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.