Neptune could NOT BELIEVE..... Josh was playing the martyr. Just..REALLY? And he was telling on her...?


Some Gryffindor he was. Pffffffft.


"I did not stupify Josh Carter in the Great Hall." It had been in a tent after the Quidditch Championship, thank you very much. Just so they were clear.

...and he'd totally deserved it. "The incident Mr. Carter is referring to was unfortunate. I heard he cried a great deal after he fell, or allegedly was stupified. Was it permanent brain damage? Oh dear." Neptune put a hand to her mouth to hide her giant O-lips of shock. "But he could hardly complain, considering how he choked Jake and bullied him last year. One might even look upon that as ...what did you call it, Josh? Justice?"

....smirk.

As for the wand..."It's true Professor. I got my wand out first. But I was afraid of Josh. I'm sure you can see why." Neptune wasn't ACTUALLY afraid of Josh, but she was a Ravenclaw and was smart enough to know that she'd need it. Defense Against the Dumb Arts. "I'm sorry for the disturbance in your garden." But not for anything SHE had done. Hmph.

This becoming highly confusing, and was heading towards being confrontational again. Sighing Seren decided it was best to move them all along. The sooner they were all separated the better.
"Be that as it may, Miss Flores, does it make things any better if you had your wand for offensive or defensive purposes? ... from what I've heard, and from what I've observed you and Master Carter are not all innocent in this, and neither is Miss Bott and Master Carmichael..." where was she going with this? oh thats right... "But I am sure that you are not innocent of provoking said behaviours... so I still stand by my decsision to deduct three points." Not that it was much of a punishment... it was actually quite lame. Still if it made any impact at all then perhaps they would learn not to bully or torment their peers.

"Thank you Miss Bott, for being so honest... now provided you don't repeat your behaviours, then all is forgiven."
Merlin that girl was feisty... and she clearly disliked Josh.

She eyed the students, "So I suggest either learn to get along... or don't, but learn to stay away from one another. Confrontations between students wont be tollerated, anywhere." Not just in her precious gardens.

After a quick glance at her pendant watch Seren sighed. Oh why did time have to fly? ...
"Have a good day", she said inclining her head as she turned to leave.

If any of them wanted to talk about anthing with her they could find her in her office... for the time being she had assignments to mark.

Kurumi giggled softly as she knelt down beside the girl. She was about to reach into her pocket for her wand, but she hesitated. "There actually is a spell to make plants grow faster," she said furrowing her brow for a moment as she chewed on her bottom lip. "I used it my first term during a Herbology lesson." She placed her hand that dirt for a moment and her expression turned soft. "Although, I am sure flowers are more beautiful when they are allowed to grow on their own."

Kurumi smiled back at Violet and was about to respond with her usual 'fine' when she felt her stomach tie in knots again. Cookie Kurumi, House Elf Kurumi, Dictionary Eating Kurumi...she could handle all those names...Quidditch Kurumi was the one that made her want to crawl under a bush in the corner. "Wha...oh...yeah...t-t-t-thank you..."

Violet smiled as Kurumi knelt beside her. When Kurumi was telling her that there was a spell to make the plants grow fast Violet gasped a little and was about to say that they should do it so they can grow already. But then Violet then heard Kurumi's next comment and then thought for a moment before smiling sweetly at her saying,"You're absolutely right Kurumi.." She then added a small giggle.

Violet then noticed Kurumi's facial expression change almost immediately when she had mentioned Quidditch to her. She then could hear the fear in Kurumi's voice and Violet looked at her sympathetically. Violet slowly reached out her hand right and placed it lightly on Kurumi's shoulder. She would've placed it on her hand, but she didn't know if Kurumi would've felt comfortable enough with Violet doing that, since they didn't know each other that much. Violet then asked lightly,"Are you scared? For Quidditch I mean?"

"This garden has its own enchantments, so I am sure they will still grow faster than normal flowers would," she nodded. At least, that had been the case for her cherry tree. "It is always spring in here after all."

Kurumi's out-of-this-world glaze over her eyes vanished with the younger Hufflepuff's touch. "T-T-That may be a slight understatement," she laughed nervously. "Selina has been training me, you know how she can get, so...I have become a fair flyer..." Fair didn't mean good though. "And our captain gave me his old broom...so they seem to have confidence in me..." Kurumi hardly had an ounce of it in herself though - considering she still thought that there was a flying breakfast food used during matches. "I'm not so afraid of Quidditch as I am of flying really." She didn't really have a reason for this to be honest. She supposed it was like small children who are afraid of learning how to ride a bike. The simple notion of failure being enough to make you run one hundred miles in the opposite direction.

