It would have been around dawn that I made my way out of the library, my invisibility and nondetection spells refreshed as I started walking again, my hoof-steps still eerily loud in the darkness of the predawn, but there were already sounds of movement about the town, no cars or anything, but the sound of early rising animals either out in the forest or in the small pastures within eye-line of the main street.

              I held my bag tightly as I just kept walking, the first body of water I passed, I paused by to refill my canteen which had a built in filter for my own safety though I did cast a few spells on it to purify it too. As I was doing so, I picked up a small stone from the stream edge, no bigger than a quarter or so, flat and smooth from the running water and a soft maroon-gray stone. I like to get stones like these whenever I find one that looks pretty or something happens in the place I stayed the night in, this would have been the prior sense that was about as uneventful as always. One of the pockets of my bag has all of the stones I’ve gathered in it, though a good handful of them are also stashed inside a double-layered sock to use as an impromptu weapon if need be.

              I’ve learned I don’t know how much about the wilderness not just from these three years of wandering, but from the libraries or other places I’ve stayed, I’d constantly be reading so, I’d just grab book after book after book. I am pretty good nowadays at being able to forage for my own food when I want or need to, a cantrip or two could also easily bring down some sort of edible animal, though I’ve had to eat some that most people would not consider eating if they had a choice like squirrel, pigeon or various forms of bugs or frogs. You get desperate when you’re hungry and some of those are honestly not as bad as you’d think.

              Based on the feel of the wind and the way moss grew along the tree bases or stones, I was moving in a south-ward direction, I had no destination, no end to my wandering or anything, I just had nowhere to go back to or to go towards. Aimlessly walking about the US was all my life has been these past few years and to the best of my knowledge, there was not a feasible end in sight.

              The low, long sound of a train’s steam whistle hit my hearing as I walked, before breaking out into a run, casting a spell on myself as I shot into the air a little as I saw the train flying by, I waited a few seconds before I saw a car that had it’s side doors open a crack, I was able to keep pace with it for a few seconds before I grabbed the edge of the car and pulled myself in. It was empty in the sense of there being no people or anything alive on the car, but there was a massive amount of hey bales, which while not the most comfortable, they were more so than the wooden floor of the car. I had been moving south, but because of the train, I had the idea that now I was moving south-west. I sat on a hay bale as I set my bag down and pulled my legs up onto the bales as I put my back to the wall of the car, sighing in relief at the idea of being able to cover a large chunk of space and give my legs a break. I used that time to eat, check my supplies and use what spells I had to repair my clothing, clean up what dirty clothing I had and checked to see how much money I had on my person. I sighed deeply as I ran my thumb along the stack of change and extremely rumbled bills I had. $13.52 was all I had to my name at that time. That could get me some stuff if I see a really, really grungy second-hand store, or I could try to get off the train at a larger town or city and try to gather some more funds. Shit, even if I see a park that has a fountain I could do that, I am not above wading through a park fountain to gather all of the change in it, there’s a lot there. I know a lot of places use the change to maintain the fountain, so I don’t take a lot, just usually sift out a few dollars’ worth, depending on the size of the fountain or popularity of the park, I may be able to gather more or less if it’s a small area. I could only imagine how many dollars’ worth of change was in a Vegas fountain.

              Thirteen dollars…maybe I could get some actual food from a fast food place or maybe I’ll splurge on a few pairs of socks or underwear. I could cast a spell on myself and sneak into an orchard or something too if I get really desperate, I try to steal as little as I possibly can, hence putting the pennies and nickels in the vending machines or taking as little money out of the fountains as possible, I only take as much as I need to survive and give back what I possibly could.

              I turned my head into my shoulder as I coughed heavily, from last nights downpour, I’m guessing I got a bit of a cold brewing or something, my chest hurt and my head was starting to feel a little fuzzy too, so as usual I’ll just have to tough it out and hope it doesn’t progress to something worse.

              I peaked out the slot of the door to see nothing, but endless cornfields were rolling past, no magic city or something for a longshot, there is a magical city in every state capital, but there were no landmarks or even roads I could see to give me an idea as to where I was and the sky was bright and blue so there were no stars I could use to navigate as well. Also sense I was in this hay bale car, there wasn’t a map or something that could tell me where I was as if it was a passenger car that had maps of all the routes it took or you had a ticket to see where you were heading towards, all I had was the knowledge of train tracks usually go to civilizations.

              As for the constant invisibility and nondetection spells, I’m not running from the law or anything like that, just…I know the people I ran away from and the chances of me revealing their wrongdoings to the people of where I’m from would make them stop at nothing to find me and keep me from telling anyone what I’ve gone through…permanently. Parents are like that sometimes, especially my father, he wouldn’t even stop at my death to prevent what he did to me being known. He’s probably find a way to kill my ghost or bottle my soul and keep me on the mantle to keep me from being able to pass on and tell those of the afterlife what I had been through. My parents are the only people I’m running from and what they’ve done to me being what made me run, there’s no active man hunt out there for me, but I can never be certain as to where they’re looking or if they’re looking in general.

              I do have a phone, but obviously, no plan or data or anything because my parents would be able to tell that I’m still using it and would be able to track where I was with it, I’ve got one of those cool solar charging port things, but the screen of my phone was more crack than not, the corners were dented in and the case I had on it long gone and served its purpose, so I didn’t really ever use my phone for anything. I really only have three numbers on it: 911, poison control and animal control, but even then I don’t have a plan or anything, so it’s more of a paper weight than anything. That alone is enough to make you invisible to a good chunk of the world, but there are times where I feel like I’m still not invisible enough for my own comfort.