biography>

Sage never really knew her parents. They never gave her a chance. Her mother dropped her off at a stranger's home, rang the doorbell, left, and hoped for the best. Fortunately enough for her, that person was kind enough to make a few calls and put her in the right hands. When she was younger, Sage would try to imagine what her parents could be. She'd daydream the hours away, convincing herself that some day they would return to her. She created elaborate stories in her head, inspired after reading too deeply into tales of lost Russian royalty. Maybe, like Anastasia, she might have been born a princess. Somewhere beyond the borders of her small town, there lay her own land to rule over. Perhaps that's why they left her. Overthrown and chased from their castle, they sent little Sage to the only form of safety they knew. They would come back soon enough for her and soon she could be the queen her people needed her to be. That's why she kept her hair so long, there was something about princesses and long hair.

There's always something about your first foster home, the first time you feel like you're apart of something that you're not just trying to insert yourself in. She was 10 years old and she knew she was the right fit. Marie and Elijah were in their late 20s; too young to be thinking about kids and too young to have them. There were long talks under warm table-side lamps right before bed, mostly about the boys she'd met and how she realized she never really liked any of them. They didn't appeal to her and the thought of boy-germs didn't scare her either, but no matter how many fantastical tales of foreign lands Sage thought up, she could never quite envision her own prince. Marie and Elijah often invited her to Sunday services, but never tried to force Sage into something she didn't want to do. As religious as they both were, they understood that it was something she wanted to explore on her own. And really, if they liked it, what was so bad about it? Her first night of bible study wasn't remotely what she expected. Her foster parents were good kind people, they spoke in understanding tones and of turning the other cheek. But the more she read, the more Sage became torn; stories of how a woman was nothing more than a man's property, that if two people of the same sex were to fall in love then they would burn in hell. She was going to hell. She was disappointing them already and they didn't even know it yet.

It wasn't until

She didn't make a lot friends going from foster home to foster home. Her first home

Eighteen years had passed, and no one ever came for her. Eighteen was also the age she was when she chopped off her hair. Not all of it, just enough to not have someone pull on it. There's something about finally being a legal adult but your whole life, you had to grow up too fast.