shared the Great Belief . . .

"Did God not send His Prophet to Rakis, there to test us and teach us?" he

asked.

Taraza delved deep into her Other Memories. A Prophet on Rakis? Muad'dib? No

. . . that did not square with either Sufi or Zensunni beliefs in . . .

The Tyrant! She closed her mouth into a grim line. "What one cannot control

one must accept," she said.

"For surely that is God's doing," Waff replied.

Taraza had seen and heard enough. The Missionaria Protectiva had immersed her

in every known religion. Other Memories reinforced this knowledge and filled it

out. She felt a great need to get herself safely away from this room. Odrade

must be alerted!

"May I make a suggestion?" Taraza asked.

Waff nodded politely.

"Perhaps there is here the substance of a greater bond between us than we

imagined," she said. "I offer you the hospitality of our Keep on Rakis and the

services of our commander there."

"An Atreides?" he asked.

"No," Taraza lied. "But I will, of course, alert our Breeding Mistresses to

your needs."

"And I will assemble the things you require in payment," he said. "Why will the

bargain be completed on Rakis?"

"Is that not the proper place?" she asked. "Who could be false in the home of

the Prophet?"

Waff sat back in his chair, his arms relaxed in his lap. Taraza certainly knew

the proper responses. It was a revelation he had never expected.

Taraza stood. "Each of us listens to God personally," she said.

And together in the kehl, he thought. He looked up at her, reminding himself

that she was powindah. None of them could be trusted. Caution! This woman

was, after all, a Bene Gesserit witch. They were known to create religions for

their own ends. Powindah!

Taraza went to the hatch, opened it and gave her security signal. She turned

once more toward Waff who still sat in his chair. He has not penetrated our

true design, she thought. The ones we send to him must be chosen with extreme

care. He must never suspect that he is part of our bait.

His elfin features composed, Waff stared back at her.

How bland he looked, Taraza thought. But he could be trapped! An alliance

between Sisterhood and Tleilaxu offered new attractions. But on our terms!

"Until Rakis," she said.

What social inheritances went outward with the Scattering? We know those times

intimately. We know both the mental and physical settings. The Lost Ones took

with them a consciousness confined mostly to manpower and hardware. There was a

desperate need for room to expand driven by the myth of Freedom. Most had not

learned the deeper lesson of the Tyrant, that violence builds its own limits.

The Scattering was wild and random movement interpreted as growth (expansion).

It was goaded by a profound fear (often unconscious) of stagnation and death.

-The Scattering: Bene Gesserit Analysis (Archives)

Odrade lay full length on her side along the ledge of the bow window, her cheek

lightly touching the warm plaz through which she could see the Great Square of

Keen. Her back was supported by a red cushion, which smelled of melange as did

many things here on Rakis. Behind her lay three rooms, small but efficient and

well removed from both Temple and Bene Gesserit Keep. This removal had been a

requirement of the Sisterhood's agreement with the priests.

"Sheeana must be guarded more securely," Odrade had insisted.

"She cannot become the ward of only the Sisterhood!" Tuek had objected.

"Nor of the priests," Odrade countered.

Six stories below Odrade's bow window vantage, an enormous bazaar spread out in

loosely organized confusion, almost filling the Great Square. The silvered

yellow light of a lowering sun washed the scene with brilliance, picking out the

bright colors of canopies, drawing long shadows across the uneven ground. There

was a dusty radiance about the light where scattered clumps of people milled

about patched umbrellas and the jumbled alignments of wares.

The Great Square was not actually square. It stretched out around the bazaar a

full kilometer across from Odrade's window and easily twice that distance to the

left and right -- a giant rectangle of packed earth and old stones, which had

been churned into bitter dust by daytime shoppers braving the heat in hopes of

gaining a bargain then.

As evening advanced, a different sense of activity unfolded beneath Odrade --

more people arriving, a quickening and more frenetic pulse to the movement.

Odrade tipped her head to peer down sharply at the ground near her building.

Some of the merchants directly beneath her window had wandered off to their

nearby quarters. They would return soon, after a meal and short siesta, ready

to make full use of those more valuable hours when people in the open could

breathe air that did not burn their throats.

Sheeana was overdue, Odrade noted. The priests dared not delay much longer.

They would be working frantically now, firing questions at Sheeana, admonishing

her to remember that she was God's own emissary to His Church. Reminding

Sheeana of many contrived allegiances that Odrade would have to ferret out and

make humorous before dispatching such trivia into proper perspective.

Odrade arched her back and went through a silent minute of tiny exercises to

relieve tensions. She admitted to a certain sympathy for Sheeana. The girl's

thoughts would be chaos right now. Sheeana knew little or nothing about what to

expect once she came fully under a Reverend Mother's tutelage. There was little

doubt that the young mind was cluttered with myths and other misinformation.

As my mind was, Odrade thought.

She could not avoid remembrance at a moment such as this. Her immediate task

was clear: exorcism, not only for Sheeana but for herself.

She thought the haunting thoughts of a Reverend Mother in her memories: Odrade,

age five, the comfortable house on Gamma. The road outside the house is lined

with what pass for middle-echelon mansions in the planet's seacoast cities --

low one-story buildings on wide avenues. The houses reach far down to an

outcurving sea frontage where they are much wider than along the avenues. Only

on the sea side do they become more expansive and less jealous of every square

meter.

Odrade's Bene Gesserit-honed memory rolled through that faraway house, its

occupants, the avenue, the playmates. She felt the tightness in her breast that

told her such memories were attached to later events.

The Bene Gesserit creche on Al Dhanab's artificial world, one of the original

Sisterhood safe planets. (Later, she learned that the Bene Gesserit once

considered making the entire planet into a no-chamber. Energy requirements

defeated this plan.)

The creche was a cascade of variety to a child from Gammu's comforts and

friendships. Bene Gesserit education included intense physical training. There

were regular admonishments that she could not hope to become a Reverend Mother

without passage through much pain and frequent periods of seemingly hopeless

muscular exercises.

Some of her companions failed at this stage. They left to become nurses,

servants, laborers, casual breeders. They filled niches of necessity wherever

the Sisterhood required them. There were times when Odrade felt longingly that

this failure might not be a bad life -- fewer responsibilities, lesser goals.

That had been before she emerged from Primary Training.

I thought of it as emerging, coming through victorious. I came out the other

side.

Only to find herself immersed in new and harsher demands.

Odrade sat up on her Rakian window ledge and pushed her cushion aside. She

turned her back on the bazaar. It was becoming noisier out there. Damned

priests! They were stretching delay to its absolute limits!

I must think about my own childhood because that will help me with Sheeana, she

thought. Immediately, she sneered at her own weakness. Another excuse!

It took some postulants at least fifty years to become Reverend Mothers. This

was ground into them during Secondary Training: a lesson of patience. Odrade

showed an early penchant for deep study. There was consideration that she might

become one of the Bene Gesserit Mentats and probably an Archivist. This idea

was dropped on the discovery that her talents lay in a more profitable

direction. She was aimed at more sensitive duties in Chapter House.

Security.

That wild talent among the Atreides often had this employment. Care with

details, that was Odrade's hallmark. She knew her sisters could predict some of

her actions simply from their deep knowledge of her. Taraza did it regularly.

Odrade had overheard the explanation from Taraza's own lips:

"Odrade's persona is exquisitely reflected in her performance of duties."

There was a joke in Chapter House: "Where does Odrade go when she's off duty?

She goes to work."

Chapter House imposed little need to adopt the covering masks that a Reverend

Mother used automatically on the Outside. She might show emotions momentarily,

deal openly with mistakes of her own and of others, feel sad or bitter or even,

sometimes, happy. Men were available -- not for breeding, but for occasional

solace. All such Bene Gesserit Chapter House males were quite charming and a

few were even sincere in their charm. These few, of course, were much in

demand.

Emotions.

Recognition twisted through Odrade's mind.

So I come to it as I always do.

Odrade felt the warm evening sunlight of Rakis on her back. She knew where her

body sat, but her mind opened itself to the coming encounter with Sheeana.

Love!

It would be so easy and so dangerous.

In this moment, she envied the Station Mothers, the ones allowed to live out a

lifetime with a mated breeding partner. Miles Teg came from such a union.

Other Memories told her how it had been for the Lady Jessica and her Duke. Even

Muad'dib had chosen that form of mating.

It is not for me.

Odrade admitted to a bitter jealousy that she had not been permitted such a

life. What were the compensations of the life into which she had been guided?

"A life without love can be devoted more intensely to the Sisterhood. We

provide our own forms of support to the initiated. Do not worry about sexual

enjoyment. That is available whenever you feel the need."

With charming men!

Since the days of the Lady Jessica, through the Tyrant's times and beyond, many

things had changed . . . including the Bene Gesserit. Every Reverend Mother

knew it.

A deep sigh shuddered through Odrade. She glanced back over her shoulder at the

bazaar. Still no sign of Sheeana.

I must not love this child!

It was done. Odrade knew she had played out the mnemonic game in its required

Bene Gesserit form. She swiveled her body and sat cross-legged on the ledge.

It was a commanding view of the bazaar and over the rooftops of the city and its

basin. Those few remnant hills out there south of here were, she knew, the last

of what had been the Shield Wall of Dune, the high ramparts of basement rock

breached by Muad'dib and his sandworm-mounted legions.

Heat danced from the ground beyond the qanat and canal that protected Keen from

intrusions by the new worms. Odrade smiled softly. The priests found nothing

strange in moating their communities to keep their Divided God from intruding

upon them.

We will worship you, God, but don't bother us. This is our religion, our city.

You see, we no longer call this place Arrakeen. Now, it's Keen. The planet no

longer is Dune or Arrakis. Now, it's Rakis. Keep your distance, God. You are

the past and the past is an embarrassment.

Odrade stared at those distant hills dancing in the heat shimmer. Other

Memories could superimpose the ancient landscape. She knew that past.

If the priests delay bringing Sheeana much longer I will punish them.

Heat still filled the bazaar below her, held there by storage in the ground and

the thick walls surrounding the Great Square. Temperature diffusion was

amplified by the smoke of many small fires lighted in the surrounding buildings

and among the tent-sheltered congeries of life scattered through the bazaar. It

had been a hot day, well above thirty-eight degrees. This building, though, had

been a Fish Speaker Center in the old days and was cooled by Ixian machinery

with evaporation pools on the roof.

We will be comfortable here.

And they would be as secure as Bene Gesserit protective measures could make

them. Reverend Mothers walked those halls out there. The priests had their

representatives in the building but none of those would intrude where Odrade did

not want them. Sheeana would meet with them here on occasion but the occasions

would be only as Odrade permitted.

It is happening, Odrade thought. Taraza's plan moves ahead.

Fresh in Odrade's mind was the latest communication from Chapter House. What

that revealed about the Tleilaxu filled Odrade with excitement that she

carefully dampened. This Waff, this Tleilaxu Master, would be a fascinating

study.

Zensunni! And Sufi!

"A ritual pattern frozen for millennia," Taraza said.

Unspoken in Taraza's report was another message. Taraza is placing her complete

confidence in me. Odrade felt strength flow into her from this awareness.

Sheeana is the fulcrum. We are the lever. Our strength will come from many

sources.

Odrade relaxed. She knew that Sheeana would not permit the priests to delay

much longer. Odrade's own patience had suffered the assaults of anticipation.

It would be worse for Sheeana.

They had become conspirators, Odrade and Sheeana. The first step. It was a

marvelous game to Sheeana. She had been born and bred to distrust priests.

What fun to have an ally at last!

Some form of activity stirred the people directly below Odrade's window. She

peered downward, curious. Five naked men there had linked arms in a circle.

Their robes and stillsuits lay in a pile at one side watched over by a darkskinned

young girl in a long brown dress of spice fiber. Her hair was bound by

a red rag.

Dancers!

Odrade had seen many reports of this phenomenon but this was her first personal

view of it since arriving. The onlookers included a trio of tall Priest

Guardians in yellow helmets with high crests. The Guardians wore short robes

that freed their legs for action, and each carried a metal-clad staff.

As the dancers circled, the watchful crowd grew predictably restive. Odrade

knew the pattern. Soon, there would be a chanting outcry and a great melee.

Heads would be cracked. Blood would flow. People would scream and run about.

Eventually, it would all subside without official intervention. Some would go

away weeping. Some would depart laughing. And the Priest Guardians would not

interfere.

The pointless insanity of this dance and its consequences had fascinated the

Bene Gesserit for centuries. Now it held Odrade's rapt attention. The

devolution of this ritual had been followed by the Missionaria Protectiva.

Rakians called it "Dance Diversion." They had other names for it, as well, and

the most significant was "Siaynoq." This dance was what had become of the

Tyrant's greatest ritual, his moment of sharing with his Fish Speakers.

Odrade recognized and respected the energy in this phenomenon. No Reverend

Mother could fail to see that. The waste of it, however, disturbed her. Such

things should be channeled and focused. This ritual needed some useful

employment. All it did now was drain away forces that might prove destructive

to the priests if left untapped.

