It all started because Olivia, the adopted daughter of my family, burned her finger on my birthday candles. My brother lured me to our old childhood hideout.

He locked the door behind me and then set the place on fire.

"You hurt Olivia on purpose to steal attention. If I don't teach you a lesson, you'll never learn!"

He left, locking me on the third floor with only a ladder by the window.

However, I had a crippling fear of heights. I couldn't even go near the window, let alone escape.

The fire raged all night, the flames swallowing me whole. My skin blistered and burned as I screamed for my parents and my brother—anyone to save me. But no one came. I died in that fire, abandoned.

When my spirit drifted back to the house, I found my parents and brother surrounding Olivia, celebrating the fact that her tiny burn had healed. They even bought her a cake.

"We won't let our precious girl get hurt again," they promised.

Olivia pretended to be innocent and asked where I was.

My parents exchanged glances with my brother and said, "Don't worry about her, Olivia. She's been sent away to learn her lesson. She won't be bothering you anymore."

Hearing those words, I finally lost all hope.

But when they discovered I had died, they all went mad.

*****

The flames licked my skin, searing it inch by inch.

Blisters bubbled up, the pain unbearable. I curled up, clutching the only family photo I had, crying out in agony.

"Dad, Mom, Claud, it hurts! Please... someone save me!"

But in that isolated villa, the only sound that answered me was the crackling of the burning wood.

My eyelids grew heavier until I could no longer keep them open.

When I opened my eyes again, I saw my own corpse.

It was charred beyond recognition, a twisted, blackened thing.

Even the house that held all my childhood memories had been reduced to rubble by the fire.

I looked down at my translucent, ghostly body and sighed.

I was dead.

Killed by the very fire my brother set.

The reason why he locked me up was ridiculous.

It was all because Olivia burned her finger on my birthday cake candles the day before.

My parents had blown up as if it were my fault. Somehow, I was to blame for Olivia's injury.

They said I shouldn't have celebrated my birthday—after all, it was Olivia who had the piano competition coming up.

My brother hadn't said much, but the look in his eyes told me he blamed me, too.

The three of them fussed over Olivia, rushing her to the hospital for her tiny burn, leaving me alone with a melting cake.

I sat there, waiting, but no one came back for me.

Hours later, I saw Olivia's social media post.

They had taken her to Disney World, a place she'd always wanted to go.

Her caption read: "Family love heals everything, even the worst cuts."

My brother commented beneath it: "Our little princess, we'll never let you get hurt again."

No one remembered I was still at home, alone.

No one remembered that it was my eighteenth birthday.

If I hadn't been kidnapped for ten years and kept from my family, I would have been the Parker family's little princess.

But the next day, my brother rushed back from the other city.

He apologized, saying they hadn't considered my feelings. He even asked if I wanted to go to our old childhood hideout—like we used to when we were kids.

That hideout was in the attic of this very house, the one I grew up in before I was taken.

We used to play there—hide and seek, pretend games, getting into trouble together.

My brother would tell me stories of knights and princesses, promising to protect me forever.

I had clung to those memories during all the years I was gone.

But in the end, my brother only wanted to trick me. He wanted revenge for the girl who now held his heart—Olivia.

He looked at me, his voice cold. "Penelope, did you burn Olivia's hand on purpose?"

I shook my head, denying it, but he didn't believe me.

"What lies have you learned out there, Penelope? You've become such a smooth liar.

"What, do you think Olivia would hurt herself right before her big competition? You're just trying to steal the spotlight again, aren't you? This time, I'm going to make sure you learn your place!"

He slammed the door shut, locking it with heavy chains.

My heart pounded as he pulled out a lighter, setting a pile of newspapers on fire.

"You'll pay for what you did to Olivia a thousand times over. Consider this a lesson you'll never forget."

With that, he walked away, leaving me trapped, my screams drowned out by the roaring flames.