Even as Kale was leading her into the foggy, chilly greenhouse, Cecelia still felt REALLY good about her decision to let him choose. You had to trust your friends, right? Kale had gone with his gut and his gut was probably made of sparkles and sunshine and flowers so his gut was a good gut indeed.

”Colder than I thought it’d be,” She admitted, taking in the sea of green. ”Talk about a needle in a haystack. See any purple anywhere?” She didn’t, at least not yet. Mostly she saw a greenhouse in need of some sun. It was so, so gloomy in here.

Well, as practical portions went, this part would be simple enough. 'Identifying and collecting' was much more their thing than 'keep this wilting leaf resource alive'. Plants were temperamental when they had no right to be, not having minds and therefore not having tempers, especially the mundane sort. Nem had no patience for it.

But this activity was fine. They drew their wand and traced the point in a circle over the lower portion of their face - "Viseo Ebullio." - then put it away again to wrench their dragonhide gloves from their bag. The Bubble-Head Charm was maybe a little dramatic when all they were doing was going in to find and grab the plant, but it could be worth staying in Flamsteed's good books by going all out where possible.

Nem did not, however, bother looking for a partner. Another day, or even another activity, maybe, but not right now. As they pulled on the gloves, Nem shouldered their way through the door they picked at random, and entered Greenhouse Y.

"Yeah, I think Emm needs help with the charm," Phoebe gave the younger girl a hair ruffle before moving her along toward Carys. She wasn't going to embarrass herself in front of yet another prefect by being incapable of completing a common spell, but if Phoebe was going to fail at a spell that caused someone's death, it would be her own death. Her mother would KILL her if she caused Emm's death. As they walked, Phoebe muttered the incantation and pointed the wand at her head, succeeding in poking herself in the eye once, blowing a bubble up her nose twice, and finally managing the bubblehead.

Just in time.

"Okay, then. Ick, it got sweaty in here fast," Phoebe paused inside the door to greenhouse Y and checked the seal on her gloves. Her hands were already sweating, and she was worried that would impact her gloves. Not worried a LOT, since she had a prefect with her. "Why is it like night in here? Plants grow during the day too."

Heath paused for a quick moment outside greenhouse X to make sure his bubble head charm was working. He took a deep breath, and… no air leaks, good! He stepped through the door, shivering slightly at the sudden temperature change. The first thing he noticed as he surveyed his surroundings was fog. That wasn’t toxic, was it? He didn’t want to believe Professor Flamsteed would do that to them, but one could never be too careful in this school! Thank Merlin he’d thought to check his bubble head charm’s effectiveness before coming in here!

Once Heath’s eyes had a chance to adjust to the fog, he saw the vines everywhere and - was that something purple in there somewhere? He started to move toward the flash of purple but stopped himself just in time. It couldn’t possibly be as easy as walk through the vines and get the wolfsbane, could it? Those vines could be something harmless, but they could also be Devil’s Snare or some other grabby plant. There was one way to find out. Drawing his wand, he cast, “Lumos.” Light emitted from the tip of his wand. There, now he could see better, and he’d soon know if those vines were Devil’s Snare. If they were, they should shrink back from the light. If not, the light shouldn’t hurt them, right?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Waddles

Mamie looked over as an older, taller student joined them. "Welcome Josh, I'm Mamie!" she greeted him, waving with her gloved hand. "Yes please to the Bubble Head Charm." She had definitely not learned that one yet.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MadAlice

Violet turned to see who had spoken to her and saw a likely looking girl, already putting on dragonhide gloves. That was good, she wanted to partner with someone who had some sense, and who didn't have a death wish. Sure, that would be great. I see you have your dragonhide gloves out--great minds think alike, eh?" she replied, holding up her own dragonhide glove-covered hands.

"I wasn't expecting to have to handle something as dangerous as wolfsbane in my second year," she continued.

Violet looked at the boy who had joined them. She was not impressed by the hard sell on the charm--it reminded her too much of her father when he wanted to sell somebody something--but the guy could cast the Bubble Head charm (or said he could, anyway). She had been worried about that, because she didn't know how to and was not confident that her makeshift mask from the trip to New York would be much good against Wolfsbane. She glanced over at Mamie as she responded, "It's okay with me, if it's okay with her." But Mamie had already welcomed Josh to their group, so Violet saw that they were a trio now.

