Jack raised his hand. "They are created when you let a magical fire go unchecked," he explained. What did that mean? Was that like...when you just let the fire go and keep on burning without watching it? Who was stupid enough to do THAT? You could get way worse things than Ashwinders...like, your HOUSE could burn down!

Marie looked over at Destiny with a reassuring smile. She knew Destiny didn't like snakes or anything that looked like them so this was probably not going to be a fun class for her.

"Professor I believe they rise from the embers of the dying fire and then they slither off into a dark corner to lay their eggs, leaving an ashy trail behind." Okay so that was a little more information than she asked for but hey, it wasn't often Marie knew answers like this, or at least she hoped what she knew was correct.

"You're all absolutely correct. Very good," she said, looking over to eye the fire.

"Now if all goes well, we will be able to watch this truly magical occurrence take place. What will we see? Can you describe an ashwinder?"

Michelle knew the answer to this, so she raised her hand and said,"It is a thin, pale-grey serpent with glowing red eyes. It will rise from the embers of the unsupervised fire and slither away into the shadows."

Her gaze turned from the tank, to the fire and finally Lady Lawson. Arya raised her hand, "Its a grey colored serpent with red eyes ."

Noooo!

Now they were going to look at one of these Ashwinders! Why did Destiny sit up front!? 'We will see a grey snakey looking thing..with freaky red eyes.'

Well, Destiny won't see a grey snakey looking thing, because she will close her eyes.

Jack raised his hand. "Don't they have lots of heads?" he said. As everyone else answered, however, he saw that he was DEFINITELY thinking of something else. "I mean...nevermind. Wrong snake. They're like, grey and have red eyes, and they're only going to live for an hour before dying," he added. He didn't want to see it die. That'd be creepy.

Fred smiled knowing this was gonna be cool sight to see and he knew what the ashwinder would look like and raised his hand responded, "The aswinder will lok like a small grey snake with bright red eyes and it will slither out the embers of a magical leaving a trail of ash behind as it goes to find a dark corner to lay it's eggs".

"If all goes well we should see the ashwinder slither off into a dark corner to lay its eggs. It will then die within an hour by collapsing into dust after the eggs have been laid."

Yep, Destiny was not going to like this. Well she might since the thing would only be alive for an hour.

Errrrrrrrrrr....they are FREAKY looking. Miranda raised her hand, once again having to uncover it due to her unexplainable long sleeve. "Mmmiss, they are grey and have these glowing red eyes, right? Their eyes like FIRE!" Miranda's own eyes grew wide at this notion. Ooooooooh, scary.

"That's correct, Michelle!" She beamed at her.
She nodded to the others in turn and moved closer to the fire. Already it had started to die down.

"A couple of you mentioned their eggs. That is where our frozen tank comes into play. Ashwinder eggs are bright red in color and give off intense heat. In order to harvest them, they must be frozen straight away or there's a risk of fires."

"Can anyone tell me what their eggs are used for?"

Eeek!

The fire was dying down, which meant any minute a freaky red eyed snake would pop out! Destiny scooted a little bit closer to Marie, just in case this Ashwinder was going to eat her, she could throw Marie in front of her...just kidding, she wouldn't do that. 'They are used for potion ingredients.'

Chris raised his hand, "Professor Ashwinder eggs can be user in Love potions!" the prefect excitedly chirpped up.

Ivory raised her hand slowly, "Love potions?"

In a way it made sense...burning passion....burning eggs....all the same mumbo jumbo. Oh wait there was somethisng else...right...medicinal uses?

" And a cure for ag-" Cough,cough. She harrumphed and coughed a bit at the end to try to cover up the fact that she had no idea what the darn word was. Agie? Agua? Agnes? Acne? Hmm maybe that was it...acne?

Arya raised her hand again, tearing her eyes away from the dying fire. "They can be eatin whole to cure ague."

What were Ashwinder eggs used for? Umm...well let's see....uh...yeah she had absoulty no clue what they were used for. Pulling her Care of Magical Creature book towards her, Nikki opened up to a random page. OMG! She opened to the right page! Yay!

Okay, umm...where the part about there eggs...

Nikki ran her fingers through the text till she finally came to the right passage. Nikki lifted her head and raised her hand. "Well when frozen Ashwinder eggs can be used in love potions and can cure ague if swallowed whole."

"Yes Destiny, exactly right. Do you know which potions specifically?"
"Love potions! Correct," she beamed. "What else?"
Professor Lawson smiled at Ivory's pronunciation. She was so darn precious. "Very good, Ivory," she giggled. "It's pronounced A gyu. Almost like 'Eh you!'"
"Right. And for those of you that don't know what ague is, think of the type of fever that accompanies the flu. Chills, sweating, fits of the shivers."

...

The professor pulled on her dragonhide gloves and walked over to the small fire as it started sputtering out. "I think it's time," she said, excitedly.

When the fire died out completely a long, pale gray serpent rose slithered out from the ashes. With it's red eyes blazing, the ashwinder slipped along slowly in search of someplace dark.

