Lesson Two - 1st years

Miles walked into the Greenhouse and quickly checked that the plants were happy and healthy, he then made his way towards the solid wood table and sat down

He watched as the sun streamed through the glass, admiring its beauty, Miles then glanced over at the door to see if any first years had arrived yet

Alyssa entered the herbology greenhouse in a Zomblie like state, she had just come from breakfast in the great hall. Not having met any friends yet, she desided to just come straight to class.
"Morning." she mummbled to her prefessor, then taking a seat at the table she promptly dropped her head on the table and groaned, "It's to early to be awake!"

Herbology, thought Kirsten, unsure if she was going to enjoy it or not ... well, no harm in trying, she guessed, remaining optimistic as she meandered through the greenhouse.

Happy to see she wasn't late, she nodded a greeting to the thoroughly out-of-it Hufflepuff girl who was already there, then turned her attention to Professor Bloxam, "Good morning," she said, "how are you?"

She decided to sit next to the half-asleep Hufflepuff. Placing her textbooks quietly on the table as to not disturb her, she sat, fixed her wayward curls, and waited for more students to arrive while absently flipping through her 1000 Herbs and Where to Find Them textbook; figuring it could do no harm to brush up on her knowledge while she waited.

In her half dazed state the Hufflepuff, heard the quiet drop of books on the table, and jerked back, falling backwards off her stool in the process. Looking up at the Ravenclaw girl sitting in the seat next to where she had previously been seated, she smiled.
"Sorry! I hope I didnt startle you, when you put your books down it startled me, I didnt expect to hear it so close, you know?" She said nervously, "My names Alyssa, whats yours?" she asked while taking a seat.

Two girls entered the classroom, the Gryffindor girl seemed quite tired and out of it, but the Ravenclaw girl greeted Miles warmly

Miles looked down at the class list surprized to see he had many more students to arrive, then had a quick glance down at his watch Hmm... 10 mins until i'll have to start the lesson Miles thought to himself, he then leaned foward and peered out through one of the glass pannels of the Greenhouse to see if he could see anymore students coming

Miles refocused back on the girls, "Ah girls, we are going to be learning about Flesh Eating Trees today. Now if you want to do some pre reading before the rest of the class gets here you will find them on page 122 in your Herbology Alive textbooks"

Miles then returned to sit behind his desk as he marked the two girls off the roll

"Oh good Lord, I'm so sorry!" Kirsten gasped as the napping girl she'd tried so hard not to disturb fell off her chair in shock. She offered a hand of assistance as she clambered back into her seat, biting her lip nervously. This was not a good start to the day.

"I'm Kirsten," she replied. "Alyssa's a lovely name!"

Then Professor Bloxam spoke, so Kirsten turned her attention to him and listened intently to his instructions. Flesh eating trees?! she thought, this oughtta be interesting!

Offering another apologetic smile in the direction of Alyssa, making sure she was okay after her fall, Kirsten retrieved her Herbology Alive textbook and flipped to the instructed page.

"Flesh eating trees," she said casually to the girl next to her, "sounds pretty gruesome hey?"

"Sorry!" Alyssa said, "I didn't mean to scare you, and I wasnt paying attention, and my ears are more sensative than most. You really didnt do anything. I'm honestly the biggest klutz in the world, except when I'm on a broom." Alyssa tried to reasure her. Hearing the teacher, she thought it sounded kind of exciting, but dangerous.
"It does sound kind of gross, but at least it'll be an interesting class." She said hopefully.

Kirsten giggled as Alyssa rambled about her klutziness, and then she confessed, "I'm pretty klutzy on a broom ... my first lesson didn't go too amazingly!"

"Yeah," she agreed, in reference to the flesh eating trees. She'd never actually heard of such a thing, and cursed herself internally for not covering that in her summer reading. "I wonder if they eat like ... whole people?"

"If you want I could help you with your flying," Alyssa said warmly, she liked this girl, she was nice, and smart. Her two favorite kinds of people.
"I really hope not!" She said in refrence to the trees, "If they do, I'm throwing my shoe at them, and running!" She said laughing.

"Oh you're too kind!" Kirsten said, "My flying is embarrassingly bad sometimes," she giggled.

"And that's a very good plan," she added, "I think a shoe distraction will do just the trick!" Laughing along with Alyssa Kirsten felt very glad that she'd met such a lovely and friendly girl.

Alyssa was loving this girl, she was really funny, and a good friend. I guess waking up early isnt all bad, she thought.
"Well, I'm pretty bad at everything, but flying, and sometimes I dont entirely fail at defense." she laughed.
"And I think it would show the tree that we mean buisness if we are willing to loose a perfectly good shoe, just to get him to not eat us!" She was barely able to finish the sentance, she was laughing so hard.

Kirsten was practically in tears with giggles over Alyssa and her amazing sense of humour. Very close to literally rofl-ing, Kirsten covered her mouth to contain and compose herself, thinking happily who knew Herbology could be so entertaining!!

"You're so funny!" she choked out, grinning widely. She was so extremely glad to have met such a cheerful companion.

