Advanced Class on Care of Magical Creatures

Professor Spencer Morgan

April 13, 2012 9:36 PM

Advanced Class by Professor Spencer Morgan

The new Care of Magical Creatures Professor stood in the clearing where he had been told most of his classes would be held. He had chosen to not where the robes most Professors seemed to wear around here. His classes would be a bit dirty most days and he didn’t want to ruin his nice robes at work. Today he wore a pair of dark jeans, and a purple polo t-shirt. To protect his clothes he wore a dragon hide apron.

He smiled at the Advanced Students as they entered the clearing and took seats on the logs he had placed there for chairs. He had also charmed the logs with a cushioning spell so the students would be comfortable during the lecture part of his lesson. Once the time had passed for class to begin the blonde hair, green eyed Professor clapped his hands. “Good morning, students! I am your new Care of Magical Creatures Professor Spencer Morgan. You may call me Professor Spencer.”

“Let’s get right to business.” with that Spencer opened the box next to him and gently brought out a three headed, orange and black snake. “Ladies and Gents this is Sybill the Runespoor.” he said grinning. Runespoors were among Spencer’s favorite animals.

“The Runespoors are native to Burkina Faso, where several forests are designated as reservations for their sole use. They tend to nest with one other Runespoor until they lay their eggs. They lay their eggs in the most fascinating way through their mouths!” Spencer set the Runespoor down and allowed it to move around freely.

“Runespoors rarely live to a great age, as each head contains an independent brain serving a different purpose, and they tend to attack each other. The right head is the planner, the middle head is the dreamer, and the left head is the critic.”

“ The planner decides where the runespoor goes and what it will do next, although the dreamer's visions often lead to a runespoor remaining stationary for days, lost in its day dreams. The critic, the fangs of which are extremely venomous, hisses continually, evaluating the efforts of the planner and the dreamer. Often, the other two heads will gang up on the critic and bite it off.”

Spencer smiled. “Now for the hands on part of the lesson! You are going to help the Runespoor build nests. Please pair up and collect dried grasses, sticks, leaves. The Runespoors will shape them to their specifications. Please be careful if you get bit please tell me because I will give you the anti-venom. Hop to it!”

Subthreads:

Are you a slithery little snake? by Dulce Garcia, Teppenpaw

0 Professor Spencer Morgan Advanced Class 0 Professor Spencer Morgan 1 5

Dulce Garcia, Teppenpaw

April 15, 2012 2:32 PM

Are you a slithery little snake? by Dulce Garcia, Teppenpaw

Dulce felt that the Care of Magical Creature class had gained the curse that Transfiguration once held. She wasn’t sure when they last had a solid Professor for more than one year. Dulce had no real understanding as to why keeping Professors for a particular lesson was seemingly so difficult. Dulce would have thought a Professor’s job at a long standing school would have been cushy and desirable. But, of course, what did she really know? She found some amusement and worth being a tutor, despite how difficult it was teaching Angel the basics, but she couldn’t exactly say it was her calling. Tutoring Angel and Delilah was one thing, but an entire school full of students… that was a whole other matter.

Dulce’s eyes settled in on the professor as she took her seat on a log. If one knew the three Garcia siblings, they may have wondered about Dulce. Both her sister and her brother had dark hair, eyes, and matching complexions, while Dulce had lighter eyes and paler skin. Her siblings took after their mother, who was full Hispanic and Dulce took after their father, who was only half. They were also very different in personalities. Adelita was a dancer and a girl who thrived in the presence of others. Dulce’s older sister was starting her Sophomore year at Julliard with her steady boyfriend, Juri. Jorge, being the youngest, had more freedom than his sisters. He was adventurous, but knew how to get the grades to keep his parents off his back. Dulce was the quiet one of the bunch. She loved her music and that was all. She had managed a friend or two and to become a tutor at the school, but otherwise, she chose the life of solitude.

This suited her just fine, really.

