Lysandra

Lysandra was a Spartan woman, the first wife of Kratos and the mother of his daughter Calliope. Though Kratos knew many women, he counted Lysandra his true love, and she was one of the few souls who did not fear him during his years as a brutal Spartan captain. More than once she questioned the reckless slaughter he visited upon the innocent.

Marriage and family#

In her youth Lysandra had known Kratos during his time in the Agoge, when he sought a place in the Vanguard Circle. After he won praise across Sparta, the two fell in love and married, and together they had a daughter, Calliope. The child was born with a horrible skin disease that left her weak, and by Spartan law she would have been cast into a chasm to die. Kratos defied the law and undertook a long and arduous journey to find the elixir Ambrosia, which held the power to heal her. Through Lysandra's pleading the King of Sparta was persuaded to spare Calliope, and once Kratos returned and cured her, he was raised to the rank of captain.

The voice of reason#

Over the years, as Kratos waged his campaigns, Lysandra often questioned his ruthlessness and his desire for glory and asked him when it would end. When he answered that it would end when the glory of Sparta was known throughout Greece, she scoffed, telling him that he fought for himself and not for Sparta or his family. Though Spartans prized ferocity, she singled out his hunger for personal glory, which their people looked down upon, and held that peaceful means could often prove more effective than violence. Her deepest fear was that Kratos' savage nature would one day be the death of him, and it was for that reason she pressed him toward better choices. She cared greatly for her husband and daughter and was willing to do whatever their welfare required.

Death and aftermath#

After Kratos swore allegiance to Ares, the god judged that the Spartan's attachment to his family held him back. Ares moved Lysandra and Calliope from Sparta to a small village that worshipped Athena, and when Kratos attacked the village he entered the Temple of Athena and, in a blood frenzy, slaughtered everyone within, his wife and daughter among them, exactly as Ares had intended. The Village Oracle bound the ashes of Lysandra and Calliope to Kratos' skin as a permanent reminder of his deed, marking him forever as the Ghost of Sparta. Haunted by their deaths, Kratos renounced his pledge to Ares and swore vengeance.

In the years that followed, Lysandra returned to Kratos only as illusion and torment. The Furies conjured her likeness in their attempts to bind him back into the service of Ares, and Ares himself raised images of Lysandra and Calliope during their final battle, only to have them slain again before Kratos' eyes. When Kratos retreated into his own mind during his last battle with Zeus, he journeyed through its darkness with the aid of Pandora and at last forgave himself for killing his wife and daughter.

Remembered in Valhalla#

Centuries later, traversing the Norse realm of Valhalla, Kratos came upon Lysandra's pendant and told her story to Mimir. He came to admit that, though he had loved her dearly, he had been a terrible husband, for he had never heeded her counsel that he did not have to be the man he had chosen to become. Lysandra had always believed there was another way to overcome his enemies, that some might be turned into friends and allies rather than annihilated, but Kratos had clung to the tradition of destroying all threats to Sparta. By placing his military duties above her, he had neglected both her and Calliope, and this long before his oath to Ares brought the final tragedy. In her, Kratos found a likeness to Faye; both women had wanted him to be a better man and had seen possibilities in him that he could not see in himself.