Zodiac - Softcover

Russell, Romina

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1595147411 ISBN 13: 9781595147417

Publisher: Razorbill, 2015

Synopsis

Book 1 in the breathtaking sci-fi space saga inspired by astrology that will stun fans of the Illuminae Files and Starbound series.

At the dawn of time, there were 13 Houses in the Zodiac Galaxy. Now only 12 remain....
 
Rhoma Grace is a 16-year-old student from House Cancer with an unusual way of reading the stars. While her classmates use measurements to make accurate astrological predictions, Rho can’t solve for ‘x’ to save her life—so instead, she looks up at the night sky and makes up stories.

When a violent blast strikes the moons of Cancer, sending its ocean planet off-kilter and killing thousands of citizens—including its beloved Guardian—Rho is more surprised than anyone when she is named the House’s new leader. But, a true Cancrian who loves her home fiercely and will protect her people no matter what, Rho accepts.

Then, when more Houses fall victim to freak weather catastrophes, Rho starts seeing a pattern in the stars. She suspects Ophiuchus—the exiled 13th Guardian of Zodiac legend—has returned to exact his revenge across the Galaxy. Now Rho—along with Hysan Dax, a young envoy from House Libra, and Mathias, her guide and a member of her Royal Guard—must travel through the Zodiac to warn the other Guardians.

But who will believe anything this young novice says? Whom can Rho trust in a universe defined by differences? And how can she convince twelve worlds to unite as one Zodiac?

Embark on a dazzling journey with ZODIAC, the first novel in an epic sci-fi-meets-high-fantasy series set in a galaxy inspired by the astrological signs.

About this title

About the Author:

Romina Russell is a Los Angeles based author who originally hails from Buenos Aires, Argentina. As a teen, Romina landed her first writing gig—College She Wrote, a weekly Sunday column for the Miami Herald that was later picked up for national syndication—and she hasn’t stopped writing since. When she’s not working on the ZODIAC series, Romina can be found producing movie trailers, taking photographs, or daydreaming about buying a new drum set. She is a graduate of Harvard College and a Virgo to the core.

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ISBN: 978-0-698-14613-6

 

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

WHEN I THINK OF HOME, I see blue. The swirling blue of the seawater, the infinite blue of the sky, the brilliant blue of Mom’s gaze. Sometimes I question if her eyes were really that blue, or if the blue of House Cancer colors them in my memory. I guess I’ll never know, since I didn’t pack pictures of her when I moved to Elara, the largest moon in our constellation. All I brought was the necklace.

On my brother Stanton’s tenth birthday, Dad took us nar-clamming on his Strider. Unlike our schooner, which was built to cover long distances, the Strider was small and shaped like a clamshell half, with rows of buoyancy benches, clam-cubbies for the nar-clams, a holographic navigational screen, and even a diving board that stuck out from the front like a tongue. The vessel’s underside was coated in millions of microscopic cilia-like legs that scurried us along the surface of the Cancer Sea.

I always loved leaning my head over the side and staring down at the tiny whirlpools that occasionally formed, swirling in various hues of blue. As if the ocean were made of paint rather than water.

I was only seven, under the legal deep-diving age, so I stayed topside with Mom, while Dad and Stanton dove down for nar-clams. Mom looked like a siren that day, perched on the peak of the diving board as we waited for the guys to surface with their spoils. Her long, light locks spilled down her back, and the sun glinted off her ivory skin and orb-like eyes. Lying back on my springy seat, I tried to soak up the heat and unwind. But I was always aware in her presence, always ready to recite facts about the Zodiac at her command.

“Rho.” Mom leapt gracefully off the platform onto the carved clamshell floor, and I straightened my spine as she approached. “I have something for you.”

She drew a pouch from her purse. Mom wasn’t the type to buy gifts or remember special occasions; those responsibilities usually fell to Dad. “But it’s not my birthday.”

A familiar, far-off look fell over her features, and I regretted saying it. I opened the pouch and pulled out a dozen nar-clam pearls, each one a different color, all strung together on a strand of silver seahorse hair. Each pearl was spaced equally apart and bore the symbol of a different Zodiac House, inscribed in Mom’s delicate calligraphy. “Wow” was all I could say as I slipped it on.

She flashed me a rare smile and sat on the bench beside me. As always, she smelled like water lilies. “In the early days,” she whispered, her electric stare lost in the blue of the horizon, “the original Guardians ruled the Zodiac together.”

Her stories always eased my nerves, and I settled into my seat, closing my eyes so I could focus on the sound of her voice. “Yet each of the Twelve prized a different strength as the key for keeping our universe safe, which caused disagreements and rifts between them. Until one day, a stranger arrived promising to restore balance. The stranger’s name was Ochus.”

