As the sun rises I shift from my spot in the middle of the clearing. I'm back to normal, the fatigue from earlier is gone. Seems that sitting still for a while worked. I notice that I can't hear anything around me, no small animals, no birdsong, nothing. Sure, I can hear all that in the distance, but there's none nearby. There's nothing large either, no predators to have scared them off... Except for me. I guess after seeing the magic from last night I've been recognized as something to be avoided.

The trip back to the campsite is similarly quiet, the forest falling silent as I pass. I'm not getting any more hunting done around here, not unless I stumble across something that's not paying much attention. Well, we should be leaving soon enough anyways, but I had hoped to catch something before that. Shadow Cloak isn't going to work during the day and it's going to be hard to find prey at night. I suppose I'll have to hunt once we cross the channel.

As I reach the edge of the forest I can see Elvira rummaging through the bags, a pile of roasted cubes of meat and some thick slices of bread on the cutting board beside the dying embers of the fire. She doesn't notice as I make my way behind her, grabbing a few chunks of meat and pulling them into my body to devour. It's my first time trying cooked meat that hasn't been dried, it's as good as raw human. Maybe better. It's cold, clearly not freshly cooked, I suppose Elvira must have prepared it some time ago. Speaking of the elf, she notices me as she turns away from the bag, letting out a small squeak of surprise.

"Gah, don't sneak up on people like that Umbra," Elvira says indignantly. "Make noise when moving around or something!"

Having run out of ink to write there isn't much I can do but mimic a shrug. Maybe I can find some sort of substitute, I'll have to look into that.

"How'd the hunting go? Catch anything?"

I can't exactly answer that... I dig my tendrils into the sand, pulling my main mass into the air and forming a ball to make something akin to a head, attempting to shake the "head" no. From Elvira's confused expression I don't think I got my message across, but it's the best I can do. I drop back down and hold up the notepad and empty bottle of ink, miming dipping a tendril in and writing to show that I can't do it anymore. That one seems to be a bit easier to understand.

"Out of ink, huh," Elvira says. "We do need to talk though. Come over here for a minute, then."

Elvira gets up and begins walking towards the forest. I follow, but only after grabbing a few more chunks of meat. The elf stops at the edge of the forest where the ground is firm enough for me to write in, waiting a moment for me to catch up before speaking.

"We need to leave today. As soon as possible. I wanted to stay at least a bit longer, but... I don't know if you noticed, there were lights on the other side of the channel last night. A city. They'll have noticed your magic last night and someone will come check what it was, we need to be gone by then."

I scratch in the dirt, writing out my response. No way across with all of us. Leave the humans?

After a moment's pause Elvira nods her head. "We don't have any other choice. I'm sure they'll be fine, it won't take more than a day before a ship comes by and picks them up."

Bring them over, I'll tell them.

So, you stay here. We'll leave food. Someone will come soon.

Harry speaks up, Josephine standing just behind him. "That's fine."

"Do they need anything?" Elvira asks. "Tell them we'll leave it with them if they do."

Anything you need?

Harry hesitates, before eventually deciding to speak. "If you're offering, we-"

"Nothing!" Josephine interrupts him. "Nothing, we don't need anything."

The two of them whisper back and forth for a few moments, a bit too quickly for me to make it all out. I hear something about the Void, corruption, and accepting dark gifts. Josephine wins the argument in the end, assuring me that they don't need anything from me. She emphasizes the "from me" part, slightly enough that I'm not sure if she realizes she's doing it. I can guess that they don't trust me not to do something to whatever I give them. Well, that just means that the elf won't complain if we take everything useful.

In elvish I write, They don't want anything. Something about dark gifts and Void corruption.

"Of course they'd say that," Elvira responds, exasperated. "Still, we can't carry everything with us, we leave what we don't need. It's up to them whether they use it."

Alright.

The elf spends the next few minutes swapping what's in what bag. It seems she had already done the bulk of the work before I returned and is just finishing up. In the meantime I finish off the pile of roasted meat, and decide to try a slice of bread. It's dry, tasteless. Not bad, but not particularly good either. As usual the humans are staying to themselves a good distance away from me and don't make any move to eat the remaining food. I'm sure they'll take some once I move away, they always do. Elvira gives me a look when she sees that I've finished the meat, but doesn't say anything.

I help the elf move the two bags that we'll be taking into the boat. I'm happy to see that she hasn't tried to leave my books behind, and that we have most of the food with us. I'm not entirely sure how much food humans need, but I can guess that Elvira hasn't left them enough for more than a day or two. I wonder, is she really that sure that a boat will pick them up within a day, or is she surprisingly ruthless? I'm not sure which I'd prefer, the latter would mean I could convince her to let me kill and eat the odd human, but it would also make her more likely to betray me. I suppose I can still eat humans either way, I just have to make sure she doesn't find out.

Soon enough Elvira and I are ready to set off. She clambers into the boat, readying the oars and waving to the humans while I slip into the water. A few tendrils reach around and grasp the edges of the boat while most of my body stays in the shade beneath it. It's just dark enough that, with the help of Night's Veil, I can create a few Black Hands and shape them into oars. It will help our speed, the elf alone would take a full day to cross the channel at least, longer than I want to spend out here. There's no telling what lives in the water. It should be safe if Farkas used this boat, but it's not something that I want to risk more than necessary.