ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Ed Kramer, for being the bridge that brought us together in the first place.

Rebecca Moesta Anderson, for her unflagging imagination, brainstorming, and plain hard work to make this novel the best it could be.

Jan Herbert, for allowing the creation of this project to continue during a wedding-anniversary trip to Europe, and for so much more.

Pat LoBrutto, our editor at Bantam Books, for helping us achieve the best possible focus and clarity in this book.

Robert Gottlieb and Matt Bialer of the William Morris Agency, Mary Alice Kier and Anna Cottle of Cine/Lit Representation, for their faith and dedication, seeing the potential of the entire project.

Irwyn Applebaum and Nita Taublib at Bantam Books, for their support and enthusiasm in such an enormous undertaking.

Penny and Ron Merritt, whose enthusiastic support made this project possible.

Beverly Herbert, for brainstorming and editorial contributions on the Dune books written by Frank Herbert.

Marie Landis-Edwards, for her encouragement.

The Herbert Limited Partnership, including David Merritt, Byron Merritt, Julie Herbert, Robert Merritt, Kimberly Herbert, Margaux Herbert, and Theresa Shackelford.

At WordFire, Inc., special thanks to Catherine Sidor, who put in many hours of hard work in preparing and revising the manuscript, and Sarah Jones, for her help in converting many old books and documents into a usable form.

And to the millions of devoted DUNE fans, who have kept the original novel popular for three and a half decades.

Transmission to the galactic merchandizing conglomerate “Combine Honnete Ober Advancer Mercantiles” (CHOAM) from the Spacing Guild:

Our specific charge in this unofficial mission has been to search the uninhabited worlds to find another source of the precious spice melange, upon which so much of the Imperium depends. We have documented the journeys of many of our Navigators and Steersmen, searching hundreds of planets. To date, however, we have had no success. The only source of melange in the Known Universe remains the desert world of Arrakis. The Guild, CHOAM, and all other dependents must continue in thrall of the Harkonnen monopoly.

However, the value of exploring outlying territories for new planetary systems and new resources bears its own fruit. The detailed surveys and orbital maps on the attached sheets of ridulian crystal will no doubt be of commercial import for CHOAM.

Having completed our contract to the specifications upon which we previously agreed, we hereby request that CHOAM deposit the required payment in our official Guild Bank headquarters on Junction.

To His Royal Highness, the Padishah Emperor Elrood IX, Ruler of the Known Universe:

From His Faithful Subject the Siridar Baron Vladimir Harkonnen, Planetary Governor of Arrakis, titular head of House Harkonnen and Overlord of Giedi Prime, Lankiveil, and allied planets.

Sire, let me once again affirm my commitment to serving you faithfully on the desert planet Arrakis. For seven years after my father’s death, I am ashamed to say that my incompetent half brother Abulurd has allowed spice production to falter. Equipment losses have been high, while exports fell to abysmal levels. Given the dependence of the Imperium on the spice melange, this bottleneck could have had dire consequences. Be assured that my family has taken action to rectify the unfortunate situation: Abulurd has been removed from his duties and relegated to the planet of Lankiveil. His noble title has been removed, though he may reclaim a district governorship one day.

Now that I am the direct overseer of Arrakis, allow me to give you my personal guarantee that I will use whatever means necessary — money, dedication, and an iron hand — to ensure that melange production meets or exceeds previous record levels.

As you so wisely have commanded, the spice must flow!

Melange is the financial crux of CHOAM activities. Without this spice, Bene Gesserit Reverend Mothers could not perform feats of observation and human control, Guild Navigators could not see safe pathways across space, and billions of Imperial citizens would die of addictive withdrawal. Any simpleton knows that such dependence upon a single commodity leads to abuse. We are all at risk.

-CHOAM Economic Analysis of Materiel Flow Patterns

Lean and muscular, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen hunched forward next to the ornithopter pilot. He peered with spider-black eyes through the pitted windowplaz, smelling the ever-present grit and sand.

As the armored ‘thopter flew high overhead, the white sun of Arrakis dazzled against unrelenting sands. The sweeping vista of dunes sizzling in the day’s heat made his retinas burn. The landscape and sky were bleached of color. Nothing soothed the human eye.

Hellish place.

The Baron wished he could be back in the industrialized warmth and civilized complexity of Giedi Prime, the central world of House Harkonnen. Even stuck here, he had better things to do back at the local family headquarters in the city of Carthag, other diversions to suit his demanding tastes.

But the spice harvesting must take precedence. Always. Especially a huge strike such as the one his spotters had reported.

In the cramped cockpit, the Baron lounged with well-postured confidence, ignoring the buffet and sway of air currents. The ‘thopter’s mechanical wings beat rhythmically like a wasp’s. The dark leather of his chestpiece fit tightly over well-toned pectorals. In his mid-forties, he had rakish good looks; his reddish gold hair had been cut and styled to exacting specifications, enhancing his distinctive widow’s peak. The Baron’s skin was smooth, his cheekbones high and well sculpted. Sinewy muscles stood out along his neck and jaw, ready to contort his face into a scowl or a hard smile, depending on circumstances.

“How much farther?” He looked sideways at the pilot, who had been showing signs of nervousness.

“The site is in the deep desert, m’Lord Baron. All indications are that this is one of the richest concentrations of spice ever excavated.”

The flying craft shuddered on thermals as they passed over an outcropping of black lava rock. The pilot swallowed hard, focusing on the ornithopter’s controls.

The Baron relaxed into his seat and quelled his impatience. He was glad the new hoard was far from prying eyes, away from Imperial or CHOAM corporate officials who might keep troublesome records. Doddering old Emperor Elrood IX didn’t need to know every damned thing about Harkonnen spice production on Arrakis. Through carefully edited reports and doctored accounting journals, not to mention bribes, the Baron told the off-planet overseers only what he wanted them to know.

He swiped a strong hand across the sheen of sweat on his upper lip, then adjusted the ‘thopter’s environment controls to make the cockpit cooler, the air more moist.

The pilot, uncomfortable at having such an important and volatile passenger in his care, nudged the engines to increase speed. He checked the console’s map projection again, studied outlines of the desert terrain that spread as far as they could see.

Having examined the cartographic projections himself, the Baron had been displeased by their lack of detail. How could anyone expect to find his way across this desert scab of a world? How could a planet so vital to the economic stability of the Imperium remain basically uncharted? Yet another failing of his weak younger demibrother, Abulurd.

But Abulurd was gone, and the Baron was in charge. Now that Arrakis is mine, I’ll put everything in order. Upon returning to Carthag, he would set people to work drawing up new surveys and maps, if the damned Fremen didn’t kill the explorers again or ruin the cartography points.

For forty years, this desert world had been the quasi-fief of House Harkonnen, a political appointment granted by the Emperor, with the blessing of the commercial powerhouse CHOAM — the Combine Honnete Ober Advancer Mercantiles. Though grim and unpleasant, Arrakis was one of the most important jewels in the Imperial crown because of the precious substance it provided.

However, upon the death of the Baron’s father, Dmitri Harkonnen, the old Emperor had, through some mental deficiency, granted the seat of power to the softhearted Abulurd, who had managed to decimate spice production in a mere seven years. Profits plunged, and he lost control to smugglers and sabotage. In disgrace, the fool had been yanked from his position and sent off without official title to Lankiveil, where even he could do little damage to the self-sustaining whalefur activities there.

Immediately upon being granted the governorship, Baron Vladimir Harkonnen had set out to turn Arrakis around. He would make his own mark, erase the legacy of mistakes and bad judgment.

In all the Imperium, Arrakis — a hellhole that some might consider a punishment rather than a reward — was the only known source of the spice melange, a substance worth far more than any precious metal. Here on this parched world, it was worth even more than its weight in water.

Without spice, efficient space travel would be impossible … and without space travel, the Imperium itself would fall. Spice prolonged life, protected health, and added a vigor to existence. The Baron, a moderate user himself, greatly appreciated the way it made him feel. Of course, the spice melange was also ferociously addictive, which kept the price high ….

The armored ‘thopter flew over a seared mountain range that looked like a broken jawbone filled with rotted teeth. Up ahead the Baron could see a dust cloud extending like an anvil into the sky.

“Those are the harvesting operations, m’Lord Baron.”

Hawklike attack ‘thopters grew from black dots in the monochrome sky and swooped toward them. The communicator pinged, and the pilot sent back an identification signal. The paid defenders — mercenaries with orders to keep out unwelcome observers — circled away and took up protective positions in the sky.

