Highfield Academy - Revenge of The Crows
Chapter Forty-Five.

Queen Shellback was pleased with her new batch of students, knowing that under Mac Deaths tutorage she was soon to have the start of a stage two academy where students could leave the Vlad and Highfield academies and undertake direct apprenticeship training in real life situations.

King Thalaba along with Merlin, paid the occasional visits to ensure all was in order and Michael the arch Angel ensured that each student was gifted with a minimum of two Dryads, this was to become an essential part of their training and a companion to be with them always.

Mac Death was a hard teacher and refused to take it easy on any of her students and that also included Kelton who was part of the training staff. She was aware from Michael that Kelton had a vital role to play in saving humanity, along with Joshua and his Rang team, so Mac Death enforced the training and surprise attacks even more to ensure Kelton was always ready.

One day with the aid of Queen Shellback, Melatron and Mac Death, King Thalaba set a surprise attack on the students, they had set out on a genuine field trip to rescue some village elders from the Crow tribe from some remnants of the Nephilim left over from Lucido’s attack.

When the students saw the seven Nephilim they were struck with fear, one because they had been informed there was only two Nephilim, and secondly because these were huge, with the smallest standing at over eighteen metres, and he was small by comparison to the remaining four.

Once the students overcame their fear, they realised two of the Nephilim were eating members of the Crow tribe raw and this turned their stomachs making some want to vomit. Kelton however along with Sandu and Kissilder stood their ground and withdrew their wands and proceeded to unite their energy and spells to act as one united force.

They battled the giants causing confusion and anger, and then amid the battle Mac Death along with the other teachers sprang their trap. King Thalaba remained to keep the Nephilim at bay, while his fellow teachers attacked the students catching them off guards, well, all except Sandu and Kelton.

Kissilder fought bravely for about twenty seconds deflecting spells and refocusing her attention to where the new attack suddenly materialised. Her mistake had been to overlook listening to her Dryads who had tried to warn her.

Kelton on the other hand took notice of all that his dryads were telling him and Sandu followed suit, and between them they fought suspending themselves in a time bubble which was fractionally out of zinc with real time. Which in turn, forced the spells cast at them to filter into the time bubble and allow their wands to absorb the spent energy.

Once the teachers saw their actions, they ceased the attacks and left the students to dispatch the remaining Nephilim. The fact that it took a further three hours before all the Nephilim were killed or subdued, left them exhausted. Sandu had tried to avoid killing, and she had convinced her friends that unless necessary to allow the Nephilim to live.

“I prefer to not have them killed” she had stated. “As they can become useful labour to the Crow Tribe and help in the reconstruction of their damaged homes.”

Kelton at first had wanted death, but he soon understood the logic and once he saw that the Nephilim respected power and authority, he realised they could become valued vessels to rebuild that which had been previously destroyed.

However, there was a contention between king Thalaba and Queen Shellback over this act of mercy. As King Thalaba had wanted the Nephilim destroyed for crimes committed against others, many had died, and much suffering was brought about by the Nephilim’s actions.

It was Kelton and Sandu’s argument that, yes, this had been true, however, the Nephilim were acting under fear and the orders of Lucido, and as such had no choice other than to refuse to fight and in turn lose their lives in a most painful way.

Sandu explained that they were taught to show compassion, mercy, truth and justice as well as integrity. Her argument was strong and convinced Queen Shellback as to the value of her argument, that all life should be treated with dignity and as such by the nature of the Nephilim, they deserved an opportunity to make amends for their transgressions.

King Thalaba was furious and tried to exert his authority, only Queen Shellback stood her ground and refused, stating,

“This is my realm not yours King Thalaba, you are but a guest and in this realm under my domain and in addition tied to the Royal degree as stated by Queen La-Fay.

King Thalaba did not like been challenged but eventually saw reason and came to respect the student’s opinions when he realised that one Nephilim alone could equal the physical man power of at least a hundred of the Crow tribe.

As four Nephilim had been spared and had decided to surrender rather than fight to the death, had indicated they were open to reason. Four giants could if working under coordinated rule, by far quicker rebuild that which was lost and destroyed, also their ability to lift enormous loads saved considerable time.

Such was the success of this action that it became common practice and all future confrontations with the Nephilim resulted in those who voluntarily surrendered been offered an opportunity of redeeming themselves.

Lucido on learning of this decided to utilise the remaining Nephilim and brain washed them to under certain condition surrender and give the appearance of placid behaviour, yet when conditions were right to enact revenge and take as many lives as possible.

Joshua and his team met in the communal rooms,

“We have an exam coming in a few days and we have a choice of what potions to mix, has anyone found out which potions we are to be set?” enquired Tim.

It was Paula and Jillian who answered, but as Jillian had started before Paula she was allowed to continue talking.

“I spoke to Roger Hogeboom and he so helpfully told me it will only be something that we have already covered in our lessons.” There was general laughter, “So that means it could be three out of one hundred and seventy-five potions, great”

Paula and Jisalder smiled

“We believe it will be something important and having a certain level of difficulty like say making a potion to enable a creature to speak in a language we can understand, or to interchange life forms and merge an essence, although it is also possible it could be to create a new hybrid potion, but we feel that could be dangerous”.

The students sighed and thought over what they had learnt, sharing knowledge and assisting their friends in areas of confusion regarding the mixing and timing of brewing a potion. Time seemed unfazed as he held the knowledge of his father and felt certain he could overcome any difficulty, and explained he was prepared to share his knowledge through his Dryads when the exam started.

The news of the incident in the first year’s transfiguration class had filtered it way to the Highfield students and poor Dennis was still trapped in been a rather large hairy dog, as for Philip his over enthusiasm cost him a written warning and five thousand lines, detention and a stint working in the infirmary emptying bed pans and keeping the toilets clean.

And all this was on top of his lessons and ate into what precious little free time he had. That said it was not by far the worst thing a student had done in been over eager to show off their new skills. Merlin had been forced to take serious action on one student who many years previous had tried sending a fellow student into an alternate dimension.

Only he was not taking the spell seriously and deliberately cast the spell over only 50% of a fellow student’s body. Resulting in the top half materialising in a pocket dimension and the bottom half remaining in the classroom.

Had the school not had its defences in place the student would have been killed brutally and split in two. As it was, the school’s defences activated and held the student’s essence and immediately had the student re-united with his other half.

Merlin was furious and the student was expelled for three years and only readmitted after he could prove his attitude had changed. His family were Royal members of Queen L-Fays court, and took their child’s punishment seriously, having him grounded for two full years and educated privately.

By the time, he was readmitted into Highfield he had to start at year one and was humble and obedient and never stepped out of line again. Philips parents learnt of the incident, and accepted Merlin’s discipline, and understanding there was no malice intended, but it was only the actions of an inexperienced youth over eager to show what he had learnt.

Dennis on the other hand enjoyed been a dog and took full advantage enjoying platefuls of beans and farting in the common room and getting revenge in playing pranks, sniffing students buts and cocking a leg and peeing on those who annoyed him.

However, his fun eventually came to an end when the nurses in the infirmary remembered the potion to reverse the rather careless spell cast by young master Philips. And Dennis was once more transmuted back into been a Fay student again. Although the flees took some weeks to fully leave him.