Every Cancrian child knew the tale of Ochus, but Mom’s version wasn’t the same as the poem we had to memorize in school. The way she told it, the story sounded less like myth and more like a history lesson. “Ochus appeared before each Guardian in a different disguise, claiming to possess a powerful gift—a secret weapon that would turn the tide in that House’s favor. To the philosophical Aquarian, Ochus promised an ancient text that contained answers to the Zodiac’s most profound questions. To the imaginative leaders of Gemini, he promised a magical mask that would create enchantments beyond the wearer’s beliefs. To Capricorn, the wisest House of all, he promised a treasure chest filled with truths amassed from worlds older than our own, worlds accessed through Helios.”

I opened my eyes to see a blonde curl blowing across Mom’s forehead. I felt the urge to brush it back for her, but I knew I shouldn’t. Mom wasn’t cold, exactly, just . . . distant.

“Ochus instructed each Guardian to meet him at a secret location, where he promised to deliver his gift. Upon arriving, each of the Twelve were shocked to learn the others had also been summoned. Their shock only grew as they each described the Ochus that had visited them: The Cancrian Mother had encountered a sea snake, the Piscene Prophet saw a shapeless spirit, the Sagittarian Guardian met a hooded wanderer, and so on. As no two had seen the same stranger, the Guardians distrusted each other’s accounts. While they argued, Ochus silently slipped away, taking with him the Zodiac’s greatest magic: the Houses’ trust in one another. All he left behind was a warning: Beware my return, when all shall burn.”

“He stole our trust, and we’ve never gotten it back,” I said, reciting the moral my teacher taught us. I’d just started school a week earlier, and wanting to impress Mom further, I went on. “Ochus was the Zodiac’s first orphan. He didn’t have a House to belong to and was jealous of the ones in our galaxy. That’s why on Cancer we look out for each other and make sure everyone has a home.”

Mom’s brow dipped. “You mean, All healthy hearts start with a happy home? Rho, you know better than that. In our lessons, I’ve taught you about great individuals who came from broken homes, like Galileo Sprock of Scorpio, who developed the first hologram centuries ago, or renowned pacifist Lord Vaz, House Libra’s revered Guardian.” She looked hurt. “If you’re going to let your teachers brainwash you, then maybe you’re not ready for school.”

“No—it was just something I heard,” I assured her. Mom was always worried about the Cancrian school system brainwashing me. It’s why she didn’t enroll me when I was five like the other kids in our House. She decided to tutor me herself instead.

I waited for her expression to clear and didn’t interrupt again. I knew Mom was only looking out for me, but I liked playing with kids my age too much to go back to her homeschooling.

“The point,” she went on, “is our ancient Guardians chose to fight one another instead of admitting they were afraid of the same monster.” When I met her gaze, her expression turned hard. “You will face fears in your life, and people will try to take them from you. They’ll try to convince you what you fear isn’t real, that it’s just in your head—but you can’t let them.”

Her reflective eyes drank in the blue around us, until they shone brighter than the sky itself. “Trust your fears, Rho. Believing in them will keep you safe.”

Her stare was so intense that I had to pull away. Whenever Mom got this worked up, I’d wonder if she was just having one of her strange spells—like the time she meditated on the roof of our bungalow and didn’t come down for two days—or if she had seen something in the stars.

Instead of meeting her eyes again, I surveyed the water. A trail of bubbles broke the surface, and I arched my neck to look for Dad and Stanton. But neither emerged.

“Let’s take a dip,” said Mom suddenly, her tone light again. She leapt up to the diving board, and in one fluid motion, she was in the water. Dad always said she was a secret mermaid. I threw on his navigational glasses to follow her movements underwater and watched her spin gracefully around the Strider. Seeing her swim was like watching a ballet.

Just as her head broke the surface, so did Dad’s and Stanton’s. Dad raised his net filled with nar-clams onto the diving board, and I dragged the day’s catch into the boat. Still in the sea, Dad and my brother pulled off their facemasks. In my periphery, I thought I saw bubbles frothing in the water again.

“This thing’s too tight.” Stanton fussed, undoing the top of his suit to free his arms. I ducked as he tossed his wet mask into the boat. It landed with a squelch. I was just about to lose the glasses and jump in with them, when a black mass broke through the sea’s surface.

The snake was five feet long, with scaly skin and red eyes—but I knew from Mom’s lessons its power was in its poisonous bite.

“There’s a Maw next to you!” I screamed, pointing at the sea snake. Stanton shrieked as the Maw shot toward him and—before my parents could reach my brother—the snake sank its teeth into his shoulder.

Stanton cried out in pain, and Mom dove to him, swimming faster that I’d ever seen anyone go. She hooked a hand under his healthy arm and pulled him toward Dad. I just stared, too terrified to think of a way to help.

Through the glasses’ special lenses, I could see the snake was orbiting us, waiting for its poison to spread and immobilize its victim, so it could feed. Its glowing red eyes can cut through darkness, which is where Maws are supposed to live—in the Rift, hundreds of fathoms down. I didn’t think they ever came up this high.

