Prince of Pigeons

Hale's Blessing

Hello, Raine Drought!

We here at Halendria's Starbright Academy are proud to accept you into our student body!
We hope that our classes and stories can push you to the best of your abilities and make you the best you "you" can be!

We can't wait to see you at the start of the next school year!

- Halendria Starlight

I received that letter about a month ago, and now I'm here. About two hours away from home.

The Academy was certainly something to stare at. A large castle, a bright pink, with shades of purple decorating the roofs and detailing the walls. The school was built next to a cliff, a waterfall pouring down into the walls I couldn't see past, the waterfall had to end in the courtyard, maybe. The tallest tower of it is to the left of the middle of the school, and it holds a large clock that looks into the school. Just across from me is a large set of curved stairs leading to the front door of the castle, which was notably big, and a shade of brown that contrasted with the purple outline that separated it from the wall.

I turn around to look at my parents, they start giving me their goodbyes, reminding me which classes I'm taking, where I have to go. It's all memorized to me at this point.

"One more thing, Raine." "Yeah dad?" "Just remember." "Yeah."
"Never, ever go into the basement of this school." "Ok dad."

I don't know why he's always so cryptic about that, every time I asked about it, he just repeated the warning. Whatever it is, I can understand it. The school doesn't even have a basement... I'm getting off track, but I just needed to vent. I hope that's the only cryptic advice I'm gonna hear in here.

The car door closes, and I watch as it drives off, we already had my stuff placed in a baggage claim area by someone else, I start walking to the front door. When I'm about three-fourths up the stairs, a large bell starts ringing. Any of the students who weren't already heading up the stairs start running up them now. When I get in I see the front hall is ornate, a marble floor makes a difference from the stone I was just walking on and marble stairs follow the walls towards a second floor, which was a good distance away from me. Everybody wanders into a door on the left, where the hallway was much smaller than expected. We wandered as one group until we found the Great Hall.

The Great Hall was very ornate, some adults were standing around, I assumed they were teachers. We all got sat down, when we were all spaced out between the tables, you'd assume the school was missing many students, but this was only for First-Year students. The pink walls curved up in the ceiling, and a large window made up the back wall of the stage.
A woman walks upon it, her blonde hair is long and well-maintained. She is beautiful and amazingly-dressed. This lady is Halendria Starbright. As she begins her speech about what this school is about I start losing focus and begin to think of other things.

A week after I got my acceptance letter to this academy, I was sent to a nearby facility, to test my affinity. An affinity is what your powers center around, it can be an element, an animal, or even a weapon, and you can even get multiple affinities, if you really try. First, they stuck me up to some machine to find that I have an animal affinity, a bird affinity. Next, they sent me into this room.
The room was large, with an open roof. There was a large tree in the middle of the room, there were countless birds in the tree. I saw a couple other people, people my age, walking around.
They gave me no instructions, they just walked away. So I walked over to the tree and waited for a few minutes. I saw a bird fly down onto the head of someone else, they got really excited and ran up to the employees, then they were taken into the door we entered from.
It was then that a pigeon landed on my head.
A pigeon. Not a butterfly, a majestic, beautiful, beloved, delicate being, and not a bat, a scary, fearsome, nocturnal, yet surviving creature. A pigeon, something all over the place, something most known for being found in every park in the city. A pigeon.
I walk over to one of the employees, and they seemed confused to seen the pigeon on my head, were there even any pigeons selected for this place? We leave the room and head back to my parents, they're happy for me, that I have the affinity of a bird.

It wasn't long after that that pigeon wings grew out of my back, and we went shopping for new clothes.

Wait, I think Halendria's finishing her speech.
"We know that you'll take this blessing, and make yourselves proficient in the classes that you have chosen! I will now leave you in the hands of my assistant, Maurice Munipa."

A man with short, brown hair, and a relaxed disposition walked onto stage. He wore simple clothes, but they had the same white color-scheme as Halendria's clothing. He began talking about the classes we were going to be taking, how we should handle lunch time, and to not worry, apparently there was an incident last year involving the Biology teacher. I don't know what your biology classes teach but, for us, Biology is about interesting animals. Anyways, I'm still having trouble listening. Before I know it, Mr. Munipa is wrapping up his speech. An electronic bell rings throughout the Grand Hall. Everybody gets up and leaves, we split into multiple groups, walking in differing directions.

I go to my classes. Biology, Spells, Math, Potion Making, English, Music, and Flying. Simple classes, I have no idea what to expect.
After all that, and the first school day ends, I start walking to my dorm, it should be the fourth one. All the dorms are a good distance away from each other.

All but one of the windows are tinted blue. Our dormitory has a living room. My fellow students are currently talking with each other, I'm just trying to find which bed to take.

There were rooms containing two normal beds, bunk beds, two bunk beds, and one couch. All of the good options were already taken.