Tristan could always count on Derf to have good questions for him. He was amazed at how much this kid already knew about animals, and how interested he was to learn more. "Well, if you think about it chilli powder isn't the same spicy as curry is. It brings heat in a different way. Curry powder has all sorts of different spices in it where chilli powder has one or two chilli pepper types and maybe a couple other things like salt, onion, and garlic. So chili powder is more chilli pepper based. Peppers alone are the main spice and flavor." He paused, "What kind of effect do spicy foods have on humans? They make us sweat, in some cases cry, give us runny noses, make us drink lots of water or anything that will put out the heat, right? Well, the heat and the spices in the Chilli powder have healing effects for these creatures. It burns us, but heals them with the heat from the spices." He paused again, "Does that make sense?" He really hoped it did.

"You all are doing a great job! Keep it up! Make sure those Salamanders are getting properly treated with that chilli powder." Tristan watched the rest of the class standing next to Derfael for a few moments. Hoping they were enjoying handling the Salamanders.


OOC: Yall are doing great! You have 3 more days!

This was why CoMC lessons were so AWEESSOMMEE!! Not only did they get to work with creatures, but they also got to help them!!! Which is what Emmeline wanted to do when she grew up, really; well, she wanted to protect creatures too, but that counted as helping them, right?? She flashed Professor Wayland a biiig smile when he said that she was right after his question.

And then it was time for the main talking part of the lesson. Normally Emmeline would struggle to pay attention to this part, but today she was able to get a quill and parchment out and scribble down looooads of notes about magical salamanders. She'd never heard of the frost ones and kinda hoped that they'd study those salamanders before she graduated too.

As soon as Professor Wayland had finished giving out instructions, the second year shoved her notes unceremoniously into bag and jumped out of her seat. She pulled her dragon-hide gloves on, too, and tried hard not to actually run to the deck area to get her chilli powder.

Once she had some chili powder in hand, Emmeline approached the fire pit and peeeered inside carefully. It took her a few minutes, but she was finally able to find a salamander that her classmates hadn't checked yet. She reached slowly and carefully into the flames and pulled the small-ish salamander out of the fire.

Only, she was super upset to see that this one had LOADS of scale rot!!! Welll, okay, maybe she was exaggerating a bit, but the poor little guy had flaky scales alllll down one of his back legs AND on the part of his back that led to his tail. It definitely wouldn't be fun for him if the scale rot spread to his tail!!! The 12 year old wasted no time in dipping her free hand into the box of chili powder, getting quite a bit of the powder, and then slowly and gently rubbing it into the salamander's skin. The poor thing made a sort of noise as she did this, and Emmeline crooned back: "It's okay, buddy. We're gonna get rid of alllllll this stuff for you, so you feel better okay?" She made sure to use a really gentle tone of voice and stuff, like she did with Sirius when he'd had chizpurfles the other day. Her cruppy had NOT been any happier than this salamander was at having to get his treatment, nope.

Still, Emmeline tried to methodically rub the chili powder onto the salamander's affected scales, moving her fingers in circles over his scales to reallllly get the chili powder rubbed in. Once there was powder on his whole leg and the affected part of his back, Emmeline touched those areas up with a bit more powder, but she rubbed up and down in straight lines instead of making circles this time. The salamander was pretty squirmy by this point, but Sirius had been WAYYY worse when he was little. As soon as she thought that she'd given all of his affected scales a good coating of the chili powder, Emmeline gently lowered her salamander back into the flames, careful to put him back in the EXACT spot that she'd picked him up from.

One salamander taken care of, YESSSS!!

Vi picked up a box of chili powder and made her way back over to the bonfire. Now it was time to pick a salamander. She placed the chili powder down by her bag and then crouched by the fire pit. She reached into the fire pit and selected a small salamander. "Hello," she whispered softly. Aw.. The salamander was so cute but looked like the poor thing had a very bad case of scale rot. She noted the scale rot growing on the right hand side of its torso. Picking up the box of chili powder next to her bag, she opened it up and scooped a small handful.

