The chalkboard mounted to the wall was chock full of rules for the classroom, scrawled in curly script, surrounded by smears of erased lessons past.

The dinosaurs immediately made a beeline for it, and began playing Noughts and Crosses over the text, arguing loudly over who would be Crosses. No-one chose to be Noughts, that was the lame player’s side, only for losers.

“Ok, how about I be blue Crosses, and you can be green crosses? there’s coloured chalk here, look…”

Anar flushed, hotly, in embarrassment, sitting at his table seat, “guys! You shouldn’t play that on there! Come on, guys, yeah? Pack it in.” He had kept his tall collar up since the College café debacle, convinced the dino duo were going to get him in trouble with all their antics.

“Maybe he’s right,” Rap frowned, pausing, rubbing out the bright marks with the board rubber. “Let’s play Hangman instead!”

“No! That wasn’t what I…”

“Is there a problem, Warlock? What are they doing with my board?” the demon faun lecturer bleated.

“Uh, they’re just… uh…”

“Anar! How do you spell ‘aardvark’?”

“Awww, now you’ve given the answer away!”

The lecturer glared at Anar with dark eyes.

“Sorry, sir,” he squeaked.

“What did you just say to me?!” he roared, fangs gnashing.

“Ffffffflip!” Anar launched back out from his seat, and urgently flapped Rap and Rave away from their smudged and scrawl-laden chalkboard.

A shadow fell across the room.

“Ah, Crowley, glad you could join us. Sit.”

The human student with the very large wings crept into the classroom, glaring daggers at Anar as he did so. He seemed pleased that the aardvark was in trouble. His seat was directly in front of Anar’s, so he kept his wings spread, to obscure the view of the lesson as much as possible.

“What was all that about?” Rap asked, innocently.

“I’m not meant to apologise,” Anar replied, darkly, once again taking his seat. “We’re all bound by the Foul Oaths, see. We have to promise to lie, cheat, betray and be as awful as we can at all times.”

“But you’re always so nice!”

“Exactly!” Anar wailed, quietly, “I’m just no good at this stuff. It’s worse than triple science back at Millcroft High. And I can’t get out of it by setting stuff on fire with the Bunsen burners, neither. Anyway, I better listen to this, so shush.”

Each student had been provided with a magical amulet at the beginning of the autumn term, two weeks prior. They’d had instructions to name it; an act that would bind it to them, rendering it useless for anyone else if it should be stolen, which was a possibility because demons will be demons. Around every horned, winged, fanged student’s neck hung a pretty, glittering trinket. Most would tuck it inside their robes as it didn’t exactly complement the whole occult vibe they were trying to pull off.

Anar had dubbed his ‘Sharon Stone’. He was very pleased with this joke. Sharon was a teardrop, amber in hue with a solid, grey metal backing that was diamond-shaped.

The amulets were strictly for lesson use only, and contained just a few drops of Power. It was widely recognised that letting students bound for the Underworld access to an abundance of magic was a Very Bad Idea. And anyway, they had familiars capable of using low-grade magical energy for everyday tasks. Once they had completed their exams and signed contracts for employment, each fully-fledged demon would have an innate magic all of their own, and no amulets would be required, but for now this was the only access to it they had.

Previous lessons had covered the idea behind magic – how to make things happen just by thinking about it. Magic was strong stuff and tightly regulated, only given to authorised users qualified in its application. Licences were valid for a set duration of time and were then reviewed. Each application of magic was recorded, and wasting it would get your amulet confiscated by the authorities. The College students knew that if your amulet was drained before term end, it was tough taters, there were no replacements and no top-ups.

Their first use of magic would be a very simple one. It involved nothing dead, there was no danger of anyone getting hurt, or anything whizzing around the room.  All they had to do was move out of a salt circle. As demonic students, the salt did not actually contain them as it would a true minion, but they would fail if they took a footstep. This task would have to be completed using some of their amulet’s Power to be successful.

