**Right.  It really, really hurt to delete the previous version off of fictionpress.  But it hurt worse to read it.  Enter the new chapter 1.  Flames are welcome, but constructive criticism is preferred.**

            Llewen sighed silently as the angry sound of a slammed door echoed in the old house.  He could hear the progress of his father’s unsteady feet, clomping up the tired steps.  Creaks and moans guaranteed a warning.  The sole reason to sleep in the cold attic of the decrepit home, really.  The door of his room flew open with a loud complaint and a wooden ouch as the doorknob dented the wall behind it.  A short, florid-faced man seethed, framed in his wrath.

            “What ever possessed you to free that – that wench?”  A scraggly, sad attempt at a beard sputtered, shaking with incontinent rage.  Llewen knew exactly who, and what, his father was trying to berate him about, but he decided to tweak his sad little goat beard and play dumb.  It was safer, as well. 

            “I have no clue what in the world you are talking about, dear father.  I’ve been in my room all night, like you requested.”  The short man turned a disturbing purple and shook a finger, stuttering, too overcome even to curse.   Llewen’s twin sister, Lily, had been the victim of a sadistic fairy tale scenario, locked in a little room.  Wilken, a blacksmith’s apprentice with quick fingers, had made the mistake of courting the pretty young woman.  Fledin, Llewen and Lily’s father, refused to let the only person capable of keeping the house relatively clean without a fight.  He had the brilliant, drunken idea to revive the stuff of stories and lock her in a ‘tower’: the pantry.  She hadn’t been uncomfortable and couldn’t go hungry, so the urgency of the situation was really just irritation and burgeoning anger at such a stupid little plot.

            Fledin took a breath and his face scaled back down the spectrum to a more regular red.  “You got me drunk and stole her out, didn’t you?”  His lip curled at the thought of any initiative on the part of his son.  Llewen straightened the bedcovers and laughed shortly, bitterly.  “No, Fledin, you got yourself drunk.  As always.  I was merely hungry and she managed to get around me when I left the door wide open.  Silly me. Are you really going to do anything about?”  He stood up for the first time, towering over his father.  Shaggy black hair was shaken out of his eyes with a calm insolence and trim fitness stared down at the bandy-legged, potbellied drunk. 

            Startled at a show of backbone, Fledin changed tactics, not dumb enough to come to blows.  Llewen had a quickfire temper and reflexes to match it, dangerous and vicious in a corner.  He harrumphed and crossed flabby arms over his stained shirt. “Fah.  Just like your mother.  Insolent and good for nothing.  Someday, lad, somebody will break you, and perhaps then you’ll be of use to someone.  Until then, you’re gonna go on mooning about doing nothing.  Worthless until then.  Just like your dam.”  He leaned against the door frame, picking his teeth.  Llewen ground his teeth, keeping hold of his anger until it could be useful.  Nothing but trouble would come of knocking his father down the stairs like he wanted to. 

            His mother had been married to a much younger Fledin at the age of fourteen.  He drank less then, but still wasn’t much of a catch.  Unfortunately for Arane, her father was taken in by Fledin’s charm and slick ways.  An herbalist, she possessed great powers of healing.  They were soon crushed when she died of a lingering disease no one could cure.  Llewen suspected she didn’t much want to be cured.  With deceptive calm, he chose his words carefully.

            “You never were good enough for her, father.  I hope someday to overcome the shame of having your blood run in my veins.”  Slamming his hand against an innocent chair, Llewen bit back more acidic words with a snarl and a sob.  With a satisfied smirk, Fledin made his way back down the stairs, delighted by pricking his son’s ego and smirching the fragile memories of his mother. 

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