Cutty Mordaunt appearing from underneath a table shouldn't have been so surprising but it was. It really was. He shot the boy a curious, confused look but decided not to question it. There were other things that were occupying his mind, like............

...................... what in the name of merlin was a Bonsai?!

Thank Merlin that Kyroh had asked and saved him the embarrassment. Thank YOU for that. In the meantime, he was going to go and grab some seeds, which were in those boxes over there. Alder, Blackthorn or Elm. No no. Enchanting Elm. That was a mushy gushy name. Enchanting. It sounded like it secreted glittery things.

Yeah. No. He wasn't selecting that one.

Instead, he was going to select Blackthorn because that was used in his wand too. Uh huh. Once he selected the seed he wanted from the second box, Grayson reached into his bag and took out his Herbology journal and writing equipment. There. He was ready.

Merlin. What in the world was wrong with Zander? He was behaving all weird. Adi was quite sure he had never seen the by act like that. He was distracted by the arrival of Benny, however, before he say anything to Zander. "Hey,'' Adi replied. Oh and looky! Cris had seen him now. He grinned and waved back. "That's alright.

And the lesson was about to start. Hmmm. Which seed should he select? How about the Enchanting Elm? That sounded cool. Plus is was flesh eating plant. Yep, that seed would work. After making his choice, the third year retrieved his book and quill from his bag. Ready to take notes, Professor.

Ian went up to the containers and tried to decide which he would prefer. Elms were a good choice, and alders as well. In the end, he decided that he wanted to give a go at the blackthorn. He thought it would be more challenging and pleasant for him to work with. He selected a seed and headed back for his seat.

Lucy selected a seed in the first box, Blackthorn tree!
...Her father had a wand of blackthorn tree..
Then she found a free seat, she sat down and started to take notes..

Select a seed? Ok, easy enough. Caleb decided to go with the enchanting elm, because it sounded REALLY cool. Who wouldn't pick an enchanted plant? People who weren't smart, that was who.

So, taking the seed from the last box, Caleb went back to his desk and prepared to take notes. He wondered what the enchanted plant actually DID...something cool, hopefully!

Mo tugged on his gloves as the professor explained their next steps. Bonsai, awesome. Growing charm, great. Select a seed? Sure... why not? He waited as some of his classmates hurried up to take their seeds and mused over which kind of seed he wanted.

It was natural to want to try the Flesh-Eating tree, but Mo had the added conundrum of knowing that whatever he grew would need to be maintained. If he grew up a plant that needed feeding, then he would have to feed it, and Mo hated killing creatures if he could help it. So that left the alder and the blackthorn, which was essentially the most anticlimatic decision he could make.

Might as well choose blackthorn, then. Mo retrieved a seed before taking up his seat again.

Sophie glanced up when she noticed her brother join the students in the classroom...err, area. Whatever they were calling the new Herbology classroom. She grinned at him. For some reason, they'd been so busy lately that she hadn't really talked to him in a week. Sad.

But anyway, back to Herbology.

Sophie turned her attention to Bentley when the woman started the lesson. Choose a seed? Okay, Sophie could do that. She thought about the three options for a moment and decided to choose a seed out the last box. There was just something about the word 'Enchanting' that drew her in.

So with her new seen in hand, Sophie waited for the lesson to continue.

It was cold, but that seemed to be thing theme at Hogwarts. AJ just kept telling herself that it couldn't last forever. The sun would eventually come out, and all would be well with the world once more. Putting her gloves on quickly AJ listened to what the professor was talking about. She thought the plants did look okay in their new home, but if she was practically frozen to death she would be grateful about a new home too.

Which seed was she going to pick? The first year didn't know too much about the different plants, but her ears perked up when Bentley said there was am Enchanting Elm. AJ immediately picked that one just because it sounded cool. Once her seed was all picked out, she jotted down some notes.

Annabeth breathed deeply, so the teacher want them to plant seeds of trees are used in the manufacture of wands. And wasting nice and strong trees to make Bonsai. It didn't make sense for her, except if professor Bentley intended to make wand-shaped key-chains. She looked at the teacher for a moment and hesitated. Should she ask about the teacher's intentions? Of course not. She bit her lips and looked at the three box with seeds.

Anna walked to where the seeds where placed and picked an Enchanting Elm seed. Elm was a good wood and produced the best wands in her opinion. Anna smiled at the seed and went back to her place, to take her notes.

Simon glanced at Zander who was not his normal self today. He bit his lip. What was wrong with Zanderman today? He was usually his happy upbeat self. Before he could send a note to his friend, class began.

Now they had to choose one of the plants. Alder, Blackthorn, or Enchanting Elm. Hmm.. All trees that could be extracted to make wands out of. He paused, trying to decide which one he'd choose. The Enchanting Elm sounded really cool. However, he opted for the Alder one. Then he headed back to his seat, ready to take notes.