She slowly cradled the salamander in her hand and then rubbed its back with a little bit of chili powder. Vi began softly rubbing the chili powder in circles carefully on the scales before increasing the pressure as she continued to rub. After a minute or two of rubbing the chili powder into the creatures scales on the right hand side of its torso. She gently turned the creature over, searching for some more scale rot. Aha! Her eyes widened when she saw a patch on its stomach. She took another small handful of the chili powder and began rubbing that into its stomach.

"All done. There you go. Back to the warmth," she said when gently placed the salamander back into the fire pit where she had found it.

Ah so it was Salamander care today. With one of his favorite flavorings too. Why is he suddenly thinking of unusual recipes involving reptiles? Shush focus!

He fitted his dragonhide gloves onto his hands and grabbed a box of chilli powder then approached the flame. He spotted one and stuck his gloved hand in, cradling the fiery salamander in his palm. Oh wow.... looks like this one got the rot all over itself. Heartstrings officially tugged.

He set the salamander down and got to work, listening to the discussion around them. Ah good question Derf, as Ace was also wondering the same thing, because he had good reason to think that ginger, which is also spicy, might've been helpful too, as it had proven to have good medicinal value for humans.

But right #PeppersOnly. He took a small handful of the chili powder and started smoothing it over a section of the salamander, covering the rots an non-rotted part of its skin. Gosh poor thing. Was the powder feeling a little rough on its tender spots? If only there was some kind of chili-balm equivalent...

-- Oh now he has a follow up question "Professor, what about the use of chili paste or chili oil? Will that be anywhere near as effective or recommended for scale rot treatment like this powder version?"

Checking for scale rot? Huh. Etta observed curiously as the professor rubbed the Salamander with some chilli powder, raising an eyebrow. Well, this was going to be fun.. and different. It was exactly why this subject fascinated her. Getting to learn something new about different kinds of creatures was super exciting, wasn’t it?

Once she was sure about what they needed to do, she stood up and headed over to the hut to pick up some chilli powder. She headed back to fire pit soon enough, set the box of chilli powder down and slowly put on her gloves. Now, to pick a salamander. She fetched one in random and carefully began to check for scale rot.. and there it was. A patch of flaky-looking scales. After picking up a handful of the spice, she started to rub it on the Salamander carefully. “Hi, there.” She said softly, looking down at the creature. “Hope that doesn’t hurt.”

Quote:

Originally Posted by Suziella

Tristan could always count on Derf to have good questions for him. He was amazed at how much this kid already knew about animals, and how interested he was to learn more. "Well, if you think about it chilli powder isn't the same spicy as curry is. It brings heat in a different way. Curry powder has all sorts of different spices in it where chilli powder has one or two chilli pepper types and maybe a couple other things like salt, onion, and garlic. So chili powder is more chilli pepper based. Peppers alone are the main spice and flavor." He paused, "What kind of effect do spicy foods have on humans? They make us sweat, in some cases cry, give us runny noses, make us drink lots of water or anything that will put out the heat, right? Well, the heat and the spices in the Chilli powder have healing effects for these creatures. It burns us, but heals them with the heat from the spices." He paused again, "Does that make sense?" He really hoped it did.

Derf was tugging on his gloves to make sure they fit snugly on his fingers while the professor spoke to him. He really did not know much about spices, so the fact that curry was made up of SEVERAL different things rather than just a curry plant or something was news to him. Was he meant to answer that question? Becauuuuuuuse...Derf's answer hadn't been listed by the man. Derf considered himself somewhat experimental when it came to food - as long as no meat or fish was involved - and he could distinctly remember one time the family had gone out somewhere for some really spicy food. Dad had been craving some tofu dish from the place...but Derf had left there with a really REALLY bad stomach ache and, well, it did not take TOO long for his dinner to go through his system.

If you know what we mean.

Still, it HAD burned coming back out so he supposed there was no real need to share his factoid with the man. "Thanks, professor!" he nodded instead. "That makes loads of sense!" He may have some follow up questions later - like what about MAKING their own chili powder vs the processed stuff found on the shelves in stores and stuff...but for now there were salamanders waiting for his keen and compassionate eye.

Chili powder in hand, the Hufflepuff approached the fire pit and crouch down to examine the embers and waiting for sign of moment rather than just shoving his hands in there. There were already so many foreign hands dropping into the flames and scooping salamanders out of there that Derf wanted to take his time. Something Hazel had taught him, be gentle in your patience. But it was HARD.

