The Goblet of Fire - Harry Potter Male Reader Insert

9: Two Cold Punishers In One School

"Today's not bad... outside all morning," said Ron, who was running his finger down his timetable. "Herbology with the Hufflepuffs and Care of Magical Creatures... damn it, we're still with the Slytherins..."

Y/N, Hermione, Harry and Ron were at Breakfast, examining their new timetables.

The morning of the first day back hadn't even gone by before Y/N would catch people muttering rumours about him. As usual, First years would run away terrified and older years tried their best to torment him. Apparently the latest rumour was that Y/N was responsible for the Dark Mark in the Quidditch World Cup.

"Double Divination this afternoon," Harry groaned, looking down.

"You should have given it up like me and Y/N, shouldn't you?" said Hermione, buttering herself some toast. Her timetable was no longer as full as it had been the previous year, as she had given up on both Muggle Studies and Divination. "Then you'd be doing something sensible like Arithmancy."

"You're eating again, I see," Y/N said, amused, watching Hermione add liberal amounts if jam to her buttered toast.

"I've decided there are better ways of making a stand about elf rights," said Hermione haughtily.

"Precisely." said Y/N.

"Yeah... and you were hungry," said Ron, grinning.

After the owl-post had arrived, they made their way to the sodden vegetable path to greenhouse three, and Professor Sprout introduced the class to the ugliest plants Y/N had ever seen. They looked like thick black slugs, protruding vertiacclt out of the soil. Each was squirming slightly, and had a number of large, shiny swellings upon it, which appeared to be full of liquid.

"Bubotubers," Professor Sprout told them briskly. "They need squeezing. You will collect the pus -"

"The what?" said Seamus Finnigan, sounding revolted.

"Pus, Finnigan, pus," said Professor Sprout, "and it's extremely valuable, so don't waste it. You will collect the pus, I say, in these bottles. Wear your dragon-hide gloves, it can do funny things to the skin when undiluted, Bubotuber pus."

Squeezing the Bubotubers was disgusting, but oddly satisfying. By the end of the lesson, they had already collected several pints.

"This'll keep Madam Pomfrey happy," said Professor Sprout, stoppering the last bottle with a cork. "And excellent remedy for the more stubborn forms of acne, Bubotuber pus. Should stop students resorting to desperate measures to rid themselves of pimples."

"Like poor Eloise Midgen," said Hannah Abbot, a Hufflepuff, in a hushed voice. "She tried to curse hers off."

"Silly girl," said Professor Sprout, shaking her head. "But Madam Pomfrey fixed her nose back on in the end."

A booming bell echoed from the castle across the wet grounds, signalling the end of the lesson, and the class separated; the Hufflepuffs climbing up the stone steps for Transfiguration, and the Gryffindors heading in the other direction, down the sloping lawn towards Hagrid's small wooden cabin, which stood on the edge of the Forbidden Forest.

"Mornin'!" Hagrid said, grinning at Y/N, Hermione, Harry and Ron. "Be'er wait get the Slytherins they won' want ter miss this - Blast-Ended Skrewts!"

"You what?" said Y/N, sounding alarmed.

Hagrid pointed at several wooden crates by his feet.

"Eurgh!" squealed Lavender Brown, jumping backwards.

Lavenders wisely inputted noise of exclamation was a very accurate summation of the revolting creatures that were Blast-Ended Skrewts. They looked like deformed, shell-less lobsters, horribly pale and slimy-looking, with legs sticking out in very odd places and no visible heads. They were giving off a very powerful smell of rotting fish. Every now and then, sparks would fly out of the end of a Skrewt and, with a small phut, it would be propelled forwards several inches.