Marigold gave another smile to Bentley before she started talking. Well, she continued smiling, but she was more focused on other things. Like the fact that SHE had her very own bonsai. Or at least she thought it was a bonsai. It was named Tozzy and was very cool and BFFLs with Ralphie, Mitch's cactus. Which reminded her - she needed to name the mini cactus she gave him. Hmmmm…

SEEDS. She chose an Enchanting Elm. That was the flesh eater… right? She would be BRAVE and choose the SLIGHTLY DANGEROUS one. Plus, is was enchanting. She wanted to be enchanted.

She was ready for notes toooooo.

Leah got up from her seat shivering as she went up to the table in front. She took a blackthorn seed. Reason unknown. She just felt like taking one from the middle box. She returned to her seat, looking at the seed. As she sat back down, the second year frowned, looking at the blackboard. Taking notes? Ugh. Not cool. Leah put down the seed safely on her table, rubbed her hands together and picked up her quill.

Squinting at the board, she realized that the professor had only wrote the title for now. She decided to copy it down.

Seren was impressed, she was. It was clear that Kyroh had a thirst for knowledge, typical Ravenclaw.
"I'm so glad you asked," she started, moving part way around the table and leaning over to pluck herself an Alder seed. "Bonsai, is the art of growing dwarf ornamental trees and shrubs... they're charming." Very charming, and they could each have one of their own!

Fine?........ Fine? ............. Angel hardly seemed fine. Seren decided she would keep a closer eye on the girl for the time being. Ensure she didn't crumble into a pile of ice, the shivering seemed intense enough.




Moving back to her position at the head of the table, she waited until each of the students had pulled their notebooks out and grabbed their seeds. Tapping the board behind her with her wand, words began to scrawl across the surface.

"There are two charms commonly used to rapidly increase the growth of plants, shrubs and trees... the first is the Vitaris Charm and the second the Herbivicus Charm." She indicated to the board at this stage, headings that they should be noting down.

"There is very little to distinguish between the two with regard to the immediate physical impact on the target, however the differences in application is evident." She paused here briefly, to gauge that all students were following the discussion thus far. "The Vitaris Charm requires a flick at the target in addition to the incantation which is discriminate to the plant which s being charmed, whereas, the Herbivicus Charm requires a point and flick as well as greater concentration on the target in addition to the incantation so as to execute the charm." Fairly straight forward stuff, neither could go terribly wrong... well... for most people.

"It has been argued that the Vitaris Charm is better suited to novice herbologists as it requires less precision and concentration in execution."

"... but, if both charms result in the same effect, and both share common elements in execution... can anyone hazard a guess in what way they might truly vary?"

She tapped the board with her wand again, though her eyes were still on the students. Any hands up?

OOC: The lesson will continue in approx 18-22 hours

It was time to take more notes. AJ tried her very best to pay attention and keep the two charms that Bentley was talking about straight. They did seem very similar with the only thing sticking out in her mind being the Herbivicus charm needing a pint and flick when the Vitaris only needing a flick.

The first year's eyes kept cutting to her sister. It was very cold, but Angel was seeming a bit dramatic about it. She wanted to tell Bentley not to coddle her as it would only make Angel that much more dramatic. Instead, AJ scribbled down the notes and tried to think of an answer to the question.

Her hand was in the air. "Professor, does it have anything to with what the plants eat? Like a certain spell would work better on flesh eaters maybe?" Maybe the flesh eaters needed that extra point. MAYBE the point made all the difference. Perhaps the point made the spell stronger.

Angel was really ill and feeling really cold, she wished that she had a blanket or something because at the minute she was feeling really cold.

*ACHOOOOO*

Angel had tried to keep the sneeze in but she couldn't help it, she looked over at her sister who was answering the question. She shivered a bit more as she felt cold again.

Angel then listened to the Professor and her sisters answer, she raised her hand. "Pro...f...essor may..be what plants the sp...ell works on." Angel was wishing she had brought something with her to keep warm.

Jasmine listened to the Professor and wrote the important information down in her notebook. When the first question was asked, she raised her hand to take a shot at it.

"I agree with A.J? Is it possible that the Vitaris Charm works with the flesh eating plants and Herbivicus Charm works with the non-flesh eating plants?" It made sense in Jasmine's head. Whether or not her answer was correct, she did not know.

Scribble...Scribble...

Adi's hand flew over his book as he made his notes while he listened to Professor Bentley. Fascinating. Two spells that did the same thing yet they varied. He finished up this round of note taking by adding the spells and their respective wand movements. Now to answer the question.

Hand in the air, Adi said ''Maybe one of the spells work a lot better than the other on a certain type of see, Professor.''