Truth be told, he didn't actually think either of them would say no but he smiled nonetheless, though the Slytherin seemed less inclined towards the idea than the Hufflepuff. Which, well, seemed to be pretty on brand from his own observations and word-of-mouth since his transfer. He wouldn't have classified his offer of a Bubblehead Charm as a hard sell really. He was no used broom salesman (car if you were a No-maj) and genuinely had a hard enough time selling himself. But twirl his wand some more he did. "Great. Cool. I'll get those up right now." Pointing his wand towards Mamie first, Josh performed the counterclockwise circle around her head. "Viseo Ebullio." Tada! After repeating the same steps over...er...he hadn't caught her name (or maybe she hadn't given it) ... the younger Slytherin's head, the sixth year performed the charm on himself and wiggled his head a bit once it was in place.

He always thought it would just...float off his head or something. Magic was wild, okay?

"Alright then! So...in we go!"

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samia

As you enter Greenhouse X, you immediately feel the temperature is lower than it was outside. Not cold enough to make you run for your sweaters, but enough to send a shiver or two down your spine. Also was that fog all around?? Was that on purpose? Or could this just be a wild chase? Three long tables sit in front of you, as you go in - your eyes can see only a sea of green - not only on the tables but also on the floors, walls and more, especially different vines which have made their home on the floor as well as the walls - but blink and you'll miss a hint of purple in at least three places.

Leading his humble little group in - he ought to as the sixth year, right? - and holding the door open for them both, Josh felt a sudden chill shoot all up and down his spin. Before he could say something stupid - like weren't greenhouses supposed to be warm - he remembered that the plant they were looking for liked cold and dark spaces. So this was promising.

The fog was a little intense though and he couldn't see too much.

"....kind of like looking through split pea soup," he mumbled a little, somewhat to the two girls but mostly just to himself. "Can you guys see anything? Want me to do a switching spell on your eyes, human to owl? Or could do a Supersensory Charm." Because this was pretty darn hard to see. "Worried Lumos might disturb the flora in here if we all light our wands."

Listen...it had happened while he was at Ilvermorny and no thank you, ma'am.

He squinted a bit more and took a couple of steps forward as well, bumping into one of the tables in front of them and letting out a low surprised grunt.

It was indeed purple you see, and no - it cannot be this easy. Because as the young slytherin (Claudine) approaches the table - the vines wanted to make immediate friends with her! Ever so slowly they creeped closer and tried to TICKLE her.

And why weren't the rest coming closer soon enough???? The vines wanted to PLAY. Eager as ever, one of them gently wrapped itself around one of the boy's (Kale) wrists and tugged him closer!

"Oh look, Mr Jones is using his brains, everybody. Please try to do the same" June chuckled, especially hearing Mr Miller. "Just some light will do, Mr Miller" she assured the boy. In all honesty, she hadn't made this task all that hard. They really just had to look and recognise, and maybe battle away some vines.

Walking around to see everyone's progress, she tried to be helpful to those who weren't able to spot the plant yet, "if you remember what we discussed - they prefer shady areas and a certain kind of soil - looking for that might help you finding it too"

She was making it so easy, you guys.

Speaking of, "Folks in Greenhouse Y - looks like everyone in Greenhouse X are winning" Hopefully that would motivate them to work harder and quicker. A little bit of competition was always healthy.

Just as Professor June announces this, you see something run all too fast yet again in greenhouse Y - WHAT WAS THAT?

AND THEN.

A CRASH.

A pot has fallen.

Suddenly the greenhouse is FILLED WITH THE WAILING OF A BABY MANDRAKE.

Oh dear.

--

OOC: THANK YOU FOR STICKING WITH ME SO FAR, GUYS! Going to merge this mini-activity into the final activity in about 24 hours <3 thank you!

Aboli turned to look at the voice, glad it was Bernie, and nodded. "Sure. And I was TRYING to help you...did a poor job of it, too. Don't remind me," she scoffed, more at herself than Bernie, and performed a bubble head charm on herself. "Might wanna' charm up, Bern," she told the younger girl.