A sweet fruit odor wafted into Odrade's nostrils. She sniffed and looked at the

vents beside her window; heat from the mob and the warmed earth created an

updraft. This carried odors from below through the Ixian vents. She pressed

her forehead and nose against the plaz to peer directly downward. Ahhh, the

dancers or the mob had tipped over a merchant's stall. The dancers were

stomping in the fruit. Yellow pulp spurted up to their thighs.

Odrade recognized the fruit merchant among the onlookers, a familiar wizened

face she had seen several times at his stall beside her building's entrance. He

appeared unconcerned by his loss. Like all the others around him, he

concentrated his attention on the dancers. The five naked men moved with a

disjointed high lift of their feet, an unrhythmic and seemingly uncoordinated

display, which came around periodically to a repeated pattern -- three of the

dancers with both feet on the ground and the other two held aloft by their

partners.

Odrade recognized it. This was related to the ancient Fremen way of

sandwalking. This curious dance was a fossil with roots in the need to move

without signaling your presence to a worm.

People began to crowd nearer the dancers out of the bazaar's great rectangle,

hopping upward like children's toys to raise their eyes above the throng for a

glimpse of the five naked men.

Odrade saw Sheeana's escort then, movement far off to the right where a wide

avenue entered the square. Animal-track symbols on a building there said the

wide avenue was God's Way. Historical awareness said the avenue had been Leto

II's route into the city from his high-walled Sareer far off to the south. With

a care for details, one could still discern some of the forms and patterns that

had been the Tyrant's city of Onn, the festival center built around the more

ancient city of Arrakeen. Onn had obliterated many marks of Arrakeen but some

avenues persisted: some buildings were too useful to replace. Buildings

inevitably defined streets.

Sheeana's escort came to a stop where the avenue debouched into the bazaar.

Yellow-helmeted Guardians probed ahead, clearing a path with their staves. The

guards were tall: When grounded, the thick, two-meter staff would come only to

the shoulders of the shortest among them. Even in the most disordered crowd you

could not miss a Priest Guardian, but Sheeana's protectors were the tallest of

the tall.

They were in motion once more leading their party toward Odrade. Their robes

swung open at each stride revealing the slick gray of the best stillsuits. They

walked straight ahead, fifteen of them in a shallow vee which skirted the

thicker clusters of stalls.

A loose band of priestesses with Sheeana at their center marched behind the

guards. Odrade caught glimpses of Sheeana's distinctive figure, that sunstreaked

hair and proudly upthrust face, within her escort. It was the yellowhelmeted

Priest Guardians, though, who attracted Odrade's attention. They moved

with an arrogance conditioned into them from infancy. These guards knew they

were better than the ordinary folk. And the ordinary folk reacted predictably

by opening a way for Sheeana's party.

It was all done so naturally that Odrade could see the ancient pattern of it as

though she watched another ritual dance, which had not changed in millennia.

As she had often done, Odrade thought of herself now as an archeologist, not one

who sifted the dusty detritus of the ages but rather a person who focused where

the Sisterhood frequently concentrated its awareness: on the ways people

carried their past within them. The Tyrant's own design was apparent here.

Sheeana's approach was a thing laid down by the God Emperor himself.

Beneath Odrade's window the five naked men continued to dance. Among the

onlookers, however, Odrade saw a new awareness. Without any concerted turning

of heads toward the approaching phalanx of Priest Guardians, the watchers below

Odrade knew.

Animals always know when the herders arrive.

Now, the crowd's restiveness produced a quicker pulse. They would not be denied

their chaos! A clod of dirt flew from the throng's outskirts and struck the

ground near the dancers. The five men did not miss a step in their extended

pattern but their speed increased. The length of the series between repetitions

spoke of remarkable memories.

Another clod of dirt flew from the crowd and struck a dancer's shoulder. None

of the five men faltered.

The crowd began to scream and chant. Some shouted curses. The chanting became

a hand-clapping intrusion onto the dancers' movements.

Still, the pattern did not change.

The mob's chanting became a harsh rhythm, repeated shouts that echoed against

the Great Square's wails. They were trying to break the dancers' pattern.

Odrade sensed a profound importance in the scene below her.

Sheeana's party had come more than halfway across the bazaar. They moved

through the wider lanes between stalls and turned now directly toward Odrade.

The crowd was at its densest about fifty meters ahead of the Priest Guardians.

The Guardians moved at a steady pace, disdainful of those who scurried aside.

Under the yellow helmets, eyes were fixed straight ahead, staring over the mob.

Not one of the advancing Guardians gave any outward sign that he saw mob or

dancers or any other barrier that might impede him.

The mob stopped its chanting abruptly as though an invisible conductor had waved

his hand for silence. The five men continued to dance. The silence below

Odrade was charged with a power that made her neck hairs stand up. Directly

below Odrade, the three Priest Guardians among the onlookers turned as one man

and moved out of view into her building.

Deep within the crowd, a woman shouted a curse.

The dancers gave no sign that they heard.

The mob crowded forward, diminishing the space around the dancers by at least

half. The girl who guarded the dancers' stillsuits and robes no longer was

visible.

Onward, Sheeana's phalanx marched, the priestesses and their young charge

directly behind.

Violence erupted off to Odrade's right. People there began striking each other.

More missiles arced toward the five dancing men. The mob resumed its chant in a

quicker beat.

At the same time, the rear of the crowd parted for the Guardians. Watchers

there did not take their attention from the dancers, did not pause in their

contributions to the growing chaos, but a way was opened through them.

Absolutely captivated, Odrade stared downward. Many things occurred

simultaneously: the melee, the people cursing and striking each other, the

continuing chant, the implacable advance of the Guardians.

Within the shield of priestesses, Sheeana could be seen darting her gaze from

side to side, trying to see the excitement around her.

Some within the crowd produced clubs and struck out at the people around them,

but nobody threatened the Guardians or any other member of Sheeana's party.

The dancers continued to prance within a tightening circle of watchers.

Everyone crowded close against Odrade's building, forcing her to press her head

against the plaz and peer at a sharp angle downward.

The Guardians leading Sheeana's party advanced through a widening lane amidst

this chaos. The priestesses looked neither left nor right. Yellow-helmeted

Guardians stared straight ahead.

Disdain was too feeble a word for this performance, Odrade decided. And it was

not correct to say that the swirling mob ignored the incoming party. Each was

aware of the other but they existed in separate worlds, observing the strict

rules of that separation. Only Sheeana ignored the secret protocol, hopping

upward to try for a glimpse past the bodies shielding her.

Directly beneath Odrade, the mob surged forward. The dancers were overwhelmed

by the crush, swept aside like ships caught in a gigantic wave. Odrade saw

spots of naked flesh being pummeled and thrust from hand to hand through the

screaming chaos. Only by the most intense concentration could Odrade separate

the sounds being carried up to her.

It was madness! '

None of the dancers resisted. Were they being killed? Was it a sacrifice? The

Sisterhood's analyses did not even begin to touch this actuality.

Yellow helmets moved aside beneath Odrade, opening a way for Sheeana and her

priestesses to pass into the building, then the Guardians closed ranks. They

turned and formed a protective arc around the building's entrance. They held

their staves horizontally and overlapped at waist height.

The chaos beyond them began to subside. None of the dancers was visible but

there were casualties, people sprawled on the ground, others staggering. Bloody

heads could be seen.

Sheeana and the priestesses were out of Odrade's view in the building. Odrade

sat back and tried to sort out what she had just witnessed.

Incredible.

Absolutely none of the Sisterhood's accounts or holophoto records captured this

thing! Part of it was the smells -- dust, sweat, an intense concentration of

human pheromones. Odrade took a deep breath. She felt herself trembling

inside. The mob had become individuals who moved out into the bazaar. She saw

weepers. Some cursed. Some laughed.

The door behind Odrade burst open. Sheeana entered laughing. Odrade whirled

and glimpsed her own guards and some of the priestesses in the hallway before

Sheeana closed the door.

The girl's dark brown eyes glittered with excitement. Her narrow face, already

beginning to soften with the curves she would display as an adult, was tense

with suppressed emotion. The tension dissolved as she focused on Odrade.

Very good, Odrade thought, as she observed this. Lesson one of the bonding

already has begun.

"You saw the dancers?" Sheeana demanded, whirling and skipping across the floor

to stop in front of Odrade. "Weren't they beautiful? I think they're so

beautiful! Cania didn't want me to look. She says it's dangerous for me to

take part in Siaynoq. But I don't care! Shaitan would never eat those

dancers!"

With a sudden outflowing awareness, which she had experienced before only during

the spice agony, Odrade saw through to the total pattern of what she had just

witnessed in the Great Square. It had needed only Sheeana's words and presence

to make the thing clear.

A language!

Deep within the collective awareness of these people they carried, all

unconsciously, a language that could say things to them they did not want to

hear. The dancers spoke it. Sheeana spoke it. The thing was composed of voice

tones and movements and pheromones, a complex and subtle combination that had

evolved the way all languages evolved.

Out of necessity.

Odrade grinned at the happy girl standing in front of her. Now, Odrade knew how

to trap the Tleilaxu. Now, she knew more of Taraza's design.

I must accompany Sheeana into the desert at the first opportunity. We will wait

only for the arrival of this Tleilaxu Master, this Waff. We will take him with

us!

Liberty and Freedom are complex concepts. They go back to religious ideas of

Free Will and are related to the Ruler Mystique implicit in absolute monarchs.

Without absolute monarchs patterned after the Old Gods and ruling by the grace

of a belief in religious indulgence, Liberty and Freedom would never have gained

their present meaning. These ideals owe their very existence to past examples

of oppression. And the forces that maintain such ideas will erode unless

renewed by dramatic teaching or new oppressions. This is the most basic key to

my life.

-Leto II, God Emperor of Dune: Dar-es-Balat Records

Some thirty kilometers into the thick forest northeast of the Gammu Keep, Teg

kept them waiting under the cover of a life-shield blanket until the sun dipped

behind the high ground to the west.

"Tonight, we go a new direction," he said.

For three nights now, he had led them through tree-enclosed darkness with a

masterful demonstration of Mentat Memory, each step directed precisely along the

track that Patrin had laid out for him.

"I'm stiff from too much sitting," Lucilla complained. "And it's going to be

another cold night."

Teg folded the life-shield blanket and put it in the top of his pack. "You two

can start moving around a bit," he said. "But we won't leave here until full

dark."

Teg sat up with his back against the bole of a thickly branched conifer, looking

out from the deeper shadows as Lucilla and Duncan moved into the glade. The two

of them stood there a moment, shivering as the last of the day's warmth fled

into the night's chill. Yes, it would be cold again tonight, Teg thought, but

they would have little chance to think about that.

The unexpected.

Schwangyu would never expect them still to be this close to the Keep and on

foot.

Taraza should have been more emphatic in her warnings about Schwangyu, Teg

thought. Schwangyu's violent and open disobedience of a Mother Superior defied

tradition. Mentat logic would not accept the situation without more data.

His memory brought up a saying from school days, one of those warning aphorisms

by which a Mentat was supposed to rein in his logic.

"Given a trail of logic, occam's razor laid out with impeccable detail, the

Mentat may follow such logic to personal disaster. "

So logic was known to fail.

He thought back to Taraza's behavior on the Guildship and immediately afterward.

She wanted me to know I would be completely on my own. I must see the problem

in my own way, not in her way.

So the threat from Schwangyu had to be a real threat that he discovered and

faced and solved on his own.

Taraza had not known what would happen to Patrin because of all this.

Taraza did not really care what happened to Patrin. Or to me. Or to Lucilla.

But what about the ghola?

Taraza must care!

It was not logical that she would . . . Teg dumped this line of reasoning.

Taraza did not want him to act logically. She wanted him to do exactly what he

was doing, what he had always done in the tight spots.

The unexpected.

So there was a species of logic to all of this but it kicked the performers out

of the nest into chaos.

From which we must make our own order.

Grief welled up in his consciousness. Patrin! Damn you, Patrin! You knew and

I didn't! What will I do without you?

Teg could almost hear the old aide's response, that stiffly formal voice Patrin

always used when he was chiding his commander.

"You will do your best, Bashar."

The most coldly progressive reasoning said Teg would never again see Patrin in

the flesh nor hear the old man's actual voice. Still . . . the voice remained.

The person persisted in memory.

"Shouldn't we be going?"

It was Lucilla, standing close in front of his position beneath the tree.

Duncan waited beside her. Both of them had shouldered their packs.

While he sat thinking, night had fallen. Rich starlight created vague shadows

in the glade. Teg lifted himself to his feet, took his pack and, bending to

avoid the low branches, emerged into the glade. Duncan helped Teg shoulder his

pack.

"Schwangyu will consider this eventually," Lucilla said. "Her searchers will

come after us here. You know it."

"Not until they have followed out the false trail and found the end of it," Teg

said. "Come."

He led the way westward through an opening in the trees.

Three nights he had led them along what he called "Patrin's memory-path." As he

walked on this fourth night, Teg berated himself for not projecting the logical

consequences of Patrin's behavior.

