• I sprinted down the grand hallway, making my footsteps as light as possible. Knowing that there was no way I could reach the main doors before someone caught up me, I quickly turned into the closest room I could find.

    Once I had shut and locked the door, I looked around. The room was quite large, and quite empty, except for a small fountain that sat meekly in the middle of the room. Like the rest of Menai Manor these walls were solid marble, but elaborately carved to depict a battle scene. If I had to guess, this had once been a ballroom of some sort, abandoned because of a lack of dances.

    As I sat on the edge of the no longer running fountain, it suddenly occurred to me that it was possible that no one had come looking for me. After all, to them, chasing after me was showing me that they thought I was worth something.

    I wondered why I had run in the first place, I had been beaten unjustly many times before, but I had always just taken it. Maybe it was because of the excruciating pain I was in. I had seen my parents torture people many times, so I knew what strange things people did when they were in pain.

    Hours passed and the room began to grow unbearably hot. I peeled off my blue wool jacket and rolled up my sleeves. My stomach had settled, but there was still a dull throbbing pain in my temple. I knew I should have gone back to the conference room to accept my punishment. The longer I waited to return the more heavily I would be beaten.

    I got up slowly, and reluctantly shuffled towards the door. I grasped the handle with my sweaty hand and took a deep breath. Suddenly, I felt angry. Why should I be punished for sickness, a sickness that I had been suffering with for years, but knew nobody cared enough to even hear about?

    For once in my life I wasn’t going to sit around mope.

    I hoisted myself up onto a windowsill and jumped out of one of the three giant windows cut into the marble walls.

    ---

    The mansion was actually made up of many different buildings set on the same plot of land. My family is so big that the conference room is one of the largest buildings of all. Luckily for me, this meant that it was also on the edge of our land.

    I trudged along the dirt path that wound around the outside, towards the front of the building. The midday sun beat mercilessly down on my pale skin, and by the time I finally reached the main gates I was starting to feel dehydrated. Digging into the pockets of my neatly pressed dress pants I found a few coins, hopefully enough to buy a drink.

    It took all my strength to open the huge iron gates and my hands are ripped up and covered in rust. Obviously, no one was supposed to leave, or no one my age and strength anyway.

    Ahead of me lay a meadow that stretched out as far as I could see. There were no trees, no bushes, and no buildings. I tried not to think of the fact that for all I knew I lived on a private island and started walking cautiously forward.

    To my relief, after wandering around aimlessly for nearly 3 hours, I came to a small shop. A sign reading, “Pown Shop” hung in the broken down window. I pushed open the door and stepped through.

    The shop was dark and musky smelling but surprisingly neat.

    “Hello?” I called nervously.

    No one responded, and I was about to turn around when a boy walked out from the shadows. His entire body was shaking uncontrollably and his eyes were rolled to the back of his head.

    “A-are you all right?” I stuttered.

    The boy let out a low gurgling sound and raised his arm. He struck out with frightening speed and tore a huge gouge out of my shoulder. I bit my bottom lip in pain as blood trickled down my elbow. My eyes widened as he took another shaky step towards me.

    “GABRIEL!” someone screamed.