So long as House Harkonnen maintained the illusion of progress and profits, the Spacing Guild didn’t need to know about every particular spice find. Nor did the Emperor, nor CHOAM. The Baron would keep the melange for himself and add it to his huge stockpiles.

After Abulurd’s years of bumbling, if the Baron accomplished even half of what he was capable of, CHOAM and the Imperium would see a vast improvement. If he kept them happy, they wouldn’t notice his substantial skim, would never suspect his secret spice stashes. A dangerous stratagem if discovered … but the Baron had ways of dealing with prying eyes.

As they approached the plume of dust, he took out a pair of binoculars and focused the oil lenses. The magnification permitted him to see the spice factory at work. With its giant treads and enormous cargo capacity, the mechanical monstrosity was incredibly expensive — and worth every solari expended to maintain it. Its excavators kicked up cinnamon-red dust, gray sand, and flint chips as they dug down, scooping up the surface of the desert, sifting for aromatic spice.

Mobile ground units ranged across the open sand in the vicinity of the factory, dipping probes beneath the surface, scraping samples, mapping the extent of the buried spice vein. Overhead, heavier machinery borne by jumbo ornithopters circled, waiting. Peripherally, spotter craft cruised up and down the sands with alert watchers searching for the telltale ripples of wormsign. One of the great sandworms of Arrakis could swallow their entire operation whole.

“M’Lord Baron,” the pilot said and handed the communicator wand over to him, “the captain of the work crew wishes to speak with you.” This is your Baron.” He touched his ear to listen to the pickup. “Give me an update. How much have you found?”

Below on the sands, the crew captain answered, his voice gruff, his manner annoyingly unimpressed with the importance of the man to whom he was speaking. “Ten years working spice crews, and this deposit’s beyond anything I’ve ever seen. Trouble is, it’s buried deep. Normally, you know, we find the spice exposed by the elements. This time it’s densely concentrated, but …”

The Baron waited for only a moment. “Yes, what is it?”

“Something strange going on here, sir. Chemically, I mean. We’ve got carbon dioxide leaking from below, some sort of a bubble beneath us. The harvester’s digging through outer layers of sand to get at the spice, but there’s also water vapor.”

“Water vapor!” Such a thing was unheard-of on Arrakis, where the moisture content of the air was nearly unmeasurable, even on the best of days.

“Could have stumbled on an ancient aquifer, sir. Maybe buried under a cap of rock.”

The Baron had never imagined finding running water beneath the surface of Arrakis. Quickly he considered the possibilities of exploiting a free-flowing water resource by selling it to the populace. That was sure to upset the existing water merchants, who had grown too swollen with self-importance anyway.

His basso voice rumbled. “Do you think it’s contaminating the spice somehow?”

“Not able to say, sir,” said the crew captain. “Spice is strange stuff, but I’ve never seen a pocket like this before. It doesn’t seem … right somehow.”

The Baron looked over at the ‘thopter pilot. “Contact the spotters. See if they’ve picked up any wormsign yet.”

“No wormsign, m’Lord,” the pilot said, scanning the reply. The Baron noticed sparkles of sweat on the man’s forehead.

“How long has the harvester been down there?”

“Nearly two standard hours, sir.”

Now the Baron scowled. One of the worms should definitely have come before now.

Inadvertently, the pilot had left the comsystem open, and the crew captain gruffly acknowledged over the speaker. “Never had this much time either, sir. The worms always come. Always. But something’s going on down here. Gases are increasing. You can smell it in the air.”

Taking a deep breath of the recycled cabin air, the Baron detected the musky cinnamon smell of raw melange scooped from the desert. The ornithopter flew in a holding pattern now, several hundred meters from the main harvester.

“We’re also detecting vibrations underground, some kind of a resonance. I don’t like it, sir.”

“You’re not paid to like it,” the Baron replied. “Is it a deep worm?”

“I don’t think so, sir.”

He scanned the estimates being transmitted from the spice harvester. The numbers boggled his mind. “We’re getting as much from this one excavation as a month’s production on my other sites.” He drummed his fingers on his right thigh in a rhythmic pattern.

“Nevertheless, sir, I suggest that we prepare to pack up and abandon the site. We could lose —”

“Absolutely not, Captain,” the Baron said. “There’s no wormsign, and you’ve already got nearly a full factory load. We can bring down a carryall and give you an empty harvester if you need it. I’m not leaving behind a fortune in spice just because you’re getting nervous … just because you have an uneasy feeling. Ridiculous!”

When the work leader tried to push his point, the Baron interrupted, “Captain, if you’re a nervous coward, you’re in the wrong profession and in the employ of the wrong House. Carry on.” He switched off the communicator and made a mental note to remove that man from his position as soon as possible.

Carryalls hovered above, ready to retrieve the spice harvester and its crew as soon as a worm appeared. But why was it taking so long for one to come? Worms always protected the spice.

Spice. He tasted the word in his thoughts and on his lips.

Veiled in superstition, the substance was an unknown quantity, a modern unicorn’s-horn. And Arrakis was inhospitable enough that no one had yet deciphered the origin of melange. In the vast canvas of the Imperium, no explorer or prospector had found melange on any other planet, nor had anyone succeeded in synthesizing a substitute, despite centuries of attempts. Since House Harkonnen held the planetary governorship of Arrakis, and therefore controlled all spice production, the Baron had no wish to see a substitute developed, or any other source found.

Expert desert crews located the spice, and the Imperium used it — but beyond that, the details didn’t concern him. There was always risk to spice workers, always the danger that a worm would attack too soon, that a carryall would malfunction, that a spice factory would not be lifted away in time. Unexpected sandstorms could come up with startling speed. The casualty rate and the equipment losses to House Harkonnen were appalling … but melange paid off nearly any cost in blood or money.

As the ornithopter circled in a steady, thrumming rhythm, the Baron studied the industrial spectacle below. Baking sun glinted off the spice factory’s dusty hull. Spotters continued to prowl the air, while groundcars cruised beneath them, taking samples.

Still no sign of a worm, and every moment allowed the crew to retrieve more spice. The workers would receive bonuses — except for that captain — and House Harkonnen would become richer. The records could be doctored later.

The Baron turned to the pilot. “Call our nearest base. Summon another carryall and another spice factory. This vein seems inexhaustible.” His voice trailed off. “If a worm hasn’t shown up by now, there just might be time … .”

The ground crew captain called back, broadcasting on a general frequency since the Baron had shut down his own receiver. “Sir, our probes indicate that the temperature is rising deep below — a dramatic spike! Something’s going on down there, a chemical reaction. And one of our ground-roving teams just broke into a swarming nest of sandtrout.”

The Baron growled, furious with the man for communicating on an unencrypted channel. What if CHOAM spies were listening? Besides, no one cared about sandtrout. The jellylike creatures deep beneath the sand were as irrelevant to him as flies swarming around a long-abandoned corpse.

He made a mental note to do more to this weakling captain than just remove him from the work crews and deny him a bonus. That gutless bastard was probably handpicked by Abulurd.

The Baron saw tiny figures of scouts tracking through the sands, running about like ants maddened with acid vapor. They rushed back to the main spice factory. One man leaped off his dirt-encrusted rover and scrambled toward the open door of the massive machine.

“What are those men doing? Are they abandoning their posts? Bring us down closer so I can see.”

The pilot tilted the ornithopter and descended like an ominous beetle toward the sand. Below, the men leaned over, coughing and retching as they tried to drag filters over their faces. Two stumbled on the shifting sand. Others were rapidly battening down the spice factory.

“Bring the carryall! Bring the carryall!” someone cried.

The spotters all reported in. “I see no wormsign.”

“Still nothing.”

“All clear from here,” said a third.

“Why are they evacuating?” the Baron demanded, as if the pilot would know.

“Something’s happening,” the crew captain yelled. “Where’s that carryall? We need it now!”

The ground bucked. Four workers stumbled and pitched facefirst onto the sand before they could reach the ramp to the spice factory.

“Look, m’Lord!” The pilot pointed downward, his voice filled with awe. As the Baron stopped focusing on the cowardly men, he saw the sand trembling all around the excavation site, vibrating like a struck drumhead.

The spice harvester canted, slipped to one side. A crack opened in the sands, and the whole site began to swell from beneath the ground, rising in the air like a gas bubble in a boiling Salusan mudpot.

“Get us out of here!” the Baron shouted. The pilot stared for a fraction of a second, and the Baron swept his left hand with the speed of a cracked whip, striking the man hard on the cheek. “Move!”

The pilot grabbed the ‘thopter controls and wrenched them into a steep ascent. The articulated wings flapped furiously.

