Never Keep (Sins of the Zodiac, #1)

by Caroline Peckham

“Better to be on the outside looking in, than on the inside looking out, Everest.”

The stars ruled this world, and the water constellations were above all others when it came to the land of Cascada, home of the Raincarvers who claimed dominion over the elemental power of water. Pisces, Scorpio and Cancer were the highest of celestial deities to my people, but the lower constellations were steeped in power too, all of them able to change the fates of worthy Fae – or curse them in the name of petty contempt.

I was heading toward The Boundary; the wall of power that kept enemy Fae from entering our lands, the other Elementals. Fire, Earth, Air.

The barrier kept our adversaries out, and the elders said it would destroy any Fae who tried to leave without permission too.

I never came up this way, it was forbidden for un-Awakened Fae - those of us who weren’t yet old enough to harness our magic and the ability to wield water - to be this near to The Boundary.

At the age of twenty-one, every year, Fae were sent to Helle Fort to unleash that magic in them and to face assessment for their calling in life. There was no calling as esteemed as that of a warrior selected to train and fight for the army of Raincarvers who fought in the Endless War against the other nations. An army I was determined to qualify for.

Never Keep, the fortress where all great warriors learned to harness their element under the guiding hands of the star-chosen prophets known as the Reapers during six months of magic instruction.

a Pisces with Aries rising, and when that time came, I would be shipped off to Never Keep alongside my vicious half-brother and all the other water elementals who came of age with us to be assessed for a position fighting for my land.

so I slipped a hand into my pocket, taking out the everflame I kept in a little jar, shaking it to brighten it up.

It was a miracle which I secretly coveted even if I did hate the Fae who had created it – a fire which never went out, burning eternally, creating a light that needed no fuel and persisted without end.

Flamebringers - who held the power of fire - had marched into our land and burned a path of death right through the heart of our nation.

In the distance, Pyros - the land of the fire wielders - loomed, nearly lost to the darkness at this time of night.

All the four lands had defensive magical barriers like this running along the borders that faced The Crux, though they were hardly needed when crossing that wasteland was a death sentence.

Alina Seaman

She was tall, strong, with hard features that were a likeness to her powerful warrior aunt, her long, black hair so silken it was as if it had been woven from the night itself.

My brutish half brother was all muscle, clearly the one who’d shoved me. He resembled our father in all ways, his skin far lighter than mine, his height towering, shoulders terribly broad. He was built for war, my father’s perfect heir with his natural bloodlust and obvious power.

His hair was russet brown, perfectly kept, and his eyes were a slick of mud that always held so much arrogance.

Merrow – the very same Order my father happened to be and, of course, in his opinion, the greatest Order in existence. They were a ferocious breed; jagged, serrated blue scales coating their body like armour in their shifted form, remaining mostly Fae in appearance apart from the spines that ran the length of their backs and the sharp spikes that extended between the knuckles of their hands. In water, they could shift their legs into a tail and carve through waves faster than any other Order of the ocean, their throat producing gills that allowed them to breathe underwater too.

Every Order form had gifts of their own, a type of magic unique to their kind such as the Sirens’ ability to influence emotion or the Medusas’ gift to paralyse their enemies with a single bite from the snakes in their hair. Each Order had a particular way of recharging their elemental magic once it was Awakened too. Merrows drew their magic from the turning tides, Pegasuses flew through clouds to bolster their power, and Werewolves ran beneath the moon.

my one friend in this world. Harlon Brook.

Every gift we were born with was honed into an advantage, each more deadly than the last. And my beauty was my sharpest weapon of all.

Moraine snorted her amusement from my left and I glanced her way, the edge of my lips curving as I took in her broad smile, her long silver hair remaining in place thanks to the braids which secured it, while mine instantly took the opportunity to sweep across my eyes as I turned my head. She had shifted into her Harpy Order form, her silvery wings a match to her hair, both a sweeping contrast to her warm, brown skin.

The Crux scarred the land, a crater fifty miles wide and carved so deeply into the earth that none had ever dared explore its depths – not that anyone would be likely to get close enough to try with fire, water and earth territories all bordering

Prince Dragor emerged from Echo Fort at our backs.

