Okay. So, this is the beginning of the first story I'm writing for NaNoWriYe. But, I have some questions about how it's being written and whether or not I'm going the write direction.

For those of you who've read Assassin's Apprentice by Robin Hobb, you know how it starts out with the main character writing in italics, like he's writing something down, which is the history of his family/country/whatever (I haven't been reading much of it >.>)? And after a paragraph of that it switches to normal text and it's the narrator telling his life story, but there are random breaks where it goes back to the italics?

I'm basically trying to do something similar to that with my Child of Ashes thing, only the difference is that I want to have it start out with the MC at 28 years old or so...and then I kind of want to like...I don't know. I want to somehow make it so that I can have it start when she was younger, like eighteen or something (maybe even younger, I don't know. It's going to depend on how I write it), and then have it lead up to her as she is now, as a 28 year old, and have it continue on from there.

What I don't know, however, is whether or not I am on the right track with what I've written so far as far as doing that goes. I'll be typing up whatever I get done tonight tomorrow for people to see, but I want to know if what I explained above makes any sense at all.

Also, I'm going to put a bolded * somewhere where I THINK there should be a break with the little **** but am not sure, so I was wondering what you guys thought about that.

As far as critiquing goes, I really just want to know if I'm going in the right direction with how I'm doing things with the narrator. Could I get away with, if I had to, having the first chapter (or maybe making it the prologue or something, I don't know) be written in first person, and then the next few chapters explaining her life up until this point in third, and then switch back to third when it's present day, and continuing on from when she's 28 years old? Or would that confuse the heack out of the reader?

[pre:31dd93782e]Child of Ashes/Empire of the Sky:

Outcast

Chapter One:

Fate Knocks

To most people, magic is a wondrous thing. A simple flick of the wrist can produce the most beautiful flower; a muttered incantation can make someone levitate.

If I had ever known that my magic would cause such hurt, such hatred, and such suffering, I never would have begun my training to become a Wielder all those years ago. I learned, however, that is better to not dwell in the past and to instead focus on the future. When you are an outcast for as long as I have been, it becomes habit to think of nothing but the past. What else is there to think of, after all, when one is living in seclusion, in an abandoned cabin in the middle of a forest?

When my seclusion first began, I would often find myself looking up to the sky, wondering what was happening up there. Most people on this Earth do not know of the existence of the Moon and Sky Empires, but I knew, because I was born into the Moon Empire. With the burden of being what we called a Moon Child came magic abilities, things as simple as using the stars to read messages, and even go as far as to travel to and from the moon itself and the sky, where the hearts of the Moon and Sky Empires were. Those with these magic abilities were often trained to ultimately become Wielders, the highest of the three levels of magic.

Not everyone who begins his or her training for this is successful, though. I am a prime example of this, since I was only a Charmer, the second level, at the time of my banishment.

My life has seemed to go so slowly, while everyone else’s are fast paced; I suppose that is one of the many burdens of being an outcast, though. As years have gone by, I’ve wondered about the other Children. There was Aracellis, whom we often called Cel. She had the natural popularity that, despite my denying so to others, I often dreamed of having, though I would never use it as she did. She was a Sky Child, whose often-cheerful disposition made it hard for her to hide. Sky Children tend to be happy a lot of the time.

Next were the twins, Kalevias and Kelesana, who were the only other Moon Children. Things had been made difficult for them, though. As if being twins wasn’t hard enough, Kalevias had been blind since birth. Everyday life was a struggle for him, as he was the one with the least advantage. It was hard to believe they were twins because their personalities were so different.

Next was Casden, the oldest but most head strong of our group. Lastly was Rais, the younger, scrawny brother of Casden. Eventually, though, Rais turned into the tall, handsome young man that he was the last time I saw him, when we were no more than nineteen years old.

Thinking of our group made me wonder if they were still even alive. I feared the most for the other Moon Children; our race is probably long dead, with the three of us being only a handful of the remainder. As I said before, though, it is better to not dwell in the past, as the hurt from missing your friends, who are the closest thing to family you have, can be too much to endeure.

However, the worst I have had to go through was receiving the Burn, as part of my punishment from what seems so long ago. According to the Council of Caelestis, I was a traitor, to them, to the Sky and Moon Empires, and even to myself. The Empress of the Levana Empire herself could not deny that my actions were traitorous.

But I knew the truth even then, and I was not given any chance to tell it to the Council before I was ultimately banished to where I reside now.

My name is Cesarina Vardin. I am the traitor to the Levana Moon Empire. I am the outcast; a child of ashes.

*

It’s hard for me, as I write this, to find a good point in my life to start my story from. My childhood is mostly a blur; I remember being with the others at the age of eight or so, and traveling from the Moon to Earth in order to keep us protected. That was a time when the chaos going on had only just started and the people of the Moon Empire were not dying off.

It wasn’t until I was older that I began discovering my magic abilities. The very first time I discovered what I learned was my life force glow, I was outside of the place we were staying one night, watching the sky. A few clouds rolled over the moon and lingered for a few minutes. During those minutes, I looked down and saw a glow coming from my hands and arms. I went to a nearby pond and looked at my reflection where I saw the same glow coming from my fce. I soon learned that Kelesana and Kelevias had the same thing, making us realize that it was a feature of Moon Children.

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That's all I've written of the first chapter so far.