Squatting and hunched over so much that his knees were up against his ears, the third year waited with his hands resting slightly beneath the ash and was STOKED when one little salamander began waddling over towards his finger tips. "Hiiiiiiiii," he whispered as the creature approached. You know, to let it know that there was a person here and not to totally take it by surprise. Thankfully this particular salamander did not seem to mind and climbed right into the palm of his hand. Lifting it gingerly up, Derf carefully looked the Salamander over with a super eager grin...and was torn with the results of his initial inspection. "Hmm...you look like a healthy one," he mused as gave the creature another thorough look over, even caaaaarefully lifting it's tail and checking along there. "Alright then...back into the fire you go little buddy."

Felicity already had Valko's the quill Valko had given her out, inked and poised ready for notes. As Professor Wayland spoke, she let herself jot down as much as possible, adding stars and symbols to her notations where she knew she wanted to read further, or knew something already but didn't have the time to write it down fully just then.

But checking Salamanders for scale rot was going to be totally interesting. And being able to help them was even better. Maybe that would be what she would do after she left Hogwarts - heal creatures. How cool would that be? She leant forward to get a better view as the Professor pointed out what scale rot looked like: after all, she didn't want to mistreat one of them.

And she was going to start right now. Pulling on her dragon hide gloves, Felicity started forward to grab a box of chilli powder, before moving towards the flames. The first Salamander that she picked up was, after a few moments inspecting its scales, fine, and so she placed it carefully back into the first and scouted for another one.

In spite of the professor promising them protection against the heat of the fire, Katy preferred to handle the salamanders with her dragon hide gloves on. She rather thought it was safer just to have a place to tuck her sleeves when she was reaching into a fire.

Katy pulled on her gloves and tucked her loose sleeves into the ends. Now. Let's get a salamander. She plucked one from near the coals, a vibrantly red one the color of glowing embers. Through her gloves, the salamander felt pleasantly warm, and Katy turned it over carefully in her hands. There, by the hind left leg, was an unhealthy patch of scales that needed treating.

It was difficult to feel the patch of skin through her gloves, but Katy coated her fingertips with the chili powder and scrubbed gently, the way she would give her kitten a belly scratch. The salamander seemed to enjoy the attention, his little legs all wriggly, and when the scale rot was thoroughly worked over with the powder, Katy popped him back into the fire.

Who was next?

Tristan had started moving around the group, watching and making sure everyone was properly powdering their Salamanders. Of course, they were all doing fantastically! He was so proud of all of his students. They all did such a fantastic job, and the fact that multiple students wanted to have a career in creatures really made him happy!

Ah, Tenacious with another great question. "Well, if you think about it, chili paste isn't just chilies either. It has a lot of other ingredients that dull down that heat as well. As for Chili oil, it doesn't have that grit to it that they powder does. You need something powdery to get the flaky bits off."
He then turned to the group at large, "If anyone is concerned about the Chili Powder being too rough for these little guys, remember, they have SCALES that are rougher than that powder. They actually really enjoy it. So no need to worry about hurting them." He said with a wink and a grin.



OOC: You all are amazing! Your posts are so fun to read!! Keep it up! 2 more days!!

Flaming salamanders were officially kind of cute. Emmeline LIKED all creatures 'cept bugs, really, but she rarely thought of the lizard-y looking ones as cute. 'Cept Derf's newt, Scamander, was ALSO pretty cute, mhm. Still, the point was that they were cute and the twelve-year-old couldn't stop smiling as she worked on this activity. It was SO COOL!!!

She dove back into the flames and gently pried a new salamander off its spot in the fire. This one was a bit bigger than the first one she'd found, so Emmeline had to watch her grip on him in case he slipped off or something; she didn't want him to get away and hurt himself. The second year gave the new salamander a BIIIIG smile and muttered softly, "Hiiii buddy. It's okay, don't be scared. I'm just gonna check your scales for a bit, okay?" She knew that creatures didn't speak English, but loads of them did respond to people's tone of voice and stuff, and it was wayyy easier for Emmeline to maintain a really calm, soothing tone if she was saying stuff that it made sense in her head for her to say to a possibly scared creature.