Bundled up tightly, Mina ventured outside. There were still a number of places she hadn't visited in her time back to the school and she did want to remedy that. Yes, there was much homework that still needed to be done and she wasn't putting it off. No, she was just taking a break for it at the moment. Locking herself up in the tower wasn't doing her any good and she needed the fresh air. The crisp December air might actually help her think a bit. There had been a lot on her mind lately.

Finding her way toward the student garden, she smiled. It had been years since she was last there and it was rather different now. The last time she was there it was in third year and at the time, she wasn't all that interested in Herbology. It probably didn't help that the professors during her those times either scared her or confused her to no end. How was she supposed to enjoy a class when the professor seemed to be scared of the plants more than she was. It was a bit sad considering she wasn't even that scared of said plants that often.

But a new year had brought a new professor and this one she did like and Herbology didn't seem all that terrible now. Maybe she would enjoy it a bit more this year, she did like flowers and gardening wasn't something she was against. She was a fan of parks and gardens, so maybe it was about time she just embraced it.

Even covered in frost, it was a rather pretty garden and it brought a smile to her face as well as memories of all the gardens and parks she had seen in the past year.

Riley had been sitting by the fire in the Gryffindor Common Room staring blankly at his bag filled with textbooks and homework assignments. He was neither in the mood to open it or even consider doing the homework today so he decided that it was an outdoors day and he should venture out before someone tried to guilt him into the studial work.

So after wandering aimlessly, except for the intense need to stay away from the Groundskeeper's hut, the seventh year found himself entering the Student garden next to the Herbology greenhouses. He had liked Professor Bentley since he and Jimmy had come down to meet her at the beginning of term and thought it would be nice to maybe tend to some of the plants since it was getting chilly and a bit frosty now. He started to head over to the flutterby bushes when he noticed there was a girl standing not too far away. He just looked at her at first and then wondered if perhaps she would help him, it was a large garden indeed.

"Hey, you, girl!" he barked, then made a face after hearing how mean it sounded. "I mean, would you like to help me tend the plants?" he added to make it sound nicer. Riley tried not to sound mean ALL the time.

Hearing someone yelling out at her general direction, Mina turned and looked. Did he just call her girl?!?! Usually something like that would have offended her, but it wasn't like he knew who she was or something. He didn't look familiar at all, but then again she didn;t know all that many people at the school any more.

Walking over, she shrugged. "Sure, why not. They aren't going to tend themselves in the cold." She didn't have anywhere else to be at the moment and it would do her some good to get her hands a little dirty and embrace her new interest in herbology.

Removing her hands from her cloak pockets, she nodded. "So what do you need me to do?" she asked. It was all really new to her and her only real experience with magic plants happened in the classrooms. If it was anything similar to muggle plants, she was pretty sure she could do it. There wasn't all that much difference, was there?

Riley watched as the girl joined him by the plants, glad that she was not scared off or appearing angry about his 'greeting', he hadn't intended it to sound as rude as it did. So she would help? Riley grinned smally, showing his teeth and nodding. "Well good. My name's Riley." he added his last name because that was important too. "Sinclair." He liked her attitude towards the plants. The Gryffindor HATED animals but plants had a soft spot with him.

He squated down into a crouched position near the few small bushes that were fluttering around despite the windless air. "These, are Flutterby bushes. They don't need trimmed it appears but they do need to be watered and warmed up a bit." he said making a little sad face as it looked like they were shivering to him.

"Nice to meet you Riley Sinclair." Mina replied with a smile. "My name's Jasmina Bennett." Well, that was what she was named after all, even if she didn't always respond to it. "But call me Mina please." It was shorter and only adults ever called her my her full name.

Moving to squat down near the small bushes, she watch him. "I don't think I've seen these around before, but they look nice." Okay, she was still clueless to what everything was called, but she would learn it. The Flutterby bushes looked like they would be pretty, but at the moment seemed to be sad. Plants could look sad, right?

"Warmth and water, gotcha," she nodded as she moved to another bush and noticed the same sadness to it. "Can we just use aguamenti or would watering by hand be more beneficial to them?" It was a valid question. Maybe they wanted to be watered by hand compared to by magical means.

So she wanted to be called Mina but her real name was Jasmina....simple enough. Though part of him wanted to call her Jasmina just to be a nuscience, the mean Riley wasn't called for as of yet. "Well nice to meet you too Mina." Besides she had asked nicely.