Luckily, she didn't hear Emm's statement, or she might have been mildly (or not) offended, but regardless, she was in charge of Bernie's fate yet again, and THIS time, she did not want to fail her friend. "It's darker in here....wonderful," she snorted as she held her wand in her now dragonhide-gloved hands. "What are we supposed to be doing again?" she asked, suddenly not remembering. Merlin, was this LAST TERM? Was it HAPPENING AGAIN? Or was Aboli's mind just that distracted??

That was when she saw something move out of the corner of her eye, and she jumped just a little. Yiiiiiikes.


AND THEN A MANDRAKE WAS ATTACKING THEM WITH SOUND POLLUTION. Schmoe would be proud of the interdisciplinary focus, right? She covered her ears. She HAD to stun it, right? "Petrificus TOTALUS!" she aimed at the sound, and the outlines of things was easier to see while her eyes got used to the darker tones of the room.

Did wolfsbane like colder climates? Was that why the greenhouse felt chillier than the temperature outside? Avalon nodded halfheartedly at Minjae's RPG comment. She had no idea what an RPG quest was, but she was too distracted by the fog in the greenhouse to ask her partner about it. All she saw was green. Where was the purple?! "It's hard to tell. I'd err on the side of--" she started replying to Minjae's question about the vines, but before she could finish, she noticed them wrapping themselves around Claudine and Kale. "....caution?"

"If wolfsbane likes shade, maybe it's growing behind or underneath the vines? We'd have to find a way to get around them first though." She could just try to move them away on her own. The greenery didn't look vicious or aggressive -- it looked to just be tickling Claudine. Plus, it didn't shy away from Heath's light, so it probably wasn't Devil's Snare. "We could just try to move them aside?" Gloves on, Avalon approached a table and attempted to peek underneath the greenery, rustling a few plants around as she did so. With her wand in her other hand, she cast lumos, using her light to search for a hint of purple.

Alright, Bernie was supposed to be working on letting things go... so she wouldn't tease Aboli about that mess of a class again. So many classes this year had been a bit messy. Big yikes. At least they still had magic though, right? "We're finding the wolfsbane," Bernie reminded her partner, mumbling the spell for the bubble-head charm next. "It's green and has purpleish flowers, I think?"

She followed her partner into the greenhouse, feeling silly for wearing a bubble on her head, and lit her wand so they'd have some light to see by. "It's so WARM in here," Bernie complained, though in the next second, there was a WAILING and SCREECHING that hurt her ears and honestly made her feel a bit dizzy.

"SILENCIO!" Bernie added her spell into the mix, trying to help Aboli out. "I DON'T KNOW HOW TO CONJURE EARMUFFS, OR I'D DO THAT."

Just saying, in case the professor was watching and was the sort to get offended by someone using MAGIC in MAGIC SCHOOL. Like Schmoe.

Ashley walked into the greenhouse and let her eyes adjust to the darkness. There was some purple and some running stuff. And then there was a screaming something. She slipped over to go investigate purple stuff, hoping the screaming thing wasn't dangerous. Well, she was ALIVE- and that was safe enough for her. She had her dragon-hide gloves on. She pulled out some earplugs. It worked to quiet annoying people, might work for plants too. Either way, Ashley didn't wanna die or burst an eardrum or get poisoned. "Lumos."

Dark. Warm. Mildly uncomfortable, but perfectly manageable.

For a moment, Nem wondered if they might be more likely to find the wolfsbane in Greenhouse X, but set that thought aside for now. There had been no clues from the outside of the greenhouses - bar the letters X and Y, and they couldn't see how those had meant anything - to base any particular choice on. Maybe it was in both. Or one. Or neither. May as well stay here and figure it out. Was that a hint of purple they could make out in the gloom?Could be that. Warm. Dry. Shaded. Wolfsbane could probably grow in here with the right soil if it got light in other parts of the day. Maybe. Whatever. Who cares.

This was ridiculous. "Lumos," Nem cast, just in time to see a flash of movement beyond where any students had yet reached. They stood in place and scanned the greenhouse, searching for either whatever was dashing around, and any other hints of purple flowers, if they were there to be seen.