Simon continued to take notes as Professor Bentley explained the two charms that they would be learning about today. As the Professor asked them what was the difference between the two, Simon paused. He had no clue but he wondered if his Latin would help him understand the properties of the two plants. Latin was generally helpful when it came to understanding medical things or at least that's what his Father told him.


Scribble. Scribble. Scribble.
Scribbling legibly and neatly.

He too thought that the charms were used for different types of plants but he didn't know how to the charms differed in that aspect. Perhaps Vitaris was used slowly for flowers since it required the name of the flora afterwards. He would wait to see what Professor Bentley would say on the matter.

Agatha was observing the seed she was holding, but lifted her head as soon as professor Bentley explained what a Bonsai was. How did people not know what a Bonsai was??

She blinked at the board after the teacher started speaking about the two different spells. She had never heard of any of them, probably because they were only used for plants? That was her conclusion, since no one in her family ever did anything with plants - animals, yes, but not plants. Of course she didn't know the answer. And of course she wouldn't hazard a guess and make a fool of herself in front of the whole class.

The Slytherin kept quiet and looked from one student to the other as they gave their answers.

Benjamin raised his hand. "You said immediate impact on the plant, Professor. Does that suggest they have different long term impacts? I seem to remember that the Vitaris Charm allows a seed to become a fully fledged plant in a matter of moments...kind of giving it vitality or 'life'. Does the Herbivicus Charm have a more controllable aspect to it...like, how much growing the plant does?"

Was it obvious he'd actually being doing NEWTs reading for once? Funng what a bit of friendly bribery can do before otherwise 'pointless' exams.

Annabeth listened very carefully to the teacher's explanation about the charms. She had no idea of what to reply, so she thought it was better to take her notes while thinking, before of making fool of herself raising her hand to say foolishness.

She wasn't happy with the idea of making a Bonsai. Quickly, she took her notes and raised a hand, "Professor, I have ever seen Bonsai before, they are charming, but useless. Why are we going to waste seeds of spetacular trees making Bonsai? I chose an Enchanting Elm seed, a wonderful wood used to make wands..." she shook her head and added, "by the way, I guess the Herbivicus Charm could make grow shady trees and the Vitaris Charm, tallest trees, not necessarily shady ones." She grinned. Her grin was probably better than her guess.

Listening to Professor Bentley, Lux tried to make sense of everything that they were being told, but a few of the words went over her head. The main point she gathered was that the two different spells gave basically the same results using different methods. Jotting everything down caused her to cringe because the gloves made everything look like a messy boy scrawl.

Not sure off an answer for the question asked, Lux remained silent.

Blah blah blah, that was all Caleb was really hearing. But he was still taking notes diligently, writing down the differences between the two charms. Now they had to guess what the actual real difference was between them...Caleb had no idea. He'd never even HEARD of these spells. But he could guess...

He raised his hand. "Does the rate of growth differ between them? So does one make the plant grow faster? Or is one perhaps only temporary, and after a while the plant receeds back into the soil?" he suggested.

Dwarf ornamental trees. They were going to be growing their own trees?!

Grayson looked down at the seed he had picked out. WELL. This wasn't as exciting as the lesson about flesh-eating plants but there were perks. Maybe he could finally have a tree or whatever named after him. Maybe. He did hope that his tree would end up doing something instead of sitting there.

But to have a tree, he needed to know how to grow it so, Grayson turned his attention over towards the Herbology Professor. Two spells? Great. Double the work. And of course there were differences. But what were they? He didn't know. Nope. He did like the idea of one being more for flesh eaters, like that girl over there had said.

He wasn't going to repeat her answer, though. Instead.......... "Professor?" he started, raising his hand in the air, "Is one more intense than the other and results in a more accurate growth?" Probably the Herbivicus one, since it required concentration. Anything that required a lot of concentration was hard but meant better results. This was his logic right here.

Text Cut: Journal

Growth Charms:

Vitaris Charm
- Flick
- Vitaris 'name of flora'


Herbivicus Charm
- Point and flick - concentration on target required
- Herbivicus

See normally, Zander would've been ever so enthusiastic to give the answer a try. Not because he liked speaking up in class, because he didn't. BUT because Herbology wasn't just ANY class. It was Beautiful Bentley's class. So by instinct the boy raised his hand into the air confidently until...

WAIT, PLEDGE OF SILENCE.

O____o

Class had only just begun and he almost ENTIRELY dropped his plan right then and there. Darn you Beautiful Bentley, you and your beautifully distracting face and angelic voice.

The Gryffindor immediately pulled his hand out of the air after his sudden realization of the plan. Heh. Well, this was embarrassing. Oops. Now, not only was he still SWEATING and feeling all these violent stomach STABBIES, but now his face was turning all TOMATO RED too. Ugh. Should've stayed in bed today.