Pixies and faeries shimmered and glimmered as they sprinkled salt around their owners, as they stood by their desks, ready.

Rap and Rave stuck their tongues in it. Rap then tossed it like wedding confetti at Anar until the lecturer growled. Rave shuffled off to find something more interesting to do, like arson.

“Watch him with the candles, Rap, yeah?” Anar sighed, covered in white crystals like he had a bad case of dandruff.

“You really know how to command a familiar, don’t you, demon donkey?” the human, referred to as ‘Crowley’, rasped.

Anar averted his gaze, staring at an oddly-shaped skull on a bookcase.

“Special permission to bring two of them, and they’re not even magical, are they?” he spat.

“They’re doing their best,” Anar mumbled.

“Really?” he asked with faux sincerity, as something beyond his line of sight clattered.

Anar hoped whatever it was, it wasn’t breakable or expensive to replace.

“I thought it was plastic!” Rave’s voice explained.

“OUT!” the lecturer commanded, shaking the walls with his baritone voice.

Rap shrugged at Anar as they left the room, “he’s magic, he can fix it in a jiffy, dunno what all the fuss is about.”

“Now, where were we? Crowley, why don’t you show us how it’s done? I’m sure you’re well practised in the wielding of Power,” the old goat teacher grinned, his lips indented from where his fangs had rested upon them.

“Certainly.” In a faint blue flash, Crowley was standing outside of his salt circle, intact and unchanged. He hadn’t moved a muscle of his skinny body. His familiar did a loop-de-loop in victory, then settled back on his shoulder.

“Excellent. Just concentrate on where you want to be, see it clear in your mind’s eye as well as your physical one, and you will shift in space. We’re only travelling a few inches, here, but in full command of your demonic abilities you will be able to travel back to the Underworld at will, should you be confined by a salt circle in future. Remember, this will not work if you are summoned by a demonologist, they are a trickier opponent. Off you go…”

The class all closed their eyes, clenching furry and scaly fists in effort, willing themselves to move without actually moving. The chittering of faithful familiars encouraging them filled the silence. For most, this was the first time they had performed any sorcerous act. A few were more practiced. Faint blue wisps appeared and disappeared.

Anar wished Rap and Rave were still here, useless though they were, having something to worry about took the edge off his anxiousness. Imagine where you want to be, the lecturer said. See it clear in your mind’s eye.  

“We’re waiting, demon donkey,” Crowley mocked.

Anar closed his glowing eyes and gritted his sharp teeth; they felt strange when they touched, he was aware of his heavy, flexing wings, his trailing tail, his horrible horns.

He could see where he wanted to be, all right. In his mind’s eye. Clear as day. That long gravel drive, the one with the creamy stones that ended in a circle that looped around in front of the door to the house, with a gurgling fountain of crystal-clear water, placed at its centre.

Warlock Court.

He felt a chill breeze on his cheek, and heard birds twittering. His eyes flew wide open, and he froze in horror. He was there. He was actually there. He’d travelled to his uncle’s home, to the seat of his ancestor, the grand country estate mere miles from Stonehenge.

He had to get back to the classroom! And now! What would his father say, if he was reported missing? He’d be toast.

He couldn’t breathe, he was overcome with panic. What if Monty found him here? What if Destroyer found him, and told Monty he’d escaped College? He hadn’t meant to! Why did these things happen to him?!

Think of the classroom! Think of the classroom!

But he couldn’t, most of it had been blocked from view by that human guy’s stupid big bloody wings! He was almost screaming at himself now; imagine it, see it, there was the chalkboard on the wall, and theopen door, and my desk and seat, the bookcase that the funny-looking skull was sat on. Think, think, think…

The chill vanished, and chirping birds were replaced by a low murmuring.

He was trembling. Slowly, he opened his eyes again, almost relieved to see a scowling, reddish pointy human face glaring right at him, seething.

