When Tobias next looked up, the writing on the board was MUCH bigger. Much easier to read. But still, having help from a friend gave Tobias more comfort than an enlarged blackboard, though he wasn't able to explain why. Both were helpful, however, and so Tobias would use both.

He was getting pretty behind again, so Tobias squinted between the board and Cutty's notes before reaching for his mortar and pestle.

"Scourgify," the little old Hufflepuff cast on the apparatus, and then added the asphodel roots and began TO CRUSH THEM. Yeah. A lot of vigorous crushing went on, but Tobias found that he tired too easily, and instantly regretted using so much force so early on. He took a moment and had a breather, before having at it again. Eventually, it reached a pretty smoth consistency, though what did Tobias know, really? He could hardly see a blasted thing.

That went off to the side with the puss, and then Tobias got started on the actual potion.

"Scourgify." Because his cauldron needed to be clean, you see. Tobias added the 0.2 litres of seal milk (??? okay sure seal milk why not) and pointed his wand at the flame pit beneath the cauldron. "Incendio."

Something Tobias had noticed but never really shared with anyone was that he had quite the penchant for fire spells; anything fire related fell squarely in his court, particularly when it came to spells that produced flames (rather than that one from History of Magic, which Tobias had taken a few goes to get right). He'd discovered a neat little trick with the fire-making spell that was very useful in potions.

With his wand still pointed at the flames, Tobias rotated his wand slowly clockwise, and subsequently set the flame to high. He smiled to himself, as it just reminded him of his little knack for certain spells, which was always good for boosting confidence. When the flame had been on high for a little while, Tobias rotated his wand back anti-clockwise again until it had lowered to a medium sort of level.

Now that his potion was underway, Tobias felt his confidence rise dramatically. The start of the lesson had been a minor setback, and Tobias refused to dwell on it. He continued the potion cheerfully enough, focusing only on the blackboard, Cutty's notes and, occasionally, Cutty and his potion.

Speaking of Cutty, the Slytherin pushed his notes over again, and Tobias bent over them and quickly (or as quickly as he could) jotted down the new steps, and then cross-referenced it by squinting at the board. As though in an odd game of to-me-to-you, Tobias smiled and transferred the notes back to Cutty's desk because his friend would obviously want to add to them for his own benefit.

Right, syrup and eyes then. Working with eyes was difficult, because it reminded Tobias that these were dead animals he was working with, which was sad. But at least they were going to good use, right? Right. And they probably were dead BEFORE being harvested as potions ingredients. That's what Tobias told himself, anyway.

Adding the syrup was easy, it was just uncorked and then BAM, in it went. The eyes, however, provided a bit more of a challenge. They were remarkably slimy and slippery, and Tobias struggled to get a good grip of the first one. It kept sliding through his fingers and was pretty much impossible to grasp. Eventually, the Hufflepuff worked a way of making his hand into a fist with an eye-shaped gap that he wedged the eye into. Toby quickly 'scourgified' his potions knife and picked it up before looking to the eye.

This was were his own eyesight was making a mockery of him again. Tobias had to get in real close to ensure he made a slit in the back of the eye, and not in his hand or something instead. He succeeded, but not without getting a noseful of the vile smell the eye was giving off, and then twisted his outstretched arm so the eye was directly over the cauldron and squeeeeeeeeeeezed. When Tobias was sure he'd got out all the fluid, he did the same with the other eye using the same technique, and then threw the rest of both eyes away.

Tobias looked around his workstation for a rag or something. Slimy hands were going to make things difficult. No go, so he picked up his wand and pointed it at said slimy hand with a "Scourgify." Perfect.