This one was definitely a bit more wiggly than her first one had been, which made turning him over and looking for scale rot kind of tricky. Still, the Gryffindor managed to gently angle his body in her hands a bit so that she could look at his sides and his tummy and everywhere for the telltale flaky scales. Thank Merlin, she didn't see anything resembling scale rot on this one! Which was super good, 'cause he was so squirmy that she was half-scared that she'd drop him at any second. Emmeline bent her knees and moved closer to the flames in a crouch -- just in case he jumped -- as she slowly lowered him back to his exact spot in the flames. The salamander was only too happy to jump back into his place. And Emmeline felt guilty, but she also kind of let out a little sigh of relief that that one hadn't had any scale rot; she wasn't entirely sure that she'd have been able to hold him still long enough to give him proper treatment. At least he seemed to be flicking his tail in what she imagined was a happy way now that he was back in his flames!

Interesting. Really interesting. Instead of looking at them from a Defense point of view like they had a few years ago in DADA - it was interesting to actually learn about caring for them. Poor things. Scale rot didn’t sound like fun at all. Nodding along with the answers the rest of the class gave, he jotted down an answer here and there, before writing down more detailed descriptions and information as the Professor gave it to them.

Scale rot. Sounded sore.

With a nod and a sigh, Remy pulllllled himself out of his chair (that was REALLY close to the ground for someone so tall) and moved over to the stoop to get a box of chilli powder. When he got back to his chair, he took his gloves out of his bag and pulled them on so he would be protected. Leaning forward, he let his eyes adjust to the heat and then reached into the fire to pull out a Salamander.

”Hey there, hottie.” He murmured to himself, chuckling as he looked over the Salamander. His tail was clean… and his back. Moving his hand around, he looked over the salamander’s face and four legs. All good so far. Gently, he rolled the Salamander over , protecting it carefully with his fingers, and checked his belly. He was slow and careful with his check - but there wasn’t any scale rot on this particular Salamander. Good. ”You’re all clean, hottie. Stay safe... Here you go...” He leant forward and carefully placed him back where he had found him.

Etta held the creature awkwardly as she rubbed the chilli powder on its scales when she noticed another patch of dry scales near it’s head. Wow.. she took a handful of the spice before rubbing it on once more, making sure she wasn’t holding the salamander too close to her clothes. You know, just to be safe.

Once she was sure that she’d covered all it’s flaky scales, she gently placed the creature back in the pit. Well, that had been interesting. Who would have thought that a spice could be used as a cure? She watched as the Salamander started to play with it’s friends, a huge smile on her face. Aww, it was cute.. was it a he or a she, though? Etta wasn’t sure but she was going to assume that it was a female. After observing the creature for another few more moments, she turned away, waiting for class to move on soon.

Well that was interesting. They'd be like creature Healers today. Sure the case was minor but the Ravenclaw found it interesting all the same. Very briefly, she'd come across this rot condition and while she hadn't bothered to delve further, she couldn't help thinking this would be a good opportunity to better study it.

Even as she slipped her gloves on and fished a salamander from the flames, the young girl raised her hand. "Does it hurt, Professor? Having the scale rot I mean. Do THEY know they have it? Or does it just go unnoticed until their tails fall off--and by then are their nerve so shot in that area that they don't even notice the tail falling off either?"

How did this work? What was the exact nature of this disease.

Being quite the multitasker, Jessa reached for the chilli powder while she waited on a response. The little guy seemed clean until she'd turned him over and found a patch right on his belly. Gonna get this nicely fixed, yep. The Ravenclaw added a bit to the area, being sure to cover it all before replacing him in the spot she got him from--or her. Could've been a her just as easily.

Who was next?

Maddie listened as the professor told them all about salamanders. Most of it, Maddie already knew, but some of it she didn't. No matter how many times she heard about it, though, she still thought it was such a sad life to just live in a fire your whole existence, and then just die when the fire died. What about the whole outside world out there? There was that six hours they had, but even that didn't seem like much. Scalamander rot? Ewww. That sounded disgusting! She made a little face but tried to wipe it immediately off, since she would have to face the facts soon enough. She was about to have to take care of that stuff.

