Smiles

Catkin won! Who's next? Also, all characters are now in the glossary with abilities and all.

During the next eight years, nine months, and three weeks, I learned a lot of things.

I had tutors who taught me about the history of this world and magic, along with magic itself. That was fun.

I had spent the majority of the past years perfecting my already-known spells or learning new ones.

With five innate magics, I couldn't learn any more, but I was content with the ones I had. They were extremely powerful by the time I was finished with my training.

And I was so good that I was almost immediately accepted into a prestigious magic academy. I was leaving for that school today, which was my birthday.

I had exactly one year from now to find a 'mate', as my parents called it, and have a child or a false egg. I was a little weirded out by that fact, but it was something that I had to do.

As I had gotten older, my body had matured a lot. Now, at the equivalent of an almost eighteen-year-old human, I was, honestly, hot. My chest was quite sizable and I had defined curves.

It would not take long to find someone, I could tell. I looked at myself in the mirror.

I had slightly tanned skin and ice-blue hair that hung down to right above my waist. My slightly pointed ears poked through, with a hint of feathers behind them. My wings were also massive. Whenever I was indoors, I had to keep them folded up so they wouldn't get in the way.

Then my gaze fell to my clawed feet. The toes were long with sharp talons at the end of them. One of them came out from my heel, like a bird. It was a little weird, having them, but they were useful for picking things up.

"Evelyn!" My mother shouted from the other room. "Are you ready?"

"Yeah!" I shouted back. I stored my packed suitcase in my magical storage ring and went to my mother.

"Have fun," She said, hugging me. "Make friends, and remember, one year from next week."

"I know," I said, smiling.

"Good," My mother said, pulling back. Then my father hugged us both.

"Goodbye," He said. "Come back on your next break."

"I will," I said, before launching into the sky. I caught a rising thermal and banked, aiming toward the nearby city.

It took several hours of my gliding to reach the academy. I easily located it from amongst the other buildings because of its massive spires.

I flew down and landed next to the crowd that was gathered outside. There were several desks lined up where people were showing their identification and proof that they passed the entrance exam. After a few minutes, I made it into the interior area, where there were the classification tests.

It was a magical crystal that read you magic power, magic skill, magic control, and bloodline level. For us new students, it was on a scale of 1-10 for each, so the maximum score was 40.

I patiently waited for the line to move forward, glancing occasionally when someone got angry about their score.

When it was my turn, I walked up and placed my hand on a round crystal. It glowed before printing out a small wooden slate with several things written on it.

The woman at the desk handed it to me and showed me where to go next. I looked at it as I walked.

I walked up to a man who asked for my card. I gave it and he stamped the back before handing it back with two pieces of paper. The stamp was a circle with three stars inside it. The first paper said 'Evelyn Orchard, Level 3 Student, Room A10', and the other was a map.

I looked up at the academy and took a deep breath. I could do this.