Mostly filler i wrote because i didnt know how to properly connect it to the next chapter. At somepoint i might take the entire story and overwork the chapters- not rewrite, but overwork.
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She hadn't slept much.
Well, if you could even call this sleep.
The smallest sound caused her to jump awake and when she dreamed her dreams were plagued by terrifying visions.
Little surprise that she was up and about with the daybreak.
Admittedly, she had planned to wake up early.
Her leg still hurt immensely and she didn't trust in her ability to run away from anything. And while she liked nothing more than to roll up in some hole and to never get out, she knew that this was no real option.
As such, with a fallen branch she used as a makeshift crutch, she tried to make as much way as possible before the other inhabitants of the oasis would wake up.
After being confronted with what kind of people were with her in the oasis, she had given up on getting finding any help soon.
The desire to run and leave the oasis was only stopped by the knowledge that a desert surrounded her. Having wandered through it without water just recently made an escape from this penalty colony not an option in her eyes.
Now her goals were reduced to just staying safe.
Hopes and dreams had been extinguished for now, what remained was her endurance.
Just get by.
She needed food and a better hiding place. That cannibal camp was surely not the only one of its kind.
Her leg had gotten better but still hurt terribly, using a stick as crutch allowed her to walk almost painlessly but not very fast.
Should any kind of beast or cannibal see her she wouldn't be able to do much.
As such she tried to move as urgently as she could. An old shirt from Dudley repurposed as a sack to store any big larva or insect she thought to be edible, so that she wouldn't have for food later.
At the same time, she listened intently for the slightest sound that would reveal the presence of someone or something. A few times she froze in shock at a loud creak in the undergrowth or a slightly louder birdcall.
It was, she realised, very similar to what life with the Dursleys had been like. Be quiet, don't get noticed and do your chores as quickly as possible. Only now the consequences were much more serious than just a scolding or a day or two without food.
Uncle Vernon had been right in the end, she really hadn't appreciated what the Dursleys had given her back then.
Not that this would change anything though, she thought when she struggled to balance her weight so that she spared her leg. It may be greedy of her, but she simply couldn't return to that life of disdain and scornful gazes. Not when there might be someone out there that may love her.
That being said she fully understood why Cirilla hadn't returned a second time for her. At best she had been ballast when the wizards had attacked them, at worst she had caused them to catch her mother.
She sighted when she finally reached the foot of the giant statue she had seen yesterday. She had so much to prove and to achieve. It almost seemed impossible to do.
Reaching the statues had given her a vantagepoint to see the shoreline before her, and what she saw worried her:
There was a camp nearby. Tents made of crocked branches and dirty cloth lined the area around and beyond a part of the shore forty or fifty meters away from her.
This was far bigger than the camp of the cannibals she had discovered yesterday. It was perhaps still too early to say anything about the camps inhabitants, but that man from yesterday had told her that this was a penalty colony.
What kind of crime do you have to do to be thrown together with cannibals? She didn't want to know and would certainly not try to figure out.
For a second Rose contemplated of simply circling around the camp like she had done before with crocodiles. At the moment it was still early and she hopped that no one in the camp would be up yet, but after her experience from yesterday she simply didn't want to risk it.
No better was to avoid that camp in its entirely.
Luckily that wasn't that difficult right now.
The two sentinel statues stood on both sides of the water in such a way that the lake was narrowed between them. as a result, the lake was much shallower here than in other places. So shallow, in fact, that from Rose's position it looked as if you could walk to the other side.
Deciding that it was better to get wet than to get killed by cannibals, she started to limb into the water. Soon the water went up to her hips and kept rising even further. Already she feared that her assumption about the waters depth to have been wrong, when she realized that the water was slowly but surely getting shallower.
Dripping wet she arrived on the sea's others side at the feet of the second sentinels.
For a second, she struggled to get used to having to put her weight on her injured leg again, but as soon as the ground become more solid, using her makeshift crunch helped her to continue on. The rising sun slowly but surely drying her clothes.
