Never Keep (Sins of the Zodiac, #1)

by Caroline Peckham

The backs of a few thousand neophytes blocked my view so I moved on, the light from outside casting stars across my skin as I moved from one hole to the next, checking both the higher and lower vantage points and finding nothing but turned backs until- I fell still, my eyebrows arching as I took in the sight of The Cobra suspended with air magic high enough for the entire crowd to see as the Grand Maester drove bolts of iron through his flesh and another Reaper cast chains of flames to burn the skin from his bones. The Reapers had been clear that execution would follow for any Fae who murdered another in this place, so had The Cobra killed someone in the sanctuary? Certainly the brutality of the execution suggested the Reapers were beyond incensed and I imagined spilling blood in the sanctity of their place of communion with the stars would achieve that. Even so, I couldn’t help but be shocked by the barbarity of the pious Reapers as it played out. They had always seemed so above the bloodshed of war, but this proved they were creatures just as capable of it as the rest of us.