Reave the Just and Other Tales (4 page)

Unquestionably, Kelven’s mode of existence was secure.

However, for reasons known only to himself, he desired a wife. And he was accustomed to obtain what he desired. When the widow Huchette spurned him, he was not daunted. He simply set about attaining his goal by less direct means.

He began by buying out the investments which had been made to secure the widow’s future. These he did not need, so he allowed them to go to ruin. Then he purchased the widow’s deceased husband’s debts from the usurer who held them. They were few, but they gave him a small claim on the importing merchantry from which Rudolph Huchette’s wealth derived. His claim provided him with access to the merchantry’s ledgers and contacts and partners, and that knowledge enabled him to apply pressure to the sources of the merchantry’s goods. In a relatively short time, as such things are measured, he became the owner of the merchantry itself.

He subsequently found it child’s play to reveal—in the presence of a magistrate, of course—that Rudolph Huchette had acquired his personal fortune by despoiling the assets of the merchantry. In due course, that fortune passed to Kelven, and he became, in effect, the widow Huchette’s landlord—the master of every tangible or monetary resource on which her marriage had made her dependent.

Naturally, he did not turn her out of her former home. Where could she have gone? Instead, he kept her with him and closed the doors to the manor house. If she made any protest, it was unheard through the stout walls.

Of all this, Jillet was perfectly innocent as he knocked on the door of the manor’s gatehouse and requested an audience with the widow. In consequence, he was taken aback when he was admitted, not to the sitting room of the widow, but to the study of her new lord, the Divestulata.

The study itself was impressive enough to a man like Jillet. He had never before seen so much polished oak and mahogany, so much brass and fine leather. Were it not for his unprecedented successes the previous evening, his aching head, which dulled his responses, and his new warrant for audacity, he might have been cowed by the mere room. However, he recited the litany which the alchemist had given him, and the words
trust, bold,
and
unscrupulous
enabled him to bear the air of the place well enough to observe that Kelven himself was more impressive, not because of any greatness of stature or girth, but because of the malign and unanswerable glower with which he regarded everything in front of him. His study was ill-lit, and the red echo of candles in his eyes suggested the flames of Satan and Hell.

It was fortunate, therefore, that Kelven did not immediately turn his attention upon Jillet. Instead, he continued to peruse the document gripped in his heavy hands. This may have been a ploy intended to express his disdain for his visitor; but it gave Jillet a few moments in which to press his hand against his hidden pouch of magick, rehearse the counsel of the alchemist, and marshal his resolve.

When Kelven was done with his reading, or his ploy, he raised his grim head and demanded without preamble, “What is your business with my wife?”

At any former time, this would have stopped Jillet dead.
Wife?
The widow had already become Kelven Divestulata’s
wife
? But Jillet was possessed by his magick and his incantation, and they gave him a new extravagance. It was impossible that Kelven had married the widow. Why? Because such a disappointment could not conceivably befall the man who had just earned with honest gold and courage the right to name himself the kinsman of Reave the Just. To consider the widow Huchette Kelven’s wife made a mockery of both justice and alchemy.

“Sir,” Jillet began. Armed with virtue and magick, he could afford to be polite. “My ‘business’ is with the widow. If she is truly your wife, she will tell me so herself. Permit me to say frankly, however, that I cannot understand why you would stoop to a false claim of marriage. Without the sanction of the priests, no marriage can be valid—and no sanction is possible until the banns have been published. This you have not done.”

There Jillet paused to congratulate himself. The alchemist’s magick was indisputably efficacious. It had already made him
bolder
than he had ever been in his life.

In fact, it made him so
bold
that he took no notice of the narrowing of Kelven’s eyes, the tightening of his hands. Jillet was inured to peril. He smiled blandly as the Divestulata stood to make his reply.

“She is my wife,” Kelven announced distinctly, “
because
I have claimed her. I need no other sanction.”

Jillet blinked a time or two. “Do I understand you, sir? Do you call her your wife—and still admit that you have not been wed?”

Kelven studied his visitor and said nothing.