As Flamsteed's voice rang out, Nem's eyes narrowed and they looked back over their shoulder towards the greenhouse door. The opened their mouth to shout back - something about just how much they cared who was winning - when the crash of a pot recaptured their attention. And then...

Nem's frustrated curse was drowned out by the wailing of the mandrake. Juvenile or mature, they couldn't tell, but acted on the assumption that it would be potentially fatal (though later would remember that Hogwarts professors were basically babies about endangering students), and turned their wand onto themselves, even as they started feeling slightly woozy. "Muffliato." It would have to do; maybe they could manage a Silencing Charm if they really put their all into it (or maybe not, having only these past few months even bothered to start learning ahead), but it didn't matter, as they had no clear view of the screaming plant. Other kids were here, they were trying to deal with it.

Maybe Nem could have stopped to look for said plant, return it to the pot once they'd fixed it. Maybe they could have searched for whatever had knocked it - maybe gnomes had been set loose or something - and deal with that. But they just wanted to get this over and done with, and had no interest in making the task any easier for the others in here. Their Lumos spell had been cancelled by their second cast, so Nem quickly sidestepped around the others and headed for the corner where they'd seen the hint of purple. They couldn't hear anything of what else was happening, but frankly... just plain didn't care. They were grabbing some wolfsbane, and then they were leaving.

Well, what do you know, the older boy really did know how to cast a Bubble Head charm. It felt kind of weird, like she ought to be suffocating in here, but she could breathe just fine and it was light as a feather, not at all heavy like it looked like it ought to be. And look, the boy had held the door for them--that was kind of nice, Violet always appreciated good manners. She began to like this kid better. Then she felt the chill of Greenhouse X envelop her...

What in Merlin's name was this? It was like walking into one of those virtual reality arcades she had seen in New York, only this wasn't virtual.

The boy was rattling off a lot of spell names that Violet didn't even know. And it was like he was talking to himself--what was that he was saying about disturbing the flora? Violet definitely didn't want to do that. Then she heard a bump, and felt something on the floor, and -- her vision must be playing tricks on her.

"I can bearly see either--it's like my eyes are playing tricks on me. Every once in a while it's like I'm seeing purple spots in the corner of my vision. I hope there's nothing in here that's making us hallucinate," Violet said.

Claudine had her eyes set on the prize until…what? There were vines creeping up on her literally and…

O__o

The girl started giggling. It was soft and helpless but definitely a laugh that a few others had heard from her. Merlin! These vines were trying to distract her. Focus… she must focus. Luckily, her Dragon Heartstring wand was still in her hand. Still giggling as vines tickled her, Claudine weakly tried to think of a spell that would counter the vines. This was definitely not Devil’s Snare or she’d have been in serious trouble by now. Claudine didn’t want to hurt or destroy the vines either.

“Lu- *giggle* Lumos!”

The wand tip illuminated and Claudine hoped desperately that the vines would retreat. If not, she’d try the Fire-Making Charm.

But gosh. Please let this first spell work or she’d collapse in exhaustion from all this giggling.

Mamie oohed and ahhed when Josh put the Bubble Charm on her. She immediately had to fight the urge to touch her face. What was it about not being supposed to touch her face that made her want to? She was pretty sure she didn't normally touch her face, but now she was thinking about it.

She followed Josh and Violet into Greenhouse X and immediately shivered. "Don't plants like light? Why can't we just use Lumos?" she asked. It wasn't like she knew what a Supersensory Charm was. It sounded scary, the name was too big. She turned toward Violet's voice (she really couldn't see in this fog). "Isn't what's-it-called purple? Let's go toward your purple flashes!" Mamie held up her wand, she wasn't going to wait for Josh to tell her they couldn't use the spell. "Lumos!" she said brightly.

Did she hear the Professor's warning on how you spoke to prefects? Of course she did, the kid was stubborn, not deaf. Though you'd never be able to tell as Emmerson expertly kept walking, following the older girls as if no one had spoken.

Aboli knew what she did. Her statement, if she heard it, couldn't have come as any surprise to the Slytherin Prefect.

"I need help!" Emm confirmed, skipping on ahead with Phoebe instead of...y'know...waiting for the offered help. Carys could catch up with them and put on whatever charms were needed and everything would be fine.