Miles glanced down at his watch and noticd the time, he had to start the lesson soon. He peered through the class pannels to see if he could see anymore students arriving

He then looked over at his two students which were busy in conversation "Ok girls pay attention" Miles said interupting theie conversation " Now flesh-eating trees can be very dangerous obviously, they tend to be found in colder environments so mainly in Europe"

Miles then looked at his students " Please copy all this down please. Now who knows roughly how many species there are of flesh-eating trees"

Alyssa continued to giggle a little as she got parchment and a quill out, hearing the professors question, she stilled.

"Wait! Theres more than one kind of flesh eating tree?!? Why cant there just be one?!?!" She said, a bit more than only a little nervous, she didnt like anything that was flesh eating, and now there are more than on kind of flesh eating tree!? This is just great!

The two students looked blankly back at him, Miles could tell they didn't know the answer " Well there are three types of Fleshing Eating Trees; Grandia, Mediocris and Parva. Now this basically means Large, Medium and Small you might find it useful to copy that information down"

Miles then flicked his wand over at a trolley in the corner of the room and it leviatated onto his desk " Now today we will be working with the Parva variety of Fleshing Eating trees" Miles reached for a gardening spade and poked the small tree, suddenly a small mouth filled with razor sharp teeth appeared out of the trunk, it sounded like a vicious dog

The whole pot began jumping foward as the tree launched its self at the spade and began shaking it rapidly, trying to rip it apart, Miles then pulled out his wand "Incendio" he quickly said, flames shot out of his wand burning the tree mildly causing it to let go of the spade. Miles then looked back at his class

" Now the spell which I just used was the Incendio Charm, this charm shots flames at the target, to cast this spell simply hold your wand out like this and move it up and down vertically with a fluid movement and then say Incendio, make sure when you say the incantation that you say it in a crisp and clear tone"

Miles then looked around and saw some old pots sitting on a shelf on the wall, he then looked back at his students "Ah, so see those couple of pots on the shelf near the wall there, practice incendio by aiming at them"

Miles then stood near his desk as he watch the students attempt the spell

Alyssa wrote the notes down, then seeing the plant up close she jumped when teeth apeared.
She saw the pots, and practiced the motion a few times, then looked at the pots determind, "Incedio," a small puff of smoke came out the tip f my wand, "Oops! I guess I need to say it more strongly!" Alyssa laughed, "Incedio!" she said with more power. A stream of steady flame came out of my wand and hit a pot, it melted. "Cool! It worked!" She looked over at her ravenclaw friend.

Kirsten blushed when she couldn't answer the Professor's question ... thankfully he recited the answer and she quickly wrote down Three types of Fleshing Eating Trees; Grandia, Mediocris and Parva, also adding an underlined note that she must brush up on her Herbology reading!

"Whoah!" she whispered, awed, as Professor Bloxam executed an amazing Incendio charm. It looked really effective too. Then Alyssa next to her did it flawlessly on her second turn. "Hey! Good work Alyssa!" she exclaimed. Seeing her friend succeed gave her the confidence to try it.

It's ok if you don't get it the first time, she reassured herself, reaching for her wand.

She glared determinedly at the pots, aimed her wand and said, "Incendio!"

She thought she saw a flicker of something at the tip of her wand, but the pot remained unscathed. "Incendio!" she tried again; and as with Alyssa's first attempt, only a small puff of smoke appeared.

Glancing helplessly at the Professor, she decided the third time she would be lucky! "INCENDIO!" She yelled, fluidly moving her wand up and down.

Success at last! Bright orange flames shot out of her wand and into the pot she had aimed at. She smiled, relieved, as the flames eagerly devoured their target. Now that was a spell she would have fun practicing!

Alyssa saw the small puff of smoke on Kristen's second try and gave her an encouraging smile. Then when the flames came from her wand Alyssa smiled. That spell was amazing.
"Woah! You did so good! You final try was more powerful thatn mine!" Alyssa was happy her friend got it, "That's a wicked spell!"

Kirsten beamed at Alyssa. "Thank you!" She said, "Yours was pretty powerful too!"

She agreed with Alyssa's labelling of the spell as 'wicked', adding with a giggle, "Flesh eating plants will be afraid of us now!"

Alyssa laughed, "Oh yeah! They'll know who's their boss! I think you'd be able to scortch a whole teenaged tree alive with that spell!" she laughed again, "They'll never stand a chance!"

Miles watched the girls attempts at casting the spell, while at first they struggled they did eventually master the spell, he gave a warm smile to both the girls

" Beatiful casts girls, I award 10 points to both your houses" Miles flicked his wand over at the trolley in the far corner and two small flesh eating trees levitated and floated towards the two students, Miles then gave a gardening spade to each of the girls

" Ok so now what I would like you to do is, poke the tree with the spade, and let it attack it then, cast the Incendio Charm to make it release the spade" Miles then nodded at both of the girls encouragingly " Ok start when your comfortable"

Alyssa looked nervously between the tree, Kristen, and the professsor. Was he crazy? I'm not about to poke a flesh eating tree to get it to attack on purpose! She thought. Looking again at Kirsten, she carefully picked up the spade, poked the tree. It grabbed the spade with its sharp teath, barely missing her hand. She jumped back, and grabbed her wand.
"Incendio!" She said, slightly paniced, after all the tree nearly had her fingers.
The tree dropped the spade, and shrank into itself to get away from the flame. Alyssa looked releived. She was scared she would do something embarassing, or make some sort of small crisis happen.