I understood the depths of his loyalty but I did not project that loyalty into a

most obvious result. We were together so many years I thought I knew his mind

as I knew my own. Patrin, damn you! There was no need for you to die!

Teg admitted to himself then that there had been a need. Patrin had seen it.

The Mentat had not permitted himself to see it. Logic could move just as

blindly as any other faculty.

As the Bene Gesserit often said and demonstrated.

So we walk. Schwangyu does not expect this.

Teg was forced to admit that walking the wild places of Gammu created a whole

new perspective for him. This entire region had been allowed to overgrow with

plant life during the Famine Times and the Scattering. It had been replanted

later but mostly as a random wilderness. Secret trails and private landmarks

guided today's access. Teg imagined Patrin as a youth learning this region --

that rocky butte visible in starlight through a gap in the trees, that spiked

promontory, these lanes through giant trees.

"They will expect us to make a run for a no-ship, " he and Patrin had agreed,

fleshing out their plan. "The decoy must take the searchers in that direction."

Patrin had not said that he would be the decoy.

Teg swallowed past a lump in his throat.

Duncan could not be protected in the Keep, he justified himself.

That was true.

Lucilla had jittered through their first day under the life-shield that

protected them from discovery by the instruments of aerial searchers.

"We must get word to Taraza!"

"When we can."

"What if something happens to you? I must know all of your escape plan."

"If something happens to me, you will not be able to follow Patrin's path.

There isn't time to put it in your memory."

Duncan took little part in the conversation that day. He watched them silently

or dozed, awakening fitful and with an angry look in his eyes.

On the second day under the shielding blanket, Duncan suddenly demanded of Teg:

"Why do they want to kill me?"

"To frustrate the Sisterhood's plan for you," Teg said.

Duncan glared at Lucilla. "What is that plan?"

When Lucilla did not answer, Duncan said: "She knows. She knows because I'm

supposed to depend on her. I'm supposed to love her!"

Teg thought Lucilla concealed her dismay quite well. Obviously, her plans for

the ghola had fallen into disarray, all of the sequencing thrown out of joint by

this flight.

Duncan's behavior revealed another possibility: Was the ghola a latent

Truthsayer? What additional powers had been bred into this ghola by the sly

Tleilaxu?

At their second nightfall in the wilderness, Lucilla was full of accusations.

"Taraza ordered you to restore his original memories! How can you do that out

here?"

"When we reach sanctuary."

A silent and acutely alert Duncan accompanied them that night. There was a new

vitality in him. He had heard!

Nothing must harm Teg, Duncan thought. Wherever and whatever sanctuary might

be, Teg must reach it safely. Then, I will know!

Duncan was not sure what he would know but now he fully accepted the prize in

it. This wilderness must lead to that goal. He recalled staring out at the

wild places from the Keep and how he had thought to be free here. That sense of

untouched freedom had vanished. The wilderness was only a path to something

more important.

Lucilla, bringing up the rear of this march, forced herself to remain calm,

alert, and to accept what she could not change. Part of her awareness held

firmly to Taraza's orders:

"Stay close to the ghola and, when the moment comes, complete your assignment."

One pace at a time, Teg's body measured out the kilometers. This was the fourth

night. Patrin had estimated four nights to reach their goal.

And what a goal!

The emergency escape plan centered on a discovery Patrin had made here as a

teenager of one of Gammu's many mysteries. Patrin's words came back to Teg:

"On the excuse of a personal reconnaissance, I returned to the place two days

ago. It is untouched. I am still the only person who has ever been there."

"How can you be sure?"

"I took my own precautions when I left Gammu years ago, little things that would

be disturbed by another person. Nothing has been moved."

"A Harkonnen no-globe?"

"Very ancient but the chambers are still intact and functioning."

"What about food, water.. . "

"Everything you could want or need is there, laid down in the nullentropy bins

at the core."

Teg and Patrin made their plans, hoping they would never have to use this

emergency bolt hole, holding the secret of it close while Patrin replayed for

Teg the hidden way to this childhood discovery.

Behind Teg, Lucilla let out a small gasp as she tripped over a root.

I should have warned her, Teg thought. Duncan obviously was following Teg's

lead by sound. Lucilla, just as obviously, had much of her attention on her own

private thoughts.

Her facial resemblance to Darwi Odrade was remarkable, Teg told himself. Back

there at the Keep, the two women side by side, he had marked the differences

dictated by their differing ages. Lucilla's youth showed itself in more

subcutaneous fat, a rounding of the facial flesh. But the voices! Timbre,

accent, tricks of atonal inflection, the common stamp of Bene Gesserit speech

mannerisms. They would be almost impossible to tell apart in the dark.

Knowing the Bene Gesserit as he did, Teg knew this was no accident. Given the

Sisterhood's propensity for doubling and redoubling its prized genetic lines to

protect the investment, there had to be a common ancestral source.

Atreides, all of us, he thought.

Taraza had not revealed her design for the ghola, but just being within that

design gave Teg access to the growing shape of it. No complete pattern, but he

could already sense a wholeness there.

Generation after generation, the Sisterhood dealing with the Tleilaxu, buying

Idaho gholas, training them here on Gammu, only to have them assassinated. All

of that time waiting for the right moment. It was like a terrible game, which

had come into frenetic prominence because a girl capable of commanding the worms

had appeared on Rakis.

Gammu itself had to be part of the design. Caladanian marks all over the place.

Danian subtleties piled atop the more brutal ancient ways. Something other than

population had come out of the Danian Sanctuary where the Tyrant's grandmother,

the Lady Jessica, had lived out her days.

Teg had seen the overt and covert marks when he made his first reconnaissance

tour of Gammu.

Wealth!

The signs were here to be read. It flowed around their universe, moving

amoebalike to insinuate itself into any place where it could lodge. There was

wealth from the Scattering on Gammu, Teg knew. Wealth so great that few

suspected (or could imagine) its size and power.

He stopped walking abruptly. Physical patterns in the immediate landscape

demanded his full attention. Ahead of them lay an exposed ledge of barren rock,

its identifying markers planted in his memory by Patrin. This passage would be

one of the more dangerous.

"No caves or heavy growth to conceal you. Have the blanket ready. "

Teg removed the life-shield from his pack and carried it over his arm. Once

more he indicated that they should continue. The dark weave of the shield

fabric hissed against his body as he moved.

Lucilla was becoming less of a cipher, he thought. She aspired to a Lady in

front of her name. The Lady Lucilla. No doubt that had a pleasing sound to

her. A few such titled Reverend Mothers were appearing now that Major Houses

were emerging from the long obscurity imposed by the Tyrant's Golden Path.

Lucilla, the Seductress-Imprinter.

All such women of the Sisterhood were sexual adepts. Teg's own mother had

educated him in the workings of that system, sending him to well-selected local

women when he was quite young, sensitizing him to the signs he must observe

within himself as well as in the women. It was a forbidden training outside of

Chapter House surveillance, but Teg's mother had been one of the Sisterhood's

heretics.

"You will have a need for this, Miles."

No doubt there had been some prescience in her. She had armed him against the

Imprinters who were trained in orgasmic amplification to fix the unconscious

ties -- male to female.

Lucilla and Duncan. An imprint on her would be an imprint on Odrade.

Teg almost heard the pieces go snick as they locked together in his mind. Then

what of the young woman on Rakis? Would Lucilla teach the techniques of

seduction to her imprinted pupil, arm him to ensnare the one who commanded

worms?

Not enough data yet for a Prime Computation.

Teg paused at the end of the dangerous open rock passage. He put away the

blanket and sealed his pack while Duncan and Lucilla waited close behind. Teg

heaved a sigh. The blanket always worried him. It did not have the deflective

powers of a full battle shield but if a lasgun's beam hit the thing the

consequent quick-fire could be fatal.

Dangerous toys!

This was how Teg always classified such weapons and mechanical devices. Better

to rely on your wits, your own flesh, and the Five Attitudes of the Bene

Gesserit Way as his mother had taught him.

Use the instruments only when they are absolutely required to amplify the flesh:

that was the Bene Gesserit teaching.

"Why are we stopping?" Lucilla whispered.

"I am listening to the night," Teg said.

Duncan, his face a ghostly blur in the tree-filtered starlight, stared at Teg.

Teg's features reassured him. They were lodged somewhere in an unavailable

memory, Duncan thought. I can trust this man.

Lucilla suspected that they were stopping here because Teg's old body demanded

respite but she could not bring herself to say this. Teg said his escape plan

included a way of getting Duncan to Rakis. Very well. That was all that

mattered for the moment.

She already had figured out that this sanctuary somewhere ahead of them must

involve a no-ship or a no-chamber. Nothing else would suffice. Somehow, Patrin

had been the key to it. Teg's few hints had revealed that Patrin was the source

of their escape route.

Lucilla had been the first to realize how Patrin would have to pay for their

escape. Patrin was the weakest link. He remained behind where Schwangyu could

capture him. Capture of the decoy was inevitable. Only a fool would suppose

that a Reverend Mother of Schwangyu's powers would be incapable of wresting

secrets from a mere male. Schwangyu would not even require the heavy

persuasion. The subtleties of Voice and those painful forms of interrogation

that remained a Sisterhood monopoly -- the agony box and nerve-node pressures --

those were all she would require.

The form Patrin's loyalty would take had been clear to Lucilla then. How could

Teg have been so blind?

Love!

That long, trusting bond between the two men. Schwangyu would act swiftly and

brutally. Patrin knew it. Teg had not examined his own certain knowledge.

Duncan's voice shocked her from these thoughts.

" 'Thopter! Behind us!"

"Quick!" Teg whipped the blanket from his pack and threw it over them. They

huddled in earth-smelling darkness, listening to the ornithopter pass above

them. It did not pause or return.

When they felt certain they had not been detected, Teg once more led them up

Patrin's memory-track.

"That was a searcher," Lucilla said. "They are beginning to suspect . . . or

Patrin . . ."

"Save your energy for walking," Teg snapped.

She did not press him. They both knew Patrin was dead. Argument over this had

been exhausted.

This Mentat goes deep, Lucilla told herself.

Teg was the child of a Reverend Mother and that mother had trained him beyond

the permitted limits before the Sisterhood took him into their manipulative

hands. The ghola was not the only one here with unknown resources.

Their trail turned back and forth upon itself, a game track climbing a steep

hill through thick forest. Starlight did not penetrate the trees. Only the

Mentat's marvelous memory kept them on the path.

Lucilla felt duff underfoot. She listened to Teg's movements, reading them to

guide her feet.

How silent Duncan is, she thought. How closed in upon himself. He obeyed

orders. He followed where Teg led them. She sensed the quality of Duncan's

obedience. He kept his own counsel. Duncan obeyed because it suited him to do

so -- for now. Schwangyu's rebellion had planted something wildly independent

in the ghola. And what things of their own had the Tleilaxu planted in him?

Teg stopped at a level spot beneath tall trees to regain his wind. Lucilla

could hear him breathing deeply. This reminded her once more that the Mentat

was a very old man, far too old for these exertions. She spoke quietly:

"Are you all right, Miles?"

"I'll tell you when I'm not."

"How much farther?" Duncan asked.

"Only a short way now."

Presently, he resumed his course through the night. "We must hurry," he said.

"This saddle-back ridge is the last bit."

Now that he had accepted the fact of Patrin's death, Teg's thoughts swung like a

compass needle to Schwangyu and what she must be experiencing. Schwangyu would

feel her world falling in around her. The fugitives had been gone four nights!

People who could elude a Reverend Mother this way might do anything! Of course,

the fugitives probably were off-planet by now. A no-ship. But what if . . .

Schwangyu's thoughts would be full of what-ifs.

Patrin had been the fragile link but Patrin had been well trained in the removal

of fragile links, trained by a master -- Miles Teg.

Teg dashed dampness from his eyes with a quick shake of his head. Immediate

necessity required that core of internal honesty which he could not avoid. Teg

had never been a good liar, not even to himself. Quite early in his training,

he had realized that his mother and the others involved in his upbringing had

conditioned him to a deep sense of personal honesty.

Adherence to a code of honor.

The code itself, as he recognized its shape in him, attracted Teg's fascinated

attention. It began with recognition that humans were not created equal, that

they possessed different inherited abilities and experienced different events in

their lives. This produced people of different accomplishments and different

worth.

To obey this code, Teg realized early that he must place himself accurately into

the flow of observable hierarchies accepting that a moment might come when he

could evolve no further.

The code's conditioning went deep. He could never find its ultimate roots. It

obviously was attached to something intrinsic to his humanity. It dictated with

enormous power the limits of behavior permitted to those above as well as to

those below him in the hierarchical pyramid.

The key token of exchange: loyalty.

Loyalty went upward and downward, lodging wherever it found a deserving

attachment. Such loyalties, Teg knew, were securely locked into him. He felt

no doubts that Taraza would support him in everything except a situation

demanding that he be sacrificed to the survival of the Sisterhood. And that was

right in itself. That was where the loyalties of all of them eventually lodged.

I am Taraza's Bashar. That is what the code says.

And this was the code that had killed Patrin.