Dragor was the oldest son of King Aquila, ruler of the air kingdom of Stormfell and the most likely candidate to take the throne when his father passed, though his sister and two brothers were also in the running.

He was in his early thirties and spent most of his time at war where he had carved out his brutal and ruthless reputation despite his youth, leaving the scandals and politics of court life to his siblings.

He may not have been looking at me, but I watched him without pause. Sometimes I felt like my very existence was so entwined with that of the Prince of Storms that I would si...

Few Fae knew the dark arts of wielding Ether, only those willing to risk their souls for the power it offered were bold enough to try and claim a hold over the deadly magic of it.

They call me the Sky Witch. Bloodborn Aquarius of the greatest nation of them all. My birth took place in the eye of a storm while battle raged around us and my mother’s screams were met with those of men dying in the fields of glory beyond. I am yearning. I am lust. I am the greatest desire of all who fall prey to my power, and I am lethal in more ways than can be counted. I am Fae. I am Air. I am master of blood and bone. My name holds no power because it is not what I am. My true name is War.

In a little over a year, the three of us would claim our places at Never Keep and our air magic would be Awakened at last, allowing us to navigate the skies with the power of our element, but I wondered if I might still prefer the rush of my windrider even then, the exhilaration I felt speeding through the sky on it second only to the rush of bloodshed.

didn’t even have my elemental magic Awakened yet, but they already feared me for my mastery over sword and blood magic alike, my reputation on the battlefield earned over six years of savage victories.

If there was one thing I had known since I was young, it was that my life would likely end in bloody carnage, and I had been taught to seek the honour of such a death so that I might earn my place beyond The Veil instead of my soul being cast to ash at the hands of the stars.

A lie. We had been told a lie. That stepping through this boundary would equal death. But why?

Harlon had always made me feel safe, and even now amidst the turmoil of war, he became a steady focal point that settled the furious pounding of my heart.

“The Sky Witch?” I echoed in horror. That creature was nothing but a monster wrapped in a beautiful veil. She wasn’t even Awakened yet, only twenty-years-old like me, but battle hardened over the last six years beneath the rule of the Storm Prince Dragor who cast children into war like pieces on a chessboard.

She had become a nightmare, whispered about behind locked doors; the girl with the face of a deity and a soul drenched in sin. She had murdered so many of my kind that the numbers were lost to legend, the tales of the deaths she reaped meaning that her title alone brought a snarl to my lips.

Those damn eyes which I could never resist when he looked at me like that.

my windrider filled my ears, the magical contraption bound to me, linked to my magical signature - the essence of who I was as a Fae - and chasing me through the sky.

No. He was watching me. Always waiting for me to fail, for my weak blood to show itself. But I never had before, and I wouldn’t now.

The power which caused their minds to fog was all in my blood – the blood of a Succubus, a master of temptation.

There weren’t many Fae who could dismiss me so easily on first sight and though sometimes I loathed the way idiots fawned and panted for my attention, I found I disliked it more when my allure failed to draw a reaction at all.

I blinked at the sharp cut of his jaw, the strong brow, the blazing, honeyed brown eyes which seemed to grab hold of me and lock me in place.

Order,” I snarled, suspecting an Incubus because what other than a creature designed for sex and lust could look like this god of a man?

“Cayde Avior,”

Dragor hadn’t shown this level of mistrust in me for years. What had I done to make him doubt me?

Basilisk venom to be precise, potent and deadly, a biological weapon coveted by all sides of the war.

Basilisks replenished their magic through pain and they needed magic to produce venom, so it wasn’t hard to figure out what had happened in this room.

I almost slammed straight into a figure who lunged from the darkness, a black mask pulled low to conceal his face, pitch black eyes widening in surprise as he jerked away to avoid the collision. I swear there was a glint of red in them for a moment too.

“What are you?” I demanded for the second time and his lips tilted in a hint of amusement. “A Drake. Meaning my wings can’t burn,”

I crept deeper into The Forge, my footsteps silent, my movements graceful as had long been my way. Mama believed my Order would reflect this part of me, and I wondered if I was destined to Emerge as light-footed as her form, a Teumessian Fox.