On the terrain below, the swollen underground bubble reached its apex — then burst, hurling the spice harvester, the mobile crews, and everything else up off the surface. A gigantic explosion of sand sprayed upward, carrying broken rock and volatile orange spice. The mammoth factory was crushed and blasted to pieces, scattered like lost rags in a Coriolis storm.

“What the devil happened?” The Baron’s dark eyes went wide in disbelief at the sheer magnitude of the disaster. All that precious spice gone, swallowed in an instant. All the equipment destroyed. The loss in lives hardly occurred to him, except for the wasted costs of crew training.

“Hang on, m’Lord,” the pilot cried. His knuckles turned white on the controls.

A hammer-blast of wind struck them. The armored ornithopter turned end over end in the air, wings flailing. The engines whined and groaned, trying to maintain stability. Pellets of high-velocity sand struck the plaz windowports. Dust-clogged, the ‘thopter’s motors made sick, coughing sounds. The craft lost altitude, dropping toward the seething maw of the desert.

The pilot shouted unintelligible words. The Baron clutched his crash restraints, saw the ground coming toward them like an inverted bootheel to squash an insect.

As head of House Harkonnen, he had always thought he would die by a treacherous assassin’s hand … but to fall prey to an unpredictable natural disaster instead — the Baron found it almost humorous.

As they plunged, he saw the sand open like a festering sore. The dust and raw melange were being sucked down, turned over by convection currents and chemical reactions. The rich spice vein of only moments before had turned into a leprous mouth ready to swallow them.

But the pilot, who had seemed weak and distractible during their flight, became rigid with concentration and determination. His fingers flew over sky rudder and engine throttle controls, working to ride the currents, switching flow from one motor to another to discharge dust strangulation in the air intakes.

Finally the ornithopter leveled off, steadied itself again, and cruised low over the dune plain. The pilot emitted an audible sigh of relief.

Where the great opening had been ripped into the layered sand, the Baron now saw glittering translucent shapes like maggots on a carcass: sandtrout, rushing toward the explosion. Soon giant worms would come, too. The monsters couldn’t possibly resist this.

Try as he might, the Baron couldn’t understand spice. Not at all.

The ‘thopter gained altitude, taking them toward the spotters and the carryalls that had been caught unawares. They hadn’t been able to retrieve the spice factory and its precious cargo before the explosion, and he could blame no one for it — no one but himself. The Baron had given them explicit orders to remain out of reach.

“You just saved my life, pilot. What is your name?”

“Kryubi, sir.”

“All right, then, Kryubi — have you ever seen such a thing? What happened down there? What caused that explosion?”

The pilot took a deep breath. “I’ve heard the Fremen talking about something they call a … spice blow.” He seemed like a statue now, as if the terror had transformed him into something much stronger. “It happens in the deep desert, where few people can see.”

“Who cares what the Fremen say?” He curled his lip at the thought of the dirty, nomadic indigents of the great desert. “We’ve all heard of spice blows, but nobody’s ever actually seen one. Crazy superstitions.”

“Yes, but superstition usually has some kind of basis. They see many things out in the desert.” Now the Baron admired the man for his willingness to speak out, though Kryubi must know of his temper and vindictiveness. Perhaps it would be wise to promote him ….

“They say a spice blow is a chemical explosion,” Kryubi continued, “probably the result of a pre-spice mass beneath the sands.”

The Baron considered this; he couldn’t deny the evidence of his own eyes. One day maybe someone would understand the true nature of melange and be able to prevent disasters like this. So far, because the spice was seemingly inexhaustible to those willing to make the effort, no one had bothered with a detailed analysis. Why waste time on tests, when fortunes waited to be made? The Baron had a monopoly on Arrakis — but it was also a monopoly based on ignorance.

He gritted his teeth and knew that once they returned to Carthag he would be forced to blow off some steam, to release his pent-up tensions on “amusements,” perhaps a bit more vigorously than he had earlier intended. He would have to find a special candidate this time — not one of his regular lovers, but someone he would never have use for again. That would free him of restraint.

Looking down, he thought, No longer any need to hide this site from the Emperor. They would record it, log it as a find, and document the destruction of the crew and equipment. No need to manipulate the records now. Old Elrood would not be pleased, and House Harkonnen would have to absorb this financial setback.

As the pilot circled around, the surviving spice crew assessed their damages on the ground, and over the comlink reported losses of men, equipment, and spice load. The Baron felt rage boiling within him.

Damn Arrakis! he thought. Damn the spice, and damn our dependence on it!

We are generalists. You can’t draw neat lines around planetwide problems. Planetology is a cut-and-fit science.

-PARDOT KYNES, Treatise on the Environmental Recovery of Post-Holocaust Salusa Secundus

0n the Imperial planet Kaitain, immense buildings kissed the sky. Magnificent sculptures and opulent tiered fountains lined the crystal-paved boulevards like a dream. A person could stare for hours.

Pardot Kynes managed to catch only a glimpse of the urban spectacle as the royal guards marched him at a rapid clip into the Palace. They had no patience for a simple Planetologist’s curiosity, nor any apparent interest in the city’s wonders. Their job was to escort him to the tremendous vaulted throne room, without delay. The Emperor of the Known Universe could not be kept waiting for mere sight-seeing.

The members of Kynes’s escort wore gray-and-black uniforms, impeccably clean and adorned with braids and medals, every button and bauble polished, every ribbon straightened and pressed. Fifteen of the Emperor’s handpicked staff, the Sardaukar, surrounded him like an army.

Still, the splendor of the capital world overwhelmed Kynes. Turning to the guard closest to him, he said, “I’m usually out in the dirt, or tromping through swamps on a planet where nobody else wants to be.” He had never seen, or even imagined, anything like this in all of the rugged and out-of-the-way landscapes he had studied.

The guard made no response to this tall, lean off-wonder. Sardaukar were trained to be fighting machines, not conversationalists.

“Here I’ve been scrubbed clean down to the third layer of my skin and dressed like a noble.” Kynes tugged at the thick corded fabric of his dark blue jacket, smelled the soap and scent of his own skin. He had a high forehead, with sparse, sandy hair combed straight back.

The escort hurried up a seemingly endless waterfall of polished stone steps, ornately highlighted with gold filigree and creamy, sparkling soostones.

Kynes turned to the guard on his left. “This is my first trip to Kaitain. I’d wager you don’t even notice the sights anymore, if you work here all the time?” His words hung on a wistful smile, but again fell on deaf ears.

Kynes was an expert and well-respected ecologist, geologist, and meteorologist, with added specialties in botany and microbiology. Driven, he enjoyed absorbing the mysteries of entire worlds. But the people themselves often remained a complete mystery to him — like these guards.

“Kaitain is a lot more … comfortable than Salusa Secundus — I grew up there, you know,” he continued. “I’ve been to Bela Tegeuse, too, and that’s almost as bad, dim and bleak with two dwarf suns.”

Finally Kynes faced forward, consenting to mutter to himself. “The Padishah Emperor called me from halfway across the galaxy. I wish I knew why.” None of these men ventured to offer any explanations.

The entourage passed under a pitted archway of crimson lava rock that bore the ponderous oppression of extreme age. Kynes looked up, and with his geological expertise recognized the massive rare stone: an ancient archway from the devastated world of Salusa Secundus.

It puzzled him that anyone would keep such a relic from the austere planet where Kynes had spent so many years, an isolated prison world with a ruined ecosystem. But then he recalled, feeling like a fool for having forgotten it, that Salusa had once been the Imperial capital, millennia ago … before the disaster changed everything. No doubt House Corrino had brought this archway here intact as a reminder of their past, or as some sort of trophy to show how the Imperial family had overcome planet-destroying adversity.

As the Sardaukar escort stepped through the lava arch and into the echoing splendor of the Palace itself, fanfare rang out from brassy instruments Kynes could not name. He’d never been much of a student in music or the arts, not even as a child. Why bother, when there was so much natural science to absorb?

Just before passing beneath the jewel-sparkling roof of the immense royal structure, Kynes craned his neck upward to gaze once more at the clear sky of perfect blue.

On the trip here, inside a cordoned-off section of the Guild Heighliner, Kynes had taken the time to learn about the capital world, though he had never before applied his planet-understanding skills to such a civilized place. Kaitain was exquisitely planned and produced, with tree-lined boulevards, splendid architecture, well-watered gardens, flower barricades … and so much more.

Official Imperial reports claimed it was always warm, the climate forever temperate. Storms were unknown. No clouds marred the skies. At first, he thought the entries might have been mere tourist propaganda, but when the ornate Guild escort craft descended, he had noted the flotilla of weather satellites, climate-bending technology that — through brute force — kept Kaitain a peaceful and serene place.

