'Get the fuck inside!' Yelled Lord Vegarion

His two children ran inside and out of the snow-covered yard. Their eyes were wild with fear. The lord slammed the door shut and turned to his two children. His eyes were filled with anger and fury, his nose was contorted and wrinkled, and his lips were white as they pursed together.

'You stupid fucking children!' He screamed at them, before continuing in a quieter but still fuming voice. 'How many times must I tell you, never ever play with those miscreant, bastard children.' 

Verona his wife walked in. She was trembling.

'What?’ He spat at her. ‘what the fuck could you possibly have to say that is useful you stupid wench.'

'Harry, stop yelling at my children.' her voice tremored slightly as she spoke. 'Please.'

'Ha! Of course,' Harry crowed 'Just because you are nobility doesn't mean I think any more of you than those shits in the streets. The king put my sorry arse here to rule over them and I will fucking rule over. Fucking oath I will. These people are for ruling over, they are nothing but dog shit in this backwater pile of crap and I just use them for the taxes and to do my bidding. Would they do what I asked if I let my children play with them, if I showed them that I am nothing special? No, no they would not. I am superior, I'm born of noble blood, you are too, but you are a bitch. You don't have balls to help you rule over anything, you ain't got nothing but tits for a me to hang onto while I fuck you.'

'Harry!' Verona yelled with a burst adrenaline 'Don't you dare talk like that in front of my children. Stewart, Lily; go to your rooms.'

'No,' Harry yelled 'Kids! Stay the fuck here. You need to see what happens to insolent bitches.'

Harry swiftly stepped up to Verona and slapped her savagely with the back of his hand. She fell to the ground with a thud. He knelt and grabbed her around the throat and began slapping her repeatedly.

'No! No please no!' 

'Shut it you bitch! I never wanted you for your smarts.' he seethed with sarcasm 'When your parents married you off. You think that I took you for your wits? I took you for that ass and to do the fucking dishes.'

'Please...' Verona wailed. Her cheekbone had swelled up and split, fresh blood ran down her cheek accompanied by tears that rolled quickly over her face.

'But despite your backchat to me, you are still happy, aren't you?' he took his pinkie and pointer finger and pushed them into the sides of her mouth and made out a smile. 'See children, she is happy with me in charge after all. That's how it should be; man in charge and the woman licking his boots.'

Verona coughed up blood onto the wooden floorboards and the children stood still. Horrified. Scared. Scarred.

'Fuck sake,' Harry said in exasperation looking at the blood on the ground. 'Kids, you clean this up, your mother and I are going to have a little chat and when we are back that floor better be squeaky clean.'

The two kids ran off quickly disappearing to get something to clean the blood. Harry stooped down to Verona with his hands on his knees. His eyes narrowed as she looked up at him through corner of her eye.

'Get up and come to our room or it will be Lily getting flogged.' he growled insidiously.

He stamped off up the stairs in the hallway, the boards creaked beneath him as he ascended. Verona stood slowly. Her Right cheek was on fire, she could hardly walk out of fear but the will to protect her eldest child was stronger. She staggered down the hallway and used a shaking hand to grab hold of the railing to the stairs. She used the railing to pull herself up each step, her feet dragged, she took the steps one at a time. As she walked up the stairs, she looked at each of the paintings of the past Vegarions. Surely they could not have all been this horrible. Some looked nice and handsome. Verona dismissed that thought as she remembered the first time she laid her eyes on her future husband for life, she had thought the same of him. Harry Vegarion was a weasel she thought, a power hungry bastard willing to do anything. She took the last step of the flight and was in another hallway that had a balustrade that overlooked the hallway below. She looked over her shoulder at her children. Lily had been born first, she was overjoyed to see it was a girl, but Harry had spent the next nine months of her second pregnancy brooding and saying he would kill the child if it wasn't a boy. Harry had got what he wanted in Theo. Theo was a cute baby, but Harry didn't care for cute. He had already begun planning the forging of his first sword to be wielded. That was the extent of his parenting. He was busy with the war there after. She shuffled her lame legs over the ground and came to the door to their bedroom. She pushed it open and almost collapsed inside but quickly regathered herself. Harry sat in his desk chair writing up a document of some kind.

'Harry.' Verona said and blinked back a tear 'I am here.'

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'Good, you know what I want.' He said without looking up.

'I am yours to command.' She replied in a monotone, a comment that was greeted with a grunt of approval. 

She stepped over the bear rug on the ground, walked past Harry and his desk and arrived at the foot of their large bed. She began undoing the dress she wore, staring blankly into the wall in front of her. The wall above their bed was home to a large oil painting with a golden frame. A portrait, Harry certainly wasn't any more horrible than his ancestors, but he was more arrogant. She pushed the dress off her shoulders and let it fall onto the floor. She climbed on to the bed and lay on her back.

Harry still sat at his desk writing. His hand movements were furious and sharp. He sat straight, his posture immaculate just as he would have been taught, just as she was taught. Harry placed the quill into the fountain and stood slowly.

