Chapter Twenty
"Dark Organic"

Page Two

"Yes, Seamus?"

"Is… is there anyway to get a soul out of an… an opal?" asked Seamus breathlessly.

Professor Binns thought Seamus looked just as ill as poor Dean Thomas. Perhaps there was an epidemic on his hands.

"That is unknown, but there have been a few theories," answered Binns. "Next… Mr. Longbottom."

"Has anyone figured out how to… how to… to capture someone's soul in an opal, even if they were born in October?" Neville stuttered.

Poor Mr. Longbottom… he must have caught this virus worse than the others. He looks as if he might faint. He looks as if he might wet himself, poor chap.

"Rumors circulated for a while that there might be a way to do this, but nothing was ever confirmed. It is just a legend and there have been no confirmed accounts of such a thing happening," assured Professor Binns. "Although… it always looks as if the person just died of natural causes, so one might never know."

Binns looked around the class and saw that all hands had been lowered thoughtfully and maybe the epidemic had resolved itself. They were all quiet again, thank heavens. No need to alert Madam Pomfrey.

The only Professor who was not overly agitated was Professor Malfoy. He seemed different, but not agitated or stressed. In their first Potions lesson after the incident, the Gryffindors and Slytherins were combined, but the regular Gryffindor-bashing seemed almost absent. Professor Malfoy, who normally would instigate the sly, hurtful remarks, the points deductions and so on, seemed rather quiet, almost reverent towards the Gryffindors. Everyone knew that the Malfoys were uneasy about the fact that Harry Potter had saved Draco. It was quite obvious Professor Malfoy wasn't sure how to be anything but hateful towards Harry, although, it was apparent that he was at least making an effort, albeit a small one, to be civil.

The following Friday met them with another peaceful flurry of snow. The students looked out the windows to see everything had been beautifully framed with piles of soft whiteness. Hagrid's hut looked like a gingerbread house from the view of Gryffindor tower.

"Come on, Harry," said Ron, his head poking around the door of the boy's dormitory. "We have to get going, it's quite a walk to the greenhouses from here. Hermione said we can't be late."

"Alright," said Harry lazily, pulling his gaze away from the window.

Harry, Ron, Hermione and the rest of the fourth year Gryffindors tromped across the cold, hard, snow-covered grounds of Hogwarts, towards greenhouse three. Herbology was their first class of the day. Normally around this time of year they had double Herbology with the Hufflepuffs, but due to the lack of a Transfiguration class, their schedules had been entirely rearranged. This unnerved Hermione to no end, however, she never complained about it.

They arrived at greenhouse three with freezing hands and bright red noses. They walked inside and were met by a nice warm waft of air, which smelled profoundly of chlorophyll.

Inside it was a pleasant 75 degrees; the tropical plants were housed here and they couldn't stand a temperature any lower.

They took off their heavy cloaks and hung them near the front door. Then they walked through a small archway of greenery and birds of paradise, into an opening where a few tables and chairs had been placed.

"Where's Professor Ceres?" asked Lavender, looking around and noticing they were alone.

"Hmm," said Seamus thoughtfully. "I bet she's just late. I don't think she'd skip off like Snape did."

"Let's just sit down," groaned Dean. "My feet are killing me."

Ron sat down next to Dean and set his book bag on the table. He reached his hand inside and pulled out a small bag of fudge.

"Mmm," he cooed, "want some fudge, Dean?"

"No thanks," said Dean, rubbing his aching feet. "I'm still full from breakfast. Those pancakes were huge."

Ron shrugged his shoulders and continued shoving fudge into his mouth.

Hermione shook her head disapprovingly as she turned to Harry, who had been looking at the other greenhouses through the glass, each one gracefully outlined in snow.

"What are you looking at, Harry?" asked Hermione.

"…nothing," he said slowly. "I was just thinking. I don't remember that shed being there last year," he pointed to a small wooden shed towards the left, between their greenhouse and greenhouse number two.

Hermione opened her mouth to comment but before she could say anything, the door of the shed in question opened and Professor Ceres stepped out. She didn't seem to be walking as gracefully as she normally did. She marched her way across the snow and entered greenhouse three through a back door.

She cleared her throat as she came into the little opening where the students were sitting, and said, "I'm sorry I'm late, chaps. Lost track of time."

Harry looked skeptically at Professor Ceres. She looked flushed; her face was pale, with red highlighting around her hairline and cheekbones.

Hermione led Harry to the table where Ron and Dean were sitting. They took their seats and flopped their book bags onto the table.

Professor Ceres meandered through the desks, absentmindedly gazing at the flora that hung all around the greenhouse. She was quickly regaining her natural graceful glide of a walk, she seemed as if she belonged more at a cocktail party instead of a stuffy greenhouse; there was a different air about her. She appeared light on her feet and thoroughly pleased with… something.

Or maybe Harry was just imagining it. The rapid change from a cold to a warm environment must be playing with his head.

"Ah, I love greenhouse three," she sighed in a voice that could have easily been mistaken for having a flirtatious undertone. She continued to walk around them, her gaze moving lazily from plant to plant. "So warm," she cooed as she stopped to look at a very large bright red flower that was larger than a quaffle. She picked a leaf from the plant next to the flower and began gliding the tip of the brilliant green leaf tauntingly along the edge of the flower's foot-size petals.

"So warm," she repeated as her gaze turned eerily towards the students. "So warm… yet so deadly." She trailed the leaf along the petal, one inch closer towards the center and in an instant, the flower shook and dark green tentacles shot out from behind the flower, wrapping themselves quickly around the flower, encasing it in a wrinkly green shell.

A few students screamed, some of the boys, out of some paternal instinct, rose quickly from their chairs, checking to see if Professor Ceres had gotten her hand out of reach of the horrid green tentacles in time.

Professor Ceres, however, stood perfectly still, unshaken, her gaze had not moved one centimeter. She seemed as if nothing more threatening than a Muggle ice cream truck were present in the room.

Her lips curled slowly into an all-knowing grin as this worried and frightened ambience became ever more prominent among the students.

"Sit back down, Mr. Finnegan," said Professor Ceres in that same tauntingly, almost flirtatious tone. She glided over to him, her hands in her pockets. Seamus, on the other hand, stood frozen in shock, only his eyes moved as they traced Professor Ceres' movements.

She quickly snapped her right arm up, placing her hand on Seamus' shoulder.

He let out a short, apprehensive scream, as did a few others, afraid of what they might see on Seamus' shoulder instead of Ceres' clean, white, well-manicured hand.

Seamus' head snapped over and as soon as he saw the untouched hand on his shoulder, he slouched down into his chair, his head feeling frightfully light.

"You may all sit down," said Ceres lightly, her gaze moving to Ron, then Dean, until finally resting on Harry.

"That idiotic flower didn't have a chance with me," she glided back up to the archway from whence she entered then turned on her heel to face the class.

"That," she said, "is a Burmese Red Dragon."

The rest of the males in the room slouched back into their seats.

"It'll eat anything that gets within three inches of its center," continued Ceres. "Just. Like. That."

The class stared back at her in stunned silence; they still hadn't recovered from that violently organic demonstration.

"Yes," said Professor Ceres airily. "I do love greenhouse three. There are hidden dangers in here, chaps. Today, I think you might fancy a quick look at the darker side of Herbology."

Neville's left eye started twitching and he mouthed, "I don't know if I can handle this."

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