At this point we perhaps should talk about Roses long term plans.
Originally, she had planned to find civilisation and from there somehow to get to London, where she would search for which mage had created the no defect blood-compass.
With the discovery of what kind of people lived in the oasis, this wasn't an option anymore. At this point it was clear that there wouldn't be able to find anyone willing to help her here.
This of course didn't mean that she had given up on that plan.
No, it merely had gained a small but necessary additional step: Survive.
If she couldn't do so much as take care of herself, then how could she expect Cirilla to take her with her?
"Don't be a burden, prove your usefulness." She nodded while walking down the shore.
Perhaps if her mother saw that she could survive all of this, she would at least see that Rose wouldn't drag her down?
Exhausted she let herself on small boulder down. Walking with a crutch, especially through sand was taxing.
If she wanted to get out of this oasis and through the desert she would be in need of water and proviant that could be kept for an unknown amount of time. Also, she needed to figure out how to orientate herself, less she would walk only deeper into the desert and exhaust her rations.
Of course, this would be all unnecessary if she could just teleport back. Just like the wizards or her mother had done before.
The thought alone was funny. Oh, sure she hoped that she could do that to one day! Besides the obvious reasons it would be amazing to be able to teleport!
But sadly, she had no idea how to do magic, well aside of her explosion spell of course. Which she was very proud of by the way! She hopped her mother would share her excitement when she saw what she had managed to do all alone.
The grumbling of her stomach ripped her out of her musings.
Right, she hadn't eaten anything yet. Her shirt sack also was empty.
With some difficulty she pulled herself up. Surely there were some big larvae around?
It took her two hours until she found a relatively small caterpillar crawling on the trunk of a crooked palm tree.
Greedily she didn't hesitate to sink her teeth into it.
At fault had been the shallow vegetation on this side of the oasis. While technically still close to the water, the ground was now far rockier than on the other side and offered not much space for plants to grow.
Instead, she had to wander even further until she found small groups of bushes trees again. And even then, there were almost none of the larvae.
Of course- so Rose mused while she was chewing on the last bit of insect-meat- perhaps this also meant that people would keep away from this part of the oasis. Afterall why should anyone go here if they there was neither food nor shade?
Sadly, this made this area for her unattractive too, despite the lack of people.
Shaking her head, she stood up again. This was leading to nothing and she was thirsty anyway. Walking down from crooked palm back to the shore, she tried to fall on to her knees without putting any stress on her hurt leg.
Then when she shovelt awkwardly with her hand water into her mouth she so it- or better them.
Little fish swimming away from where she was disturbing the water.
The idea flashed through her mind. Perhaps she could try to catch one of them? When she had crossed the sea, she had definitely seen bigger fishes too. Of course, she didn't have really any experience in fishing. Uncle Vernon had taken Dudley once with him on a fishing trip, but she had to stay at home back then.
Of course, she understood the basics. A lure on a long line, and when the fish swallowed the lure with the line, the line was used to pull it ashore.
She didn't have a line of course. But she did have a stick.
A few minutes later, Rose balanced herself on one leg in knee high water, while holding her crutch ready to strike at soon as a fish would dare to swim near her. She had sharpened the thinner end of it by repeatedly scratching it on a rock, yet even with this adjustment catching anything had proven difficult.
Whenever she actually tried to skewer a fish, she seemed to miss her target. Even her best shots, missed the prey ever so barely.
Yet Rose was nothing but enduring if given proper motivation. And getting proper food without going anywhere near areas where cannibals or unruly criminals would build up their camps was certainly motivating enough. Slowly the day went pass without Rose catching so much as even a single fish. Already she felt hungry once more and contemplated calling it a day. Surely, she could still find just soe seeds or giant caterpillars again.
Giving it one last try, she pushed her makeshift spear forward once more. Perhaps she was a bit overeager to try something else to find food, for when she pushed her spear down, she suddenly lost her balance.
Catching herself on her spear at the last second, she avoided falling into the water.