'You know what is right.' He said suddenly as he unbuckled his belt. 'So why do you speak out? I don't understand your constant rebellion. I can't stand it anymore.' 

He pulled his pants down and stepped out of them and them continued undressing, undoing his white button up shirt that had a smear of her blood on it. He walked closer to the bed. To her. 

'Women have a simple purpose, they stay in the house and breed heirs to continue the family name. That's how it should be, the man manages the family, just as I manage this town. This is how it should be; women are too simple to do anything important.' he pulled his shirt away and climbed atop of her. 'Isn't that right?' he breathed into her ear.

'Yes.' She whispered back

He started off slow, but she could hear his anger as he grunted, he began being rougher with her. He stopped suddenly and flipped her over. He began raping her again. He took a hold of her hair and yanked hard on it, reefing Verona's head back.

She began screaming as he beat her in the back of the ribs with his free hand. Her screams didn't make him stop and instead he began ravaging her more and more violently.

'Stop!' She grated out in pain.

'A bitch is only as good as the silence she keeps.'

Her screams could be heard throughout the whole house, bouncing off the walls and downstairs to Theo and Lily.

'Try and block it out little brother.' Lily whispered quietly enough only for him the hear.

'It doesn't work that way Lily, no matter what I can always hear, even when they aren't fighting.'

'I know little brother, I know.' Lily said as she looked upstairs towards the room. The screaming had reached a crescendo. High pitched and full off pain. They began scrubbing harder. Suddenly the screaming stopped and only their father's grunts of anger could be heard.

'Do you think Mum is dead this time.'

'Leo!' Hushed Lily 'You can't say things like that, you can't think that. Mum will be ok, I hope. C'mon the floor is clean we should go to our place.'

'Yeah' 

They took their bloody rags and ran away from hallway. They fled through the large house, averting their eyes from the paintings around the rooms. They arrived at the kitchen, and both crawled into the old chimney. 

'Is she alive?'

'Yes, little brother, she is alive.'

'How can you be so sure?'

'I just know, please Theo, stop asking about it.' Lily looked out into the light that was flooding in through the kitchen.

'We went out to talk to those kids, we went through a big town in a cart with horses. We stopped at some places and bought new things. Mainly food but dad bought that big artwork.'

'Harry went through town to check everything was running smoothly Theo, he stopped to pick up his painting. He said it was expensive and that there was nothing else important today.' Lily sighed 'Harry isn't dad Theo, he never has been, I read one of those books he keeps in the cupboards. There was one part where the dad bought his wife a gift using up all the money he owned, the gift wasn't glamourous or rich. But it was beautiful to her because it was very thing that the dad had spent all his money on. Do you know what I mean?'

'No'

'You will one day little brother.' She looked at the light flooding into the chimney again. 'You remember how Harry said that nothing else important was happening today?'

'Yeah' 

'Well, it is your birthday Theo.' She said forcing a smile onto her face she leant over to him and gave him a big hug. Her heart was warmed when she saw a smile spread across Theo's face. 'Here look, Mum snuck you a present.'

Lily pulled a toy out from behind her. It was a small wooden carving of a soldier holding a sword and shield. Theo's face somehow made an even bigger smile. He made a little squeak in excitement. Lily giggled quietly and watched as her brother snatched up the toy and stared at it intently. 

'Happy tenth Theo' Lily said and leaned up against the brick walled chimney. 

Lily was three years older than Leo. Almost four. Her father had left after her birth to fight in the war, she remembered how her mother had told her bedtime stories and rocked her to sleep every night. She was so happy then. As happy as an ignorant memory from a three-year-old can remember. Maybe it was the thought of her husband dying or the mere absence of him. She could think on it for an eternity and never come to conclusive decision. She once more looked at the light flooding into the chimney. It was safe where they were, Harry never entered the kitchen, it was a woman's place after all. Every time her and Theo went into the chimney, she lived in fear of a big shadow looming over them instead of the golden light. She couldn't hope to escape the world that she was in, even if she got out of the house, he would find her. He would always find her. She moved her hand to her throat. She could still feel his fingers around her throat the day she cried in public. She had only been ten years old. She looked at her brother who was swooshing his figure through the air. He would never be choked, he was a male, a superior. Lily had told herself time and time again that she would never let Theo be the way Harry was, but her hope was crushed every time she remembered that it was passed down through the generations. She remembered her grandfather as being almost as horrible as Harry. She didn't know how someone could be so horrible and so terrible. Every week she stole a book from her father's cupboard and read it. She felt she had gained a better understanding of things, she knew what was happening was not right, no matter what he said, she knew that it wasn't normal. She knew that Harry didn't care about anyone but himself.

'Where the fuck are you kids!' Came a shout deeper in the house.

'Quick, hide your toy here and let's go.' She ushered Theo and quickly they crawled out of their safe haven and began venturing toward the sound of an angry man.