Hidden Within [BOOK 1] | ✔️

Heart of revenge

Hafelia
|• your words were my motivation •|

No time, not a minute a day. Between seven siblings, Isaac felt the loneliest, even lonelier after his legs became paralysed. He couldn't contact Lily at all, the fact gnawed at his bones, he feared Lincoln had done something to her. It had never occurred to him that his accident that night was Lincoln's doing, but it was. He had never thought that Lily deleted all forms of contact by choice, but she did. He thought he knew, he thought he understood, but he didn't. No one truly cared if he was dead; another burden would just be off their shoulders.

"Isaac?" A small knock brought him back. He was in his room, a big room, it reminded him how lonely he was.

"Come in." He kept his eyes on the sky, the oh-so bright, blue sky. How it was so vast, so void and empty; like his heart.

"Hey." Martha, his carer, approached him slowly. Martha was a thirteen-year-old girl with frizzy hair and brown eyes. She was too young to be a carer, however, she had the best work résumé in comparison to other applicants, so Isaac's parents thought she'd be excellent. They made him feel disabled, not that anything was wrong with that, it made him feel unwanted and odd. It gave his siblings more of an opportunity to mind his existence.

"Why so glum?" Martha asked. Isaac ignored her, he had no interest in talking today, especially after what he overheard. "Come on, only I have the right to be Moody Martha, you can only be Interesting Isaac." She pouted. No matter how hard he tried, she always made him smile.

"Oh, come here, Martha." Isaac said. Martha knelt down as he ruffled her hair. "For a child, you are smart." He added.

"Who said I'm a child?" She displayed an evil smirk.

Isaac sunk back in his chair and whispered. "No one." Martha gave him a skeptical look after which they burst with laughter.

"God, you know how to swing on your moods." She wiped away a tear from the laughter. "Now, tell me what's bothering you," Martha asked.

Isaac cleared his throat and hesitated. "Not here." He shook his head. Martha knew he only said that to make her forget about it, especially because the walls in the Martin mansion were the thickest ones around and no one would have been able to overhear him.

"Then I know just where!" Martha turned on her heels and found Isaac's coat.

"But—"

"Never. No buts." She helped him put on his coat and shoes and then zipped her own. "Have you ever been to the tunnels downstream?"

He shook his head and watched her eyes gleam in delight.

—

The air was calm and wrapped around Isaac like a blanket of cold. Martha has taken him to a tunnel near the stream. It was dark there, the cave almost looming over their heads, but somehow it created a sort of comfort; assurance of a roof above their heads.