Climate engineers could certainly strong-arm the weather to what someone had foolishly decided was optimal — though they did it at their own peril, creating an environment that led, ultimately, to malaise of the mind, body, and spirit. The Imperial family would never understand that. They continued to relax under their sunny skies and stroll through their well-watered arboretums, oblivious to an environmental catastrophe just waiting to unfold before their covered eyes. It would be a challenge to stay on this planet and study the effects — but somehow Kynes doubted that was why Emperor Elrood IX had summoned him here ….

The escort troops led him deeper into the echoing Palace, passing statuary and classic paintings. The sprawling audience chamber could well have been an arena for ancient gladiatorial events. Its floor stretched onward like a polished, multicolored plain of stone squares — each one from a different planet in the Imperium. Alcoves and wings were being added as the Empire grew.

Court functionaries in dazzling raiment and brilliant plumage strutted about, showing off fabrics that had been spun with threads of precious metal. Carrying documents, they conducted inexplicable business, hurrying to meetings, whispering to each other as if only they understood what their true functions were.

Kynes was an alien in this political world; he would rather have the wilderness any day. Though the splendor fascinated him, he longed for solitude, unexplored landscapes, and the mysteries of strange flora and fauna. This bustling place would give him a headache before long.

The Sardaukar guards ushered him across a long promenade beneath prismatic lights, taking sharp, rhythmic footsteps that sounded like weapons fire; Kynes’s stumbles provided the only dissonance.

Ahead on a raised dais of blue-green crystal sat the translucent Golden Lion Throne, carved from a single piece of Hagal quartz. And on the dazzling chair perched the old man himself — Elrood Corrino IX, Imperial ruler of the Known Universe.

Kynes stared at him. The Emperor was a distressingly gaunt man, skeletal with age, with a ponderously large head on a thin neck. Surrounded by such incredible luxury and dramatic richness, the aged ruler appeared somehow insignificant. But with a twitch of his large-knuckled finger, the Emperor could condemn entire planets to annihilation, killing billions of people. Elrood had sat upon the Golden Lion Throne for nearly a century and a half. How many planets were in the Imperium? How many people did this man rule? Kynes wondered how anyone could tally such a staggering amount of information.

As he was led to the base of the dais, Kynes smiled uncertainly at Elrood, then swallowed hard, averted his gaze, and bowed low. No one had bothered to instruct him in the proper protocol here, and he’d had little use for manners and social niceties. The faint cinnamon odor of melange touched his nostrils from a mug of spice beer the Emperor kept on a small table beside his throne.

A page stepped forward, nodded to the leader of the Sardaukar guard escort, and turned, booming out in Galach, the common language, “The Planetologist Pardot Kynes!”

Kynes squared his shoulders and tried to stand straight, wondering why they had made such a loud and portentous introduction when the Emperor obviously knew who he was — else why summon him here? Kynes wondered if he should say hello, but decided instead to wait and let the Court determine the flow of events.

“Kynes,” the old Emperor said in a reedy, scratchy voice that suffered from too many years of issuing firm commands, “you come to me highly recommended. Our advisors have studied many candidates, and they’ve chosen you above all others. What do you say to that?” The Emperor leaned forward, raising his eyebrows so that his skin furrowed all the way to the top of his cranium.

Kynes mumbled something about being honored and pleased, then cleared his throat and asked the real question. “But, sir, what exactly have I been chosen for?”

Elrood cackled at that and sat back. “How refreshing to see someone more concerned with satisfying his own curiosity than with saying the right thing, or pandering to these stupid clingers and buffoons.” As he smiled, Elrood’s face turned rubbery, the wrinkles stretching back. His skin had a grayish, parchment tone. “The report says you grew up on Salusa Secundus, and you wrote definitive, complex reports on the ecology of the planet.”

“Yes, Sire, uh, Your Majesty. My parents were bureaucratic functionaries, sent to work in your Imperial prison there. I was just a child and went along with them.”

In truth, Kynes had heard rumors that his mother or father had displeased Elrood somehow, and that they had been transferred in disgrace to the punishment planet. But young Pardot Kynes had found the wastelands fascinating. After the tutors were finished with him, he’d spent his days exploring the blasted wilderness — taking notes, studying the insects and weeds and hardy animals that had managed to survive the ancient atomic holocaust.

“Yes, yes, I understand that,” Elrood said. “After a while your parents were transferred to another world.”

Kynes nodded. “Yes, Sire. They went to Harmonthep.”

The Emperor waved a hand to dismiss the reference. “But later you returned to Salusa, of your own free will?”

“Well, uh, there was still much more for me to learn on Salusa,” he answered, stifling an embarrassed shrug.

Kynes had spent years by himself in the outback, piecing together the mysteries of the climate and ecosystems. He had suffered many hardships, endured much discomfort. He had even been pursued once by Laza tigers and survived. Afterward, Kynes had published an extensive treatise about his years there, opening remarkable windows of understanding to the once-lovely, now-abandoned Imperial capital planet.

“The wild desolation of the place whetted my interest in ecology. It’s so much more interesting to study a … damaged world. I find it difficult to learn anything in a place that’s too civilized.”

Elrood laughed at the visitor’s comment and looked around so that all the other members of the Court chuckled as well. “Like Kaitain, you mean?”

“Well, I’m sure there must be interesting places here, too, Sire,” Kynes said, hoping he hadn’t made an inexcusable faux pas.

“Well spoken!” Elrood boomed. “My advisors have chosen you wisely, Pardot Kynes.”

Not knowing what else to do or say, the Planetologist bowed awkwardly.

After his years on Salusa Secundus, he had gone on to the swampy tangles of dimly lit Bela Tegeuse, and then to other places that interested him. He could live off the land just about anywhere; his needs were few. To him, most important of all was the harvesting of scientific knowledge, looking under rocks and seeing what secrets the natural processes had left for him to find.

But his curiosity was piqued now. What had brought him to such impressive attention? “If I may ask again, Your Majesty … what exactly do you have in mind for me?” Then he added quickly, “Of course, I am happy to serve in whatever capacity my Emperor wishes.”

“You, Kynes, have been recognized as a true world-reader, a man capable of analyzing complex ecosystems in order to harness them to the needs of the Imperium. We have chosen you to go to the desert planet of Arrakis and work your magic there.”

“Arrakis!” Kynes could not restrain his astonishment — and yes, pleasure-at the prospect. “I believe the nomadic Fremen inhabitants call it Dune.”

“Whatever its name,” Elrood said a little sharply, “it is one of the most unpleasant yet important worlds in the Imperium. You know, of course, Arrakis is the sole source of the spice melange.”

Kynes nodded. “I’ve always wondered why no searchers have ever found spice on any other world. And why doesn’t anyone understand how the spice is created or deposited?”

“You are going to understand it for us,” the Emperor said. “And it’s about time, too.”

Kynes suddenly realized he might have overstepped his bounds, and he balked a little. Here he was in the grandest throne room on a million worlds, having an actual conversation with Emperor Elrood IX. The other members of the Court stared at him, some with displeasure, some with horror, some with wicked glee as if they anticipated a severe punishment momentarily.

But soon Kynes found himself thinking of the sweeping landscape of scoured sands, majestic dunes, and monstrous sandworms — visions he’d only seen in filmbooks. Forgetting his minor lapse in tact, he caught his breath and waited for the details of his assignment.

“It is vitally important to the future of the Imperium that we understand the secret of melange. To date, no one has spent the time or effort to unravel its mysteries. People think of Arrakis as an unending source of riches, and they don’t care about the mechanics or the details. Shallow thinking.” He paused. “This is the challenge you will face, Pardot Kynes. We install you as our official Imperial Planetologist to Arrakis.”

As Elrood made this pronouncement, he looked down at the weathered, middle-aged man and assessed him privately. He saw immediately that Kynes was not a complex man: His emotions and alliances lay wide-open on his face. Court advisors had indicated that Pardot Kynes was a man utterly without political ambitions or obligations. His only true interest lay in his work and in understanding the natural order of the universe. He had a childlike fascination for alien places and harsh environments. He would do the job with boundless enthusiasm, and would provide honest answers.

Elrood had spent too much of his political life surrounded by simpering sycophants, brainless yes-men who said what they thought he wanted to hear. But this rugged man filled with social awkwardness was not like that.

Now it was even more important that they understand the facts behind the spice, in order to improve the efficiency of operations, vital operations. After seven years of inept governorship by Abulurd Harkonnen, and the recent accidents and mistakes made by the overambitious Baron Vladimir Harkonnen, the Emperor was concerned about a bottleneck in spice production and distribution. The spice must flow.