Glad that she was down on the dirt with him and he was not alone to tend to the plants, he nodded as she took in the fluttering plants before them. "Yes, they are quite nice actually. They flutter constantly unless they are sick or underfed. But thankfully that is not the case with any of these ones." he reached out and grabbed a branch in his ungloved hand. It was soft, a good sign for being out in the cold air.

By hand or by magic. Well did she have a watering can with her? The Gryffindor was sure Professor Bentley had a few somewhere nearby but there was no need to go searching when they had perfectly good wands in their pockets. "It doesn't really matter, I don't recall if they have a preference. But since it's cold out and I don't have a can with me, we might as well just use the spell. But first lets warm them, do you know how to do the Blue Bell Flames spell; verbally or nonverbally?" He had brought a jar for the occasion and set it down in the earth infront of them.

Pointing his wand at it he did a nonverbal duplicating spell creating 4 identical jars they could use for the project.

Dum-di-dum-di-dum!

Mikey Grainger, as the world knew him, strolled into the Student Garden absent-mindedly not knowing anything about the castle, it's origins or where in sane heck he was. But he was inqusitive. The first year walked down the pathway to an empty bench and sat down admiring the scenery. Wow it really was beautiful. He could see he was going to have some good times whilst here at Hogwarts. Though the world of magic was an entirely different world to the young Slytherin. He'd never been around it before up until now. Due to his own personal problems. But he was going to keep that a secret for as long as possible. Though he often wondered if his parents once walked the castle's many halls.

La-di-da-di-da!

Maria Charday, as she was known as, walked into the Student Garden, admiring the beauiful plants. Mainly the roses. Did Adrianna, her older stepsister, ever come here? Ad had said that she confessed she loved Justin in a Garden at the magnificent school, bt never said where. Then she saw a boy walking around, alone.

For good looks, on a scale of one to ten, he scored an easy fifteen.

Maria approached from behind and walked beside him. "Hey. I'm Maria. Maria Charday" she said, smiling, her neon locks falling in her eyes.

Mikey continued walking down the endless and winding paths. He enjoyed walking, oddly. It was as though it was a hobby. Almost. But it wasn't a hobby. Then someone joined him. He smiled cutely, as ever, at the girl. "Pleasure meeting you Maria, I'm Mikey. Mikey Grainger" he told her cheerfully. One friend at last. But he'd just got here so he was in no rush to make friends. Though the surname rang a bell.

Maria smiled brightly. "The name rings a bell. Do you know Adrianna Charday? She's my stepsister" she said, fiddling with the ring on the chain around her neck.

Mikey half-smiled. He felt a little awkward around straingers. Always had since he was a little boy. "Yeah I know her. She went out with my cousin" he replied, his voice sounding as sweet as anything.

Maria smiled reassuringly at Mikey. "Yeah, Justin...if it's not too upsetting...why'd he leave?" she asked, braced for tears...or shouting.

Mikey just shrugged. He didn't have the faintest idea why. "I don't know, he never spoke about his personal stuff. He didn't want me to be upset. I know he wasn't well. That's all I do know" he replied. Short and snappy. Ish. Maria ought to have known more than himself, she'd been around longer than he had.

Maria's face fell, and she fiddle with the ring a bit more. "oh" she said softly. "I see. Well...how much about this country do you know?" she asked. The Italian girl didn't know much about her new home country.

Mikey walked over to the nearest bench and sat down on it, looking down. He was rather shy but he didn't know why. "Not a lot. I've never had the chance to explore" he replied. Bang went keeping his life previous a secret.

Maria sat down next to him. "Oh. Well, what do you know that you don't think an Italian like me would know?" she asked.

Mikey looked up at Ad. "Like I said, I've never had contact with the outside world. I don't know anything about anything. I'm new to everything. It's what you get when you've been fostered by several muggle families" he replied sounding a little upset. He did that a lot.

Maria bit her lip and looked down, slightly ashamed. "Oh. I-I'm sorry" she said softly. She heard how upset he sounded, and pulled her hair over one shoulder, her dark green eyes troubled.

Mikey looked up slightly then back down again, his deep brown eyes filled with hurt, fear and sadness. He was reliving it all over again in his mind and it was horrible. He closed his eyes tightly then opened them again as tears fell from his eyes. He never said a word. Just sat and cried slightly. "Don't be sorry" he finally said in a whisper. He didn't want to cry at his new school in this new world. But he knew all along he was likely to.

Maria watched in surprise as Mikey began to cry. She pulled the boy into a hug. "I should be. I said the wrng thing, which caused you to get really upset" she said.