I hope you suffered no pain, old friend.

Once more, Teg paused under the trees. Taking his fighting knife from its boot

sheath, he scratched a small mark in a tree beside him.

"What are you doing?" Lucilla demanded.

"This is a secret mark," Teg said. "Only the people I have trained know about

it. And Taraza, of course."

"But why are you . . ."

"I will explain later."

Teg moved forward, stopping at another tree where he made the tiny mark, a thing

which an animal might make with a claw, something to blend into the natural

forms of this wilderness.

As he worked his way ahead, Teg realized he had come to a decision about

Lucilla. Her plans for Duncan must be deflected. Every Mentat projection Teg

could make about Duncan's safety and sanity required this. The awakening of

Duncan's pre-ghola memories must come ahead of any Imprint by Lucilla. It would

not be easy to block her, Teg knew. It required a better liar than he had ever

been to dissemble for a Reverend Mother.

It must be made to appear accidental, the normal outcome of the circumstances.

Lucilla must never suspect opposition.

Teg held few illusions about succeeding against an aroused Reverend Mother in

close quarters. Better to kill her. That, he thought he could do. But the

consequences! Taraza could never be made to see such a bloody act as obedience

to her orders.

No, he would have to bide his time, wait and watch and listen.

They emerged into a small open area with a high barrier of volcanic rock close

ahead of them. Scrubby bushes and low thorn trees grew close against the rock,

visible as dark blotches in the starlight.

Teg saw the blacker outline of a crawl space under the bushes.

"It's belly crawling from here in," Teg said.

"I smell ashes," Lucilla said. "Something's been burned here."

"This is where the decoy came," Teg said. "He left a charred area just down to

our left -- simulating the marks of a no-ship's take-off burn."

Lucilla's quickly indrawn breath was audible. The audacity! Should Schwangyu

dare bring in a prescient searcher to follow Duncan's tracks (because Duncan

alone among them had no Siona blood in his ancestry to shield him) all of the

marks would agree that they had come this way and fled off-planet in a no-ship .

. . provided . . .

"But where are you taking us?" she asked.

"It's a Harkonnen no-globe," Teg said. "It has been here for millennia and now

it's ours."

Quite naturally, holders of power wish to suppress wild research. Unrestricted

questing after knowledge has a long history of producing unwanted competition.

The powerful want a "safe line of investigations," which will develop only those

products and ideas that can be controlled and, most important, that will allow

the larger part of the benefits to be captured by inside investors.

Unfortunately, a random universe full of relative variables does not insure such

a "safe line of investigations."

-Assessment of Ix, Bene Gesserit Archives

Hedley Tuek, High Priest and titular ruler of Rakis, felt himself inadequate to

the demands just imposed upon him.

Dust-fogged night enveloped the city of Keen, but here in his private audience

chamber the brilliance of many glowglobes dispelled shadows. Even here, in the

heart of the Temple, though, the wind could be heard, a distant moan, this

planet's periodic torment.

The audience chamber was an irregular room seven meters long and four meters at

its widest end. The opposite end was almost imperceptibly narrower. The

ceiling, too, made a gentle slope in that direction. Spice fiber hangings and

clever shadings in light yellows and grays concealed these irregularities. One

of the hangings covered a focusing horn that carried even the smallest sounds to

listeners outside the room.

Only Darwi Odrade, the new commander of the Bene Gesserit Keep on Rakis, sat

with Tuek in the audience chamber. The two of them faced each other across a

narrow space defined by their soft green cushions.

Tuek tried to conceal a grimace. The effort twisted his normally imposing

features into a revealing mask. He had taken great care in preparing himself

for this night's confrontations. Dressers had smoothed his robe over his tall,

rather stout figure. Golden sandals covered his long feet. The stillsuit under

his robe was only for display: no pumps or catchpockets, no uncomfortable and

time-consuming adjustments required. His silky gray hair was combed long to his

shoulders, a suitable frame for his square face with its wide thick mouth and

heavy chin. His eyes fell abruptly into a look of benevolence, an expression he

had copied from his grandfather. This was how he had looked on entering the

audience chamber to meet Odrade. He had felt himself altogether imposing, but,

now, he suddenly felt naked and disheveled.

He's really a rather empty-headed fellow, Odrade thought.

Tuek was thinking: I cannot discuss that terrible Manifesto with her! Not with

a Tleilaxu Master and those Face Dancers listening in the other room. What ever

possessed me to allow that?

"It is heresy, pure and simple," Tuek said.

"But you are only one religion among many," Odrade countered. "And with people

returning from the Scattering, the proliferation of schisms and variant beliefs

. . ."

"We are the only true belief!" Tuek said.

Odrade hid a smile. He said it right on cue. And Waff surely heard him. Tuek

was remarkably easy to lead. If the Sisterhood was right about Waff, Tuek's

words would enrage the Tleilaxu Master.

In a deep and portentous tone, Odrade said: "The Manifesto raises questions

that all must address, believers and non-believers alike."

"What has all this to do with the Holy Child?" Tuek demanded. "You told me we

must meet on matters concerning --"

"Indeed! Don't try to deny that you know there are many people who are

beginning to worship Sheeana. The Manifesto implicates --"

"Manifesto! Manifesto! It is a heretical document, which will be obliterated.

As for Sheeana, she must be returned to our exclusive care!"

"No." Odrade spoke softly.

How agitated Tuek was, she thought. His stiff neck moved minimally as he turned

his head from side to side. The movements pointed to a wall hanging on Odrade's

right, defining the place as though Tuek's head carried an illuminating beam to

reveal that particular hanging. What a transparent man, this High Priest. He

might just as well announce that Waff listened to them somewhere behind that

hanging.

"Next, you will spirit her away from Rakis," Tuek said.

"She stays here," Odrade said. "Just as we promised you."

"But why can't she . . ."

"Come now! Sheeana has made her wishes clear and I'm sure her words have been

reported to you. She wishes to be a Reverend Mother."

"She already is the --"

"M'Lord Tuek! Don't try to dissemble with me. She has stated her wishes and we

are happy to comply. Why should you object? Reverend Mothers served the

Divided God in the Fremen times. Why not now?"

"You Bene Gesserit have ways of making people say things they do not want to

say," Tuek accused. "We should not be discussing this privately. My

councillors --"

"Your councillors would only muddy our discussion. The implications of the

Atreides Manifesto --"

"I will discuss only Sheeana!" Tuek drew himself up in what he thought of as

his posture of adamant High Priest.

"We are discussing her," Odrade said.

"Then let me make it clear that we require more of our people in her entourage.

She must be guarded at all --"

"The way she was guarded on that rooftop?" Odrade asked.

"Reverend Mother Odrade, this is Holy Rakis! You have no rights here that we do

not grant!"

"Rights? Sheeana has become the target, yes the target! of many ambitions and

you wish to discuss rights?"

"My duties as High Priest are clear. The Holy Church of the Divided God will --

"

"M'Lord Tuek! I am trying very hard to maintain the necessary courtesies. What

I do is for your benefit as well as our own. The actions we have taken --"

"Actions? What actions?" The words were pressed from Tuek with a hoarse

grunting. These terrible Bene Gesserit witches! Tleilaxu behind him and a

Reverend Mother in front! Tuek felt like a ball in a fearsome game, bounced

back and forth between terrifying energies. Peaceful Rakis, the secure place of

his daily routines, had vanished and he had been projected into an arena whose

rules he did not fully understand.

"I have sent for the Bashar Miles Teg," Odrade said. "That is all. His advance

party should arrive soon. We are going to reinforce your planetary defenses."

"You dare to take over --"

"We take over nothing. At your own father's request, Teg's people redesigned

your defenses. The agreement under which this was done contains, at your

father's insistence, a clause requiring our periodic review."

Tuek sat in dazed silence. Waff, that ominous little Tleilaxu, had heard all of

this. There would be conflict! The Tleilaxu wanted a secret agreement setting

melange prices. They would not permit Bene Gesserit interference.

Odrade had spoken of Tuek's father and now Tuek wished only that his long-dead

father sat here. A hard man. He would have known how to deal with these

opposing forces. He had always handled the Tleilaxu quite well. Tuek recalled

listening (just as Waff listened now!) to a Tleilaxu envoy named Wose . . . and

another one named Pook. Ledden Pook. What odd names they had.

Tuek's confused thoughts abruptly offered up another name. Odrade had just

mentioned it: Teg! Was that old monster still active?

Odrade was speaking once more. Tuek tried to swallow in a dry throat as he

leaned forward, forcing himself to pay attention.

"Teg will also look into your on-planet defenses. After that rooftop fiasco --"

"I officially forbid this interference with our internal affairs," Tuek said.

"There is no need. Our Priest Guardians are adequate to --"

"Adequate?" Odrade shook her head sadly. "What an inadequate word, given the

new circumstances on Rakis."

"What new circumstances?" There was terror in Tuek's voice.

Odrade merely sat there staring at him.

Tuek tried to force some order into his thoughts. Could she know about the

Tleilaxu listening back there? Impossible! He inhaled a trembling breath.

What was this about the defenses of Rakis? The defenses were excellent, he

reassured himself. They had the best Ixian monitors and no-ships. More than

that, it was to the advantage of all independent powers that Rakis remain

equally independent as another source of the spice.

To the advantage of everyone except the Tleilaxu with the damnable melange

overproduction from their axlotl tanks!

This was a shattering thought. A Tleilaxu Master had heard every word spoken in

this audience chamber!

Tuek called on Shai-hulud, the Divided God, to protect him. That terrible

little man back there said he spoke also for Ixians and Fish Speakers. He

produced documents. Was that the "new circumstances" of which Odrade spoke?

Nothing remained long hidden from the witches!

The High Priest could not repress a shudder at the thought of Waff: that round

little head, those glittering eyes; that pug nose and those sharp teeth in that

brittle smile. Waff looked like a slightly enlarged child until you met those

eyes and heard him speak in his squeaky voice. Tuek recalled that his own

father had complained of those voices: "The Tleilaxu say such terrible things

in their childish voices!"

Odrade shifted on her cushions. She thought of Waff listening out there. Had

he heard enough? Her own secret listeners certainly would be asking themselves

that question now. Reverend Mothers always replayed these verbal contests,

seeking improvements and new advantages for the Sisterhood.

Waff has heard enough, Odrade told herself. Time to shift the play.

In her most matter-of-fact tones, Odrade said: "M'Lord Tuek, someone important

is listening to what we say here. Is it polite that such a person listen

secretly?"

Tuek closed his eyes. She knows!

He opened his eyes and met Odrade's unrevealing stare. She looked like someone

who might wait through eternity for his response.

"Polite? I . . . I . . ."

"Invite the secret listener to come sit with us," Odrade said.

Tuek passed a hand across his damp forehead. His father and grandfather, High

Priests before him, had laid down ritual responses for most occasions, but

nothing for a moment such as this. Invite the Tleilaxu to sit here? In this

chamber with . . . Tuek was reminded suddenly that he did not like the smell of

Tleilaxu Masters. His father had complained of that: "They smell of disgusting

food!"

Odrade got to her feet. "I would much rather look upon those who hear my

words," she said. "Shall I go myself and invite the hidden listener to --"

"Please!" Tuek remained seated but lifted a hand to stop her. "I had little

choice. He comes with documents from Fish Speakers and Ixians. He said he

would help us to return Sheeana to our --"

"Help you?" Odrade looked down at the sweating priest with something akin to

pity. This one thought he ruled Rakis?

"He is of the Bene Tleilax," Tuek said. "He is called Waff and --"

"I know what he is called and I know why he is here, M'Lord Tuek. What

astonishes me is that you would allow him to spy on -"

"It is not spying! We were negotiating. I mean, there are new forces to which

we must adjust our --"

"New forces? Oh, yes: the whores from the Scattering. Does this Waff bring

some of them with him?"

Before Tuek could respond, the audience chamber's side door opened. Waff

entered right on cue, two Face Dancers behind him.

He was told not to bring Face Dancers! Odrade thought.

"Just you!" Odrade said, pointing. "Those others were not invited, were they,

M'Lord ?"

Tuek lifted himself heavily to his feet, noting the nearness of Odrade,

remembering all of the terrible stories about the Reverend Mothers' physical

prowess. The presence of Face Dancers added to his confusion. They always

filled him with such terrible misgivings.

Turning toward the door and trying to compose his features into a look of

invitation, Tuek said: "Only . . . only Ambassador Waff, please."

Speech hurt Tuek's throat. This was worse than terrible! He felt naked before

these people.

Odrade gestured to a cushion near her. "Waff is it? Please come and sit down."

Waff nodded to her as though he had never seen her before. How polite! With a

gesture to his Face Dancers that they remain outside, he crossed to the

indicated cushion but stood waiting beside it.

Odrade saw a flux of tensions move through the little Tleilaxu. Something like

a snarl flickered across his lips. He still had those weapons in his sleeves.

Was he about to break their agreement?