"That would have been awkward. I just got dry again." With a sight she struggled to regain her footing. Well, that had been another miss. This time she hadn't even properly targeted the damn fish.
Or hadn't she?
Because there it was! Almost ripped apart by the thick wood of her crutch/spear, hang a single fish!
Her excitement for her success was only dwarfed by her sheer bewilderment for it. How had she succeeded now? She was certain that she had missed the fish before her spear had even broken through the water's surfaces!
Pulling the fish from her spear, she stuffed it into her sack, preparing herself for yet another attempt. But this time she tried something else: the second where she pushed her spear down, Rose purposefully pulled it a bit to the side.
A small red cloud started to sip from the fish when her stick skewered it.
God she was right! And she was obviously an idiot. The water distorted the fish's proper location. She could have realized that hours ago.
A bit frustrated, yet in fact quite happy about her success and discovery she left the water and returned to the shore.
The sun was already starting to set when she returned to her new camp between a few rocks and a single palm tree. Proudly she took her to catches out and looked at them.
Now in regard of eating them… she couldn't eat them raw like the larvae, could she? Better was she would try eat cook them.
Was just a little problem with the fire.
Quickly she gathered some dried-up leaves and a few branches of a nearby dead bush. She had read in a book about the stone age that people rubbed some stick on a piece of wood to make fire, yet her attempts sadly resulted in failure.
Luckily, she had an alternative for this. Searching through her backpack she pulled the wand of the dead wizard out. Sure, pushing her magic into it only resulted in a shower of pretty sparks, but wasn't that what she kind of needed?
Putting the wand between the leaves and small branches, she easily managed to create small clouds of smoke, and soon enough the first few flames.
Pulling the now slightly burned wand out of her improvised fireplace, she instead piled the remaining and bigger branches on it. Then, with some hesitation, she placed the dead fishes on rocks near the fire.
She knew that technically she should have taken the intestines of the fish out. Rose had done so in the past for her aunt, but she now lacked a knife for it. The fishes were also not as big as the once the Dursleys bought at the market, so hopefully it wasn't necessary?
When the bluish scales of one fish started to turn in brown and blackish, she decided to try it.
She almost spied it out.
While the flesh of the fish had been properly cooked and turned white, it had become almost unbearable bitter.
Ignoring the instinct to throw the ruined meal away she started to pull and pick the pieces of eatable meat of the overcooked fish. This wasn't the first time she had gotten to eat something inedible.
One horrible tasting meal and two fishes later, Rose was cleansing her mouth at the shore. Using a stick as a toothbrush she tried to get even the last remnants of the horrific taste out of her mouth.
She definitely needed a knife or something similar.
Her mind wandered back to the weapons of the cannibals. They had used weapons made from stone and bone. And hadn't she read how people in the stone age made knifes or spearheads from some kind of special stone? What was it again…?
She couldn't remember. But she needed something sharp in future, she already had troubles sharpening her crutch into a fishing spear.
A yawn escaped her. The day had been taxing again and despite everything it was nice and relaxing to have eaten something warm for once. She would see tomorrow if she could find something useable as a knife.
However, she didn't plan to sleep just yet.
She had still to practise her magic after all. The last few days since her arrival in the desert she hadn't really gotten around to it, but alone the fact she hadn't really been able to call on it at the cannibal camp showed her that she couldn't become lazy at it.
She had to become used to using it at any moment! Of course, there were other reasons too…
Would Cirilla praise her for figuring magic out on her own? And could she perhaps figure other things besides her explosion-spell out too? She hoped so, being able to do magic was amazing.
Not simply "save her life amazing" but more like "Oh god, she could actually do magic amazing".
It would also be great if she could somehow produce similar magic like she had seen the wizards or even her mother use. In fact, that would be the best possible case. Then she could just teleport herself out of here.
Sadly, she had no idea how to even start at that. Her explosion spell was somewhat understandable of what how it worked, but how would someone go about teleporting oneself? That wasn't really something one learnt in elementary school, hell most kids her age still learnt how to read properly!