Blending in on Herbology

Nathan Xavier

January 01, 2021 7:45 PM

Beginners: Defensive Plants and Projectile Weapons by Nathan Xavier

Nathan stood just inside the door to Greenhouse One as the students began to arrive, returning the marked exams they had taken at the end of fall term. Each exam was accompanied by a greeting and personalized remark on the student's progress, ranging from "Excellent work," to "As a reminder, I offer office hours all day on Wednesdays." Most of Wednesday, of course, was spent grading papers and supervising Zeus and Dora digging holes since the students generally had other class obligations for most of it, but he tried to make himself especially available between classes, over lunch, and after classes ended. He was also willing to write excuse notes to other teachers if someone was really struggling and needed some one-on-one instruction and the other professor approved the absence ahead of time, though that didn't come up very often.

Now in early January, the warmth of the greenhouse was a welcome relief to the cold outside, and robes could be worn comfortably without risking heat stroke. Winter was one of his favorite seasons for that reason, given that he consistently spent a good portion of his day inside greenhouses all year round. It was infinitely more pleasant in here now than it had been in early September or would be in late May and early June.

Once all of the students had arrived and taken seats along the long work tables set up down the middle of the greenhouse, he spoke to them more generally, "Welcome back to Herbology. I hope you all had a good break and are ready to start learning about magical plants with defense mechanisms. As this is a beginner class, we're not going to look at anything truly dangerous yet, so be aware that this is the mild end of the spectrum. Plants in the magical world can get quite terrifying, and just because they are - usually - rooted to the ground and - generally - unable to move under their own volition, does not mean they are harmless. We're going to look at two herbological cousins today called the Spiky Bush and the Spiky Prickly Plant, which have very similar features."

He pointed his wand one of two bushes he had sitting at one end of the greenhouse, far enough away from where the students were sitting that they were not at risk, and cast a spell to flash light on it so they knew which one he was talking about. "That one is the Spiky Bush. As you can see, it is a bush that has large spikes growing out of it. If something gets too close, or it otherwise senses harm, it will shoot those spikes out around it. It can only shoot them about two feet out, so you're all safe where you are at. They are generally considered a nuisance plant - not unlike wild muggle pricker bushes and they grow like weeds - so most people don't want to care for these guys but take them out. The safest way to do that is stand well back and light them on fire. The incendio charm works very well on these bushes. They will shoot off their spikes when they catch on fire, so do remember to stand far enough back that they can't reach you."

"Next, I'll ask you to turn your attention to the next bush over," he invited, and cast his light charm again on the other plant to draw attention to that one. "This is called a Spiky Prickly Plant." He made a slight expression of distaste for the informal name given to the bush in question. "As you can see, this one has quite large yellow thorns growing on it. There are two variants of these plants that often grown together in the wild, but its the ones with yellow thorns you need to be most careful of. These are the ones that can also shoot their thorns out at nearby people. If they have brown thorns, those are just normal thorns that can't become projectile weapons. The Spiky Prickly Plant also happens to be fire resistant, so they best way to get rid of these bushes is to just cast a severing charm on the stems to cut them down."

"Neither plant features in any common potions, though a small handful of very specialized brews may make use of the yellow thorns or the Spike Bush's spikes, but neither ingredient is one you will ever find in your potions kits as there just isn't much use for them, and when they are used, they are most effective if collected fresh."

"Now, for the practical part of the lesson, I'd like the first years on this side of the greenhouse, and second years on that side. First years, you will be setting fire to the Spiky Bush." The fire starting charm was a little easier to master than the severing one. Professor Wright had also said he'd covered the Incendio charm already this year, but not the severing one yet, though the second years would have seen it at the end of last year. "Second years, you'll be cutting down the Spiky Prickly Plants. Not everyone needs to cast a charm, so if you don't feel comfortable casting in front of your peers, that is fine. Quite frankly, I don't have enough bushes for everyone to have a turn anyway."