It was time, Odrade knew, for Waff's suspicions to regain all of their original

strength and more. He would be feeling trapped by Taraza's maneuverings. Waff

wanted his breeding mothers! The reek of his pheromones announced his deepest

fears. He carried in his mind, then, his part of their agreement -- or at least

a form of that sharing. Taraza did not expect Waff really to share all of the

knowledge he had gained from the Honored Matres.

"M'Lord Tuek tells me you have been . . . ahhh, negotiating," Odrade said. Let

him remember that word! Waff knew where the real negotiation must be concluded.

As she spoke, Odrade sank to her knees, then back onto her cushion, but her feet

remained positioned to throw her out of any line of attack from Waff.

Waff glanced down at her and at the cushion she had indicated for him. Slowly,

he sank onto his cushion but his arms remained on his knees, the sleeves

directed at Tuek.

What is he doing? Odrade wondered. Waff's movements said he was embarked on a

plan of his own.

Odrade said: "I have been trying to impress upon the High Priest the importance

of the Atreides Manifesto to our mutual --"

"Atreides!" Tuek blurted. He almost collapsed onto his cushion. "It cannot be

Atreides."

"A very persuasive manifesto," Waff said, reinforcing Tuek's obvious fears.

At least that was according to plan, Odrade thought. She said: "The promise of

s'tori cannot be ignored. Many people equate s'tori with the presence of their

god."

Waff sent a surprised and angry stare at her.

Tuek said: "Ambassador Waff tells me that Ixians and Fish Speakers are alarmed

by that document, but I have reassured him that --"

"I think we may ignore the Fish Speakers," Odrade said. "They hear the noise of

god everywhere."

Waff recognized the cant in her words. Was she jibing at him? She was right

about the Fish Speakers, of course. They had been so far weaned from their old

devotions that they influenced very little and whatever they did influence could

be guided by the new Face Dancers who now led them.

Tuek tried to smile at Waff. "You spoke of helping us to . . ."

"Time for that later," Odrade interrupted. She had to keep Tuek's attention on

the document that disturbed him so much. She paraphrased from the Manifesto:

"Your will and your faith -- your belief system -- dominate your universe."

Tuek recognized the words. He had read the terrible document. This Manifesto

said God and all of His works were no more than human creations. He wondered

how he should respond. No High Priest could let such a thing go unchallenged.

Before Tuek could find words, Waff locked eyes with Odrade and responded in a

way he knew she would interpret correctly. Odrade could do no less, being who

she was.

"The error of prescience," Waff said. "Isn't that what this document calls it?

Isn't that where it says the mind of the believer stagnates?"

"Exactly!" Tuek said. He felt thankful for the Tleilaxu intervention. That was

precisely the core of this dangerous heresy!

Waff did not look at him, but continued to stare at Odrade. Did the Bene

Gesserit think their design inscrutable? Let her meet a greater power. She

thought herself so strong! But the Bene Gesserit could not really know how the

Almighty guarded the future of the Shariat!

Tuek was not to be stopped. "It assaults everything we hold sacred! And it's

being spread everywhere!"

"By the Tleilaxu," Odrade said.

Waff lifted his sleeves, directing his weapons at Tuek. He hesitated only

because he saw that Odrade had recognized part of his intentions.

Tuek stared from one to the other. Was Odrade's accusation true? Or was that

just another Bene Gesserit trick?

Odrade saw Waff's hesitation and guessed its reason. She cast through her mind,

seeking an answer to his motivations. What advantage could the Tleilaxu gain by

killing Tuek? Obviously, Waff aimed to substitute one of his Face Dancers for

the High Priest. But what would that gain him?

Sparring for time, Odrade said: "You should be very cautious, Ambassador Waff."

"When has caution ever governed great necessities?" Waff asked.

Tuek lifted himself to his feet and moved heavily to one side, wringing his

hands. "Please! These are holy precincts. It is wrong to discuss heresies

here unless we plan to destroy them." He looked down on Waff. "It's not true,

is it? You are not the authors of that terrible document?"

"It is not ours," Waff agreed. Damn that fop of a priest! Tuek had moved well

to one side and once more presented a moving target.

"I knew it!" Tuek said, striding around behind Waff and Odrade.

Odrade kept her gaze on Waff. He planned murder! She was sure of it.

Tuek spoke from behind her. "You do not know how you wrong us, Reverend Mother.

Ser Waff has asked that we form a melange cartel. I explained that our price to

you must remain unchanged because one of you was the grandmother of God."

Waff bowed his head, waiting. The priest would come back into range. God would

not permit a failure.

Tuek stood behind Odrade looking down at Waff. A shudder passed through the

priest. Tleilaxu were so . . . so repellent and amoral. They could not be

trusted. How could Waff's denial be accepted?

Not wavering from her contemplation of Waff, Odrade said: "But, M'Lord Tuek,

was not the prospect of increased income attractive to you?" She saw Waff's

right arm come around slightly, almost aimed at her. His intentions became

clear.

"M'Lord Tuek," Odrade said, "this Tleilaxu intends to murder us both."

At her words, Waff jerked both arms up, trying to aim at the two separated and

difficult targets. Before his muscles responded, Odrade was under his guard.

She heard the faint hiss of dart throwers but felt no sting. Her left arm came

up in a slashing blow to break Waff's right arm. Her right foot broke his left

arm.

Waff screamed.

He had never suspected such speed in the Bene Gesserit. It was almost a match

for what he had seen in the Honored Matre on the Ixian conference ship. Even

through his pain he realized that he must report this. Reverend Mothers command

synaptic bypasses under duress!

The door behind Odrade burst open. Waff's Face Dancers rushed into the chamber.

But Odrade already was behind Waff, both hands on his throat. "Stop or he

dies!" she shouted.

The two froze.

Waff squirmed under her hands.

"Be still!" she commanded. Odrade glanced at Tuek sprawled on the floor to her

right. One dart had hit its target.

"Waff has killed the High Priest," Odrade said, speaking for her own secret

listeners.

The two Face Dancers continued to stare at her. Their indecision was easy to

see. None of them, she saw, had realized how this played into Bene Gesserit

hands. Trap the Tleilaxu indeed!

Odrade spoke to the Face Dancers. "Remove yourselves and that body to the

corridor and close the door. Your Master has done a foolish thing. He will

have need of you later." To Waff, she said: "For the moment, you need me more

than you need your Face Dancers. Send them away."

"Go," Waff squeaked.

When the Face Dancers continued to stare at her, Odrade said: "If you do not

leave immediately, I will kill him and then I will dispatch both of you."

"Do it!" Waff screamed.

The Face Dancers took this as the command to obey their Master. Odrade heard

something else in Waff's voice. He obviously would have to be talked out of

suicidal hysteria.

Once she was alone with him, Odrade removed the exhausted weapons from his

sleeves and pocketed them. They could be examined in detail later. There was

little she could do for his broken bones except render him briefly unconscious

and set them. She improvised splints from cushions and torn strips of green

fabric from the High Priest's furnishings.

Waff reawakened quickly. He groaned when he looked at Odrade.

"You and I are now allies," Odrade said. "The things that have transpired in

this chamber have been heard by some of my people and by representatives from a

faction that wants to replace Tuek with one of their own number."

It was too fast for Waff. He was a moment grasping what she had said. His mind

fastened, though, on the most important thing.

"Allies?"

"I imagine Tuek was difficult to deal with," she said. "Offer him obvious

benefits and he invariably waffled. You have done some of the priests a favor

by killing him."

"They are listening now?" Waff squeaked.

"Of course. Let us discuss your proposed spice monopoly. The late lamented

High Priest said you mentioned this. Let me see if I can deduce the extent of

your offer."

"My arms," Waff moaned.

"You're still alive," she said. "Be thankful for my wisdom. I could have

killed you."

He turned his head away from her. "That would have been better."

"Not for the Bene Tleilax and certainly not for my Sisterhood," she said. "Let

me see. Yes, you promised to provide Rakis with many new spice harvesters, the

new airborne ones, which only touch the desert with their sweeper heads."

"You listened!" Waff accused.

"Not at all. A very attractive proposal, since I'm sure the Ixians are

providing them free for their own reasons. Shall I continue?"

"You said we are allies."

"A monopoly would force the Guild to buy more Ixian navigation machines," she

said. "You would have the Guild in the jaws of your crusher."

Waff lifted his head to glare at her. The movement sent agony through his

broken arms and he groaned. Despite the pain, he studied Odrade through almost

lidded eyes. Did the witches really believe that was the extent of the Tleilaxu

plan? He hardly dared hope the Bene Gesserit were so misled.

"Of course that was not your basic plan," Odrade said.

Waff's eyes snapped wide open. She was reading his mind! "I am dishonored," he

said. "When you saved my life you saved a useless thing." He sank back.

Odrade inhaled a deep breath. Time to use the results of the Chapter House

analyses. She leaned close to Waff and whispered in his ear: "The Shariat

needs you yet."

Waff gasped.

Odrade sat back. That gasp said it all. Analysis confirmed.

"You thought you had better allies in the people from the Scattering," she said.

"Those Honored Matres and other hetairas of that ilk. I ask you: does the slig

make alliance with its garbage?"

Waff had heard that question uttered only in khel. His face pale, he breathed

in shallow gasps. The implications in her words! He forced himself to ignore

the pain in his arms. Allies, she said. She knew about the Shariat! How could

she possibly know?

"How can either of us be unmindful of the many advantages in an alliance between

Bene Tleilax and Bene Gesserit?" Odrade asked.

Alliance with the powindah witches? Waff's mind was filled with turmoil. The

agony of his arms was held so tentatively at bay. This moment felt so fragile!

He tasted acid bile on the back of his tongue.

"Ahhhh," Odrade said. "Do you hear that? The priest, Krutansik, and his

faction have arrived outside our door. They will propose that one of your Face

Dancers assume the guise of the late Hedley Tuek. Any other course would cause

too much turmoil. Krutansik is a fairly wise man who has held himself in the

background until now. His Uncle Stiros groomed him well."

"What does your Sisterhood gain from alliance with us?" Waff managed.

Odrade smiled. Now she could speak the truth. That was always much easier and

often the most powerful argument.

"Our survival in the face of the storm that is brewing among the Scattered

Ones," she said. "Tleilaxu survival, too. The farthest thing from our desires

is an end to those who preserve the Great Belief."

Waff cringed. She spoke it openly! Then he understood. What matter if others

heard? They could not see through to the secrets beneath her words.

"Our breeding mothers are ready for you," Odrade said. She stared hard into his

eyes and made the handsign of a Zensunni priest.

Waff felt a tight band release itself from his breast. The unexpected, the

unthinkable, the unbelievable thing was true! The Bene Gesserit were not

powindah! All the universe would yet follow the Bene Tleilax into the True

Faith! God would not permit otherwise. Especially not here on the planet of

the Prophet!

Bureaucracy destroys initiative. There is little that bureaucrats hate more

than innovation, especially innovation that produces better results than the old

routines. Improvements always make those at the top of the heap look inept.

Who enjoys appearing inept?

-A Guide to Trial and Error in Government, Bene Gesserit Archives

The reports, the summations and scattered tidbits lay in rows across the long

table where Taraza sat. Except for the night watch and essential services,

Chapter House Core slumbered around her. Only the familiar sounds of

maintenance activities penetrated her private chambers. Two glowglobes hovered

over her table, bathing the dark wood surface and rows of ridulian paper in

yellow light. The window beyond her table was a dark mirror reflecting the

room.

Archives!

The holoprojector flickered with its continuing production above the tabletop --

more bits and pieces that she had summoned.

Taraza rather distrusted Archivists, which she knew was an ambivalent attitude

because she recognized the underlying necessity for data. But Chapter House

Records could only be viewed as a jungle of abbreviations, special notations,

coded insertions, and footnotes. Such material often required a Mentat for

translation or, what was worse, in times of extreme fatigue demanded that she

delve into Other Memories. All Archivists were Mentats, of course, but this did

not reassure Taraza. You could never consult Archival Records in a

straightforward manner. Much of the interpretation that emerged from that

source had to be accepted on the word of the ones who brought it or (hateful!)

you had to rely on the mechanical search by the holosystem. This, in its turn,

required a dependency on those who maintained the system. It gave functionaries

more power than Taraza cared to delegate.

Dependencies!

Taraza hated dependency. This was a rueful admission, reminding her that few

developing situations were ever precisely what you imagined they would be. Even

the best of Mentat projections accumulated errors . . . given enough time.

Still, every move the Sisterhood made required the consultation of Archives and

seemingly endless analyses. Even ordinary commerce demanded it. She found this

a frequent irritation. Should they form this group? Sign that agreement?

There always came the moment during a conference when she was forced to

introduce a note of decision:

"Analysis by Archivist Hesterion accepted."

Or, as was often the case: "Archivists' report rejected; not pertinent."

Taraza leaned forward to study the holoprojection: "Possible breeding plan for

Subject Waff."

She scanned the numbers, gene plans from the cell sample forwarded by Odrade.

Fingernail scrapings seldom produced enough material for a secure analysis but

Odrade had done quite well under the cover of setting the man's broken bones.

