Having followed the professor down to the grounds, West stopped in his tracks. They were gonna be 'burned at the stake' were they? Well so long as he didn't end up tied up he was all for it. Sounded fun. And besides the flame-freezing charm wasn't hard.

He found a spot and waited quietly for the lesson to resume.

Right by the Forbidden Forest, how nice.

Ella disliked that place for a few reasons but she figured they were safe enough now, Professor in their company and wands with them. Hopefully nothing ridiculous happened while they were here. Hopefully.

Speaking of ridiculous, it had taken a ridiculously long time to get out here. Slow Ella was slow today. Everything just...hurt, y'know? Hey, maybe she was actually getting taller! Late growth spurt or something? It could happen, right? Hmm..

The blonde stood on the outside of the circle of bonfires, curious as to what was in the large boxes the Professor was standing by. She eyed them for a moment or two before tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. Surely they'd find out soon enough. For now, she'd just wait and enjoy the warmth from the bonfires. Yup.

Stopping near the edge of the Forbidden Forest, Lux joined a few of her classmates who had already assembled there. Since she had never ventured to this part of the grounds before, she looked around curiously first at the big trees (which were scary looking), and then over to the big bonfires and the boxes. Wondering what on earth was in the boxes, she waited to hear what was happening next. As long as the Professor was there, things would be safe... right?

Sander followed the Professor until they reached the edge of the Forbidden Forest where there were three campfires blazing. Standing at the edge of one of them, Sander waited patiently for the other students to join them. As he waited, he looked at the flames and wondered how it felt to have been burned at the stake. He shuddered just thinking about it. It must have been horrible. Then he saw someone familiar and walked over to join them.



Sander saw his young friend and bent down to bump shoulders with her. "Hey Lux, mind if I join you here?" he asked her. Even as he did, he glanced around to look for Tessa.

After what seemed to be years, Adi arrived at the designated spot. He eyed the Forbidden Forrest, thinking how fun it would be to explore it. But not when he was plagued with this strange slowness.

Anyway, here he was, taking in the fires and the Professor standing with the boxes and waiting patiently for the lesson to resume.

When Lux felt someone bump shoulders with her, she was happy to see that it was Sander. "Hey! Isn't this exciting?!" She really was curious as to what the Professor had planned for them, and hoped that she would be able to master the spell if she kept the advice she got from both Tessa and Lucas in mind. Noticing Sander glancing around, she figured he was probably looking for Tessa, and wondered where that girl was. And on another note, where was Bay?

Cutty wanted a good seat...close to the fires, but apparently they weren't meant to take them as he was prompted to take a place further away. Why the boxes, then? He stopped himself from thinking something exciting would be beneath them, because from lessons before surprises were inevitably less charging than one always thought. He turned sharply, wearing a sort of blank expression, then gravitated towards the other Slytherins (LIKE WEST) who'd gotten there first and yawned.

Bay was following the rest of the class where he spotted Sander because he was a tad taller than Lux… and then Lux.. he jogged over to meet up with them "Hey guys… this class is awesome right" he said while trying to catch his breath.

As they reached the edge of the forest, Adrienne peered into it, curious. She'd never really approached it before- though she'd been tempted to try, simply due to the fact that it was against the rules, she was always busy or admittedly a little bit frightened, so she'd never been this far out on the grounds. Her attention was drawn to what appeared to be silhouette somewhere within the dark mass of trees, though it could easily have been a shadow or a stump. Moments later, she was distracted as she noticed that there were, in fact, three giant fires around her. Her eyes lit up and she moved in towards one, where two people were already standing. (Squishy and FireboltAvis88) The heat from the fire felt great on her front half, but it was making her back uncomfortably cold, so she turned sideways and noticed who exactly she was next two.

"Oh, it's you," Adrienne said, her lip curling slightly. The girl from Divination who'd gotten her into trouble. If she hadn't raised a fuss, she wouldn't have lost any points for Ravenclaw and she wouldn't have walked around in a bad mood for the rest of the day. She glanced at the professor, but he didn't seem distracted enough for her to make any threats, so instead she just scowled at the girl.

Slow walking was slow. He hoped that the Professor wouldn't mind; the boy was simply taking care of his back, which he rubbed every now and then on his journey outside. It was probably a good thing that the History of Magic classroom was so close to the grounds. One floor and some walking down the grounds.

... Was that... fire?!

Alec was perplexed. Fire. And there was the Forbidden Forest there too. He shot a furtive glance over in that direction before looking back at the Professor. As long as they weren't going inside the forest, he was okay. Happy, even. But still mainly confused at the three campfires that were surrounding them.

Coming to a stop near a huddle of students, the seventh year let out a small sigh of relief that they weren't walking anymore. Were those boxes? ... What...? Campfires and whatever was in those boxes. Confused, he was. But he wasn't going to question it. The man would explain soon enough, yeah? Right now, he was just going to stand there. Awkwardly.

Hearing a voice near her, Lux turned and saw the girl from Divination glaring at her. Well, it was her own fault for insulting Lucas, so the only one she could blame for the points loss was herself. Not wanting to cause a scene, and really not being overly concerned with the whole matter now since Lucas was okay, Lux paid her no real attention and turned her attention back to the bonfire just as Bay arrived.

"Hey, Bay. Tell me about it!" Watching the fires burning, she started thinking of all those poor witches and wizards who had suffered, burning because they were accused of being magical. That on top of the scary trees, had her rather frighten. Instinctively, she reached out and grabbed Bay's hand for comfort. She did like contact when she was upset, like hugs, and he was like her brother.

