“It’s bloody freezing out here,” Ron complained grumpily as he trundled along with the rest of the seventh years into the Dark Forest, “Aren’t we not supposed to go in here anyway?” he added nervously, recalling all the misfortune he had encountered in the forest over the years.

  “It’ll be fine,” Hermione replied almost confidently, “Professor Lupin is here.” The rest of the class was unconvinced, but their professor seemed wholly unconcerned;

  “Not much further now! Oh come on; it’s not that cold,” he announced to his shivering class, “Ahh. Here we are.”  They had arrived at a small clearing in which resided several small clumps of mushrooms. 

  “Now I know this is neither a Potions class, nor a Care of Magical Creatures class, but we’re here to look at the mushrooms!” the Professor stated excitedly.  Ron scoffed.  The rest of the class also looked wholly unimpressed.  Professor Lupin pressed on undeterred; “Now as it’s Valentine’s Day I thought these might be of interest.  They aren’t normal mushrooms, and although they aren’t Dark creatures in themselves, they can be used in many Dark spells and potions.  They are really quite dangerous,” he noticed his class growing increasingly uneasy, “but only if used wrongly…or you annoy them, which we are not going to do.   As well as often being used in the Dark Arts they are also, oddly enough, the main ingredient in many love potions and spells…”

  “Would you please shut up.  I am trying to sleep here,” said a tiny voice.  Professor Lupin looked around;

  “Oh I am sorry,” he replied, apparently to the ground in front of him, “I was just teaching my students about your fascinating properties.”  Just as the class was beginning to think their professor had gone mad, they noticed one of the small mushrooms looking up at him.  The mushroom appeared to be grinning mischievously;  

“What would you know?  You’re not a mushroom.  But I’ll tell them.”  The mushroom turned to the class and began; “We’re amazing really…”

“Modest too,” Ron whispered to Hermione and Harry at the back of the class.

“…as well as being fully in control of our faculties, we have thousands of medicinal and magical properties.  For example, just pop one of us into a pot of hot water and you get an amazingly calming cup of tea…”

“Doesn’t that hurt?” Hermione asked in horror at the thought of this poor little mushroom screaming in agony as it slowly boiled to death.

“Oh no, just so long as you don’t eat us, we’re fine.  One of our incredible properties, you see.  Very hardy.  Take today for example.  While you humans are all getting frost bite, I feel like it’s a pretty warm day.  Now don’t interrupt…”  The mushroom (whose name turned out to be Geoff) continued for half an hour explaining different potions and incantations his kind were involved in.  The class stood there, freezing, and a little wary of the being before them.  As the mushroom finally made a pause to breath, Professor Lupin interjected;

“Well that was truly fascinating, thankyou Geoff.” And began to clap.  The rest of the class joined in enthusiastically (a round of applause signaled both the end of the class and provided an excuse to warm their hands up).  The mushroom looked a little perturbed at being interrupted, but bowed graciously.

“Unfortunately, we must end this riveting lesson there, students.  Once again, Geoff, my compliments on your amazing knowledge.  I didn’t know half of those uses!”  Lupin bowed to the mushroom and began leading the class back to Hogwarts.

“I thought we’d be stuck there forever.” Ron whined as he rubbed his blue face.

“It was very interesting though.  I never knew there were mushrooms like that.” Hermione said.  Ron looked at Hermione incredulously;

“That was boring, Hermione.”  Hermione just tutted.

“They’re amazing, aren’t they?” Professor Lupin had fallen in step with Harry, Hermione and Ron.

“Yes! I’ve never heard of them before!” Hermione responded enthusiastically.  The two boys did not share her feelings. 

“They’re very rare, you see,” Lupin began, “but you have to be careful with them.  They’re very mischievous.  Not malicious, but they have a very bad temper.”

“Is there anything that’ll counter the effects of the mushrooms?  Like in any of those potions that mushroom was talking about?”  Lupin looked around in surprise.  It was Malfoy who had spoken.  He had been dawdling behind with his usual cronies and now, suddenly, he seemed to have grown an intense interest in the mushrooms.  Harry couldn’t help feeling suspicious.

“Don’t dawdle about in the Dark Forest, Mr. Malfoy.  And no, there is no known antidote to those potions.  You just have to wait until the effects wear off.  Except for the potions that cause death.  Obviously then the effects don’t wear off.  Because you’re dead…”  Harry noticed a sly grin spread across Malfoy’s pale face.