As Dad carried Stanton into the boat, Mom’s bright blue eyes flashed and her lips curled. I’d never seen her look like that: so furious and feral.

Then she vanished beneath the surface. “Mom!”

I turned to Dad in desperation, but he was bent over Stanton, sucking out the Maw’s poison from his shoulder wound. I found Mom again in the water: She was leading the Maw away from us, but the snake was gaining on her. It was going to strike.

I couldn’t move, I couldn’t even scream; all I could do was watch. My hands gripped the side of the Strider, and I wasn’t sure if my body could take much more of my heart’s beating. Then Mom stopped swimming and turned around to face the snake.

Something silver glinted in her hand. It looked like the blade Dad used to pry open the nar-clams—he always brought it with him underwater, and she must have grabbed it from his belt before diving in. When the Maw lashed out with its mouth to bite her, Mom raised her hand and sliced the snake in half.

I gasped.

“Rho!” called Dad. “Where’s Mom?”

“She’s—alive,” I said, breathless, “and coming back.” Seeing Stanton’s pallid and unconscious figure, my panic resurfaced. “Is he—?”

“I got the poison out, but we need to get him to a healer,” said Dad, starting up the Strider and steering it toward Mom. She pulled herself up by the diving board and landed lightly in the boat. As soon as she was in, Dad went full speed.

Mom sat beside Stanton and rested her hand on his forehead. I expected her to tell Dad how she sliced the Maw in two, but she just sat there in silence. I couldn’t believe how brave she’d been. She saved us.

“What in the name of Helios was a Maw doing in the shallows?” mused Dad to himself, his eyes glassy and his breathing still heavy. He didn’t speak again after that, reverting to his quiet nature. I helped Mom sort the nar-clams into clam-cubbies, and when we finished, we sat with Stanton.

“Mom, I’m sorry,” I muttered, the tears falling before I could stop them, “I didn’t know what to do. . . .”

“It’s okay, Rho,” said Mom, surprising me by reaching out to adjust the pearl necklace so the Crab was centered on my chest. “You’re still young, so of course the world seems scary to you.” Then she looked at me—looked into me—and everything outside her bulletproof gaze grew blurry.

“Hold onto your fears,” she whispered. “They’re real.”

1

TWELVE HOLOGRAPHIC SYMBOLS DRIFT DOWN the Academy hallway, gliding through people like colorful ghosts. The signs represent the Houses of our Zodiac Solar System, and they’re parading to promote unity. But everyone’s too busy buzzing about tonight’s Lunar Quadract to spare them a glance.

“You ready for tonight?” asks my best friend, Nishiko, an exchange student from Sagittarius. She waves at her locker and it pops open.

“Yeah . . . what I’m not ready for is this test,” I say, still watching the twelve signs drift through the school. Acolytes aren’t invited to the celebration, so we’re hosting our own party on campus. And after Nishi’s brilliant idea to bribe the dining hall staff into adding our new song to their lunchtime playlist, our band was voted to play the event.

I dip my fingers in my coat pocket to make sure I have my drumsticks, just as Nishi slams her locker shut. “Have they told you why they’re making you re-
take it?”

“Probably the same old reason—I never show my work.”

“I don’t know. . . .” Nishi scrunches up her forehead in that uniquely Sagittarian I’m-curious-about-everything way. “They might want to know more about what you saw in the stars last time.”

I shake my head. “I only saw it because I don’t use an Astralator for my predictions. Everyone knows intuition isn’t star-proof.”

“Having a different method doesn’t make you wrong. I think they want to hear more about your omen.” She waits for me to say something more about it, and when I don’t, she pushes harder. “You said it was black? And . . . writhing?”

“Yeah, kind of,” I mutter. Nishi knows I don’t like discussing that vision, but asking a Sagittarian to suppress her curiosity is like asking a Cancrian to abandon a friend in need. Neither is in our natures.

“Have you seen it again since the test?” she presses.

This time I don’t answer. The symbols are rounding the corner. I can just make out the Fish of Pisces before they vanish.

“I should go,” I finally say, flashing her a small smile so she knows I’m not upset. “See you onstage.”

· · ·

The halls still swarm with restless Acolytes, so nobody sees me slip into Instructor Tidus’s empty classroom. I leave the lights off and let instinct guide me through the black space.

When I’ve reached the teacher’s desk, I feel along its surface until my fingers find cold metal. Though I know I shouldn’t, I switch on the Ephemeris.

Stars puncture the blackness.

Hovering in the center of the room, countless winking pinpricks of light form a dozen distinct constellations—the Houses of the Zodiac. Larger balls of colored light swirl among the stars: our planets and moons. In the midst of it all burns a ball of blazing fire: Helios.

I slide a stick from my pocket and twirl it. Amid all the sparkles in the glittering universe, I find the chu...

About this edition

• Publisher: Razorbill
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 1595147411
• ISBN 13: 9781595147417
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 480