Hiraeth ↭ Kai Parker

1. Hidden Jacket

The sound of footsteps echoed throughout the two-story home. Soft giggles followed as a young woman's voice sounded from somewhere on the first floor. 

At the final number of the countdown, the game was officially on, all those found would be deemed the loser and the last in hiding would be crowned the champion. Or, that was how Malachai Parker understood the game his siblings were partaking in. 

He, himself was sat on the fireplace, the cool stone seeping into his jeans and eliciting a chill. His twin sister, Josette was the seeker and with seven younger children to find, she'd be at it all night.

"You could help find them, you know?" 

The sudden voice of Indigo Drabek startled Malachai. His blue-gray eyes flickered from the fire he was attempting to light to peer into sea green eyes. Her lips were curved downward as her arms were folded against her chest. 

"I also don't think you're going to start a fire by glaring at it."

Malachai scoffed and turned from her. "What are you doing here, Indigo? I thought the all of the Drabek's had to attend the formal."

Indigo blanched. Her hands curled into fists as she fought the urge to shatter anything near them. He was correct, as he annoyingly often was. 

As the eldest of her family she was supposed to be the leading dance partner to the eldest and future coven leader; him. However, as fate tended to be cruel Malachai and Indigo never liked one another from the time he dropped her on her head at only a year old. 

When it was revealed that he was, to the coven's standards, an abomination, everyone was ordered to never touch him. If they did or if he touched anyone, he and that person would be punished. 

The entire night was rendered pointless but to the young adult's horror and annoyance, it would still take place.

"I'm here to help you twins babysit the gaggle." Indigo replied, crouching down and peering at the firewood waiting to be made of use. 

"Incendia." Fire came to life, shrouding the wood and sending the room into a warmth only the wood could offer.

"I could've done that." Malachai snapped, his head jerking to the side to glare at her. 

When he realized how close she was, how dangerously easy it would be to reach out and touch her, he blanched.

"Of course, you could Kai." Indigo muttered, ignoring his wide-eyed stare as she addressed him by his preferred name. It was simpler to say or shout in anger than his full name.

Standing, Indigo peered through him, debating. Her parents were enraged, threatening to lock her up for the next fifty years if she didn't put on that stupid silver gown and join them. 

It was wrong, in her opinion, what the coven was doing. Forcing her to suddenly wait around for the youngest of the Parker children to grow up and get married. 

The idea of marrying Kai was bad enough but it was tolerable; he was only two years older than her. The idea of going behind his back and marrying his four year old brother in the next fifteen something years was horrible. 

Indigo felt pity creep into her chest as her gaze found his.

She was closest to his twin sister, Josette, and all of his younger siblings. She and Kai never much spent time together, even before he was deemed an abomination. 

Perhaps that was why she spoke with him in short moments. She made it a point to let him know that he wasn't what the whispers believed him to be. Though as they got older it never dawned on her that he didn't care.