"Please stand here where I have marked a line on the floor a safe distance away but where you should be able to both sets of bushes. You will take turns." He did not envy Grayson for needing to oversee a class where children who were just learning to control a wand were shooting fire around, and he did not want to have to explain to Selina that he had accidentally let his first years burn down his greenhouse, so they were going to do this one at a time. "Please observe how the bushes react to the threat, and how effective the charm is at eliminating the bush. Feel free to take notes on your observations or discuss what you see with your classmates. Now, line up and can I have a first year volunteer to cast the first fire starting charm?"

OOC: You can post about casting the appropriate spell, or talking about the plants with your neighbors. You are welcome to god-mod Nathan requesting volunteers or asking you to cast the spell on the other plant to demonstrate its effectiveness there or summoning a fresh bush from the back of the greenhouse. The information about these bushes is pretty sparse, so don't feel bad about making things up, so long as you don't completely contradict something another post has already established.

Nathan won't let anything get too out of hand, so if there is a potentially dangerous situation, tag me before it gets too bad.

Reference for this comes from this page about the Spiky Prickly Plant and this page about the Spiky Bush.

Subthreads:

Fire? by Billy Cobb with Oz Spellman

Blending in by Stanley O'Malley with Ian Malone

What is he doing? [Wally] by Valentine Duell with Wally O'Malley

I don't like the sound of this by Jasper Brockert

1 Nathan Xavier Beginners: Defensive Plants and Projectile Weapons 28 1 5

Billy Cobb

January 01, 2021 8:34 PM

Fire? by Billy Cobb

Billy liked Herbology a lot better than most of the other classes. It felt more like something he'd do back home. It was like learning to avoid poison ivy or which mushrooms were okay to eat. Those were good things to know and very practical. Sure, learning to make fire in Charms class was good, just like learning how to fight monsters. How to turn one useless thing into another useless thing didn't seem great so far... but if it became turning useless things into useful things, that would be better. The thing those classes had against them, was that the was all inside. This was was outside.. well, almost. These greenhouses were a strange mixture of inside and outside. He'd wondered about all the magic that was used to make them work. Ma would love to have a house for her garden that was always summer inside.

He wasn't really much for note taking, but he did scribble some notes as the Professor talked and tried to draw each of the plants. He was not a great artist. However he did perk up more when the professor mentioned they'd be using that fire making spell to burn down these plants. He also make sure to note down that the other one didn't care if it was set on fire. Maybe it had learned from the other plant. Then the professor asked for him to come up and give it a try. Well, he'd asked for a first year, and he was going to try this before his roommates got a chance. This would be fun!

Taking the position indicated he looked at the plant in front of him. Other than those spiky bits, it look like an ordinary plant. He debated stepping closer to see how exactly it threw the spikes, but remembered the Professor say they would do that once it was on fire. Great. He looked over his shoulder at the first-year behind him, "Ready to take notes?" he asked, "Imma gunna make some fire." He grinned and turned back to the plant and tried to remember everything he could about the fire charm. Then he flicked his wand, "Incendio!" The fire erupted from the end of his wand, and nearly made it to the plant. It must have sensed the heat or motion or something because spiky bits shot all over the place and landed short of him, just as his fire had done to it. He gave it an unhappy look. "Dangnabit," he said as he turned back to the person behind him, "Alright, you give it a shot."

2 Billy Cobb Fire? 1519 0 5

Oz Spellman

January 02, 2021 8:42 PM

WOO! by Oz Spellman

Oz took his test back, hurriedly folding it and shoving it in his bag out of sight as soon as he got to his desk. He hoped no one had overheard Professor Xavier's remark as he handed it back.

Good work.

If they had, they would assume he was talking to someone else, right? Or that he was just being nice because that was kind of his jam? Oz hoped so. He wasn't sure whether he was imagining it or whether there really had been a note of surprise in Professor Xavier's voice. His test was a lot better than most of the homework he had turned in. He knew that. And his chest tightened a little at the thought of being asked to explain. But tests were easy. You took them in class time, and everyone had to be quiet and work by themselves, with the teacher watching. He put his test score out of his mind, deciding there was no point worrying unless someone brought it up, and tried to pay attention to class.