"It's sooooo dark in heeerree." Fancy how that worked. The little girl tugged on Phoebe's robes. "Is this where the poison plant i--"

What was that? Something moved, something moved! Forgetting her friend for a moment, Emmerson clung to the Hufflepuff prefect. If anyone would know what to do, it would probably be here, even if she was a Hufflepuff.

And then came the screaming. Emmerson's hands flew to her ears. What WAS that? More importantly, how did they make it stop! "ONE OF YOU DO SOMETHING!" She tried to scream over the...er...screaming. This had all gotten confusing and the little girl didn't know what to pay attention to anymore, so she paid attention to the two older girls. They'd know what to do.

Since she'd managed to get her own bubblehead working, Phoebe felt just slightly prepared enough to apply one to Emm as well. And it worked. And no wands up the nose. And no poked eyeballs. Merlin knew that would have been terribly embarrassing in front of the prefect. And Emm would have thrown a terrible fit over it too, and drawn even more attention to her failure.

But there was no failure.

"Just look for something purp..." The sudden shriek of a baby mandrake broke the air, and Phoebe spun protectively toward Emm. Sorry, Carys, but she had to protect the baby lion or else she'd get murdered by a bunch of scary Aurors. Plus she loved her, in spite of herself. It was impossible to get to Emm's ears with her head wrapped in a bubble, but Phoebe did manage to wrap the sleeves of her robe around Emm's giant bubble head before succumbing to the song herself.

Nap time!

Heath blushed at the praise from Professor Flamsteed. Whether negative or positive, that kind of attention always flustered him! No one saw that right? Hopefully not… his hair would cover most of the reddish tinge to his ears and face. Okay, so they were looking for shade, well-draining soil, and - Oh dear Merlin! His heart dropped upon hearing the professor say the “W” word. Did she have any idea of the Pandora’s box she might’ve just opened by suggesting this was a competition? If the other lessons so far this term were any indication, it was only a matter of moments before his classmates started exchanging spells and taunts. Consider his guard up!

He watched the vines, studying their reaction to his spell. They didn’t seem to mind the light, so clearly not Devil’s Snare. He ventured farther into the greenhouse, trying to dodge and weave between the vines, just in case they were something else dangerous, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw them creeping near Claudine. It took every bit of restraint he had not to go into full knight-in-shining-armor mode right then, but he would let her handle it herself... unless things started to go very badly wrong. Blink, blink. Wait, were they… tickling her? That giggle… did she know how adorable it was? He wished she’d do it more often… Merlin, what was he thinking?! He shook his head. Focus, Heath! He inwardly berated himself.

His eyes darted around the room in search of something purple or shady, but all he saw were vines and tables. Wait, that gave him an idea! The tables could provide shade. Maybe the wolfsbane was under one of them instead of on them? He made his way to the nearest table and peered underneath it. What would he find there?

Oh look, Mr. Jones is using his brains, everybody. Please try to do the same.

His brain couldn't even process who Mr. Jones was, only that that was NOT him and that that meant he was clearly NOT using his brain and therefore Professor Flamsteed thought he was an absolute moron. Swallowing thickly and ears reddening as she reassured him that just the light was necessary. And that he was an absolute idiot. She didn't actually say it but he could feel it.

"Thanks, professor."

He was an absolute moron.

Looking back to the little Slytherin - still didn't know her name - he tried to offer her a small smile. "Don't worry. The Bubblehead Charm will prevent any of that from happening." Hallucinating gases or whatever from plants. Gases? Pollen. Probably Pollen was more accurate. "You can hold on to my robes if you'd like. I can see pre----wait. You see purple?" Little bit slow on the uptake here, Miller.

Mamie jumped right on that too...along with lighting her wand whiiiich he still hadn't done. "No, yeah, no. Professor Flamsteed said Lumos is fine." Thanks for the reminder! Giving his own wand a flourish, Josh casted Lumos and then slowly starting making progress forward. "Which way did you see the purple...er...I didn't quite catch your name?" he asked while glancing over his shoulder at the Slytherin.

Somewhere in the distance there was a giggle...and...was there a plant that giggled?!

Uhhhhh.

