in the direction of good and not evil, of course,” he replies. “In this class, I will teach you the history of the great angels who sat in the seats you are in and walked the same corridors of this academy as you do. I will teach you their names, their actions in life, and hope that when the time comes for you to shape history, you will look back to them and make the right choice,” he says and sits back down. “Now come and gather a book off my desk and start reading. We have a lot of ground to cover before we can talk of the great stories.”
Each of us gets a dusty book and sits back down before we open it to find it’s not in English at all.
“Master Gabriel, we don’t speak Latin,” Vesnia says.
“I’m well aware. The Latin translation books are at the back of the class. I suggest you get to work rather than asking me questions,” Master Gabriel replies, and I all but groan as I slide out my seat.
This is going to be a long class.
“Hopefully, Herbology is going to be better than that. I nearly fell asleep in my dusty book,” Vesnia grumbles, wiping dust off her hoodie sleeve. “It’s a good thing your sneezing kept me awake.”
“I don’t do dust,” I mumble just before I sneeze once again. I pull out my map from my back pocket and see that Herbology is in the greenhouse with Professor Louton. Vesnia hooks my arm in hers as we head down the corridor and to the greenhouse where most of our class is already waiting with Professor Louton.
“Welcome, class, to your first Herbology lesson. In this class, we will teach you about herbs and plants that have magical qualities such as healing humans who have been poisoned or drawing metal out of a human body. These things will be useful when you finish The Angel Academy and have to look after a human of importance,” she says. “It is very important you study hard for this class, because one mix-up when making a healing lotion could result in death, and I do love for my students to try out their own work on themselves.”
“That got everyone’s attention,” I mutter because it did, and I have no idea if she is joking or not.
“Right behind me is a plant called the Dekal,” she explains waving a hand at the plant with some yellow leaves scattered between purple ones. “The yellow leaves are safe to touch, but they have no healing properties. The purple leaves are deadly to touch, but they also are a vital ingredient in a lotion I want you to make. So get one leaf each and meet me at the back of the greenhouse.”
Professor Louton walks off, her black high heels clicking against the stone with every step as we all stare at each other.
“Any chance someone has gloves in their pockets?” Ves asks.
Resounding nos answer Vesnia, and then we all stare at the plant, none of us brave enough to test the warning Professor Louton said.
“I have an idea,” I mutter and take a step forward. I carefully lean into the plant and pick off a yellow leaf, and then I use the yellow leaf to very carefully pull a purple leaf off the plant. I raise an eyebrow at Vesnia who grins and goes next as I head down the path and to the back of the greenhouse. Thallon is talking quietly with Professor Louton as I get closer, and she laughs at something he said, placing her hand on his shoulder. I clear my throat to interrupt, not knowing why I felt like I had to do something to get noticed. Thallon smiles at me and then sees the leaves in my hand. He rushes over, picking a jar up off the side, and I drop the leaves in the jar.
“Are you still getting them to pick these leaves?” Thallon asks. “Last year, three students died from accidently touching them.”
“And those were three students who did not deserve to be an angel,” she sourly replies, her eyes locked on me.
“I figured using the yellow leaf to hold the purple was the idea,” I say quietly.
“Did anyone die?” she asks, and I shake my head. “Shame, it would have been a more interesting class. We do have all year though.” Thallon gets a jar for Vesnia as she comes over with her leaf, and she places it in