child is never tolerated. Deliberately hurt a child in their sphere of influence and they will hunt you down and kill you. Their enemies have sometime tried to turn this into a weakness. Half of the Vargan territory is land they have taken from people who tried to exploit this weakness.

Further, the term bastard, has no meaning in Vargan culture.

They are naturalists. They worry about how to best care for the land and the wildlife that lives on it.

Vargans don't do magic. The Vargans also include an offshoot of the Ashkwen, known as the Valley Ashkwen. Unlike the traditional Ashkwen who love high places and strong winds, the Valley Ashkwen live in the hills and ravines of Varga. So, even though Vargans don't do magic, the Vargans who aren't Vargans because they are Ashkwen, do magic.

An insight to Vargan culture can be gleaned from the ennobling of Reshana, the Earl-ka of Bloodvale. The King of Kalakhan created Reshana Countess of Bloodvale. Reshana is a Vargan, sort of—well she wasn't, but she is now, which never happens, but she is anyway. With becoming a Vargan, one gets family.

The Vargans found that Reshana—Their Reshana—was a countess and decided that countess was an inferior title, culturally, than Earl. So, they started calling her Earl—but there's a problem: the Vargans don't have hereditary titles. They feel that it improper to saddle a child with a burden the child might not want, just because an accident of birth.

Each should hunt their own path and not be told what path to hunt.

They also feel that they don't need a lord to tell them how to live as they have friends and family that provide that service with a lot more love than some person that is born to a position they didn't earn.

That being said, they decided to call Reshana an Earl-ka—the -ka ending is the Vargan feminine ending, which would mean that Earl-ka would be the equivalent of countess, which would seem to be where we started, but it doesn't really as it means Earl-ka.

It is acceptable that Reshana is an Earl-ka as she earned the title.

If you can follow that, I think you might begin to understand the Vargans. They do have titles: Father, Mother, Uncle, Aunt—well Father-ka and Uncle-ka, but the idea is important—Brother, Sister and Grandparents. Family! Of course!

Vargan Title	Approximate Translation	Duties
Sura [-ka]	Brother [Sister]	Befriend the stranger, share burdens and joys, advocate.
VenSura [-ka]	Uncle [Aunt]	Compassionate councilor, teacher, Foster Parent for troubled or difficult children.
Kama [-ka]	Father [Mother]	Judge, Mayor, Foster Parent for the young orphan.
VenKama [-ka]	Grandparent	Priest, Historian, Memory Speaker, Truth Seer

More information on the Vargans: The Saying of Uncle Bear