Valentina had walked into the greenhouse, rather confidently, pretty certain that she’d be able to find a purple flower. Pfffft, so EASY. And Professor June mentioning that people in the other greenhouse were winning only made her want to finish this activity as soon as possible. They had to win, yeah.

... But, it wasn’t going to be that simple unfortunately. She took a couple of steps forward..... when.. she frowned, noticing something? someone? dash right in front of her. UM, What was THAT?? She casually slipped behind an older student, peeking over the top of their shoulder. Nope, she wasn’t scared—— CRASH! She literally jumped, eyes wide. But before she could even react, there was a sudden WAILING. Ouch!! Her hands immediately flew to her ears, wishing someone would make that STOP!!

"It's Violet, Violet P.... er, just Violet," she replied. She'd almost used her whole name, complete with middle initial, like she used to do in first year. What a dork she'd been. At least that trip with her father had given her better (slightly better) social skills. And Mamie had used Lumos--for a minute she was afraid everything would explode or something, but casting that spell seemed to do nothing but provide some much-needed light.

"I...it's hard to tell in this fog, but I thought I saw it over on the far right corner, in that shady spot and....is that something grabbing my ankle?!!" she squeaked. It was, and it was pulling her toward the right end of the table....or was it trying to pull her under the table?!

Kale didn’t see any purple, but, to be fair, he wasn’t really looking. Because nearly as soon as he was about to do any kind of school work, or whatever school work Cece told him to do, he was accosted by the vines.

Kale shrieked loudly. Screaming like a disgruntled pelican. Help! H E L P!!!

He was going to die. The vines were here to straight up murder him. “Cece!!! Cece, HALP!”

June was so amused, and frankly a bit proud of these vines to play along like she had wanted them to. It was so hard not to laugh when Mr Trent had a panic attack over being grabbed by the vines. "Yes, Miss Summers, please help the poor boy" Oh, she loved these vines of hers. That was not to say the kids weren’t impressing her. Because they were, especially with the way they were helping each other - especially Mr Miller. So, a smile definitely went his way when she noticed him assuring the younger ones.

Noticing Miss Sinclair and Mr Jones searching for the plant - and knowing already how close they were to it, she walked by them, offering them another hint, “you know plenty of plants are purple, but if you recall Professor Rainwater’s lessons from previous terms, you can figure out if a plant is poisonous or not by performing Venenum Hortus” Wasn’t that man simply awesome?

Speaking of awesome, look at Miss Blaze!

June CHEERED her on as the girl cast another Lumos at the vines, but to her amusement instead of feeling threatened by it - they tried to be helpful instead, and POINTED at the table the pot of WOLFSBANE PLANT was at. Laughing, June clapped her hands for the young Slytherin, “Look at that, everybody, Miss Blaze found one”

“Why don’t you carry it outside, Miss Blaze? Everyone, please follow her too”



Greenhouse Y was a disaster. And not the kind June had planned at all. Because WHY was a baby mandrake crying??? Did someone knock it over? But that was not possible - unless someone picked it off the shelf and threw it on the ground. Because that was certainly not supposed to be one of the hurdles she had wanted the students to overcome.

Leaving behind the people in greenhouse X, the brunette dashed into the other greenhouse. Oh no, oh no - the poor baby mandrake! Miss Song's spell had missed the little one but the silencio from Miss Grantham had definitely gotten it. Waving her own wand, she restored the LIGHT in the greenhouse - revealing the wolfsbane plant almost immediately sitting at a shaded area.

But that was certainly not the issue at the moment, rushing over to the broken pot, she quickly RE-potted the plant, hoping to calm the baby mandrake's very silent wailing. Oh dear. She hated plants in distress. It was awful. Cooing it like a child, she settled it back into a new pot before turning back to the rest of them, "Yikes. That was certainly NOT ideal" she admitted, before noticing Miss James and walking over to her to examine her - "come on, why don't you sit, Miss James. And here, take a bite of this" she fished out a chocolate bar from her pocket.

Ah, what a mess.

Hopefully the next part of this lesson will go smoothly.