Taraza shook her head at the data. Offspring would surely be like all the

previous ones the Bene Gesserit had attempted with Tleilaxu: The females would

be immune to memory probing; males, of course, would be an impenetrable and

repellent chaos.

Taraza sat back and sighed. When it came to breeding records, the monumental

cross-referencing assumed staggering proportions. Officially, it was the

"College of Ancestral Pertinence," CAP to the Archivists. Among the Sisters at

large, it was known as the "Stud Record," which, although accurate, failed to

convey the sense of detail listed under the proper Archival headings. She had

asked for Waff's projections to be carried out into three hundred generations,

an easy and rather rapid task, sufficient for all practical purposes. Threehundred-

Gen mainlines (such as Teg, his collaterals and siblings) had proved

themselves dependable for millennia. Instinct told her it would be bootless to

waste more time on the Waff projections.

Fatigue welled up in Taraza. She put her head in her hands and rested them for

a moment on the table, feeling the coolness of the wood.

What if I am wrong about Rakis?

Opposition arguments could not be shuffled away into Archival dust. Damn this

dependency on computers! The Sisterhood had carried its main lines in computers

even back in the Forbidden Days after the Butlerian Jihad's wild smashing of

"the thinking machines." In these "more enlightened" days, one tended not to

question the unconscious motives behind that ancient orgy of destruction.

Sometimes, we make very responsible decisions for unconscious reasons. A

conscious search of Archives or Other Memories carries no guarantees.

Taraza released one of her hands and slapped it against the tabletop. She did

not like dealing with the Archivists who came trotting in with answers to her

questions. A disdainful lot they were, full of secret jokes. She had heard

them comparing their CAP work to stock breeding, to Farm Forms and Animal Racing

Authority. Damn their jokes! The right decision now was far more important

than they could possibly imagine. Those serving sisters who only obeyed orders

did not have Taraza's responsibilities.

She lifted her head and looked across the room at the niche with its bust of

Sister Chenoeh, the ancient one who had met and conversed with the Tyrant.

You knew, Taraza thought. You were never a Reverend Mother but still you knew.

Your reports show it. How did you know to make the right decision?

Odrade's request for military assistance required an immediate answer. The time

limits were too tight. But with Teg, Lucilla, and the ghola missing, the

contingency plan had to be brought into play.

Damn Teg!

More of his unexpected behavior. He could not leave the ghola in jeopardy, of

course. Schwangyu's actions had been predictable.

What had Teg done? Had he gone to ground in Ysai or one of the other major

cities on Gammu? No. If that were the case, Teg would have reported by now

through one of the secret contacts they had prepared. He possessed a complete

list of those contacts and had investigated some of them personally.

Obviously, Teg did not place full trust in the contacts. He had seen something

during his inspection tour that he had not passed along through Bellonda.

Burzmali would have to be called in and briefed, of course. Burzmali was the

best, trained by Teg himself; prime candidate for Supreme Bashar. Burzmali must

be sent to Gammu.

I'm playing a hunch, Taraza thought.

But if Teg had gone to ground, the trail started on Gammu. The trail could have

ended there as well. Yes, Burzmali to Gammu. Rakis must wait. There were

certain obvious attractions in this move. It would not alert the Guild. The

Tleilaxu and the ones from the Scattering, however, would certainly rise to the

bait. If Odrade failed to trap the Tleilaxu . . . no, Odrade would not fail.

That one had become almost a certainty.

The unexpected.

You see, Miles? I have learned from you.

None of this deflected the opposition within the Sisterhood, though.

Taraza put both palms flat on her table and pressed hard, as though trying to

sense the people out there in Chapter House, the ones who shared Schwangyu's

opinions. Vocal opposition had subsided but that always meant the violence was

being readied.

What shall I do?

The Mother Superior was supposed to be immune to indecision in a crisis. But

the Tleilaxu connection had unbalanced their data. Some of the recommendations

for Odrade appeared obvious and already had been transmitted. That much of the

plan was plausible and simple.

Take Waff into the desert far beyond unwanted eyes. Contrive a situation-inextremis

and the consequent religious experience in the old and reliable pattern

dictated by the Missionaria Protectiva. Test whether the Tleilaxu were using

the ghola process for their own kind of immortality. Odrade was perfectly

capable of carrying out that much of the revised plan. It depended heavily on

this young woman, Sheeana, though.

The worm itself is the unknown.

Taraza reminded herself that today's worm was not the original worm of Rakis.

Despite Sheeana's demonstrated command over them, they were unpredictable. As

Archives would say, they had no track record. Taraza held little doubt that

Odrade had made an accurate deduction about the Rakians and their dances. That

was a plus.

A language.

But we do not yet speak it. That was a negative.

I must make a decision tonight!

Taraza sent her surface awareness roaming backward along that unbroken line of

Mothers Superior, all of those female memories encapsulated within the fragile

awareness of herself and two others -- Bellonda and Hesterion. It was a

tortuous track through Other Memories, which she felt too tired to follow.

Right at the edge of the track would be observations of Muad'dib, the Atreides

bastard who had shaken the universe twice -- once by dominating the Imperium

with his Fremen hordes, and then by spawning the Tyrant.

If we are defeated this time it could be the end of us, she thought. We could

be swallowed whole by these hell-spawned females from the Scattering.

Alternatives presented themselves: The female child on Rakis could be passed

into the Sisterhood's core to live out her life somewhere at the end of a noship's

flight. An ignominious retreat.

So much depended on Teg. Had he failed the Sisterhood at last or had he found

an unexpected way to conceal the ghola?

I must find a way to delay, Taraza thought. We must give Teg time to

communicate with us. Odrade will have to drag out the plan on Rakis.

It was dangerous but it had to be done.

Stiffly, Taraza lifted herself from her chairdog and went to the darkened window

across from her. Chapter House Planet lay in star-shadowed darkness. A refuge:

Chapter House Planet. Such planets were not even recipients of names anymore;

only numbers somewhere in Archives. This planet had seen fourteen hundred years

of Bene Gesserit occupancy but even that must be considered temporary. She

thought of the guardian no-ships orbiting overhead: Teg's own defense system in

depth. Still, Chapter House remained vulnerable.

The problem had a name: "accidental discovery."

It was an eternal flaw. Out there in the Scattering, humankind expanded

exponentially, swarming across unlimited space. The Tyrant's Golden Path secure

at last. Or was it? Surely, the Atreides worm had planned more than the simple

survival of the species.

He did something to us that we have not yet unearthed -- even after all of these

millennia. I think I know what he did. My opposition says otherwise.

It was never easy for a Reverend Mother to contemplate the bondage they had

suffered under Leto II as he whipped his Imperium for thirty-five hundred years

along his Golden Path.

We stumble when we review those times.

Seeing her own reflection in the window's dark plaz, Taraza glared at herself.

It was a grim face and the fatigue easily visible.

I have every right to be tired and grim!

She knew that her training had channeled her deliberately into negative

patterns. These were her defenses and her strengths. She remained distant in

all human relationships, even in the seductions she had performed for the

Breeding Mistresses. Taraza was the perpetual devil's advocate and this had

become a dominant force in the entire Sisterhood, a natural consequence of her

elevation to Mother Superior. Opposition developed easily in that environment.

As the Sufis said: Rot at the core always spreads outward.

What they did not say was that some rots were noble and valuable.

She reassured herself now with her more dependable data: The Scattering took

the Tyrant's lessons outward in the human migrations, changed in unknown ways

but ultimately submissive to recognition. And in time, a way would be found to

nullify a no-ship's invisibility. Taraza did not think the people of the

Scattering had found this -- at least not the ones skulking back into the places

that had spawned them.

There was absolutely no safe course through the conflicting forces, but she

thought the Sisterhood had armed itself as well as it could. The problem was

akin to that of a Guild navigator threading his ship through the folds of space

in a way that avoided collisions and entrapments.

Entrapments, they were the key, and there was Odrade springing the Sisterhood's

traps on the Tleilaxu.

When Taraza thought about Odrade, which was often in these crisis times, their

long association reasserted itself. It was as though she looked at a faded

tapestry in which some figures remained bright. Brightest of all, assuring

Odrade's position close to the seats of Sisterhood command, was her capacity for

cutting across details and getting at the surprising meat of a conflict. It was

a form of that dangerous Atreides prescience working secretly within her. Using

this hidden talent was the one thing that had aroused the most opposition, and

it was the one argument that Taraza admitted had the most validity. That thing

working far below the surface, its hidden movements indicated only by occasional

turbulence, that was the problem!

"Use her but stand ready to eliminate her," Taraza had argued. "We will still

have most of her offspring."

Taraza knew she could depend on Lucilla . . . provided Lucilla had found

sanctuary somewhere with Teg and the ghola. Alternate assassins existed at the

Keep on Rakis, of course. That weapon might have to be armed soon.

Taraza experienced a sudden turmoil within herself. Other Memories advised

caution in the utmost. Never again lose control of the breeding lines! Yes, if

Odrade escaped an elimination attempt, she would be alienated forever. Odrade

was a full Reverend Mother and some of those must still remain out there in the

Scattering -- not among the Honored Matres the Sisterhood had observed . . . but

still . . .

Never Again! That was the operational motto. Never another Kwisatz Haderach or

another Tyrant.

Control the breeders: Control their offspring.

Reverend Mothers did not die when their flesh died. They sank farther and

farther into the Bene Gesserit living core until their casual instructions and

even their unconscious observations became a part of the continuing Sisterhood.

Make no mistakes about Odrade!

The response to Odrade required specific tailoring and exquisite care. Odrade,

who allowed certain limited affections, "a mild warmth," she called them, argued

that emotions provided valuable insights if you did not let them govern you.

Taraza saw this mild warmth as a way into the heart of Odrade, a vulnerable

opening.

I know what you think of me, Dar, with your mild warmth toward an old companion

from school days. You think I am a potential danger to the Sisterhood but that

I can be saved from myself by watchful "friends."

Taraza knew that some of her advisors shared Odrade's opinion, listened quietly

and reserved judgment. Most of them still followed the Mother Superior's lead

but many knew of Odrade's wild talent and had recognized Odrade's doubts. Only

one thing kept most of the Sisters in line and Taraza did not try to delude

herself about it.

Every Mother Superior acted out of a profound loyalty to her Sisterhood.

Nothing must endanger Bene Gesserit continuity, not even herself. In her

precise and harshly self-judgmental way, Taraza examined her relationship to the

Sisterhood's continuing life.

Obviously, there was no immediate necessity to eliminate Odrade. Yet, Odrade

was now so close to the center of the ghola design that little occurring there

could escape her sensitive observation. Much that had not been revealed to her

would become known. The Atreides Manifesto had been almost a gamble. Odrade,

the obvious person to produce the Manifesto, could only achieve a deeper insight

as she wrote the document, but the words themselves were the ultimate barrier to

revelation.

Waff would appreciate that, Taraza knew.

Turning from the dark window, Taraza went back to her chairdog. The moment of

crucial decision -- go or no-go -- could be delayed but intermediate steps must

be taken. She composed a sample message in her mind and examined it while

sending a summons to Burzmali. The Bashar's favorite student would have to be

sent into action but not as Odrade wanted.

The message to Odrade was essentially simple:

"Help is on the way. You are on the scene, Dar. Where safety of girl Sheeana

is concerned, use own judgment. In all other matters that do not conflict with

my orders, carry out the plan."

There. That was it. Odrade had her instructions, the essentials that she would

accept as "the plan" even while she would recognize an incomplete pattern.

Odrade would obey. The "Dar" was a nice touch, Taraza thought. Dar and Tar.

That opening into Odrade's limited warmth would not be well shielded from the

Dar-and-Tar direction.

The long table on the right is set for a banquet of roast desert hare in sauce

cepeda. The other dishes, clockwise to the right from the far end of the table,

are aplomage sirian, chukka under glass, coffee with melange (note the hawk

crest of the Atreides on the urn), pot-a-oie and, in the Balut crystal bottle,

sparkling Caladan wine. Note the ancient poison detector concealed in the

chandelier.

-Dar-es-Balat, Description at a Museum Display

Teg found Duncan in the tiny dining alcove off the no-globe's gleaming kitchen.

Pausing in the passage to the alcove, Teg studied Duncan carefully: eight days

here and the lad appeared finally to have recovered from the peculiar rage that

had seized him as they entered the globe's access tube.

They had come through a shallow cave musky with the odors of a native bear. The

rocks at the back of the lair were not rocks, although they would have deceived

even the most sophisticated examination. A slight protrusion in the rocks would

shift if you knew or stumbled upon the secret code. That circular and twisting

movement opened the entire rear wall of the cave.

The access tube, brilliantly lighted automatically once they sealed the portal

behind them, was decorated with Harkonnen griffins on walls and ceiling. Teg

was struck by the image of a young Patrin stumbling into this place for the

first time (The shock! The awe! The elation!) and he failed to observe

Duncan's reaction until a low growl swelled in the enclosed space.

Duncan stood growling (almost a moan), fists clenched, gaze fixed on a Harkonnen

griffin along the right-hand wall. Rage and confusion warred for supremacy on

his face. He lifted both fists and crashed them against the raised figure,

drawing blood from his hands.