...and that time had come now.

Maddie pulled her gloves out of her bag and put them on, and then she went to collect a container of chili powder. Better go ahead and have that stuff ready. Returning to the fire, Maddie looked into it with hesitation before finally sinking her hand in and toward a salamander. She got one! "Hey little guy," she said. Spotting the scale rot, she collected a bit of the chili powder and began to rub it along the creatures back. She wondered why they were doing this if the creatures were just going to die anyway, but that was probably a mean thought to have. Maddie scrubbed away until all the scale rot was gone, and then she carefully released the salamander back into its home.

"Ohhhh so its the heat and the abrasion that makes this treatment work...." he said upon the Professor's response. Well now he had a deeper understanding and appreciation of what he's doing since it makes sense now. He continued working of the creature's problem areas, which were plentiful. But given how bad it was he sure wanted to make sure he made a thorough job of it. Goodness knows how long the poor creature would get treatment this good again.

After a while he was satisfied with his work, and so did the Salamander it seems, its mood vastly improving. "Time to go back little one." he crooned as he deposited the fire-born creature back into the flames.

Kyle slipped on his dragonhide gloves and looked into the fire. Well, they were kinda cute, weren't they? He made sure he had some chili powder close by before carefully picking one up. He looked it over cautiously, making sure he didn't miss any spots. Nope, no scale rot. Lucky little fellow, he presumed. He carefully put it back where he found it.

He picked up another salamander and looked it over. This guy (girl?) wasn't so lucky. Along one leg the scales had dulled: the characteristic of scale rot. Kyle grabbed some chili powder and carefully began rubbing it in. A little clumsy, however, as he wound up dropping the salamander onto his lap!! He scrambled to pick it back up and put it in the fire, hoping he'd gotten enough chili powder rubbed in.

But he had another problem: his robes were on fire! He flicked his wrist, causing his wand to spring into it from its holster, and he backed away from the fire, casting onto his robes: "Aguamenti!" A stream of water put out the fire and he canceled the spell. Then he looked at his robes closely. Well, now they were wet, and there was a hole burnt into them. That sucked.

Shay took lots of notes, as the professor began to give details about the Battle of Hogwarts. Then it was Main Activity time! Treating the salamanders for scale rot was a very productive way to spend their class time. Possibly a bit icky, but definitely productive. If Shay could help just one of the creatures to heal, her day would be made. Of course she hoped to help many more than just one.

After hearing the instructions, Shay went up and got a container of chilli powder not pepper. Returning to her designated spot, she put on her protective gloves. Once she was properly geared up, Shay went over and stood in front of the fire. She stared into the flames and spotted her first salamander. Reaching into the fire, she gently wrapped her fingers around the critter and pulled him out. Shay held him up and checked his scales for any sign of rot. She looked him over from head to tail. There were no dry or flaky patches to be found."You look fine little guy", Shay said to the salamander. Then she placed him back into the fire.

Peering back into the fire, Shay noticed another salamander near the one she had just replaced. She reached in once more and snagged salamander number two. After inspection, Shay realized that this time, scale rot was most definitely present. "It's ok buddy. I'm going to make you as good as new." Holding the salamander carefully, she tried to open the box of chilli powder. Clearly the Gryffindor had not thought this through. Opening the box was no easy task while wearing dragon hide gloves. Once she did open it, she managed to scoop some powder onto the finger of her glove. Then she gently rubbed the chilli powder into the salamander's scales. Shay made sure to cover all of the crusty areas. Making sure not to take too long, she finished the task as quickly as possible. Then she placed the creature back into his spot in the fire. Feeling some satisfaction, Shay began to look for her next patient.

He wanted them to pick these things up and check them?He didn't have the schooling to take care of creatures nor did he want to. So he sat for a few moments just watching everyone else gather what they were doing and heading to the fire. The fire itself was much more interesting than the salamanders in it. Watching the flames was a bit hypnotic and he got lost in them for a few minutes until he had his foot stepped on by someone.

Looking around he easily pulled his gloves out of his bag and slipped to a less crowded spot. Maybe he'd be next to Eivan and they could play in the fire a bit or he could sneak one of the Salamanders away for experiments, obviously, they didn't have great life expectancy anyway.