His mouth dropped open as Professor Xavier explained two plants which honestly sounded straight up like something from a video game. Oz liked video games (he had spectated a lot of them at the arcade) but he had never exactly dreamed of meeting things from them in real life. There was a reason you took a shutgun or a karate to kick to most things you encountered in those worlds. They were bad. 'This thing shoots spikes at you' was however quickly followed up with 'you shoot fire in return' which had him firmly back on board - a fact underlined by the fact he had whooped at the mention of fire.

He scrambled forward eagerly when Professor Xavier asked for volunteers, though funnily enough he wasn’t the only one who was keen to get going, and Billy got there before him. He let out a ‘whoa!’ when the plant totally did the thing that Professor Xavier had said it would do. He was already jumping forward with a ‘my turn, my turn!’ when Billy handed over.

“Incendio!” he cast. The swing lost a little precision in his excitement, but one thing Oz was good at was simultaneously feeling a rush of adrenaline and co-ordinating his movements. It was like when it was your turn to bat in baseball - you were stoked, and hyped, but your body still focussed because it knew this was your shot. He was not quite as well practised with his wand as he was with his baseball bat, but some of the skill in aiming was transferable, and one of the areas he’d found he excelled at was getting his spells to go where he wanted, even if he didn’t always get them to do what he wanted. This time he got both, because after all, who wouldn’t study the heck out of fire spells? It was a little weak as a jet, he could produce more fire power when he concentrated, and it wasn’t right on the heart of the bush, but it touched it! There was a distinct smell of singed plant, and another shower of spikes.

“YEAH!” he grinned, “Ten points to me!” Ten was a nice round number. Probably in a game you’d only get five for hitting the edge or something but five sounded cruddy. Ten was awesome. Whoever hit it in the centre could get twenty.

13 Oz Spellman WOO! 1514 0 5

Stanley O'Malley

January 03, 2021 10:46 AM

Blending in by Stanley O'Malley

Okay so real talk, Professor Xavier was a chill guy and all, but Stanley wasn’t especially impressed by Herbology as a subject. At first, he had been excited because he was expecting a lot of just playing in the dirt, slapping seeds in the holes you dug up, and then seeing what grew. However, he had quickly realized that Herbology was actually just a lot of work, and for a class about playing in the dirt, it had a ton of rules and safety precautions, and those things just weren’t Stanley’s style. He didn’t know why Professor Xavier had to make gardening so complicated, but hey, the man was the one with the degree, and Stanley had a healthy respect for teachers drilled into him by his former teacher mom, so he didn’t outwardly question it. He wasn’t mad, he was just disappointed. How’s it feel in reverse, ADULTS? he thought to himself, amused even though no one else could hear how funny he was.

Today’s lesson was about a Spiky Bush and a Spiky Prickly Plant, two separate designations that to him sounded completely arbitrary, as they both were gonna stab you, but one would apparently just stab you slightly less. The coolest factor about them was something they shared, which was that sometimes, if you got too close, they just shot their spikes right at your face, which was easily the most badass thing Stanley had ever heard a plant do.

The next greatest disappointment in Stanley’s young life, however, came in the announcement that the second years were going to be cutting their plant while the first years got to light theirs on fire. Arguably, this was the most exciting thing to ever happen to anybody, and not getting to partake was the most tragic slight in history. Not cool, Professor Xavier, not cool.

In his mourning, Stanley didn’t hear the part about first years lining up on one side and second years on the other, and so he ended up on the wrong side of the classroom. When he was about halfway down the line, he noticed the head in front of him was lower than he expected of his yearmates. Was this person tiny, or…? He glanced across at the other line and made brief eye contact with Wally, who looked confused but not surprised by Stanley’s antics, as often Wally did. Stanley gave a shushing gesture and a wink, and Wally rolled his eyes before returning to face forward.

