5. Chapter 4
She didn’t try the remedy again when morning came, worried her mother would be distressed by her leaving for Arcania.
Instead, she hugged and kissed them both on the cheek, as well as Betsy.
She’d call once she got settled in her new residence so they’d have her phone number in case of an emergency.
A cab took her to the town train station, where she’d connect to the larger station in New Halden, where she’d board the train directly to Arcania.
Averston’s station comprised a single platform, a small indoor ticketing and waiting area, and restrooms. The early morning air had a bite to it as she waited for the taxi driver to take her suitcase out of the trunk, and she tucked her cheeks into her hoodie to brace herself against the wind and wrapped her arm gently around Lou.
She handed the driver the cash and took her suitcase in her free hand.
The station was quiet with it being barely past five o’clock.
Only a few hushed conversations, soft classical music, and the thrum of magic running the train surrounded her.
After stopping at the ticket desk inside the small brick building to pick up the tickets she had bought over the phone, she made her way to the platform where the tin-silver train was already waiting.
She’d gotten the earliest train available at seven in the morning since it would take about three hours to get to her next stop, and she wanted to claim one of the more comfortable seats for the journey.
A blue electric glow flickered along the tracks as the train filled its tanks with arcane energy, a relatively new improvement to this station so its conductors wouldn’t burn out their pool of magic.
As Ivy neared the open door on the train, the attendant waved cheerfully at her. “Good morning! May I see your ticket, please?”
Ivy pulled the ticket from her purse and handed it to the attendant with a sleepy grin
“Welcome aboard, Miss Heartwell. Feel free to sit wherever you’d like. When you’ve picked a seat, please place this in the clip above it.” The attendant tore her ticket and handed Ivy one half.
She walked through the door and turned right into the first cabin.
The seats inside were plum with teal and yellow squiggly lines zig-zagging across the fabric.
The design was a bit dated, but comfortable.
There were already a few others on board, leaving the train quiet for now.
She made her way to the third cabin, which was empty, and placed her plant on the single seat on the left before lifting her suitcase to fit in the storage above the seat.
After clipping her ticket as instructed, she placed Lou securely on her lap.
It was the first plant she’d grown on her own.
Cerulean ferns were smaller than the average fern, making them easy to travel with and maintain, and their fronds were tinted a faint blue, which is how they received their common name.
She cared for him meticulously over the last eight years, and through that, he was there for her every single day.
She waved her hand over the soft leaves, casting golden light through her fingertips onto them, and smiled as they danced in appreciation.
A few minutes later, the train hummed to life and departed the station, and she pulled her book from her purse.
Ivy looked out of the window where a few people were standing and waving to loved ones on board.
She hoped there would still be a day when her parents were there, waving goodbye.
Or it was her and Briar’s parents together on the platform, with tears in their eyes, as they left for the new school year.
As the train pulled away, it cut through the small town and soon entered the northern countryside filled with tall, green trees and rolling hills near the mountains, and on bridges over rivers and streams. As they neared the border, a ripple of magic washed over the windows, turning the train invisible to move through mundane land unnoticed outside of the barriers.
By the time the train pulled into the station, she had only a few chapters left of her book.
The platform at New Halden bustled with people walking off the train and toward the entrance to the large station building.
She grabbed Lou and hopped to her feet, took her suitcase, and followed the flow of people to the platform.
She’d only been to this station a few times in her life, but it never ceased to amaze her.
She’d read somewhere in a guide once that the stations spanned over 2,000 acres of land to cover arcane destinations connecting all over North America.
It was built decades ago when black iron and red brick were the easiest materials to access, but the concourses have since been modernized with automatic doors and durable tile.
Ivy walked through a set of doors which seemed to never close due to the stream of people coming and going.
Fresh coffee instantly hit her senses. She’d have to find the shop it was coming from before going to her platform since travelling always tired her out.
The bustling station was certainly much louder than the one she’d come from.
But at least she didn’t have to teleport all the way to Arcania.
Prior to trains like these, people had to rely mostly on teleportation to go long distances, which would sap enough energy from the arcane that sometimes the teleportation would fail during the process, and they’d end up lost.
She weaved through the crowd until she found the departure board.
The placards flipped like a deck of cards for each train leaving the station within the next hour.
People jostled her about as they fought their way closer to the board before running off in different directions.
She finally landed on her train information.
“Platform 314E,” she muttered. “Leaving in only twenty minutes?” She glanced at the platform she came from. 705H. She groaned as she now became the jostler rushing to her station. Coffee would have to wait for another time.
She hustled her way through the concourses, bypassing the slow-walkers and tempting food options. Her breath was ragged by the time she reached the bridge connecting the center of the station to concourse E. She slowed to a walk to catch her breath.
But as she neared the archway at the end of the bridge, something hard crashed into her from behind.
Her suitcase and purse scattered, and before she could fall to the ground, a pair of large hands grabbed her shoulders to keep her steady.
Instead of looking at her assailant, she stared open-mouthed where Lou shattered across the floor.