Chapter Six - Dark Arts
The next day was cold and damp, a light mist hung around the grounds and thick grey clouds filled the skies. This weather meant Bree would be able to go to the Greenhouses the normal way, instead of the tunnel Dumbledore had made for her. A harsh wind hit Bree in the face as the four of them headed to Herbology, Dumbledore explained in a letter that the Greenhouse had been fitted with the same glass as the Hogwarts Express making it safe for Bree to have her lessons there. It had began to rain and the grass was quickly becoming muddy, the mist and the rain was also making it difficult to see. The four Hufflepuffs were all huddled under Bree's new umbrella. Bree's mother had sent it to her that morning, it was yellow and had a tiny bronze Hufflepuff shield on the handle.
"Here we are." Hannah said, "Greenhouse One."
"Good!" They hurried inside and Bree shook off the raindrops and joined Ernie, Hannah and Justin around a table and waited for the lesson to begin. Over the next five minutes the rest of the class trickled in each in a varying state of wetness. Harry gave Bree a small wave as he entered the Greenhouse with Ron, they sat at a table near Bree with Neville and Hermione.
Professor Sprout was stood at the front of the class, she smiled at them, "Good morning class! Today is our first lesson together so I must go over some ground rules before we begin. The first is the most important." She paused, "Never go near the Venomous Tentacula!" She pointed towards the back of the Greenhouse where several large spiky plants were moving slowly. "Rule Two, always wear your gloves if you think something could be dangerous…" The rules went on for about another five minutes and each of them made Herbology seem like a quite dangerous subject.
"So." Professor Sprout clapped her hands, "We'll be starting off with something simple. Today you are each going to plant a beanstalk, in our next lesson you will each use a different fertiliser and then in the coming weeks you will be able to judge which gets the best results. Hopefully some of them will become as tall as the castle and strong enough to climb! Now who can tell me a bit more about beanstalks?"
Hermione's hand shot up, "There's a muggle fairytale called Jack and the Beanstalk about a man who finds a beanstalk and climbs up it and finds a giant."
"Exactly. Ten points to Gryffindor. The Muggles don't know that was actually a true story based on Jack Finn's encounter with the brutal giant Gurg Trakal who lived in the Pennines. The Muggle version ends happily but in the more factual, Wizarding version Trakal kills and eats Jack and wears his skull on a pendant." She paused for a second then moved on, "On a more positive note, the leaves are sometimes used in quite old and obscure happiness potions." Professor Sprout tapped the blackboard with her wand and a set of instructions for the correct planting appeared in large, neat letters. "You may begin!"
The instructions were easy enough to follow, after filling a plant pot with soil they had to take one of the tiny red beans and plant it. The more complicated part was watering the plant. The students would have to mix their own solution to speed up the growth of the plant.
"So, the mixture in one third water and seventy three daisy petals, then we stir it clockwise for one minute, add two drops of ginger essence and we're done!"
"This is a bit too much like Potions for my liking." Hannah whispered nervously as she poured water into her jar.
"This is simple." Bree assured her as she began adding her petals. A heavy silence hit the Greenhouse , Bree glanced around and noticed that everyone was hunched over their tables with furrowed brows as they carefully added their petals. Bree couldn't help but be distracted by the quiet mutters of numbers emanating from other tables. Somewhere to her left Ernie was clicking his tongue each time he dropped in a petal. Bree blinked, was she at fifty-nine or forty nine? She had completely lost count. She racked her brain but whatever number she had been storing was lost now. Bree hastily added twenty five extra petals, after all what harm could it do if she was a little over?
The silence was gone now and had been replaced by a hubbub of conversation and the banging of spoons against jars. After the ginger had been added the liquid become a light golden colour, Bree scanned the room, her mixture didn't look any different to the others, she gave a small sigh of relief.
"Pour it all on the plant!" Professor Sprout called out, "Then label your plant pot and leave it on the shelf at the back. For your homework I want you to write four paragraphs on the history and use of beanstalks ready to hand in next week. Goodbye students!"
Outside the rain had stopped but it was still dark and overcast, the four of them rushed to the castle to warm up.
"Well, I quite enjoyed that!" Ernie grinned and Hannah and Justin nodded.
"Hmm…" Bree murmured distractedly.
"What's wrong?"
"I…um…sort of messed up my mixture. I lost count of the petals so I just threw a load in and hoped for the best," she said quickly, "My plant isn't going to grow is it?"
There was a pause.
"I might grow into something…" Hannah was trying to sound reassuring but a glance at Bree's face told her it wasn't working, "There were probably other people who lost count as well." She elbowed Ernie in the ribs.
"Oof! I mean, I lost track as well," he said unconvincingly.
"So…" Justin tried to break the silence, "History of Magic next."
"Yeah," Bree leapt upon the new topic, "Apparently it is taught by a ghost, that should be cool!"
It was not cool. Professor Binns floated pearly white in front of them and droned on and on about the goblin uprisings of the 1600s. The lesson was made worse by the presence of Draco Malfoy who spent the lesson muttering to his friends who tittered and guffawed at his every word. It also didn't help that they were expected to write down every word that fell from the Professors mouth and he refused to stop or repeat anything. At the end of the lesson Bree looked down at her parchment it was a messy scribble with the odd blank place where she had meant to go back and fill in a name when Binns stopped or paused for breath, but he was a ghost and didn't pause for breath. She tried to read a line of what she had wrote, 'The Rebellion of Ushawrts raged between wizards and goblins from 1647 to 16??. The leader of the Holrar clan attempted to strike a deal with Yurup but was beheaded by his henchman, Jagrok.' She squinted, was that Jagrok or Jaqrok?
After the lesson the four Hufflepuffs conspired, "We should make a pact," Justin suggested in hushed tones, "that only one of us takes notes and then the rest of us can copy them up later."
"That doesn't sound very Hufflepuff." Hannah pointed out, "Aren't we supposed to be hardworking and unafraid of toil? Besides I didn't have any trouble copying it all down."
"Well then, we'll just copy your notes every lesson." Justin joked.
"Tut-tut," Draco muttered as he shoved past them on his way out, "That sounds very Slytherin, shame you're a Mudblood."
Ernie and Hannah gasped. Bree pulled out her wand and jabbed Draco in the neck with it, "You never say that again!" Bree threatened. Draco scoffed, pushed her hand away with ease and swaggered off.
"What was that about?" Justin asked, looking confused.
Bree shoved her wand back in her robe, "It doesn't matter, come on. We'll be late for Defence Against the Dark Arts."
"Yes, we should hurry." Ernie nodded and lead the way downstairs. Bree wasn't really looking forward to this lesson. She had bumped into Harry and Ron at breakfast that morning and they weren't feeling the same way, they were both really excited. They had heard that Quirrell had fought of a vampire in Romania and that he was obsessed with hunting it down and finishing it off. Bree had almost dropped her books when they said this.
With every step towards the classroom Bree felt the fear set in. When she had seen the Professor during the Welcoming Feast he had looked quite harmless but now she could only see him as a fearless vampire slayer! She imagined epic fight scenes between him and this vampire with stakes, crosses, holy water, garlic and blasts of sunlight, Bree shivered.
"Here we are." Justin pointed to the open door. Bree entered cautiously and was hit by the unmistakable, pungent aroma of garlic, she felt dizzy and grasped a close desk to keep herself from falling over.
"Let's just sit here." Bree took the seat closest to the door and sat down, the others followed and sat near her. This was like hell. There was a ringing in her ears, her whole body felt cold and clammy, her vision faded and then, there was nothing.
AN - Cliffhanger! What do you think will happen next? I'm not telling. Let me know your thoughts!