“Then this is a matter for the magistrates.” In a sense, Jillet did not hear his own words. Certainly, he did not pause to consider whether they would be pleasing to the Divestulata. His attention was focused, rather, on alchemy and incantations. Enjoying his new boldness, he wondered how far he could carry it before he felt the need to make reference to his kinsman. “The sacrament of marriage exists to protect women from those who are stronger, so that they will not be bound to any man against their will.” This fine assertion was not one which he had conceived for himself. It was quoted almost directly from the school lessons of the priests. “If you have not wed the widow Huchette, I can only conclude that she does not choose to wed you. In that case”—Jillet was becoming positively giddy—“you are not her husband, sir. You are her enslaver.

“You would be well advised to let me speak to her.”

Having said this, Jillet bowed to Kelven, not out of courtesy, but in secret delight. The Divestulata was his only audience for his performance: like an actor who knew he had done well, he bowed to his audience. All things considered, he may still have been under the influence of the previous evening’s ale.

Naturally, Kelven saw the matter in another light. Expressionless except for his habitual glower, he regarded Jillet. After a moment, he said, “You mentioned the magistrates.” He did not sound like a man who had been threatened. He sounded like a man who disavowed responsibility for what came next. Having made his decision, he rang a small bell which stood on his desk. Then he continued, “You will speak to my wife.”

The servant who had conducted Jillet to the Divestulata’s study appeared. To the servant, Kelven said, “Inform my wife that she will receive us.”

The servant bowed and departed.

Jillet had begun to glow inwardly. This was a triumph! Even such a man as Kelven Divestulata could not resist his alchemy—and he had not yet made any reference to Reave the Just. Surely his success with the widow was assured. She would succumb to his magick; Kelven would withdraw under threat of the magistrates; and all would be just as Jillet had dreamed it. Smiling happily at his host, he made no effort to resist as Kelven took him by his arm.

However, allowing Kelven to take hold of him may have been a mistake. The Divestulata’s grip was hard—brutally hard—and the crush of his fingers upon Jillet’s arm quickly dispelled the smile from Jillet’s lips. Jillet was strong himself, having been born to a life of labor, but Kelven’s strength turned him pale. Only pride and surprise enabled him to swallow his protest.

Without speaking—and without haste—Kelven steered Jillet to the chamber where he had instructed his wife to receive visitors.

Unlike Kelven’s study, the widow’s sitting room was brightly lit, not by lamps and candles, but by sunshine. Perhaps simply because she loved the sun, or perhaps because she wished herself to be seen plainly, she immersed herself in light. This made immediately obvious the fact that she remained clad in her widow’s weeds, despite her new status as the Divestulata’s
wife
. It also made obvious the drawn pallor of her face, the hollowness of her cheeks, the dark anguish under her eyes. She did nothing to conceal the way she flinched when Kelven’s gaze fell upon her.

Kelven still did not release Jillet’s arm. “This impudent sot,” he announced to the widow as though Jillet were not present, “believes we are not wed.”

The widow may have been hurt and even terrified, but she remained honest. In a small, thin voice, she said, “I am wed to Rudolph Huchette, body and life.” Her hands were folded about each other in her lap. She did not lift her gaze from them. “I will never marry again.”

Jillet hardly heard her. He had to grind his teeth to prevent himself from groaning at Kelven’s grip.

“He believes,” Kelven continued, still addressing the widow, “that the magistrates should be informed we are not wed.”

That made the widow raise her head. Sunlight illuminated the spark of hope which flared in her eyes—flared, and then died when she saw Jillet clearly.

In defeat, she lowered her gaze again.

Kelven was not satisfied. “What is your answer?” he demanded.

The widow’s tone made it plain that she had not yet had time to become accustomed to defeat. “I hope he will inform the magistrates,” she said, “but I believe he was a fool to let you know of his intentions.”

“Madam—my lady.” Jillet spoke in an involuntary gasp. His triumph was gone—even his hope was gone. His arm was being crushed. “Make him let go of me.”

