Among the Stars

One: Love is Not in These Bricks

    I really don't know what I was thinking when I agreed to go to yet another magic school. Here I was, being a wimp, sitting in the corner doing splits. Not practicing as I should've been. I'd already gotten most of my instructors to ignore me via self-deprecating comments. My eyes were drawn to a boy shooting bolts of what seemed to be fire at a target, a slightly sadistic smile on his face. True to the stereotype, his hair was a fiery orange, and his eyes were a bright hazel. He was in most of my classes so far, and he seemed to be almost the direct opposite of me.

That class having been successfully avoided, I trudged to the next thing to do that day. Instead of a sixth class, we were going to be assessed on our current abilities. Of which I had next to none. We were instructed to stand in a line, and I made sure to stick myself right in the middle of it. Kids were talking and playing with their powers. To try to fit in I summoned a small excuse for a star and twirled it around my finger. As the instructor went down the line, I got unreasonably anxious.

"Teresa Lincoln?" the instructor asked of me. I nodded. She asked me to hold out my hand, which I did, and she stuck a sort of bracelet on my hand. She then took off the bracelet and gave me a near identical version. I was instructed to not take it off before she moved on down the line. No explanation was given as to what that bracelet meant, it just sort of seemed to exist. It was a simple black bangle, nothing fancy. The boy I had noticed before was next to me, His bracelet was white, He looked over at me and cocked his head.

"What do these mean?" he asked. In reply I shrugged. "I guess nothing," he mumbled. He slipped it onto his wrist as well. Nothing much happened, he just had a bracelet on his wrist. I was a bit disappointed, maybe that could have turned out to be the start of some quest. But there was no quest and we were all still losers.

After that ordeal was over, we were mostly done for the day. There was still an assembly at the end of the day, just before curfew. As I was getting ready to leave, the boy turned to me again.

"You know, celestial users are kinda cool. They can do a lotta stuff, if they want to," he mused as he twiddled with a zipper on his jacket.

"Ah, yeah, sure," I replied, studying my feet. I noticed his raised eyebrow. We both turned our different ways and I headed to my dorm. My roommate was already there, sitting on the couch. We were mostly indifferent towards each other, not friends nor enemies. I walked down the small hallway and flopped down on my bed to sleep until the assembly.

I threw open my eyes and glanced at my clock, finding I was almost late. I jogged down to the auditorium (there wasn't quite that much of a hurry), and grabbed the first seat I saw. Which was one fairly close to the front. All the other kids has bracelets just like I did, although I did notice an overwhelming amount of white. A few kids had black bracelets like I did, but I ruled that we were going to be the generically 'oppressed' ones by the 'popular' kids. Someone I assumed was the principal stepped onto the stage and quieted us down.

"Now, welcome all to this academy. You might be wondering tons of things about the school, and you will learn the answers in time. For now I will tell you this; Your bracelets are important and they are indicative of your magical powers and abilities. Please do not remove them." We all broke into hushed whispers. We figured out by ourselves what the colors meant. I had already figured out I was a reject, long before coming here, so I was fine. Some of the other kids, though, didn't look so fine. We were quieted again, and he resumed what he was saying.

"Please refrain from discriminating against students due to this fact. The two groups will not be separated in hopes of helping you all work together," he said, looking around the room. We all collectively fidgeted under his gaze. Everyone was subject to his scrutiny.