The Guardian's Mark — Isabelle Santiago

In Zerah, Guardians of Water, Fire, Air, Earth, Life and Death are chosen by The Beings to serve their people. Able to feel emotions The Beings cannot, the six keep their world, and each other, balanced. Guardians live and die together, but when Kieran is born with marks that prove he is the Guardian of Death, his mother risks her life to conceal him instead of giving him up to the Temple. When an attempt to heal him of the burdens of the Guardianship goes horribly wrong, Kieran is suddenly brought to the attention of the High Priests and forced into servitude to a people who have shunned his very existence. He resents his position and all that it entails. It has cost him everything: his freedom, his family. Expected to live and study with the other Guardians, learn the right ways to use his power, Kieran is an outsider among his own kind until he finds the one person who can see the man beneath Death's mask. Amaya, the embodiment of Water, breaks through his bitter shell and helps him to see that all of life is not bleak. But they've sworn a vow and love for one another isn't part of it.