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.”
Well, Jillet was a fool. Alchemy had failed him, and the power of ideas was a small thing compared to the power of Kelven’s fist. To speak frankly, he had lived all his life at the mercy of events—or at the dictates of the decisions or needs or even whims of others. He was not a fit opponent for a man like the Divestulata.
Nevertheless he was loved in Forebridge for a reason. That reason went by the name of amiability, but it might equally well have been called kindness or open-heartedness. He did not answer Kelven’s question. Instead, through his own hurt, he replied, “This is wrong. She does not deserve it.”
“‘She’? Do you refer to my wife?” Kelven was mildly surprised. “We are not speaking of her. We are speaking of your kinsman, Reave the Just.”
“She is weak and you are strong,” Jillet persisted. “It is wrong to victimize her simply because she is unable to oppose you. You damn yourself by doing so. But I think you do not care about damnation.” This was an unusual insight for him. “Even so, you should care that you demean yourself by using your strength against a woman who cannot oppose you.”
As though Jillet had not spoken, Kelven continued, “He has a reputation for meddling in other men’s affairs. In fact, his reputation for meddling is extensive. I find that I would like to put a stop to it. No doubt his reputation is only gossip, after all—but such gossip offends me. I will put a stop to it.”
“It is no wonder that she refuses to wed you.” Jillet’s voice began to crack, and he required an effort to restrain tears. “The wonder is that she has not killed herself rather than suffer your touch.”
“Simpleton!” spat Kelven, momentarily vexed. “She does not kill herself because I do not permit it:” He promptly regained his composure, however. “Yet you have said one thing which is not foolish. A strong man who exerts his strength only upon the weak eventually becomes weak himself. I have decided on a more useful exercise. I will rid the world of this ‘Reave the Just.’
“Tell me how you propose to involve your kinsman in my affairs. Perhaps I will allow you to summon him”—the Divestulata laughed harshly—“and then both you and my wife will be rescued.”
There Jillet collapsed. He was weeping with helplessness and folly, and he had no understanding of the fact that Kelven intended to keep him alive when the widow Huchette had predicted that Kelven would kill him. Through a battle of tears and self-recrimination and appeals for pity, he told the Divestulata the truth.
“I am no kinsman of Reave the Just. That is impossible. I claimed kinship with him because an alchemist told me to do so. All I desired was a love-potion to win the widow’s heart, but he persuaded me otherwise.”
At that time, Jillet was incapable of grasping that he remained alive only because Kelven did not believe him.
Because Kelven did not believe him, their conversation became increasingly arduous. Kelven demanded; Jillet denied. Kelven insisted; Jillet protested. Kelven struck; Jillet wailed. Ultimately Jillet lost consciousness, and Kelven went away.
The candle was left burning.
It was replaced by another, and by yet another, and by still others, so that Jillet was not left entirely in darkness; but he never saw the old ones gutter and die, or the new ones set. For some reason, he was always unconscious when that happened. The old stumps were not removed from the bench; he was left with some measure for his imprisonment. However, since he did not know how long the candles burned he could only conclude from the growing row of stumps that his imprisonment was long. He was fed at intervals which he could not predict. At times Kelven fed him. At times the widow fed him. At times she removed her garments and fondled his cold flesh with tears streaming from her eyes. At times he fouled himself. But only the candles provided a measure for his existence, and he could not interpret them.
How are you related to Reave?
How do you contact him?
Why does he meddle in other men’s affairs?
What is the source of his power?
What is he?
Poor Jillet knew no answer to any of these questions.
His ignorance was the source of his torment, and the most immediate threat to his life; but it may also have saved him. It kept Kelven’s attention focused upon him—and upon the perverse pleasures which he and the widow provided. In effect, it blinded Kelven to the power of ideas: Jillet’s ignorance of anything remotely useful concerning Reave the Just preserved Kelven’s ignorance of the fact that the townspeople of Forebridge, in their cautious and undemonstrative way, had summoned Reave in Jillet’s name.
Quite honestly, most of them could not have said that they knew Reave had been summoned—or that they knew how he had been summoned. He was not a magistrate to whom public appeal could be made; not an official of the County to whom a letter could be written; not a lord of the realm from whom justice might be demanded. As far as anyone in Forebridge could have said for certain, he was not a man at alclass="underline" he was only a story from places far away, a persistent legend blowing on its own queer winds across the North Counties. Can the wind be summoned? No? Then can Reave the Just?
In truth, Reave was summoned by the simple, almost nameless expedient of telling the tale. To every man or woman, herder or minstrel, merchant or soldier, mendicant or charlatan who passed through Forebridge, someone sooner or later mentioned that “Reave the Just has a kinsman here who has recently disappeared.” Those folk followed their own roads away from Forebridge, and when they met with the occasion to do so they told the tale themselves; and so the tale spread.
In the end, such a summons can never be denied. Inevitably, Reave the Just heard it and came to Forebridge.
Like a breeze or a story, he appeared to come without having come from anywhere: one day, not so long after Jillet’s disappearance, he was simply there, in Forebridge. Like a breeze or a story, he was not secretive about his coming: he did not lurk into town, or send in spies, or travel incognito. Still it was true that he came entirely unheralded, unannounced—and yet most folk who saw him knew immediately who he was, just as they knew immediately why he was there.