Reave the Just and Other Tales by Stephen R. Donaldson Read Free Book Online Page B

drunk what he could, the man put a morsel or two of honeycomb in his mouth.
    After that, the man waited for Jillet to speak.
    Water and honey gave Jillet a bit of strength which he had forgotten existed. Trying harder to focus his gaze upon the strange figure smiling soberly before him, he asked. “Have you come to kill me? I thought he did such things himself. And liked them.” In Jillet’s mind, “he” was always the Divestulata.
    The man shook his head. “I am Reave.” His voice was firm despite its quietness. “I am here to learn why you have claimed kinship with me.”
    Under other conditions, Jillet would have found it frightening to be confronted by Reave the Just. As an amiable man himself, he trusted the amiability of others, and so he would not have broadly assumed that Reave meant him ill. Nevertheless, he was vulnerable on the point which Reave mentioned. For several reasons, Jillet was not a deceptive man: one of them was that he did not like to be
found out
—and he was always so easily
found out
. Being discovered in a dishonest act disturbed and shamed him.
    At present, however, thoughts of shame and distress were too trivial to be considered. In any case, Kelven had long since bereft him of any instinct for self-concealment he may have possessed. To Reave’s inquiry, he replied as well as his sense of doom allowed, “I wanted the widow.”
    “For her wealth?” Reave asked.
    Jillet shook his head. “Wealth seems pleasant, but I do not understand it.” Certainly, wealth did not appear to have given either the widow or Kelven any particular satisfaction. “I wanted her.”
    “Why?”
    This question was harder. Jillet might have mentioned her beauty, her youth, her foreignness; he might have mentioned her tragedy. But Reave’s clear gaze made those answers inadequate. Finally, Jillet replied, “It would mean something. To be loved by her.”
    Reave nodded. “You wanted to be loved by a woman whose love was valuable.” Then he asked, “Why did you think her love could be gained by alchemy? Love worth having does not deserve to be tricked. And she would never truly love you if you obtained her love falsely.”
    Jillet considered this question easy. Many candles ago—almost from the beginning—the pain in his arms had given him the feeling that his chest had been torn open, exposing everything. He said, “She would not love me. She would not notice me. I do not know the trick of getting women to give me their love.”
    “The ‘trick,’” Reave mused. “That is inadequate, Jillet. You must be honest with me.”
    Honey or desperation gave Jillet a moment of strength. “I have been honest since he put me in this place. I think it must be Hell, and I am already dead. How else is it possible for you to be here? You are no kinsman of mine, Reave the Just. Some men are like the widow. Their love is worth having. I do not understand it, but I can see that women notice such men. They give themselves to such men.
    “I am not among them. I have nothing to offer that any woman would want. I must gain love by alchemy. If magick does not win it for me, I will never know love at all.”
    Reave raised fresh water to Jillet’s lips. He set new morsels of honeycomb in Jillet’s mouth.
    Then he turned away.
    From the door of the chamber, he said, “In one thing, you are wrong, Jillet of Forebridge. You and I are kinsmen. All men are of common blood, and I am bound to any man who claims me willingly.” As he left, he added, “You are imprisoned here by your own folly. You must rescue yourself.”
    Behind him, the door closed, and he was gone.
    The door was stout, and the chamber had been dug deep: no one heard Jillet’s wail of abandonment.
    Certainly the widow did not hear it. In truth, she was not inclined to listen for such things. They gave her nightmares—and her life was already nightmare enough. When Reave found her, she was in her bedchamber, huddled upon the bed, sobbing uselessly. About