But that was neither here nor there. Now she sat on the log, taking in the newest professor, who apparently liked to be called by his first name and title. Everyone had a thing, she supposed. At least his lesson wasn’t completely boring. The Runespoor was an interesting creature, even if it didn’t seem to have anything useful to them. What was the point of having three heads if they weren’t put to good use?

Dulce had to suppress a sigh when the actual lesson came about. She had to assume that he didn’t want them to use magic to collect the material, otherwise, it wouldn’t really be that decent of a lesson. Dulce stood up from the log and made her way into the gardens to begin collecting grass and leaves. If anyone wanted to be her partner, she was more than willing, but otherwise, didn’t really mind working alone.

0 Dulce Garcia, Teppenpaw Are you a slithery little snake? 0 Dulce Garcia, Teppenpaw 0 5

Jane Carey, Teppenpaw

April 29, 2012 4:40 PM

Maybe one head is? by Jane Carey, Teppenpaw

For as long as Jane could remember, she and her older brother had been exposed to as many of the great disciplines as their parents could find tutors for and squeeze into their already over-full schedules, all in the interests of producing a son who would prove himself as a philosopher-king and rescue, at the end of it all, two whole branches of their family from total ruin. Jane receiving the same education had been an unintended consequence, something that happened because Edmond and Jane had begun to refuse to do things the other didn’t get to do, too, but she was grateful for it, anyway. She couldn’t see how life could be anything other than gray and confusing when you didn’t have the knowledge to make sense of it all.

As they got older, they had been allowed, more and more, to choose their own areas of study, within limits, and at that point – after Edmond went to school – they had begun to see that they were not, as they had always assumed they were, perfectly the same. Jane in particular had developed interests in philosophy and political theory, both of which bored her brother but were coming in handy as the new professor, grinning, came up with a runespoor. The philosophy allowed her to recall that they were mentioned in a number of fascinating texts about the concept of the self, and the political theory was helping her remember that it was always best to look after her own interests as she took out her wand and, she hoped discreetly, cast a spell which put up an invisible barrier between her and the snake, just in case the poisonous head decided to be active when it was near her.

Once that was done, Jane felt more comfortable observing the creature and listening to the professor. It had been a long time since she doubted that a spell she cast would do what she meant for it to do, or it felt like a long time, anyway. It was always best to keep one eye on the creature when dealing with something poisonous, but she thought she would be safe as long as she sat still.

She couldn’t do that while hunting for twigs and things, though, so she frowned slightly as she worked a charm and a bit of a transfiguration on her skirt and shoes after she stood up, making them, if not impermeable, at least significantly tougher than they had been to begin with. She didn’t know exactly how long a runespoor’s fangs were off the top of her head, or with how much force it would strike, but it was just a precaution, not something she expected would happen; Dark wizards had been known to keep them for pets for centuries, there were whole books about that, and while Dark wizards didn’t tend to live to very old ages, and especially not to do so as free men who could own pets, it wasn’t usually the snake that killed them. She could be careful enough, she was sure, to not get bit, but it never hurt to be a little more careful than you needed to be.

Now she had to find a partner. She saw Dulce Garcia leaving the clearing alone and followed her, deciding the Teppenpaw prefects might as well stick together, at least enough to seem to comply with a new teacher, and also knowing that Dulce was not talkative. Jane wasn’t in a very talkative mood today, so that suited her very well. She transfigured her handkerchief into a little basket and then caught up.

“Good day, Dulce,” she said, catching up, before scooping some twigs into the basket. She could, she supposed, have just left it as a handkerchief – there were many theories, some of which she could agree from personal experience had merit, about how it was bad to rely too much on magic, lest you forget how to improvise when it wasn’t available – but it was a bit easier this way not to lose things, and she had another. Always having two handkerchiefs was something that her mother had taught her when she was small.

0 Jane Carey, Teppenpaw Maybe one head is? 0 Jane Carey, Teppenpaw 0 5