AN: This is my first fic, so I'd like constructive feedback if you have any ^.^ I've put this up before, but taken it down. I would like to leave it up this time, and hopefully I can start on it again and finish it, barring tragedy. Read and Review please :D

Now for the story. Enjoy.

I shouldn't have to lock the door, he thought. But I don't want anything going wrong tonight, I have to be careful about everything from now on.

Lucas used the new chains he got from his friend Ian, which were actually rusted, but quite thick and possessed very useful links scavenged from a nearby junkyard, to anchor his door to the wall. With those locked together, Rick wouldn't be able to get in the room that night. However, he wouldn't be a problem if everything went as planned. Something was finally going Lucas' way.

The makeshift lock wasn't exactly out of place in Lucas' room, which would be complimented if called tattered. The windows were hung with dreary, torn black curtains, which matched the rickety spring bed sheets. The quilt Lucas used was relatively intact, save for the stains, but the walls were atrocious. Well, what you could see of the decaying wooden boards, at least. Lucas had been able to afford posters to cover his walls by collecting beer cans littered across his living room floor and trading them in for some change. He would go to the post office down the way and pick up their weekly World Travel posters, showing far off places Lucas had never dreamed he would be able to visit. Egypt, the Swiss Alps, even London, just a couple hundred miles away from his house in Yorkshire. Things were looking up for him now, and anything was possible now that Lucas knew what he was.

His friends had scheduled to pick Lucas up at half past midnight. He checked the watch Ian gave him, and it was only a quarter after eleven. Lucas checked to see he packed everything he would want to take with him, but there wasn't all that much to take, to be honest. All his possessions fit in a plastic bag: his only good sweatshirt (good meaning that it fit; everything he owned was shabby), an extra pair of sneakers, all the soap in the house (apparently this was the most important thing Lucas had to offer), a woven bracelet, and a picture of his mother. It gave him a glimpse into another life, where his parent held him as a baby, genuinely smiling, happy, and a disembodied arm wrapped around his mother's shoulders. The side of the image was torn off, the last photo of the father Lucas never had. Rick, his step dad, didn't count. This last memorabilia of his mother was the thing he treasured most, along with the bracelet he always wore.

Ian was looking forward to having a fourth person finally come along. With just three people traveling together, he had said things got boring real fast, not to mention the frustrations of spending nearly every waking hour with the same people, especially with one whom almost never spoke. Ian assured him that the new dynamics would be welcome in their daily lives, since kids of any age need friends, particularly those who don't go to school and don't have families. Everyone was still young in their little group, Lucas the youngest at barely 8, and Ian the oldest at 11. Normal runaways wouldn't last a month on their own, but luckily for them, none of them would ever be called "normal" by anyone.

"Fifteen 'til," Lucas muttered after glancing at his watch, lying down on the groaning bed. "If everything goes well, I won't have to sleep on you anymore, ya big junk pile."

Looking back on what happened, it still amazed Lucas to think that he had been discovered, considering he didn't know what he was, himself. I mean, who could have even seen that I took that man's lunch when I didn't even know I had taken it! He thought. "That sub you're eating? You made it disappear from that man in the deli and put it right beside you," Ian had said in their first encounter. "You used magic without even realizing what you were doing. I guess you must have been pretty hungry."

Magic.

It still made Lucas shake with excitement when he heard those words. "You're a wizard," they had told him. "You can do magic. You can do whatever you want!" At first, of course, it had sounded absurd. Too good to be true. Like Lucas ever got anything he ever wanted, let alone the ability to fix all his problems. It was only believable when they took him to the junkyard and cast actual spells in front of him. They couldn't do it in public, or else the Muggles would freak out. "While it's against the law, it's just a bad idea in general to do magic in front of the Mugs," Ian had told Lucas. "But you don't really have to worry about them. If you come with us, that is."

He felt that Ian and Aurelia liked him, but Lucas had to ask about the other girl, a blonde about his age, who had yet to speak to him and looked rather angry. "Just ignore her for now. She's been upset since we invited her along, so it's nothing to do with you."

They could tell that Lucas was from a bad home, just like them. Wizards didn't do well in the Muggle world, anyway, so there really wasn't a choice in Ian's offer to come with them. Hmm, let's see, Lucas thought. Being miserable with a horrible stepfather, or a chance at a new life, with the friends I never had, doing impossible things with magic. Tough choice.

It had been two long weeks since that first meeting, and Lucas was fortunate that he met the three when he did. They were on their way out of town when they spotted his little stunt, and, after a quick conversation, decided to invite him along. They were staying in the city longer than they normally would to retrieve Lucas a wand, which, he had been told, was absolutely necessary. "Wizards use wands to make the magic come out," it had been explained to him. When Lucas asked about the magic he had just done, Ian shrugged and said, "You grow out of it."

Lucas heard a faint tap, and realizing what it was, woke with a start. He looked at his watch. It was past one in the morning! There was another rap on the glass, and he ran to the window, sighing as he saw two faces grinning at him. Most people would have been startled by two floating figures outside their second story window, but Lucas knew better.

"Sorry, we got caught up in traffic," said the closer of the two, light glinting off of the golden streaks in her tangled brown hair and her playful lime green eyes. Aurelia was riding the Nimbus 3000, a dirty broomstick, but an efficient one, nonetheless. And more importantly, able to fly.

Ian was looking around, almost like he was searching for someone who was following him, the street lights reflecting his thin face and shaggy light brown hair. "C'mon, I'm ready to get out of here. Get on with Aurelia, Lucas." Ian instructed.

Lucas handed her his sack and was about to mount the back of her broom when she held out a hand with a wand in it. "Here, take it."

He reached out for it, only for her to pull it out of his reach. Lucas thought she was messing with him at first, but Aurelia was serious when she told him, "No, you have to take it, grab it from me."

"What? Why?" Lucas was confused, and Aurelia just shook her head.

Lucas obeyed and snatched the wand from her, concerned about the sanity of his new friends. "Look the wand works better that way, just trust me on this."

"Hey, where's the other girl?" he asked as Aurelia maneuvered the back of the broom to sit on the windowsill.

"Scarlett? She's going to meet up with us once we leave the city." Ian answered as Lucas climbed on the broom behind Aurelia. "And don't worry, you'll grow on her."

When Lucas lifted his feet up, the broom fell a few feet in the air from the added weight before it stabilized again, and Aurelia glanced back as he put his hands around her for stability. "Aw, Luke, you're so cute." she cooed.

"Shut up and drive this thing." Lucas murmured, still unsure of the safety of a flying stick.

"Oh-ho, you just asked for it." she said wickedly, and Aurelia sped off into the air, ascending almost straight up, and she was somehow urging the broom to accelerate with incredible speed. Lucas shut his eyes and yelled all the way up and into the clouds, Ian following close behind. They leveled off just above the lowest clouds, England's crummy weather helping their nighttime escape.

After the exhilarating, if not terrifying, takeoff, Lucas felt the thrill of being hundreds of feet in the air, going over a hundred kilometers an hour, he reckoned! The feeling of freedom finally washed over him. True freedom, something he never thought he would have. Looking down on all the miniscule buildings and lights, Lucas knew Rick wouldn't know he was gone for hours. He was probably still at the bar getting drunk, completely unaware Lucas was running away. In all honesty, Rick likely wouldn't care the kid was gone, and a missing child report would be the last thing on that man's mind.

This was, by far, the best thing that had ever happened in Lucas' life. It really was a magical experience.