"Do not be afraid, children. See that pile of stones nearby? I placed them there specifically for this purpose." No sooner than she had finished her sentence, the snake slithered off in that direction. "Now if you've brought your dragonhide gloves, put them on. We will collect the eggs and place them in the tank."

Marie watched as Destiny moved closer to her. Giggling a little she whispered, "It's not going to get you, it will look for a dark place to hide its eggs."

Even if it did come their way she wouldn't let it get Destiny, she didn't want her to be scared.... well unless she was the one doing the scaring, then it was funny.

Hearing the other students say the ashwinder eggs were used in love potions made her think of potions class and.....Evan. Yes, that was a class she would never forget.

Jack was not very thrilled about collecting fresh snake eggs but ehhh. It wasn't the worst thing in the world. Humming to himself, he pulled his gloves out of his bag and slipped them on, waiting for Morgan--Lawson--whatever she was went by now to continue.

It was time? Ohhh...it made it sound so awesome. Well, more awesome than it probably was. Hehe. Nikki's blue eyes shifted thier gaze from Professor Lawson to the fire. After a couple seconds, she started getting bored. And her eyes were starting to hurt from staring at the fire. But just as she was about to rub her eyes, the gray, ashy looking, ashwinder came slighering.

It looked sorta of creepy with it's red eyes. But Nikki pulled her bookbag towards her. She began searching through it, looking up to see what the ashwinder was doing every once and a while. She finally found her gloves somewhere next to her empty ink bottle things, and slipped them on.

'Love potions!' Yeah, Destiny knew that from last terms potions class..not fun.

Destiny turned to Marie when she was whispering that the Ashwinder wasn't going to get her. Yeah, like that was going to make her feel any better. Pfffft. Opening her mouth to make a remark, Destiny heard Professor MorganLawson say 'it's time'.

Time for what?

Oh. Time to see the Ashwinder.

For the love of Merlin that thing was huuuge and verrrrry scary! And it was totally looking right at her! Those freaky red eyes were glaring a hole right through her Destiny. Do not be afraid? Easy for MorganLawson to say..the snakey thing was not looking at her.

Jumping out of her seat, Destiny pointed to the snake, 'It's gonna eat me!' and before the snake even had a chance to eat her, she took off running towards the Forbidden Forest..

Scary snake and it's freaky eyes.

Arya watched excitedlt as the fire died and the ashwinder rose from the ashes. Even though it wasn't her first time seeing one being born, it still fasinated her to watch.

She watched as it crawled over to the pile of rocks, keeping her gaze for a few seconds more before turning and putting on her gloves. Then she looked to Lady Lawson, waiting for more instructions.

Herminny cringed and jumped a little as she exclaimed, "EWWW GROSS", as she watched a snake slither out of the fire and she had to get close enough to collect it's eggs. Just nooooooooo, Herminny thought as she put her gloves on she was sure she would have to keep her eyes closed to even go through with this.

Risk of fires?

It’s time!

Although Ivory knew that Professor Lady Lawson would never let anything happen to her, she couldn’t quench the feeling of discomfort as she stared at the dying fire. She wasn’t scared of snakes per se but burning snakes? That was like the embodiment of what she thought should be everyone’s fear. Well at least it was too close to one of hers . The fear of being burned alive.

It was supposed to be the worst kind of death and just thinking about the agony that a death like that meant…well petrified was the word that came upmost in her mind to describe how she felt.

Her lip began to quiver funnily and her hands were wringing in her lap.

Seriously, they were snakes that laid eggs that could send dwellings up in flames after all. Who wouldn’t be scared of that…

What if one of those happened to get near her? What if she got bitten by the magical snakes? Would the venom burn like a fire? ! It wasn’t a mundane snake after all….GASP!!!.....Would she catch on fire inside out?

Shaking her head in denial, Ivory’s mind whirled with the ’what if’s scenarios. She’d always been a worry wort, and when she found something to worry about well there usually was no stopping her.

Especially right at that moment. When from the dying embers of fire emerged a long, pale grey snake, it eyes burning like the fire from a thousand suns, and Ivory swore she heard the wail of the many souls who had lost their lives to fire at some point.

Without even noticing, Ivory had been slowly scooching backwards, away from the snake. Eventually as the snake slithered closer to her, she actually stood up her eyes wide and fearful her feet back pedaling.

Oh no…not today! She was so not going to be burned alive. Oh no! No third degree burns today thank you very much.

Her mind wild with some weird instinct to live, her common sense was completely overridden, especially when the horrible spawn of Hades himself let out an ashy hiss, Ivory did the only thing she could do.

SHE RAN!

So what if she was running toward the Forbidden Forest where there were bound to be more dangerous things...it didn't matter! The more distance she put between her and that thing the better!

Marie had just gotten her gloves on when she watched as the noticed the snakey looking thing appear. She reached out to grab Destiny but it was too late. She had already jumped up and started running.

"Destiny, it's not going to eat you," she said as she jumped up and followed her friend towards the forest.

Catching up to her she said, "You don't want to go in there, it's dark in there, that snake will probably want to go in there and hide its eggs." She grabbed Destiny's hand to lead her back to where they had been sitting..... away from where the snake was heading.