Either way Eddie decided to pick one up and check it so it at least seemed like he cared about being there. All these BOG walking around made him sure his mother would show up at any moment. Looking it over he saw the rot the professor was speaking of and took some chilli powder to rub on it.

Even though Maddie assumed this kind of thing was uncomfortable for the salamander, she was kind of enjoying reaching into a fire and coming out with a creature. Plus, she felt like she really helping out the little guys, what was scraping off their rot and all. That still kind of grossed her out, but her first try at it hadn't been all that bad, so she'd be okay. She checked to make sure her gloves were secure, and when she discovered that they were, she reached into the fire a second time.

Out came a second salamander.

"Hello to you, too," she said, greeting it just like she did the first salamander. This one was pretty bad off, and it'd probably take a while for her to clean him up. Nevertheless, she got right on it. After collecting more of the chili powder, she began scraping away at all the scale rot. It took her about five minutes just to get half of the rot off the salamander. "Poor little guy," she whispered to it. She collected more of the chili powder then started scraping away again. After about ten minutes, she was finally finished and released the salamander back into the fire.

With a calm smile on his face, the Welshman looked into the fire and pulled out a second Salamander. Sitting back into his chair so that he was comfortable, he gave an unhappy smile as he instantly noticed scale rot in various patches along the salamanders back and he hadn’t even given the poor creature a proper check over. However, since the scale rot was so obvious he forgo the in depth scan and simply gently rubbed over the creature’s head with his thumb to keep it calm, as he opened up the chilli pot.

Taking a handful of the powder, he started to rub at the spot on the salamander’s tail, chuckling when he felt the salamander relax in his hand. So, the Professor was right - they really did like the attention and the rubbing. He moved his fingers in circles, rubbing the rough chilli powder into the scales that had gotten dried out and had started to flake. Once he was sure the poor things tail was clear, he moved up its back moving over the other four dry areas he spotted as soon as he took the salamander out of the fire. Once he was done, he gave the salamanders legs and feet a good check over, before turning it over. Picking up some more chilli powder, he worked free the drying scales under its chin laughing when he almost got a cat-like reaction from the creature. There were two more sections of rot on the long belly, which both got treated with the chilli powder from the pot next to him. Once he was done, he carefully checked over the salamanders scales one last time just to make sure he had used the powder on them all and the little creature was clean and free. When he was satisfied, he leant forward to place it back into the fire where he had taken it from.

Looking through the flames, Remy found a third salamander to take out to check. Carefully plucking it from the firey heat, he once again moved backwards to get comfortable in his chair as he took the time to check the little guy over. He instantly felt better for this salamander than his previous one - there were no instant or obvious patches of scale rot, which was a great sign in comparison. Taking a closer look across the creatures full body, he only found one very small patch at the top of the salamanders head, between its eyes. So, he carefully took some chilli powder and worked the dry scales free before lowering it back into the fire.

Moving a bit further into the heat of the fire, Remy pulled a fourth salamander out of the heat. While reaching into a fire was something he usually would have done, he was definitely enjoying it right now… especially since he was getting to help the tiny salamanders at the same time. On closer inspection, Remy found a sole patch of scale rot on its back leg, covering most of its… well… the thigh equivalent of a salamander. Not quite its leg, not quite its back but the part in between. Rubbing chilli powder didn’t work as quickly or as easily with this patch - instead taking three separate handfuls of powder and considerable elbow grease and pressure (but not enough to actually hurt the creature) to remove all of the dry and rotting scales. With a happy smile, Remy leant far forward once more and replaced the fourth salamander back into the fire.

Maddie watched the fire for a few minutes, mesmerized by the fact that there were living, breathing creatures inside of it. Not only that, she was pulling out said creatures from the fire and then putting them right back in. Magic was amazing. Maddie secured her gloves a third time then reached right on back into the fire. Out came a third salamander, who equally as messed up as the second one she'd helped. "It's okay, little guy. I'm going to get all that nasty stuff off of you," she said. Maddie scooped up some chili powder then got to work.