The Spacing Guild needed vast amounts of melange to fill the enclosed chambers of their mutated Navigators. He himself, and all the upper classes in the Empire, needed daily (and increasing) doses of melange to maintain their vitality and to extend their lives. The Bene Gesserit Sisterhood needed it in their training to create more Reverend Mothers. Mentats needed it for mental focus.

But though he disagreed with many of Baron Harkonnen’s recent harsh management activities, Elrood could not simply take Arrakis for himself. After decades of political manipulations, House Harkonnen had been placed in charge after the ouster of House Richese.

For a thousand years now, the governorship of Arrakis had been an Imperial boon, granted to a chosen family that would wring the riches out of the sands for a term not to exceed a century. Each time the fief changed hands, a firestorm of pleas and requests for favors bombarded the Palace. Landsraad support came with many strings attached, and some of those strings felt like nooses to Elrood.

Though he was Emperor, his position of power rested in a careful and uneasy balance of alliances with numerous forces, including the Great and Minor Houses of the Landsraad, the Spacing Guild, and the all-encompassing commercial combines such as CHOAM. Other forces were even more difficult to deal with, forces that preferred to remain behind the scenes.

I need to disrupt the balance, Elrood thought. This business of Arrakis has gone on too long.

The Emperor leaned forward, seeing that Kynes was fairly bursting with joy and enthusiasm. He actually wanted to go to the desert world — all the better! “Find out everything you can about Arrakis and send me regular reports, Planetologist. House Harkonnen will be instructed to give you all the support and cooperation you need.” Though they certainly won’t like an Imperial Observer snooping around.

Newly installed in the planetary governorship, Baron Harkonnen was wrapped around the Emperor’s fingertip, for now. “We will provide the items necessary for your journey. Compile your lists and give them to my Chamberlain. Once you reach Arrakis, the Harkonnens will be instructed to give you whatever else you require.”

“My needs are few,” Kynes said. “All I require are my eyes and my mind.”

“Yes, but see if you can make the Baron offer a few more amenities than that.” Elrood smiled again, then dismissed the Planetologist. The Emperor noticed a pronounced spring in Kynes’s step as he was led out of the Imperial audience chamber.

Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind.

-Chief commandment resulting from the Butlerian Jihad, found in the Orange Catholic Bible

Suffering is the great teacher of men,” the chorus of old actors said as they stood on the stage, their voices in perfect unison. Though the performers were simple villagers from the town below Castle Caladan, they had rehearsed well for the annual performance of the official House Play. Their costumes were colorful, if not entirely authentic. The props — the facade of Agamemnon’s palace, the flagstoned courtyard — showed a realism based only on enthusiasm and a few filmbook snapshots of ancient Greece.

The long play by Aeschylus had already gone on for some time, and the gathered audience in the theatre was warm and the air was close. Glowglobes lit the stage and rows of seating, but the torches and braziers around the performers added aromatic smoke to the building.

Though the background noises were loud enough, the Old Duke’s snores threatened to carry all the way forward to the performers.

“Father, wake up!” Leto Atreides whispered, nudging Duke Paulus in the ribs. “The play isn’t even half-over.”

In the chair of his private box, Paulus stirred and straightened, brushing imaginary crumbs from his broad chest. Shadows played across the creased, narrow face and the voluminous salt-and-pepper beard. He wore a black Atreides uniform with a red hawk crest on the left breast. “It’s all just talking and standing anyway, lad.” He blinked toward the stage, where the old men still hadn’t moved much. “And we’ve seen it every year.”

“That is not the point, Paulus, dear. People are watching.” It was Leto’s mother, sitting on the other side of the Duke. The dark-skinned Lady Helena, dressed in her fine gown, took seriously the ponderous words of the Greek chorus. “Pay attention to the context. It’s your family history, after all. Not mine.” Leto looked from one parent to the other, knowing that the family history of his mother’s House Richese carried just as much grandeur and loss as that of Atreides. Richese had sunk from a highly profitable “golden age” to its current economic weakness.

House Atreides claimed to trace its roots more than twelve thousand years, back to the ancient sons of Atreus on Old Terra. Now the family embraced its long history, despite the numerous tragic and dishonorable incidents it contained. The Dukes had made an annual tradition of performing the classic tragedy of Agamemnon, the most famous son of Atreus and one of the generals who had conquered Troy.

With black-black hair and a narrow face, Leto Atreides strongly resembled his mother, though he had his father’s aquiline nose and hawkish profile. The young man watched, dressed in uncomfortable finery, vaguely aware of the off-world background of the story. The author of the ancient play had counted on his audience understanding the esoteric references. General Agamemnon had been a great military commander in one of human history’s legendary wars, long before the creation of thinking machines that had enslaved mankind, long before the Butlerian Jihad had freed humanity.

For the first time in his fourteen years, Leto felt the weight of legends on his shoulders; he sensed a connection with the faces and personalities of his star-crossed family’s past. One day he would succeed his father, and would become a part of Atreides history as well. Events were chipping away at his childhood, transforming him into a man. He saw it clearly.

“The unenvied fortune is best,” the old men chimed together to say their lines. “Preferable to sacking cities, better than following the commands of others.”

Before sailing to Troy, Agamemnon had sacrificed his own daughter to guarantee favorable winds from the gods. His distraught wife, Clytemnestra, had spent the ten years of her husband’s absence plotting revenge. Now, after the final battle of the Trojan War, a chain of signal fires had been lit along the coast, sending back home word of the victory.

“All of the action occurs offstage,” Paulus muttered, though he had never been much of a reader or literary critic. He lived life for the moment, squeezing every drop of experience and accomplishment. He preferred spending time with his son, or his soldiers. “Everybody just stands in front of the sets, waiting for Agamemnon to arrive.”

Paulus abhorred inaction, always telling his son that even the wrong decision was better than no decision at all. In the play, Leto thought the Old Duke sympathized most with the great general, a man after his own heart.

The chorus of old men droned on, Clytemnestra stepped out of the palace to deliver a speech, and the chorus continued again. A herald, pretending to have disembarked from a ship, came onto the stage, kissed the ground, and recited a long soliloquy.

“Agamemnon, glorious king! How you deserve our joyous welcome, for annihilating Troy and the Trojan homeland. Our enemy’s shrines lie in ruins, nevermore comforting their gods, and their soils are barren.”

Warfare and mayhem — it made Leto think of his father’s younger days, when he had charged out to fight battles for the Emperor, crushing a bloody rebellion on Ecaz, adventuring with his friend Dominic, who was now the Earl of House Vernius on Ix. In private times with Leto, the Old Duke often talked about those days with great fondness.

In the shadows of their box, Paulus heaved a too-loud sigh, not concealing his boredom. Lady Helena shot him a daggered glare, then returned her attention to the play, reconstructing her face to form a more placid smile in case anyone should look at her. Leto gave his father a crooked and sympathetic grin, and Paulus winked back at him. The Duke and his wife played their parts and fit their own comfortable roles.

Finally, on the stage below, the victorious Agamemnon arrived in a chariot, accompanied by his spoils-of-war mistress, the half-insane prophetess Cassandra. Meanwhile, Clytemnestra made preparations for her hated husband’s appearance, feigning devotion and love.

Old Paulus started to loosen the collar of his uniform, but Helena reached over quickly to pull his hand away. Her smile didn’t waver.

Seeing this ritual his parents often went through, Leto smiled to himself. His mother constantly struggled to maintain what she called “a sense of decorum,” while the old man behaved with far less formality. Though his father had taught him much about statecraft and leadership, Lady Helena had taught her son protocol and religious studies.

A daughter of Richese, Lady Helena Atreides had been born into a House Major that had lost most of its power and prestige through failed economic competitions and political intrigues. After being ousted from the planetary governorship of Arrakis, Helena’s family had salvaged some of its respectability through an arranged marital alliance with the Atreides; several of her sisters had been married off to other Houses.

Despite their obvious differences, the Old Duke had once told Leto he had truly loved Helena in the first years of their union. Over time, that had eroded, and he’d dabbled with many mistresses, possibly producing illegitimate children, though Leto was his sole official heir. As decades passed, an enmity built up between husband and wife, causing a deep rift. Now their marriage was strictly political.

“I married for politics in the first place, lad,” he had said. “Never should have tried to make it otherwise. At our station, marriage is a tool. Don’t muck everything up by trying to throw love into the mix.”

Leto sometimes wondered if Helena herself had ever loved his father, or if it had only been his title and station that she loved. Of late, she seemed to have assumed the role of Paulus’s royal caretaker; she constantly strove to keep him groomed and presentable. It bore as much on her own reputation as on his.