Stanley bent his knees a little to blend in better. He wasn’t especially tall, but he definitely fit in better among twelve year olds than eleven year olds, especially with his thirteenth birthday just a few months away. (Okay, it was like six months away yet, but whatever, get off his back.) realizing he might look silly to the person directly behind him, he turned his head awkwardly over his shoulder and smiled a sheepish, “Your lesson is cooler than mine. Don’t tell, mkay?”

12 Stanley O'Malley Blending in 1491 0 5

Valentine Duell

January 03, 2021 11:16 AM

What is he doing? [Wally] by Valentine Duell

Valentine greeted Professor Xavier warmly as she arrived, and accepted her exam from him. She looked over it as she found her way over to the tables and sat down next to her boyfriend. Because that was the sort of thing that girlfriends should do, unless they got to class first in which case the boyfriend was supposed to sit next to her. At least on occasion. She still needed to sit with Bonabelle and Lavender and Philippe and everyone else on occasion as well. This time though, she'd sit next to her boyfriend.

Her exam had gone okay, not perfect, but mostly right. It was a normal grade for her, she sighed and wished she could do better. Why did some of these things have to have names that were so similar? Oh well. She flashed Stan.... oops, she'd missed. She was sitting next to Wally. Well, she flashed Wally a friendly smile as Professor Xavier began the lesson and then turned back to her notes. As the lesson progressed she momentarily gave Professor Xavier a disapproving look at the plant names. Talk about similar names. However, she caught a similar look of his own and realized that he hadn't named the plants, it wasn't his fault, and it didn't look like he liked those names either. So she quickly changed her expression into one of sympathy for him.

She, as well as the other second years, would be trying to cut down the Spiky Prickly Plant. Yes, that was the one, the one that was fire resistant. Val remembered learning about the severing charm last year, she had taken notes on it last year. She didn't have last year's notebook with her at the moment, she hadn't realized she was going to need it. A mild case of panic set in as everyone was getting up to get into lines. Bonabelle would know, but she could spot her friend in the chaos of lining up. She turned to Wally instead, "Do you remember the severing charm? I don't have last year's notes with me. What..." her voice stopped abruptly as her frantic searching eyes landed on someone. Her boyfriend was crouching down in the line of first years. "..in the world is your brother doing?" she finished with mystified confusion.

2 Valentine Duell What is he doing? [Wally] 1490 0 5

Billy Cobb

January 04, 2021 6:42 PM

Nice! by Billy Cobb

Billy stuck around to see how Oz's attempt at burning the bush went. He wound up cheering right along with his roommate as the flames singed the plant's leaves. He may also have taken an unnecessary, involuntary step back as the plant exploded once more with thorns. Then he gave Oz a most likely, all to familiar inquiring look. "We're allowed to give ourselves points?" Well, shucks, if he'd known that Pecari would probably be doing a whole heck of a lot better. It must of been in one of them books he hadn't gotten around to reading yet. "Now I really gotta try better when I get another turn."

He cast his eyes about the green house for other possible targets he could practice on until he got back to the front of the line again. "How do the points work out? You get ten for hittin' the thing? Do you see anything we could practice on while we wait fer our turns again?" There were plenty of plants around, but he was pretty sure Professor Xavier wouldn't take to kindly to them burning down all his greenery. If only.... Then his face lit up and he snapped his fingers, "I got it!" Billy turned to Oz with a grin, "The professor said that other plant the second years is working with is fireproof, right? So, if'n we can find another one of them settin' about here, we could practice on that without worryin' about burning anything down!" It was a fantastic idea, "Do ya see any more of them?"

2 Billy Cobb Nice! 1519 0 5

Wally O'Malley

January 09, 2021 1:26 PM

Who ever knows? by Wally O'Malley

While maybe not his favorite class, Wally actually really liked Herbology. He wasn’t much one for getting his hands dirty - not that he had any trouble about doing so, but it wasn’t an activity he particularly felt inclined to seek out - but there was something relaxing in what was, in essence, gardening. He had tried to keep a vegetable garden at home one spring when he was seven or eight, but he hadn’t had much knack for it. He had picked the wrong veggies for their climate, and Stanley kept stepping on it accidentally. Wally was pretty sure the only reason they had any harvest at all was because Mom had run some magical interference and did something to keep the plants alive.

