Nightwalkers

The clan traces its origin to Nightwalker, who was sent to the Eternal City on his first winter solstice. While other Sleepers had also been sent there, he was the only one to survive, managing to escape aboard the Night Garden, which drifted near the city. The Eternal City itself was described as an immortal abode — a utopia where death could not reach, and where enlightened beings lived in peace and prosperity, continually reborn when their bodies and souls grew frail. It was also a resting place for weary deities. Over time, however, its current state became unknown. Even Nightwalker himself had only seen its outer edges — the piers, the wharf, and the lighthouse.^[5]

The most important treasures of the House of Night — the Night Garden, the lineage of Storm God, and the map charting the course to the Eternal City — all came from there. According to Naeve and Bloodwave, the lighthouse of the Eternal City is not just a lighthouse, but also a temple dedicated to Storm God, within which a star is trapped. This star is the source of the lineage of Storm God. Anyone who enters the lighthouse and is bathed in its silver light is reborn as a descendant of Storm God — or dies, as many do.^[5]

Nightwalker entered the Lighthouse and survived, receiving the lineage of Storm God. Before escaping the Eternal City, he collected a portion of the starlight into a special Memory. This Memory allowed the founding members of the House of Night to also receive the lineage, though some perished in the process. Later on, marriages occurred between different branches of the clan, but Nightwalker himself only ever had one child.^[5]

The starlight stolen by Nightwalker and contained within the Star Lantern was not infinite. It was described as merely a wisp and was eventually exhausted. Aether was the last person to directly benefit from it. Furthermore, not every child born in the House of Night inherited the lineage, and with the frequent deaths of Awakened, the bloodline was always at risk of vanishing. Over time, no one manifested the lineage as strongly as Nightwalker himself.^[6]