On the stage, Clytemnestra greeted her husband, strewing purple tapestries on the ground so he could walk on them rather than on the dirt. Amidst great pomp and fanfare, Agamemnon marched into his palace, while the oracle Cassandra, speechless in terror, refused to enter. She foretold her own death and the murder of the general; of course, no one listened to her.

Through carefully cultivated political channels, Leto’s mother maintained contacts with other powerful Houses, while Duke Paulus developed strong bonds with the common people of Caladan. The Atreides Dukes led their subjects by serving them and by paying themselves only what was fair from family business enterprises. This was a family of wealth, but not to excess — not at the expense of its citizens.

In the play, when the returning general went to his bath, his treacherous wife tangled him in purple robes and stabbed both him and his oracular mistress to death. “My gods! A deadly blow has befallen me!” Agamemnon wailed from offstage, out of sight.

Old Paulus smirked and bent over to his son. “I’ve killed many a man on the battlefield, and I have yet to hear one say that as he died!”

Helena hushed him.

“Gods protect me, another blow! I shall die!” cried the voice of Agamemnon.

While the audience was engrossed in the tragedy, Leto tried to sort through his thoughts of the situation, how it related to his own life. This was supposedly his family’s heritage, after all.

Clytemnestra admitted the murder, claiming vengeance against her husband for his bloody sacrifice of their daughter, for his whoring in Troy, and for blatantly bringing his mistress Cassandra into her own home.

“Glorious king,” wailed the chorus, “our affection is boundless, our tears unending. The spider has ensnared you in its ghostly web of death.”

Leto’s stomach churned. House Atreides had committed horrible deeds in the distant past. But the family had changed, perhaps driven by the ghosts of history. The Old Duke was an honorable man, well respected by the Landsraad and beloved by his people. Leto hoped he could do as well when it came his turn to rule House Atreides.

The final lines of the play were spoken, and the company of actors marched across the stage, bowing to the assembled political and business leaders, all of whom were dressed in finery befitting their stations.

“Well, I’m glad that’s over,” Paulus sighed as the main glowglobes went on in the performance hall. The Old Duke rose to his feet and kissed his wife’s hand as they filed out of the royal box. “On your way now, my dear. I have something to say to Leto. Wait for us in the reception room.”

Helena glanced once at her son and went down the corridor of the ancient stone-and-wood theatre. Her look said she knew exactly what Paulus intended to say, but she bowed to his archaic tradition of having the men speak of “important matters” while the women busied themselves elsewhere.

Merchants, important businessmen, and other well-respected locals began filling the corridor, sipping Caladanian wine and munching hors d’oeuvres. “This way, lad,” the Old Duke said, taking a backstage passage. He and Leto strode past two Atreides guards, who saluted. Then they took a lift tube up four levels to a gilded dressing room. Balut crystal glowglobes floated in the air, flickering a warm orange. Formerly the living quarters of a legendary Caladanian actor, this chamber was now used exclusively by the Atreides and their closest advisors for times requiring privacy.

Leto wondered why his father had taken him here.

After closing the door behind him, Paulus slipped into a green-and-black suspensor chair and motioned for Leto to take one opposite him. The young man did so and adjusted the controls to lift the floating chair higher in the air, so that his eye level was equal to that of his father. Leto only did this in private, not even in the presence of his mother, who would consider such behavior unseemly and disrespectful. By contrast, the Old Duke found his son’s brashness and high spirits to be an amusing reflection of the way he himself had been as a young man.

“You are of age now, Leto,” Paulus began, removing an ornate wooden pipe from a compartment in the arm of his chair. He did not waste time with chitchat. “And you must learn more than your own backyard. So I’m sending you to Ix to study.” He examined the black-haired youth who looked so similar to his mother, but with lighter, more olive-toned skin than hers. He had a narrow face with sharp angles and deep gray eyes.

Ix! Leto’s pulse accelerated. The machine planet. A strange and alien place. Everyone in the Imperium knew of that mysterious world’s incredible technology and innovations, but few outsiders had ever been there. Leto felt disoriented, as if on the deck of a boat in a storm. His father loved to pull surprises like this, to see how well Leto could react to a changed situation.

Ixians maintained a strict veil of secrecy around their industrial operations. They were rumored to skirt the fringes of legality, manufacturing devices that came close to violating Jihad prohibitions against thinking machines. Why then is my father sending me to such a place, and how has it been arranged? Why hasn’t anyone asked me?

A robo-table emerged from the floor beside Leto and produced a cold glass of cidrit juice. The young man’s tastes were known, just as it was known that the Old Duke would want nothing but the pipe. Leto took a sip of the tart drink, puckering his lips.

“You’ll study there for a year,” Paulus said, “according to the tradition of the allied Great Houses. Living on Ix will be quite a contrast with our bucolic planet. Learn from it.” He stared at the pipe in his hand. Carved from Elaccan jacaranda wood, it was deep brown, with swirls that glinted in the light cast by the glowglobes.

“You’ve been there, sir?” Leto smiled as he remembered. “To see your comrade Dominic Vernius, right?”

Paulus touched the combustion pad on the side of his pipe, lighting the tobacco, which was actually a golden seaweed rich in nicotine. He took a long drag and exhaled smoke. “On many occasions. The Ixians are an insular society and don’t trust outsiders. So you’ll have to go through plenty of security precautions, interrogations, and scans. They know that dropping their guard for the briefest instant can be fatal. Great and Minor Houses alike covet what Ix has and would like to take it for themselves.”

“Richese for one,” Leto said.

“Don’t say that to your mother. Richese is now only a shadow of what it was because Ix trounced them in all-out economic warfare.” He leaned forward and took a puff from his pipe. “The Ixians are masters of industrial sabotage and patent appropriation. Nowadays Richesians are only good for making cheap copies, without any innovations.”

Leto considered these comments, which were new to him. The Old Duke blew smoke, puffing his cheeks and making his beard bristle.

“In deference to your mother, lad, we’ve filtered the information you’ve learned. House Richese was a most tragic loss. Your grandfather, Count Ilban Richese, had a large family and spent more time with his offspring than watching his business interests. Not surprisingly, his children grew up pampered, and his fortunes fizzled away.”

Leto nodded, attentive as always to his father’s talk. But he already knew more than Paulus imagined; he’d listened privately to holorecords and filmbooks inadvertently left accessible to him by his proctors. It occurred to him now, however, that perhaps all of that was by design, part of a plan to open his mother’s family history to him like a flower, one petal at a time.

In conjunction with his familial interest in Richese, Leto had always found Ix to be equally intriguing. Once an industrial competitor of Richese, House Vernius of Ix had survived as a technological powerhouse. The royal family of Ix was one of the wealthiest in the Imperium — and he was going to study there.

His father’s words broke through his thoughts. “Your training partner will be Prince Rhombur, heir to the noble title of Vernius. I hope you two get along. You’re about the same age.”

The Prince of Ix. Leto’s thoughts soured, hoping the young man wasn’t spoiled, like so many other children of powerful Landsraad families. Why couldn’t it at least have been a princess, one with a face and figure like the Guild banker’s daughter he had met last month at the Tidal Solstice Ball?

“So … what is this Prince Rhombur like?” Leto asked.

Paulus laughed, a blustery offering that suggested a lifetime of revelry and bawdy stories. “Why, I don’t think I know. It’s been a long time since I visited Dominic at home with his wife Shando.” He smiled with an inner joke. “Ah, Shando — she was an Imperial concubine once, but Dominic stole her right out from under old Elrood’s nose.” He gave a loud, impertinent chuckle. “Now they have a son … and a daughter, too. Her name is Kailea.”

Smiling enigmatically, the Old Duke continued, “There is much for you to learn, my boy. A year hence, both of you will come to study on Caladan, an exchange of teaching services. You and Rhombur will be taken to pundi rice farms in the lowland marshes on the southern continent, to live in shacks and work the paddies. You’ll travel beneath the sea in a Nells chamber, and you’ll dive for coral gems.” He smiled and clapped his son on the shoulder. “Some things can’t be taught with filmbooks or in classrooms.”

“Yes, sir.” He smelled the iodine-sweetness of the seaweed tobacco. He frowned, hoping the smoke covered his expression. This drastic and unexpected change in his life wasn’t to his liking, but he respected his father; Leto had learned through many hard lessons that the Old Duke knew exactly what he was talking about, and that Paulus had only the greatest desire to ensure that his son would follow in his footsteps.

The Duke lounged back in his suspensor chair, bobbing in the air. “Lad, I can tell you’re not entirely pleased, but this will be a vital experience for you and for Dominic’s son. Here on Caladan you’ll both learn our greatest secret — how we foster the intense loyalty of our subjects, why we trust our people implicitly in a way the Ixians do not trust theirs.”