But doing something relatively independent and quiet was something the Crotalus found quite peaceful, especially compared to the magnitude 7 earthquake that was Stanley. Wally loved his brother, of course, but it was nice to branch away for a little peace here and there.

Trimming a spiky prickly plant with a severing charm wasn’t exactly the low-energy solo move Wally tended to like best about this class, but even he couldn’t really object to it. He had to admit, it sounded pretty cool. So he got in the correct line and patiently stood, awaiting his turn, when someone spoke to him. And yes, of course it was Valentine. She was specifically asking a class-related question, though, so that made it a bit easier to swallow the lump in his throat. He was about to answer and offer a quick demonstration of the wand motion, but Valentine seemed to have noticed something across the way.

“What… in the world is your brother doing?”

It was a question that was never good, but one that Wally had often heard in his nearly thirteen years of life. He followed Valentine’s gaze over to the line that was supposed to be composed exclusively of first years, and there was Stanley, hunkered down between them. The twins’ eyes met briefly, and Stanley gave a wink and a shushing motion. Wally couldn’t help but roll his eyes before he turned away. “I have no idea, but he’s apparently set on doing it,” Wally sighed. “He clearly doesn’t want us to say anything.”

12 Wally O'Malley Who ever knows? 1492 0 5

Valentine Duell

January 09, 2021 5:28 PM

I thought you may have a clue by Valentine Duell

Valentine watched the exchange between the boys with mild confusion, and wasn't sure what to do. Was Stanley doing something he should be? Well, he was because he was in the wrong line. Should she do something about it? Wally said he didn't think Stanley wanted them to say anything, and since Wally has undoubtedly had the most experience interacting with Stanley, he was the expert. So, if he thought Stanley didn't want them to say anything to anyone about him being in the wrong line, he was probably right. However... just because that was what Stanley wanted, was that what they should do? She still wasn't entirely sure where she fit into all of these dynamics.

Once more, Val fretted a moment that she hadn't had any sibling or even other kids her own age to interact with while she was growing up. It seemed like one should tell the person in charge if there was something going on out of the ordinary at least that was the idea she'd always gotten from Mama and Papa. However, if one of your friends was having fun and not hurting anyone, what was the harm? If Stanley didn't want them to tell anyone, he'd be mad if they did. On top of that, she was now his girlfriend. Did that change things? Should she be rooting for his antics? They seemed a bit strange to her, should she be finding this charming? It was a bit funny to see him over there. What would the Professor's reaction be when he got to the front of the line? She stifled a bit of a giggle at the thought.

What if he got into trouble though? Does a good girlfriend look out for her boyfriend's best interests? Should she be trying to convince him to come over to the right line? Should she be distracting Professor Xavier so he doesn't notice? This was hard... she was going to have to find someone else that had a boyfriend to talk to later. Who did she know? Evelyn had Heinrich, maybe she would have to find Evelyn the next chance she got. But... that didn't solve the immediate situation.

She turned back to Wally. He was still the expert in this situation and by his demeanor had dealt with this sort of thing on occasion. "What should we do? Do you think he will get into trouble?"

2 Valentine Duell I thought you may have a clue 1490 0 5

Ian Malone

January 10, 2021 4:55 AM

I usually am doing just that. Probably with success. by Ian Malone

Ian was not all that excited about coming back to school. He was doing well with his studies but he really had been happy seeing his family over midterm and was not all that happy to be away from them again. He'd been homesick all last term and now he felt that dull empty ache he'd felt all last term coming back. A dull empty ache he'd been so far unable to manage to fill with making friends. Ian liked his roommate well enough and there were others he knew a little bit the same way he'd briefly met Tommy prior to Sonora but...pretty much everyone else intimidated him.