“Paugh!” With a flick of his hand, Kelven flung Jillet to the floor. “It is offensive to be threatened by a clod like you.” Then he turned to the widow. “What do you believe I should do when I am threatened in this fashion for your sake?”

Despite her own distress, Rudolph’s widow was still able to pity fools. Her voice became smaller, thinner, but it remained clear. “Let him go. Let him tell as many magistrates as he wishes. Who will believe him? Who will accept the word of a laborer when it is contradicted by Kelven Divestulata? Perhaps he is too shamed to tell anyone.”

“And what if he is not shamed?” Kelven retorted instantly. “What if a magistrate hears him—and believes him enough to question you? What would you say?”

The widow did not raise her eyes. She had no need to gaze upon her
husband
again. “I would say that I am the prisoner of your malice and the plaything of your lusts, and I would thank God for His mercy if He would allow me to die.”

“That is why I will not let him go.” Kelven sounded oddly satisfied, as though an obscure desire had been vindicated. “Perhaps instead I will put his life in your power. I wish to see you rut with him. If you do it for my amusement, I will let him live.”

Jillet did not hear what answer the widow would have made to this suggestion. Perhaps he did not properly hear anything which the Divestulata and his
wife
said to each other. His shame was intense, and the pain in his arm caused his head to throb as though it might burst; and, in truth, he was too busy cursing himself for not invoking the power of alchemy sooner to give much heed to what was said over him. He was a fool, and he knew it—a fool for thinking, however briefly, that he might accomplish for himself victories which only magick could achieve.

Therefore he struggled to his feet between Kelven and the widow. Hugging his arm to his side, he panted, “This is intolerable. My kinsman, Reave the Just, will be outraged when he learns of it.”

Despite their many differences, Kelven Divestulata and the widow Huchette were identical in their reactions: they both became completely still, as though they had been turned to stone by the magick of the name
Reave the Just
.

“My kinsman is not forgiving,” Jillet continued, driven by shame and pain and his new awareness of the power of ideas. “All the world knows it. He has no patience for injustice or tyranny, or for the abuse of the helpless, and when he is outraged he lets nothing stand in his way.” Perhaps because he was a fool, he was able to speak with perfect conviction. Any man who was not a fool would have known that he had already said too much. “You will be wiser to come with me to the magistrate yourself and confess the wrong you have done this woman. He will be kinder to you than Reave the Just.”

Still united by the influence of that name, the widow and Kelven said together, “You fool. You have doomed yourself.”

But she said, “Now he will surely kill you.”

His words were, “Now I will surely let you live.”

Hearing Kelven, Jillet was momentarily confused, misled by the impression that he had succeeded—that he had saved the widow and himself, that he had defeated the Divestulata. Then Kelven struck him down, and the misconception was lost.

When he awakened—more head-sore, bone-weak, and thirst-tormented than he had ever been in his life—he was in a chamber from which no one except Kelven himself and his own workmen had ever emerged. He had a room just like it in his ancestral home and knew its value. Shortly, therefore, after his acquisition of the manor house he had had this chamber dug into the rock beneath the foundations of the building. All Forebridge was quite ignorant of its existence. The excavated dirt and rock had been concealed by being used in other construction about the manor house—primarily in making the kennels where Kelven housed the mastiffs he bred for hunting and similar duties. And the workmen had been sent to serve the Divestulata in other enterprises in other Counties, far from Forebridge. So when Jillet awakened he was not simply in a room where no one would ever hear him scream. He was in a room where no one would ever look for him.

In any case, however, he felt too sick and piteous to scream. Kelven’s blow had nearly cracked his skull, and the fetters on his wrists held his arms at an angle which nearly dislocated his shoulders. He was not surprised by the presence of light—by the single candle stuck in its tallow on a bench a few feet away. His general amazement was already too great, and his particular discomfort too acute, to allow him the luxury of surprise about the presence or absence of light.

On the bench beside the candle, hulking in the gloom like the condensed darkness of a demon, sat Kelven Divestulata.

“Ah,” breathed Kelven softly, “your eyes open. You raise your head. The pain begins. Tell me about your
kinship
with Reave the Just.”