She started by getting all the obvious places. It's back looked really bad, so Maddie gave it a good scrub. Once it was all fixed up again, she started on its neck. The neck wasn't as bad as the back, but Maddie gave it a good scrub anyway. The salamander was starting to squirm, so Maddie stopped scrubbing away at it for a few minutes and just let it calm down. Maybe it was anxious to get back into the fire... Maddie got more of the chili powder and checked the salamander's legs. She scrubbed off any scale rot that was on them, and then she checked for any spots she may have missed.

None. She smiled at the little creature then released it back into the fire.

Scarlett wished that ALL animal problems were as easy to solve as this scale rot on the salamanders. Her dog had gotten ringworm somehow over the summer and it had NOT be fun to deal with. This was simple compared to that!

Putting on her dragonhide gloves, she waited for some of the other students to get going before selecting her salamander. She found a small one that seemed unwilling to move and decided that HE (or she?) was the one who needed her help most of all.

It was small - even smaller than her dog - which meant she didn't need a WHOLE lot of chili powder. She got to it and picked up some of her powder and started to rub it into the scaly rot on the salamander's back. it didn't seem to make any kind of indication that it hurt or that it felt good...so she just kept going. This thing was ALIVE, right?

Yeah, he was breathing. And looking at her like she was crazy. "This is for your own good, little man," she chuckled.

Tristan heard Jessa's voice, and turned to look at her from his standing spot at the head of the fire pit. She had a very good question. So many good questions coming from his students! HE LOVED IT! The curiosity they had about these subjects just astounded him. "Another good questions Jessa! We don't think it hurts them until their tail falls off. Normally, if a Salamander's tail get broken off by accident it will grow back like most lizards. But when they get scale rot, though the flakiness of the scales doesn't hurt them, when their tails fall off because of scale rot it seems to be very painful, and it never grows back." He paused, "Which is why we try to help them. Having a full intact tail is very important for balance as well as safety." He said with a nod.

AND back to Tenacious! "Exactly!" Tristan said with a smile. He always loved seeing when a concept made sense to a student. It was like a light bulb turned on! He was about to continue when he heard...

Tristan ran as fast as he could dodging students trying to get to Kyle. But by the time he had gotten there, the flames had already been put out. "Are you alright, Kyle? Your skin didn't get burned did it?" He would have checked for the boy, but felt it would be inappropriate to do so. With a flick of his wand a towel appeared. "Do you think you need to go see Healer Reed?" He asked extremely concerned. He personally hated getting burned. Working with these types of creatures, it happened far to often for his liking. But luckily burns could be treated and healed in an instant. He always wondered how muggles dealt with burns without magic.


OOC: You all are doing awesome! You have about 24 hours left to get your posts in!!

Once he was done with the first one Eddie decided to pick up another. Looking at the new one it seemed it was fine so he placed it back in the fire where he got it and grabbed a third. Turning it over and over he noticed apart on its leg. There was that spot again so he took a handful of chili powder and rubbed the salamander.

This was so boring and he was not going to be doing another one. Setting it back in the fire he decided he was over it and found a seat, opening his notebook he thought about the things he could test on the salamander. Maybe he could sneak one, could he shove some of the fire into a jar with the salamander? This could be what his thoughts could go to for now.

Huh. Interesting. Painless until the tails fell off. The Ravenclaw couldn't help but wonder why. What caused the sudden pain upon the loss of the tail? How come they couldn't feel it before? If it was penetrating deep enough to cause a loss of limbs then how come it didn't seem to affect the nerves that connected these limbs to the rest of the body.

Curious. Very curious.

She had more questions, naturally she did, but at the moment Jessa thought it best to keep her focus on the salamander in her hand. It had already begun squirming in an attempt to get back to its flame. "Alright, hang on little guy. Gotta get you all patched up first."

The Fourth Year grabbed a bit more of the chilly powder and went about applying it around the neck and shoulder region of the salamander. It continued to squirm, as if impatient to get it over with--you'd think it'd be more grateful she was saving its life from this non-life threatening illness that it had fallen into. Circe.

For as much as she could help it, she tried to be very thorough with the application process. Couldn't miss even an inch, in case this was one of those things that bounced right back if not correctly treated--or worse, it was contagious, she left some and it went on to recontaminate