Paulus became most serious now, without the slightest glint of humor in his eyes. “My son, this is more essential than anything you will learn on an industrial world: People are more important than machines.”

It was an adage Leto had heard often; the phrase was part of him, almost as important to him as breathing. “That’s why our soldiers fight so well.”

Paulus leaned forward into the curling smoke from his last puff. “One day you will be Duke, lad, patriarch of House Atreides and a respected representative in the Landsraad. Your voice there will be equal to that of any other ruler among the Great Houses. That’s a great responsibility.”

“I’ll handle it.”

“I’m sure you will, Leto … but let yourself relax a bit. The people can tell when you’re not happy — and when their Duke is not happy, the population is not happy. Let pressure pass over and through you; that way you can’t be harmed by it.” He extended a scolding finger. “Have more fun.”

Fun. Leto thought again of the Guild banker’s daughter, envisioning the fullness of her breasts and hips, the moist pout of her mouth, the way she had looked at him so enticingly.

Maybe he wasn’t as serious as his father thought he was ….

He took another drink of cidrit juice; the tart coolness dissipated in his throat. “Sir, with your proven loyalty, with the known faithfulness of the Atreides to its allies, why do the Ixians still put us through their interrogation procedures? Do you think an Atreides, even with all that has been instilled in him, could ever become a traitor? Could we ever become like … like the Harkonnens?”

The Old Duke scowled. “Once, we were not so different from them, but those are not stories you’re ready to hear yet. Remember the play we just watched.” He held up a finger. “Things change in the Imperium. Alliances form and dissolve on whims.”

“Not our alliances.”

Paulus met the boy’s gray-eyed stare, then looked away, into a corner where the smoke from his pipe swirled in thick curtains.

Leto sighed. There was so much he wanted to know, and quickly. But it was being fed to him in little morsels, like petit fours at one of his mother’s fancy parties.

Outside, they heard people moving about, clearing the theatre for the next performance of Agamemnon. The actors would be resting, changing costumes, preparing for another audience.

Sitting in this private room with his father, Leto felt more like a man than ever before. Maybe next time he would light a pipe of his own. Maybe he would drink something stronger than cidrit juice. Paulus looked at him with a proud glow in his eyes.

Leto smiled back and tried to imagine what it would be like to be Duke Atreides — then felt a sudden rush of guilt as he realized his father would have to die first in order for him to slip the ducal signet ring onto his finger. He didn’t want that, and was thankful that it would be a long time yet. Too far in the future to think about.

Spacing Guild: one leg of the political tripod maintaining the Great Convention. The Guild was the second mental-physical training school (see Bene Gesserit) after the Butlerian Jihad. The Guild monopoly on space travel and transport and upon international banking is taken as the beginning point of the Imperial Calendar.

-Terminology of the Imperium

From his perch on the Golden Lion Throne, Emperor Elrood IX scowled down at the broad-shouldered and too-confident man who stood at the base of the royal dais, with one of his boots, still dirty probably, on the lowest step. As polished-bald as a marble banister knob, Earl Dominic Vernius still carried himself like a popular and decorated war hero, though those days were long over. Elrood doubted anyone still remembered the man’s reckless glory days.

The Imperial Chamberlain, Aken Hesban, moved swiftly to the visitor’s side, and in a brusque tone ordered Dominic to remove the offending foot. Hesban’s face was sallow, his mouth framed with long and drooping mustaches. The last rays of Kaitain’s afternoon sunlight cast streaks high on a wall, shining golden rivers through the narrow prismatic windows.

Earl Vernius of Ix removed his foot as he was instructed, but continued to stare cordially at Elrood. The Ixian crest, a purple-and-copper helix, adorned the collar of Dominic’s tunic. Though House Corrino was vastly more powerful than the ruling family of Ix, Dominic had the maddening habit of treating the Emperor as an equal, as if their past history — good and bad — allowed him to dispense with formalities. Chamberlain Hesban did not at all approve.

Decades ago Dominic had led legions of Imperial troops during the rough civil wars, and he had not truly respected his Emperor since. Elrood had gotten himself into political trouble late in his impulsive marriage to his fourth wife Habla, and several Landsraad leaders had been forced to use their House military might to enforce stability again. House Vernius of Ix had been among these allies, as had the Atreides.

Now Dominic smiled beneath an extravagant mustache, and looked on Elrood with a jaded eye. The old vulture had not earned his throne through great deeds or compassion. Dominic’s great-uncle Gaylord had once said, “If you are born to power, you must prove you deserve it through good works — or give it up. To do any less is to act without conscience.”

Standing impatiently on the checkerboard floor of polished stone squares — purportedly samples from all the worlds in the Imperium — Dominic waited for Elrood to speak. A million worlds? There couldn’t possibly be that many stones here, though I don’t want to be the one to count them.

The Chamberlain stared down at him as if his diet consisted entirely of soured milk. But Earl Vernius could play the game himself and refused to fidget, refused to inquire into the nature of his summons. He just stood still, smiling at the old man. Dominic’s expression and bright eyes implied knowledge of many more embarrassing personal secrets about the old man than Shando had actually confessed to him — but the suspicion galled Elrood, like an Elaccan bitterthorn in his side.

Something moved on the right, and in the shadows of an arched doorway Dominic saw a black-robed woman, one of those Bene Gesserit witches. He couldn’t make out her face, partially concealed as it was by an overhanging cowl. Notorious hoarders of secrets, the Bene Gesserit were always close to the centers of power, constantly watching … constantly manipulating.

“I won’t ask you if it’s true, Vernius,” the Emperor finally said. “My sources are unerring, and I know you have committed this terrible act. Ixian technology! Pah!” He made as if to spit from his withered lips. Dominic did not roll his eyes upward; Elrood always overestimated the effectiveness of his melodramatic gestures.

Dominic continued to smile, showing plenty of teeth. “I am unaware of committing any ‘terrible act,’ Sire. Ask your Truthsayer, if you don’t believe me.” He flicked a glance at the dark-robed Bene Gesserit woman.

“Mere semantics — don’t play dumb, Dominic.”

Still, he simply waited, forcing the Emperor to state his charge explicitly.

Elrood huffed, and the Chamberlain huffed with him. “Damn it, your new Heighliner design will allow the Guild, with their damnable monopoly on space transport, to carry sixteen percent more in each load!”

Dominic bowed, still smiling mildly. “Actually, m’Lord, we have been able to boost the increase to eighteen percent. That’s a substantial improvement over the previous design, involving not only a new hull but a shield technology that weighs less and takes up less room. Therefore, boosted efficiency. This is the very heart of Ixian innovation, which has made House Vernius great over the centuries.”

“Your alteration reduces the number of flights the Guild must make to haul the same amount of cargo.”

“Why, naturally, Sire.” Dominic looked at the old man as if he were incredibly dense. “If you increase the capacity of each Heighliner, you decrease the number of flights required to haul the same amount of material. Simple mathematics.”

“Your redesign causes great hardship for the Imperial House, Earl Vernius,” said Aken Hesban, clutching his chain of office as if it were a handkerchief. His long mustaches looked like the tusks of a walrus.

“Well, I suppose I can understand the shortsighted reason for your concern, Sire,” Dominic said, not deigning to look at the stuffed-shirt Chamberlain. Imperial tax was based on the number of flights rather than on the amount of cargo, and the Heighliner redesign therefore resulted in a substantial reduction in income for House Corrino.

Dominic spread his broad scarred hands, looking eminently reasonable. “But how can you request that we blatantly hold back progress? Ix has in no way countermanded the strictures of the Great Revolt. We have the full support of the Spacing Guild and the Landsraad.”

“You did this knowing it would incur my wrath?” Elrood leaned forward on the massive throne, looking even more the vulture.

“Come now, Sire!” Dominic laughed, belittling the Emperor’s concerns. “Personal feelings can have no place in the march of progress.”

Elrood raised himself off the chair, standing in his billowy robes of state that hung like awnings over his skeletal body. “I can’t renegotiate with the Guild for a tax based on metric tonnage, Vernius. You know that!”

“And I can’t change the simple laws of economics and commerce.” He shook his gleaming head, then shrugged. “It’s just business, Elrood.”

The Court functionaries stopped with a gasp, listening to the candor and familiarity Dominic Vernius used with the Emperor. “Watch yourself,” the Chamberlain warned.

But Dominic ignored him and continued. “This design modification affects many people, most of them positively. We are only concerned about progress, and about doing the best possible job for our client, the Spacing Guild. The cost of one new Heighliner is more than most planetary systems make in a Standard Year.”