"Damn them to the deepest pits of hell!" he shouted.

It was an oddly mature curse issuing from the youthful mouth.

The instant the words were out Duncan relapsed into uncontrolled shudders.

Lucilla put an arm around him and stroked his neck in a soothing, almost sensual

way, until the shuddering subsided.

"Why did I do that?" Duncan whispered.

"You will know when your original memories are restored," she said.

"Harkonnens," Duncan whispered and blood suffused his face. He looked up at

Lucilla. "Why do I hate them so much?"

"Words cannot explain it," she said. "You will have to wait for the memories."

"I don't want the memories!" Duncan shot a startled look at Teg. "Yes! Yes, I

do want them."

Later as he looked up at Teg in the no-globe's dining alcove, Duncan's memory

obviously returned to that moment.

"When, Bashar?"

"Soon."

Teg glanced around the area. Duncan sat alone at the auto-scrubbed table, a cup

of brown liquid in front of him. Teg recognized the smell: one of the many

melange-laced items from the nullentropy bins. The bins were a treasure house

of exotic foods, clothing, weapons, and other artifacts -- a museum whose value

could not be calculated. There was a thin layer of dust all through the globe

but no deterioration of the things stored here. Every bit of the food was laced

with melange, not at an addict level unless you were a glutton, but always

noticeable. Even the preserved fruit had been dusted with the spice.

The brown liquid in Duncan's cup was one of the things Lucilla had tasted and

pronounced capable of sustaining life. Teg did not know precisely how Reverend

Mothers did this, but his own mother had been capable of it. One taste and they

knew the contents of food or drink.

A glance at the ornate clock set into the wall at the closed end of the alcove

told Teg it was later than he thought, well into the third hour of their

arbitrary afternoon. Duncan should still be up on the elaborate practice floor

but they both had seen Lucilla take off into the globe's upper reaches and Teg

saw this as a chance for them to talk unobserved.

Pulling up a chair, Teg seated himself on the opposite side of the table.

Duncan said, "I hate those clocks!"

"You hate everything here," Teg said, but he took a second look at the clock.

It was another antique, a round face with two analog hands and a digital second

counter. The two hands were priapean -- naked human figures: a large male with

enormous phallus and a smaller female with legs spread wide. Each time the two

clock hands met, the male appeared to enter the female.

"Gross," Teg agreed. He pointed to Duncan's drink: "You like that?"

"It's all right, sir. Lucilla says I should have it after exercise."

"My mother used to make me a similar drink for after heavy exertions," Teg said.

He leaned forward and inhaled, remembering the aftertaste, the cloying melange

in his nostrils.

"Sir, how long must we stay here?" Duncan asked.

"Until we are found by the right people or until we're sure we will not be

found."

"But . . . cut off in here, how will we know?"

"When I judge it's time, I'll take the life-shield blanket and start keeping

watch outside."

"I hate this place!"

"Obviously. But have you learned nothing about patience?"

Duncan grimaced. "Sir, why are you keeping me from being alone with Lucilla?"

Teg, exhaling as Duncan spoke, locked on the partial exhalation and then resumed

breathing. He knew, though, that the lad had observed. If Duncan knew, then

Lucilla must know!

"I don't think Lucilla knows what you're doing, sir," Duncan said, "but it's

getting pretty obvious." He glanced around him. "If this place didn't take so

much of her attention . . . Where does she dash off to like that?"

"I think she's up in the library."

"Library!"

"I agree it's primitive but it's also fascinating." Teg lifted his gaze to the

scrollwork on the nearby kitchen ceiling. The moment of decision had arrived.

Lucilla could not be depended upon to remain distracted much longer. Teg shared

her fascination, though. It was easy to lose yourself in these marvels. The

whole no-globe complex, some two hundred meters in diameter, was a fossil

preserved intact from the time of the Tyrant.

When she spoke about it, Lucilla's voice took on a husky, whispering quality.

"Surely, the Tyrant must have known about this place."

Teg's Mentat awareness had been immersed immediately in this suggestion. Why

did the Tyrant permit Family Harkonnen to squander so much of their last

remaining wealth on such an enterprise?

Perhaps for that very reason -- to drain them.

The cost in bribes and Guild shipping from the Ixian factories must have been

astronomical.

"Did the Tyrant know that one day we would need this place?" Lucilla asked.

No avoiding the prescient powers that Leto II had so often demonstrated, Teg

agreed.

Looking at Duncan seated across from him, Teg felt his neck hairs rising. There

was something eerie about this Harkonnen hideaway, as though the Tyrant himself

might have been here. What had happened to the Harkonnens who built it? Teg

and Lucilla had found absolutely no clues to why the globe had been abandoned.

Neither of them could wander through the no-globe without experiencing an acute

sense of history. Teg was constantly confounded by unanswered questions.

Lucilla, too, commented on this.

"Where did they go? There's nothing in my Other Memories to give the slightest

clue."

"Did the Tyrant lure them out and kill them?"

"I'm going back to the library. Perhaps today I'll find something."

For the first two days of their occupation, the globe had received a careful

examination by Lucilla and Teg. A silent and sullen Duncan tagged along as

though he feared to be left alone. Each new discovery awed them or shocked

them.

Twenty-one skeletons preserved in transparent plaz along a wall near the core!

Macabre observers of everyone who passed through there to the machinery chambers

and the nullentropy bins.

Patrin had warned Teg about the skeletons. On one of his first youthful

examinations of the globe, Patrin had found records that said the dead ones were

the artisans who had built the place, all slain by the Harkonnens to preserve

the secret.

Altogether, the globe was a remarkable achievement, an enclosure cut out of

Time, sealed away from everything external. After all of these millennia, its

frictionless machinery still created a mimetic projection that even the most

modern instruments could not distinguish from the background of dirt and rock.

"The Sisterhood must acquire this place intact!" Lucilla kept saying. "It's a

treasure house! They even kept their family's breeding records!"

That wasn't all the Harkonnens had preserved here. Teg kept finding himself

repelled by subtle and gross touches on almost everything in the globe. Like

that clock! Clothing, instruments for maintaining the environment, for

education and pleasure -- everything had been marked by that Harkonnen

compulsion to flaunt their uncaring sense of superiority to all other people and

all other standards.

Once more, Teg thought of Patrin as a youth in this place, probably no older

than the ghola. What had prompted Patrin to keep it a secret even from his wife

of so many years? Patrin had never touched on the reasons for secrecy, but Teg

made his own deductions. An unhappy childhood. The need for his own secret

place. Friends who were not friends but only people waiting to sneer at him.

None of those companions could be permitted to share such a wonder. It was his!

This was more than a place of lonely security. It had been Patrin's private

token of victory.

"I spent many happy hours there, Bashar. Everything still works. The records

are ancient but excellent once you grasp the dialect. There is much knowledge

in the place. But you will understand when you get there. You will understand

many things I have never told you."

The antique practice floor showed signs of Patrin's frequent usage. He had

changed the weapons coding on some of the automata in a way Teg recognized. The

time-counters told of muscle-torturing hours at the complicated exercises. This

globe explained those abilities which Teg had always found so remarkable in

Patrin. Natural talents had been honed here.

The automata of the no-globe were another matter.

Most of them represented defiance of the ancient proscriptions against such

devices. More than that, some had been designed for pleasure functions that

confirmed the more revolting stories Teg had heard about the Harkonnens. Pain

as pleasure! In its own way, these things explained the primly unbending

morality that Patrin had taken away from Gammu.

Revulsion created its own patterns.

Duncan took a deep swallow of his drink and looked at Teg over the lip of the

cup.

"Why did you come down here alone when I asked you to complete that last round

of exercises?" Teg asked.

"The exercises made no sense." Duncan put down his cup.

Well, Taraza, you were wrong, Teg thought. He has struck out for complete

independence sooner than you predicted.

Also, Duncan had stopped addressing his Bashar as "sir."

"You disobey me?"

"Not exactly."

"Then exactly what is it you're doing?"

"I have to know!"

"You won't like me very much when you do know."

Duncan looked startled. "Sir?"

Ahhhh, the "sir" is back!

"I have been preparing you for certain kinds of very intense pain," Teg said.

"It is necessary before we can restore your original memories."

"Pain, sir?"

"We know of no other way to bring back the original Duncan Idaho -- the one who

died."

"Sir, if you can do that, I will be nothing but grateful."

"So you say. But you may very well see me then as just one more whip in the

hands of those who have recalled you to life."

"Isn't it better to know, sir?"

Teg passed the back of a hand across his mouth. "If you hate me . . . can't say

I'd blame you."

"Sir, if you were in my place, is that how you would feel?" Duncan's posture,

tone of voice, facial expression -- all showed trembling confusion.

So far so good, Teg thought. The procedural steps were laid out with a

precision that demanded that every response from the ghola be interpreted with

care. Duncan was now filled with uncertainty. He wanted something and he

feared that thing.

"I'm only your teacher, not your father!" Teg said.

Duncan recoiled at the harsh tone. "Aren't you my friend?"

"That's a two-way street. The original Duncan Idaho will have to answer that

for himself."

A veiled look entered Duncan's eyes. "Will I remember this place, the Keep,

Schwangyu and . . ."

"Everything. You'll undergo a kind of double-vision memory for a time, but

you'll remember it all."

A cynical look came over the young face and, when he spoke, it was with

bitterness. "So you and I will become comrades."

All of a Bashar's command and presence in his voice, Teg followed the

reawakening instructions precisely.

"I'm not particularly interested in becoming your comrade." He fixed a

searching glare on Duncan's face. "You might make Bashar someday. I think it

possible you have the right stuff. But I'll be long dead by then."

"You're only comrades with Bashars?"

"Patrin was my comrade and he never rose above squad leader."

Duncan looked into his empty cup and then at Teg. "Why didn't you order

something to drink? You worked hard up there, too."

Perceptive question. It did not do to underestimate this youth. He knew that

food sharing was one of the most ancient rituals of association.

"The smell of yours was enough," Teg said. "Old memories. I don't need them

right now."

"Then why did you come down here?"

There it was, revealed in the young voice -- hope and fear. He wanted Teg to

say a particular thing.

"I wanted to take a careful measurement of how far those exercises have carried

you," Teg said. "I needed to come down here and look at you."

"Why so careful?"

Hope and fear! It was time for the precise shift of focus.

"I've never trained a ghola before."

Ghola. The word lay suspended between them, hanging on the cooking smells that

the globe's filters had not scrubbed from the air. Ghola! It was laced with

spice pungency from Duncan's empty cup.

Duncan leaned forward without speaking, his expression eager. Lucilla's

observation came into Teg's mind: "He knows how to use silence."

When it became obvious that Teg would not expand on that simple statement,

Duncan sank back with a disappointed look. The left corner of his mouth turned

downward, a sullen, festering expression. Everything focused inward the way it

had to be.

"You did not come down here to be alone," Teg said. "You came here to hide.

You're still hiding in there and you think no one will ever find you."

Duncan put a hand in front of his mouth. It was a signal gesture for which Teg

had been waiting. The instructions for this moment were clear: "The ghola

wants the original memories wakened and fears this utterly. That is the major

barrier you must sunder."

"Take your hand away from your mouth!" Teg ordered.

Duncan dropped his hand as though it had been burned. He stared at Teg like a

trapped animal.

"Speak the truth," Teg's instructions warned. "At this moment, every sense

afire, the ghola will see into your heart."

"I want you to know," Teg said, "that what the Sisterhood has ordered me to do

to you, that this is distasteful to me."

Duncan appeared to crouch into himself. "What did they order you to do?"

"The skills I was ordered to give you are flawed."

"F-flawed?"

"Part of it was comprehensive training, the intellectual part. In that respect,

you have been brought to the level of regimental commander."

"Better than Patrin?"

"Why must you be better than Patrin?"

"Wasn't he your comrade?"

"Yes."

"You said he never rose above squad leader!"

"Patrin was fully capable of taking over command of an entire multi-planet

force. He was a tactical magician whose wisdom I employed on many occasions."

"But you said he never --"

"It was his choice. The low rank gave him the common touch that we both found

useful many times."

"Regimental commander?" Duncan's voice was little more than a whisper. He

stared at the tabletop.

"You have an intellectual grasp of the functions, a bit impetuous but experience

usually smooths that out. Your weapons skills are superior for your age."

Still not looking at Teg, Duncan asked: "What is my age . . . sir?"

Just as the instructions cautioned: The ghola will dance all around the central

issue. "What is my age?" How old is a ghola.

His voice coldly accusing, Teg said: "If you want to know your ghola-age, why

don't you ask that?"

"Wha . . . what is that age, sir?"

There was such a weight of misery in the youthful voice that Teg felt tears

start in the corners of his eyes. He had been warned about this, too. "Do not

reveal too much compassion!" Teg covered the moment by clearing his throat. He

said: "That's a question only you can answer."

The instructions were explicit: "Turn it back on him! Keep him focused inward.

Emotional pain is as important to this process as the physical pain."