The lecturer clomped with cloven hooves in between them, his faun eyes filling Anar’s vision, “there’s always one, every year, isn’t there? And this year it’s you, Warlock! Showing off, wandering about as you please. I won’t tell you again, so listen carefully with those big ears of yours; you’re going to drain your amulet carrying on like that! I’ll not take pity on you, no matter who you are.”

The warning look lasted a moment longer before he moved on, straightening up his back and long, hairy goat legs.

The rest of the class were delighted. They hadn’t gotten in any trouble, even if they’d struggled to complete their work. This was free entertainment.

“Believe me when I say you don’t want campus security coming to retrieve you.” The teacher turned his back on Anar, and instructed the familiars to clean up the salt off the floor, returning it to the jar.

Crowley shook his head and scowled, “you really can’t do anything right, can you, donkey?”

“What is your problem with me?” Anar hissed.

Crowley’s eyes narrowed. “You don’t know who I am, do you?”

Anar shrugged, feeling his wings crease as he did so. “Crowley?”

“Exactly.”

There was a pause. “’K. Cool.” What else did the dude want from him? A bow?!

“You’re an insolent, rude little grey prick! I’m royalty!”

Cogs turned. “The occultist guy? Wasn’t that, like, forever ago?”

“Aleister Crowley was my great grandfather! He was a powerful magician! Satan himself invited him into the inner circle of Hell, and you know what, donkey? I still only have one familiar, and I don’t get away with half the shit you pull! Swanning about with Laurel and Hardy, taking over the coffee shop – yeah I heard about that. Pushing in front of one of the necromancers? I’d have been in Master Leviathan’s office sooner ‘n you can say ‘shit’, but noooo, not a word said for you,” he pointed a talon, “whatever you are. Whoever you are. Warlock, was it? I know you had a stupid first name. Mess up, and I’ll dob on you! I’ll grass you up, see if I don’t!”

“That will do.” The teacher’s voice cut through.

Crowley lashed his tail, “I’m the important one here! Me! I’m Hell-stock! Infernal-born! This is my calling!” he whined, frowning at the aardvark again, “you don’t even look very scary. You look like something from a Saturday morning cartoon!”

Anar shifted on his Reebok’s heels. He wasn’t used to people having mental breakdowns in public. He wiped his snout with his baggy sleeve. He didn’t know why he was getting away with Rap and Rave’s misbehaviour, neither. He’d been crapping himself, expecting a letter home or some such rubbish, and having his father turn up for a meeting with the headmaster. There was still time for that. Maybe he was doing better in lessons than he thought? Perhaps he was on a three-strike system thing, and he was on his last strike? Disaster was probably just around the corner. He edged closer to the classroom doorway, leaving someone else’s hapless familiar to pick up the small dinosaur’s salt-strewn mess.

Part of him was still reeling from what he’d just done. He’d actually travelled all the way to Warlock Court, using just his mind, using a Power that was new to him. If he’d messed up getting back, he could be lost right now. In the middle of nowhere, alone. What was he even going to put on his magic slot sheet? He used two shots of magic, when he should have used one. Blagging your way past senior staff at the Infernal Holy College was one thing, but the Council of Sorcerer’s? he wasn’t touching them with a twenty-foot barge pole! They were bad news for his family. They were the scary ones in all this. He could mention his natural magic in his blood to no one, demon lecturers included. Even Rap and Rave didn’t know the full story. He downplayed it, took full advantage of their naivety seeing as they were new to this world. ‘Strange things happened to him, and he had a powerful ancestor’; that was all he’d told them.

What if there was more to it than that? What if he now had a knack for magic that was going to become apparent to everyone, and get them asking questions? He scurried along the corridor, leaving the classroom and Crowley behind him. Rap and Rave would be in front of the Discovery Channel, drinking fruit tea with the lava lamp on. He needed a cigarette break, and a stock up on Coke. Next lesson for him was research using the PCs in the tech centre. He contemplated leaving the dinosaurs where they were for that one, in case they started installing Lemmings on the computers again...