With a strange crack in his hip every few steps or so, Terry followed the Professor and arrived at the campfires. He blinked a couple of times and then scratched his head. Was the Professor intending on burning a few kids at the stake? He feared for the first years.

The Slytherin watched the flames cautiously as he stood outside of the circle and waited for the Professors instructions. His attention was then drawn to the Forbidden Forest, his eyes scanning for some form of Magical Creature that he could watch intently. But he was soon disappointed and the sixteen year old went back to waiting for his fellow classmates to arrive.

Soon enough, Toby found himself arriving at the fires with the rest of the class. Sure it was the middle of the day, but it was still easy to tell exactly where they were supposed to be going, as the fires were pretty obvious.

When he reached where the rest of the group was, Tobias surveyed the scene for a moment or two before going over to stand near to Alec, 'cause why not?

Then he waited.

Campfire? Interesting. Caleb caught up with the rest of the class and gathered around with them, heading towards the back of the crowd. Whenever fire was involved, he wanted to stop and see what they were going to do first before he got involved.

Some pretty awesome campfires going on in the forest right now. Made sense since they were going to be practicing that charm. Where they going to be on those stakes like in the Middle Ages. Just not getting really burned.

Nigel waited patiently with everyone else to see what they were really going to do.

Bart followed the rest of the group his eyes bouncing from the different kids to the scene around them until they stopped near the campfires. Why were they all standing so far away from him, were they scared? He moved as close as he was allowed and looked at the fires, "Are we going to get to make s'mores after the lesson?" Oh wait that really wasn't where he wanted his question to go, but food sounded good he was hungry and s'mores were awesome and there was fire and fire was great and did he know about potions, because it had flames as well and that was so cool.


"Professor if you need an assistant could I help? I like flames and fire and I'm not afraid of getting hurt, I drank potion that made my insides burn. So did some others, but still I'll help." He looked at the flames again. He wanted to do the charm now did they have to wait for anyone else. Why were all these people walking so slow and taking so long. Really they were kids. It's pretty sad if an adult could walk faster than them. Quidditch season seemed doomed if this was their pace.

Could they start.. now.. come on.. spell time people!!!

Sander smiled down at Lux. "You're right. This is exciting," smiled down and at the younger puff. Then he glanced up just in time to see Bay. "Hey Bay. How's it going? Yep it definitely is awesome too. I wonder what the Professor is going to make us do." Sander asked both of them, although he had a sneaky suspicion he knew....but hoped that he was wrong.



Sander doing his lookover rounds trying to see whether he could spot Tessa, saw Lux slip her hand into Bay's. Sander grinned and quickly turned away not wanting either of them to see him. He always thought they were a cute couple...even if they weren't officially one.

Tessa finally caught up with the group- and it was quite obvious where her friends were. After all, Sander stood at least a head taller than most of the population. She was about average- so it was a little easier to see over everyone.

"Hey guys," she whispered, patting Bay on the back and giving Lux's shoulder a reassuring squeeze. Naturally, she went over to stand next to Sander. She would have stood between him and Lux, but they were holding hands. She didn't want to interrupt that. Or Lux and Bay's hand holding. Grin.

And, since it seemed to be a common occurrence, she slipped her hand in Sander's. "So, do we know what the fires are for yet?" she whispered to him, taking in the scene of the fires against the forest.

Ohh, fires! Three of them, to be exact. Sophie noted that the professor was in the middle, along with boxes of who-knew-what. She stood with the rest of her classmates and waiting for things to begin.

She overheard Maroon volunteering to help. Riiiight. Sophie had heard about him. People thought she was trouble, but that boy? That boy would be the one to accidentally knock somebody into a fire.

Fires.

Beverly liked those. When her magic started showing up that's what happened. Fires. Everywhere. She stopped about a foot away from where Cutty stood and watched the professor with curious eyes. They just finished talking about the Salem Witch Trials and people getting burned at the stake. Were they...

Nah.

He wouldn't have students try that...right? If so, Bev wanted to be the burner, not the burn-ee. Dibs!

Alex arrived at the edge of the Forbidden Forest to see three large fires surrounded by her classmates. Thinking that this was bound to be an interesting demonstration, she made her way closer to the action......but not too close. Alex was not exactly a big fan of fire. When she spotted some of her friends, she headed in their direction.

It wasn't hard to spot the gathering location for the second portion of the class. The group of students and the professor was only part of the clue. The two....no three large fires already set and steadily blazing was the other and it certainly reminded Ben of what they had been talking about. An involutary shiver rushing through the second year and he absently rubbed the back of his neck as he stood uneasily to try and hide the weird feeling. Now to simply wait for the lesson to resume and hoping nothing bad happened in the process. Spell casting and fires were known to be quite unpredicatable after all.

An unknown professor only made it more...interesting.

Awesome! Mo made his way to the fires the professor had lit along the forest line, limping along at the rear of the pack. Why was the forest so far away from the castle? It wasn't like it HAD to be that far away... someone was obviously prejudiced against trees.

Mo pulled up near West and nodded at his mate. It was nice being friends again, and not something he was taking for granted.

Sander smiled when he finally spotted Tessa...or rather she spotted him. "Hey Tessa, we're glad you could join us...at least I know I am," Sander smiled down at her. "I have a sneaky suspicion but I think I'll wait to see what the Professor says," he told Tessa.

Then he felt her slip her hand into his and Sander's heart began to race again. But he was fine with that. Holding her hand felt the most natural thing in the world right now.