A deep sigh shuddered through Duncan. He closed his eyes tightly. When Teg had

first seated himself at the table, Duncan had thought: Is this the moment?

Will he do it now? But Teg's accusing tone, the verbal attacks, were completely

unexpected. And now Teg sounded patronizing.

He's patronizing me!

Cynical anger surged into Duncan. Did Teg think him such a fool that he could

be taken in by the most common ploy of a commander? Tone of voice and attitude

alone can subjugate another's will. Duncan sensed something else in the

patronizing, though: a core of plasteel that would not be penetrated.

Integrity . . . purpose. And Duncan had seen the tears start, the covering

gesture.

Opening his eyes and looking directly at Teg, Duncan said: "I don't mean to be

disrespectful or ungrateful or rude, sir. But I can't go on without answers."

Teg's instructions were clear: "You will know when the ghola reaches the point

of desperation. No ghola will try to hide this. It is intrinsic to their

psyche. You will recognize it in voice and posture."

Duncan had almost reached the critical point. Silence was mandatory for Teg

now. Force Duncan to ask his questions, to take his own course.

Duncan said: "Did you know that I once thought of killing Schwangyu?"

Teg opened his mouth and closed it without a sound. Silence! But the lad was

serious!

"I was afraid of her," Duncan said. "I don't like being afraid." He lowered

his gaze. "You once told me that we only hate what's really dangerous to us."

"He will approach it and retreat, approach and retreat. Wait until he plunges."

"I don't hate you," Duncan said, looking once more at Teg. "I resented it when

you said ghola to my face. But Lucilla's right: We should never resent the

truth even when it hurts."

Teg rubbed his own lips. The desire to speak filled him but it was not yet

plunge time.

"Doesn't it surprise you that I considered killing Schwangyu?" Duncan asked.

Teg held himself rigid. Even the shaking of his head would be taken as a

response.

"I thought of slipping something into her drink," Duncan said. "But that's a

coward's way and I'm not a coward. Whatever else, I'm not that."

Teg remained silently immobile.

"I think you really care what happens to me, Bashar," Duncan said. "But you're

right: we will never be comrades. If I survive, I will surpass you. Then . .

. it will be too late for us to be comrades. You spoke the truth."

Teg was unable to prevent himself from inhaling a deep breath of Mentat

realization: no avoiding the signs of strength in the ghola. Somewhere

recently, perhaps in this very alcove just now, the youth had ceased being a

youth and had become a man. The realization saddened Teg. It went so fast! No

normal growing-up in between.

"Lucilla does not really care what happens to me the way you do," Duncan said.

"She's just following her orders from that Mother Superior, Taraza."

Not yet! Teg cautioned himself. He wet his lips with his tongue.

"You have been obstructing Lucilla's orders," Duncan said. "What is it she's

supposed to do to me?"

The moment had come. "What do you think she's supposed to do?" Teg demanded.

"I don't know!"

"The original Duncan Idaho would know."

"You know! Why won't you tell me?"

"I'm only supposed to help restore your original memories."

"Then do it!"

"Only you can really do it."

"I don't know how!"

Teg sat forward on the edge of his chair, but did not speak. Plunge point? He

sensed something lacking in Duncan's desperation.

"You know I can read lips, sir," Duncan said. "Once I went up to the tower

observatory. I saw Lucilla and Schwangyu down below talking. Schwangyu said:

'Never mind that he's so young! You've had your orders.' "

Once more cautiously silent, Teg stared back at Duncan. It was like Duncan to

move around secretly in the Keep, spying, seeking knowledge. And he had seated

himself in that memory-mode now, not realizing that he still was spying and

seeking . . . but in a different way.

"I didn't think she was supposed to kill me," Duncan said. "But you know what

she was supposed to do because you've been obstructing her." Duncan pounded a

fist on the table. "Answer me, damn you!"

Ahhhh, full desperation!

"I can only tell you that what she intends conflicts with my orders. I was

commanded by Taraza herself to strengthen you and guard you from harm."

"But you said my training was . . . was flawed!"

"Necessary. It was done to prepare you for your original memories."

"What am I supposed to do?"

"You already know."

"I don't, I tell you! Please teach me!"

"You do many things without having been taught them. Did we teach you

disobedience?"

"Please help me!" It was a desperate wail.

Teg forced himself to chilly remoteness. "What in the nether hell do you think

I'm doing?"

Duncan clenched both fists and pounded them on the table, making his cup dance.

He glared at Teg. Abruptly, an odd expression came over Duncan's face --

something grasping in his eyes.

"Who are you?" Duncan whispered.

The key question!

Teg's voice was a lash striking out at a suddenly defenseless victim: "Who do

you think I am?"

A look of utter desperation twisted Duncan's features. He managed only a

gasping stutter: "You're . . . you're . . ."

"Duncan! Stop this nonsense!" Teg jumped to his feet and stared down with

assumed rage.

"You're . . ."

Teg's right hand shot out in a swift arc. The open palm cracked against

Duncan's cheek. "How dare you disobey me?" Left hand out, another rocking

slap. "How dare you?"

Duncan reacted so swiftly that Teg experienced an electric instant of absolute

shock. Such speed! Although there were separate elements in Duncan's attack,

it occurred in one fluid blur: a leap upward, both feet on the chair, rocking

the chair, using that motion to slash the right arm down at Teg's vulnerable

shoulder nerves.

Responding out of trained instincts, Teg dodged sideways and flailed his left

leg over the table into Duncan's groin. Teg still did not completely escape.

The heel of Duncan's hand continued downward to strike beside the knee of Teg's

flailing leg. It numbed the whole leg.

Duncan sprawled across the tabletop, trying to slide backward in spite of the

disabling kick. Teg supported himself, left hand on table, and chopped with the

other hand to the base of Duncan's spine, into the nexus deliberately weakened

by the exercises of the past few days.

Duncan groaned as paralyzing agony shot through his body. Another person would

have been immobilized, screaming, but Duncan merely groaned as he clawed toward

Teg, continuing the attack.

Relentless in the necessities of the moment, Teg proceeded to create greater

pain in his victim, making sure each time that Duncan saw the attacker's face at

the instant of greatest agony.

"Watch his eyes." the instructions warned. And Bellonda, reinforcing the

procedure, had cautioned: "His eyes will seem to look through you but he will

call you Leto."

Much later, Teg found difficulty in recalling each detail of his obedience to

the reawakening procedure. He knew that he continued to function as commanded

but his memory went elsewhere, leaving the flesh free to carry out his orders.

Oddly, his trick memory fastened onto another act of disobedience: the Cerbol

Revolt, himself at middle age but already a Bashar with a formidable reputation.

He had donned his best uniform without its medals (a subtle touch, that) and had

presented himself in the scorching noon heat of Cerbol's battle-plowed fields.

Completely unarmed in the path of the advancing rebels!

Many among the attackers owed him their lives. Most of them had once given him

their deepest allegiance. Now, they were in violent disobedience. And Teg's

presence in their path said to those advancing soldiers:

"I will not wear the medals that tell what I did for you when we were comrades.

I will not be anything that says I am one of you. I wear only the uniform that

announces that I am still the Bashar. Kill me if that is how far you will carry

your disobedience."

When most of the attacking force threw down their arms and came forward, some of

their commanders bent the knee to their old Bashar and he remonstrated: "You

never needed to bow to me or get on your knees! Your new leaders have taught

you bad habits."

Later, he told the rebels he shared some of their grievances. Cerbol had been

badly misused. But he also warned them:

"One of the most dangerous things in the universe is an ignorant people with

real grievances. That is nowhere near as dangerous, however, as an informed and

intelligent society with grievances. The damage that vengeful intelligence can

wreak, you cannot even imagine. The Tyrant would seem a benevolent father

figure by comparison with what you were about to create!"

It was all true, of course, but in a Bene Gesserit context, and it helped little

with what he was commanded to do to the Duncan Idaho ghola -- creating mental

and physical agony in an almost helpless victim.

Easiest to recall was the look in Duncan's eyes. They did not change focus, but

glared directly up into Teg's face, even at the instant of the final screaming

shout:

"Damn you, Leto! What are you doing?"

He called me Leto.

Teg limped backward two steps. His left leg tingled and ached where Duncan had

struck it. Teg realized that he was panting and at the end of his reserves. He

was much too old for such exertions and the things he had just done made him

feel dirty. The reawakening procedure was thoroughly fixed in his awareness,

though. He knew that gholas once had been awakened by conditioning them

unconsciously to attempt murder on someone they loved. The ghola psyche,

shattered and forced to reassemble, was always psychologically scarred. This

new technique left the scars in the one who managed the process.

Slowly, moving against the outcry of muscles and nerves that had been stunned by

agony, Duncan slid backward off the table and stood leaning against his chair,

trembling and glaring at Teg.

Teg's instructions said: "You must stand very quietly. Do not move. Let him

look at you as he will."

Teg stood unmoving as he had been instructed. Memory of the Cerbol Revolt left

his mind: He knew what he had done then and now. In a way, the two times were

similar. He had told the rebels no ultimate truths (if such existed); only

enough to lure them back into the fold. Pain and its predictable consequences.

"This is for your own good."

Was it really good, what they did to this Duncan Idaho ghola?

Teg wondered what was occurring in Duncan's consciousness. Teg had been told as

much as was known about these moments, but he could see that the words were

inadequate. Duncan's eyes and face gave abundant evidence of internal turmoil -

- a hideous twisting of mouth and cheeks, the gaze darting this way and that.

Slowly, exquisite in its slowness, Duncan's face relaxed. His body continued to

tremble. He felt the throbbing of his body as a distant thing, aches and

darting pains that had happened to someone else. He was here, though, in this

immediate moment -- whatever and wherever this was. His memories would not

mesh. He felt suddenly out of place in flesh too young, not fitted to his preghola

existence. The darting and twisting of awareness was all internal now.

Teg's instructors had said: "He will have ghola-imposed filters on his preghola

memories. Some of the original memories will come flooding back. Other

recollections will return more slowly. There will be no meshing, though, until

he recalls that original moment of death." Bellonda had then given Teg the

known details of that fatal moment.

"Sardaukar," Duncan whispered. He looked around him at the Harkonnen symbols

that permeated the no-globe. "The Emperor's crack troops wearing Harkonnen

uniforms!" A wolfish grin twisted his mouth. "How they must have hated that!"

Teg remained silently watchful.

"They killed me," Duncan said. It was a flatly unemotional statement, all the

more chilling for its positive delivery. A violent shudder passed through him

and the trembling subsided. "At least a dozen of them in that little room." He

looked directly at Teg. "One of them got through at me like a meat cleaver

right down on my head." He hesitated, his throat working convulsively. His

gaze remained on Teg. "Did I buy Paul enough time to escape?"

"Answer all of his questions truthfully."

"He escaped."

Now, they came to a testing moment. Where had the Tleilaxu acquired the Idaho

cells? The Sisterhood's tests said they were original, but suspicions remained.

The Tleilaxu had done something of their own to this ghola. His memories could

be a valuable clue to that thing.

"But the Harkonnens . . ." Duncan said. His memories from the Keep meshed.

"Oh, yes. Oh, yes!" A fierce laugh shook him. He sent a roaring victory shout

at the long-dead Baron Vladimir Harkonnen: "I paid you back, Baron! Oh, I did

it to you for all of the ones you destroyed!"

"You remember the Keep and the things we taught you?" Teg asked.

A puzzled frown drew deep crease lines across Duncan's forehead. Emotional pain

warred with his physical pains. He nodded in response to Teg's question. There

were two lives, one that had been walled off behind the axlotl tanks and another

. . . another . . . Duncan felt incomplete. Something remained suppressed

within him. The reawakening was not finished. He stared angrily at Teg. Was

there more? Teg had been brutal. Necessary brutality? Was this how you had to

restore a ghola?

"I . . ." Duncan shook his head from side to side like a great wounded animal

in front of the hunter.

"Do you have all of your memories?" Teg insisted.

"All? Oh, yes. I remember Gammu when it was Giedi Prime -- the oil-soaked,

blood-soaked hell hole of the Imperium! Yes, indeed, Bashar. I was your

dutiful student. Regimental commander!" Again, he laughed, throwing his head

back in an oddly adult gesture for that young body.

Teg experienced the sudden release of a deep satisfaction, far deeper than

relief. It had worked as they said it would.

"Do you hate me?" he asked.

"Hate you? Didn't I tell you I would be grateful?"

Abruptly, Duncan lifted his hands and peered at them. He shifted his gaze

downward at his youthful body. "What a temptation!" he muttered. He dropped

his hands and focused on Teg's face, tracing the lines of identity. "Atreides,"

he said. "You're all so damned alike!"

"Not all," Teg said.

"I'm not talking about appearance, Bashar." His eyes went out of focus. "I

asked my age." There was a long silence, then: "Gods of the deep! So much

time has passed!"

Teg said what he had been instructed to say: "The Sisterhood has need of you."

"In this immature body? What am I supposed to do?"

"Truly, I don't know, Duncan. The body will mature and I presume a Reverend