"Mr Nemesis, the pot of wolfsbane is right there," she pointed, "please pick it up and move outside - everyone please follow him" she added, before making sure nothing else was going wrong in the greenhouse. She had a FEELING she was being watched, but ... that was just silly. Shaking away the paranoia, she too followed everyone outside.

"Alright everyone, time to move forward. The whole idea of this task was for you to understand that wolfsbane has the ability to grow in more than one environment - despite their preferences. The other was for you to realise that while your focus was on protecting yourself from the poisonous nature of wolfsbane, at the same time you need to be ready for anything that may come your way" Even if it was a little bit of rain.

"Now, for your final task - follow me" she said, once again smiling wide, and forgetting entirely the debacle that had taken place just a few moments ago. "I was lucky enough to stumble upon some lovely patches of the wolfsbane plant near the forest area earlier this year," she told them as they walked. With a wave of her wand a couple of wheelbarrows followed them too, one of which was carrying the tools for their next task. "While I'll be repotting these baby ones there" which Mr Nemesis and Miss Blaze were carrying for her "you'll all help me collect the rest of them"

Once there, June smiled even wider seeing the BEAUTIFUL plant there. COULD THEY SEE IT? It was such a wonderful sight.

Sighing as if in love, she turned back to the students, “let me demonstrate how to collect one, and then you all can follow, yes?” With her dragon-hide clad hands, she grabbed a trowel and moved to crouch down beside one of the plants. Using a trowel, she dug the soil around the plant, revealing the root of the wolfsbane. “You need to be very careful, and not touch the root - we don’t need it either, so -” she paused to grab her wand, and while holding the plant from its stem, used a severing charm and sliced the plant from its root.

Simple, so simple.

Smiling yet again - she levitated it back to one of the empty wheelbarrows.

“Alright, get to work, everybody”

OOC: Main Activity is UP, you guys! I am sorry for the delay. But you have about 72 hours to get this done!

The steps to the activity are pretty simple and are as follows:

With the use of dragon hide gloves, and a trowel, dig up the soil around the plant, and use a severing charm to cut it from the roots and levitate it to the wheelbarrows present there. And of course, June will be walking around helping anyone in need!

Have Fun! <3

Aboli would not have called it a complete disaster, but it was unfortunate enough. The way Professor June had cared for the baby mandrake was just sooOOoo sweet, it made Aboli's heart melt just a teeeensy bit. Bernie had actually had a better idea, too, about silencing the plant - using a SILENCING charm. Merlin. Why hadn't she thought of that?

Dumb Aboli.

DUMB.

As she followed Professor June, she hoped they wouldn't be going TOO close to the forest. Aboli had never been that close...she was a little frightened of what was inside, AND it was against the rules. Be that as it may, they stopped before getting too into the dark foliage of the menacing forest, and Aboli nodded at the instructions. It seemed easy enough! She was ready with her dragonhide gloves, too!

She grabbed a trowel and knelt next to a baby sprout peeking it's way up, eyeing its purple-ish color as she began to dig around it very carefully.

Ashley sighed. They were handling wolfsbane now? She didn't want to be near wolfsbane ever. But she reluctantly started doing the task, humming a sad tune to herself as she did so.

Phew.

Claudine was relieved to kick the moments of giggling. She was even more relieved that the vines didn’t mind her Lumos spell; it would have been a great travesty. What surprised her, however, was the plants actually seemed to be trying to help her out. Cue her staring at them in uncertainty. “Um, thank you?’’ Super nice vines these were. Yes, the girl could make out the bits of purple of the Wolfsbane plant at the table indicated. Claudine collected the potted plant, and now that it was actually in her possession, she was more grateful to the vines.

A nod was given in Flamsteed’s direction before she headed out. “Thanks again,’’ she muttered to the plants happily. Helpful and playful little things they were.

Now outside, Claudine waited for Flamsteed to proceed with the lesson. Everyone was gathering together again, some with Wolfsbane. With interest, she watched the wheelbarrows appear. They were following everyone too. Magic never ceased to impress her. Anyway. Yes, please, professor. A demonstration would be great. The Snakette watched closely, memorising the key aspect: no touching the roots.

“Here you are, Professor,’’ the fourth year said, holding out the baby Wolfbane. Or should she set it down somewhere? Whichever it was, once done, she was going to get started on the collection of the others.