All twelve of us are orphans here. We don't have homes anymore, our parents are gone. We were all found in different places at different times, and we were all brought to the Academy, where the Maestro has raised us to be magicians.

We're all the kids the world didn't want. My best friend, Celyma, was found in a field in the winter, wrapped up in a frail piece of cloth, with a red fox curled around her. The fox had the power of speech, just like every other familiar. Oh. You don't know what a familiar is?

Only those blessed with the magical gift were given familiars, which are extensions of your inner powers, and display who you are inside, as well as resembling you. My familiar is a golden cat, and I had been thrown out of my home when I was two because I had an otherworldly talking animal, left to fend for myself and my familiar, Seraphim. Maestro luckily found me and raised me with the other children.

Everyone here is a loner, with nobody to love them. We've gotten used to it, and we're kept hard at work, trying to become a Mage, the highest level of magic achievable.

There are twelve levels of magic. Twelve is a powerful magic number, in case you didn't know that by now. The first level, you wear a white robe, and this stage of your life lasts nearly five years. The rest of your magical training lasts much less, only about a year per level, unless you're a Maestro, in which it takes twelve to twenty-four years to become a Mage.

I'm a blue, in my second stage of training. Orange is next, I'm still working on receiving that robe, and after that comes an amber color, then red, then indigo, then purple, then yellow, then green, then copper, then silver for the Maestro, then gold for the Mage.

I want to become a Mage so badly, just as badly as every other child in the Academy. But I need to become a Mage, if only because I want to find my parents and show them they were wrong about me, they were wrong in thinking I was a freak, they were wrong to throw me out and leave me for dead. I'm only fourteen, but I'm already faced with problems as difficult as any adult.

This is my story...