In some cases, he didn't know why. For example, the Aladren girls seemed pretty nice and Isla Brockert was even somehow related to him, though unlike Wally and Stanley and that whole group, he didn't recall ever meeting her. Or Jasper, a second year in his house either. It was just...that Ian was rather shy. Other than those times when Stanley and Wally had birthday parties and he got included, he hadn't socialized much with other children growing up. Both his sister and his first cousin Nadia were so much younger than him. They were so lucky that they would be growing up together along with Aunt Melanie's new baby.

It wasn't as if he was actively kept away from other kids, it just hadn't been a priority and mostly, Ian was all right with that. It wasn't as if he always had to play by himself, because his mom would play with him and anyway, he really didn't mind playing alone sometimes. Also, the Teppenpaw very much enjoyed playing with his little sister too.

That was another thing about Sonora, there were so many more people than he was used to and it scared him. Some of them scared him as individuals. Not like he'd be scared of say, some dangerous creature who wanted to eat him, but more that they wouldn't like him or would be actually nasty to him. That they would eat him alive metaphorically rather than literally like a bear would or something, because he was quiet and shy and bookish rather than a rough and tumble jock like some seemed to be.Actually, had Ian not sort of known Stanley at all, the second year's loud and brash ways probably would have probably intimidated him too.

Of course, the Teppenpaw was intimidated by most of the second years anyway-other than Wally, Stanley, Lavender and Val- just because they were older than him. Not to mention even older students. If he had a problem, he wouldn't go to the prefects as from his perspective even the ones from his own house were big scary people,he'd go to the few older students he vaguely knew.

It was nothing personal, Ian was just easily intimidated and not used to socializing. That was all.

Now he was in Herbology which was taught by his HoH, whom he found more approachable than most of the other staff members. Although, the first year did overall find adults less scary than other kids. He trusted them to be wise and mature and Professor Xavier was warm and friendly. Plus, Herbology was an incredibly useful subject when one wanted to be a Healer. Actually, Healers generally needed most subjects taught at Sonora besides COMC-animal Healers might need that but Ian wanted to heal people , specifically specializing in immune deficiencies like his mom had-and Divinations. Which was unfortunate as he wasn't a huge fan of DADA.

He wasn't too fond of this lesson either. Ian figured the way to deal with a dangerous plant, particularly one that had no use for potions ingredients was to avoid it. And how on Earth was fire ever a safe way to deal with anything? Especially with eleven and twelve year olds, some of whom probably weren't the most safety conscious.

Naturally, the person who volunteered to demonstrate was Billy, one of the Pecaris. Ian never volunteered to do anything in class, even when he knew the answer to something as he generally wanted to avoid drawing attention to himself, even when the thing in question wasn't something dangerous and involving fire.

And of course, Oz enthusiastically followed his roommate.

Ian sighed with resignation as he got in line with the rest of the first years. He didn't really want to do this. What if he screwed up and hurt himself or others? Or someone else hurt him by mistake?

Then, he blinked as he realized that he was standing directly behind Stanley. Wasn't the Pecari supposed to be in line with the rest of the second years? Had the older boy made a mistake and misunderstood the directions? He was debating with himself whether or not to point this out to his cousin when Stanley turned to him and said,

“Your lesson is cooler than mine. Don’t tell, mkay?”

Ian nodded. He might not have been the most socially skilled but he knew tattling was wrong and the older boy was someone he wanted to like him."All right." Cooler? Was Stanley making a joke? Like, because fire was involved and fire was hot and not cool in multiple senses of the word. It didn't seem so but the Teppenpaw was enough of a nerd to find that choice of words mildly amusing and maybe if he wasn't so overall anxious about fire and his classmates using it-and he hated to admit because he so wanted to be part of Stanley's group-the second year using it, he would have cracked a smile at the probably unintentional irony of Stanley's remark.

11 Ian Malone I usually am doing just that. Probably with success. 1522 0 5