### **Year 0: The Starfall Child**
Lysandra Thorn was born beneath a dying star.
The night sky cracked open as her first cries echoed through the **Thorn Citadel**, a cascade of crimson meteors streaking across the heavens. In the courtyard, her father, **Lord Alaric Thorn**, gripped his sword as the Obsidian Tower pulsed in the distance—a silent, brooding titan none had dared approach in centuries.
"**The Eclipseblood awakens**," whispered her mother, **Lady Seraphine**, her voice trembling as she cradled the newborn. A crescent-shaped mark glowed faintly on Lysandra's palm, silver as moonlight. "**The Legion will come for her.**"
Alaric knelt, his armor clinking, and brushed a calloused finger over the Mark. "**Not while I live.**"
---
### **Year 3: The Secret Garden**
Lysandra's earliest memory was the scent of frostbloom petals and her mother's lullabies.
The Thorns ruled **Vale Eclipse**, a floating fortress-city shielded from the Tower's corruption by ancient wards. Seraphine homeschooled Lysandra in hidden gardens where crystalline butterflies danced around her tiny hands. "**Your blood is special, little star**," she'd say, tying silk gloves over Lysandra's Mark. "**One day, it will protect us all.**"
But Lysandra didn't want protection. She wanted stories—tales of her father's battles against the Eclipse Legion, of the Obsidian Tower's cursed treasures, of the **Celestial Academy** where Seraphine had once been Head Archivist.
"**Will I go to the Academy?**" she asked, clutching a plush drake.
Seraphine's smile faltered. "**Someday. But first, you must learn our ways.**"
---
### **Year 7: The First Lie**
Lysandra's gloves never came off.
At her seventh birthday banquet, while nobles feasted on starfire wine and gossiped about Tower expeditions, a boy from House Veyra tugged at her sleeve. "**Why do you hide your hands? Are you cursed?**"
Before she could answer, her father's shadow fell over them. "**Lysandra is blessed**," Alaric said, his voice a blade sheathed in velvet. "**The gods marked her for greatness.**"
That night, Lysandra overheard her parents arguing in the vault.
"**We can't keep this secret forever, Alaric!**" Seraphine hissed. "**Vorion suspects. He's asked about her twice this week.**"
Alaric's fist struck stone. "**That Academy snake will never touch her.**"
---
### **Year 10: The Mentor's Visit**
**Headmaster Vorian** arrived in Vale Eclipse on a ship of living shadow.
Lysandra hid behind her mother's skirts as the gaunt, silver-haired man knelt before her. "**A pleasure, Lady Thorn**," he said, his smile not reaching his hollow eyes. "**Your mother speaks highly of your… talents.**"
Vorion stayed a week, tutoring her in celestial arithmetic and Tower lore. He praised her intellect but watched her gloves like a starving wolf.
"**Why does he stare?**" Lysandra asked her mother later.
Seraphine tightened the laces of Lysandra's gown. "**Because some men confuse fear with hunger.**"
---
### **Year 12: The Shattered Vow**
The Eclipse Legion attacked on Lysandra's twelfth birthday.
They descended at dusk—soldiers clad in void-forged armor, their banners bearing the Tower's jagged sigil. Lysandra hid in the vault, clutching her father's dagger, as screams echoed through the citadel.
When she emerged, Vale Eclipse was ash.
Her mother lay broken in the courtyard, her final spell still crackling around Lysandra's gloves. Her father's sword was embedded in the skull of a Legion warlord, his body nowhere to be found.
Vorion found her hours later, cradling Seraphine's corpse. "**Come, child**," he said, offering a hand gloved in lies. "**The Academy will keep you safe.**"
---
### **Year 14: The Orphan's Mask**
At the **Celestial Academy**, Lysandra Thorn became **Lysandra Veyra**, a orphaned ward of House Veyra.
She buried her mother's lullabies, her father's laughter, and the truth of her blood. She excelled—top of her class in mecha-cultivation, a prodigy in combat runes. Vorion praised her publicly, mentored her privately, and watched her gloves *always*.
Until the day her reactor core failed.
Until the Mark awoke.
Until the Tower whispered:
***"Come home, Eclipseborne. They will all burn."***
---
**Epigraph:**
*"The Thorn dynasty did not fall in fire. It drowned in the silence of secrets."*
—From *The Lost Chronicles of Vale Eclipse*, recovered from the Obsidian Tower's archives