Elrood stared him down. “Perhaps it is time for my administrators and licensors to inspect your manufacturing facilities.” His voice carried a threatening tone. “I have reports that Ixian scientists may be developing secret, illegal thinking machines in violation of the Jihad. Yes, I have also heard complaints of repression against your suboid working class. Haven’t we, Aken?”

The Chamberlain nodded dourly. “Yes, Highness.”

“There have been no such rumors.” Dominic chuckled, though a bit uncertainly. “No evidence whatsoever.”

“Alas, they were anonymous reports and therefore no records have been kept.” The Emperor tapped his long-nailed fingertips together as a real smile crossed his face. “Yes, I believe the best thing would be an unannounced inspection of Ix — before you can send a warning and arrange for anything to be hidden.”

“The inner workings of Ix are off-limits to you, according to a long-established Imperium-Landsraad pact.” Dominic was riled now, but he tried to maintain his composure.

“I made no such agreement.” Elrood looked down at his fingernails. “And I’ve been Emperor for a long, long time.”

“Your ancestor did, and you’re bound by it.”

“I have the power to make and break agreements. You don’t seem to realize that I am the Padishah Emperor, and I can do as I please.”

“The Landsraad will have something to say about that, Roody.” Instantly Dominic regretted using the nickname and wished he could take it back. But it was too late.

Flushing with rage, the Emperor leaped to his feet and pointed an accusing, shaking finger at Dominic. “How dare you!” The Sardaukar guards snapped to attention, shifting their weapons.

“If you insist on an Imperial inspection,” Dominic said with a contemptuous, dismissive gesture, “I will resist it and file a formal complaint in Landsraad court. You have no case, and you know it.” He bowed and backed away. “I’m extremely busy, Sire. If you will excuse me, I must take my leave.”

Elrood glared at him, stabbed by the pet name Dominic had used. Roody. Both men knew that particular personal nickname had been used only by a former concubine of Elrood’s, the beautiful Shando … who was now Lady Vernius.

After the Ecazi Rebellion, Emperor Elrood had decorated brave young Dominic and granted him an expansion of his fief to include other worlds in the Alkaurops system. At Elrood’s invitation, the young Earl Vernius had spent much time at court, a war hero to be seen as a decoration at Imperial banquets and state functions. Hearty Dominic had been very popular, a welcome guest, a proud and humorous companion in the dining hall.

But it was there that Dominic had met Shando, one of the Emperor’s many concubines. At the time, Elrood had been married to no one; his fourth and last wife Habla had died five years earlier, and he already had two male heirs (though his eldest, Fafnir, would be poisoned later that year). The Emperor continued to keep a retinue of beautiful women, though primarily to maintain appearances, since he rarely took Shando or any of his other concubines to bed.

Dangerously, Dominic and Shando had fallen in love, but had kept their relationship secret for many months. It was clear that Elrood had lost interest in her after five years, and when she asked to be freed from service and to leave the Imperial Court, Elrood — though perplexed — had complied. He thought fondly of her, and saw no reason to deny her a simple request.

The other concubines had thought Shando foolish to give up such riches and pampering, but she’d had enough of the lavish life and instead wanted a real marriage and children. Elrood, of course, would never take her as his wife.

As soon as she was freed from Imperial service, Dominic Vernius married her, and they had completed their vows with minimal pomp and ceremony, but airtight legality.

Upon hearing that someone else wanted her, Elrood’s male pride suddenly made him change his mind — but it was too late. He had resented Dominic ever since, feeling like a cuckold, paranoid about what bedroom secrets Shando might be sharing with her husband.

Roody.

The Bene Gesserit witch who hovered near the throne faded deeper into the shadows behind a speckled column of Canidar granite. Dominic couldn’t tell if the cowled woman was pleased or annoyed with the events.

Forcing himself not to waver, not to hurry, Dominic strode confidently past a pair of Sardaukar guards and entered the outer hallway. At a signal from Elrood, they could execute him instantly.

Dominic increased his pace.

The Corrinos were known for rash behavior. On more than one occasion they’d had to make up for their hasty and ill-advised reactions, using their vast family wealth for payoffs. Killing the head of House Vernius during an Imperial audience might just be one of those rash acts — if it weren’t for the involvement of the Spacing Guild. The Guild had favored Ix with increased attention and benefits — and had adopted the new Heighliner design — and not even the Emperor and his brutal Sardaukar could oppose the Guild.

This was an ironic circumstance, considering the military might of House Corrino, for the Guild had no fighting forces, no armaments of its own. But without the Guild and their Navigators to see a safe path across folded space, there would be no space travel, no interplanetary banking — and no empire for Elrood to rule. On a moment’s notice, the Guild could withhold its favors, stranding armies and putting an end to military campaigns. Of what use would the Sardaukar be if they were planet-bound on Kaitain?

Finally reaching the main exit gate of the Imperial Palace, passing under the Salusan lava arch, Dominic waited while three guards ran him through a security scan.

Unfortunately, Guild protection only went so far.

Dominic had very little respect for the old Emperor. He had tried to hide his contempt for the pathetic ruler of a million worlds, but he’d made a dire mistake by allowing himself to think of him as a mere man, a former lover of his wife’s. Elrood, snubbed, could annihilate an entire planet in a fit of pique. The Emperor was the vindictive sort. All Corrinos were.

I HAVE MY contacts, Elrood thought as he watched his adversary depart. I can bribe some of the workers who are building components for those improved Heighliners — though that may be difficult, since suboids are said to be mindless. Failing that, Dominic, I can find other people you’ve pushed aside and taken for granted. Your mistake will be in overlooking them.

In his mind’s eye Elrood envisioned the lovely Shando, and recalled their most intimate moments together, decades ago. Purple merh-silk sheets, the sprawling bed, incense burners, and mirrored glowglobes. As Emperor, he could have any woman he wanted — and he had chosen Shando.

For two years she had been his favorite concubine, even when his wife Habla had been alive. Small-boned and petite, she had a fragile porcelain-doll appearance, which she had cultivated during her years on Kaitain; but Elrood also knew she had a commonsense strength and resiliency deep inside her. They had enjoyed doing multilingual word puzzles together. Shando had whispered “Roody” in his ear when he had invited her to the Imperial bedchamber; and she had cried it loudly during climactic moments of passion.

In memory he heard her voice. Roody … Roody … Roody …

Being a commoner, however, Shando simply wasn’t suitable for him to marry. It had not even been an option. The heads of royal Houses rarely wed their concubines, and an Emperor never did. Dashing young Dominic, with his wiles and flattery, had gotten Shando to talk herself free, to trick Elrood, and then had spirited her away to Ix, where he had married her in secret. The astonishment in the Landsraad came later, and despite the scandal the two had remained married these many years.

And the Landsraad, despite Elrood’s petition to them, had refused to do anything about it. After all, Dominic had married the girl and the Emperor never had any intention of doing so. Everything according to law. Despite his petty jealousies, Elrood couldn’t claim Shando had been adulterous, not by any legal standard.

But Dominic Vernius knew her intimate nickname for him. What else had Shando told her husband? It ate at him like a Poritrin fester.

On the screen of a wrist-strap security monitor, he watched Dominic at the main gate, as pale security beams washed over him — from a scanner that was another sophisticated Ixian machine.

He could send a signal, and the probes would obliterate the other man’s mind, leave him a vegetable. An unexpected power surge … a most terrible accident … How ironic if Elrood were to use an Ixian scanner to kill the Earl of Ix.

Oh, how he wanted to do it! But not now. The time wasn’t right, and there could be embarrassing questions, maybe even an investigation. Such vengeance required subtlety and planning. In that way, the surprise and ultimate victory would be so much more satisfying.

Elrood switched off the monitor, and the screen darkened.

Standing beside the blocky throne, Chamberlain Aken Hesban didn’t ask why his Emperor was smiling.

The highest function of ecology is the understanding of consequences.

-PARDOT KYNES, Ecology of Bela Tegeuse, Initial Report to the Imperium

Over a razor-edged horizon the shimmering atmosphere was filled with pastel colors of sunrise. In a brief instant the clean stillness of Arrakis allowed warm light to flood over the wrinkled landscape … a sudden deluge of brightness and rising heat. The white sun lurched above the horizon, without much precursor glow in the arid air.

Now that he had finally arrived on the desert world, Pardot Kynes drew a deep breath, then remembered to put the face mask over his nose and mouth to prevent extreme moisture loss. His sparse, sandy hair blew in a light breeze. He had only been on Arrakis four days, and already he sensed that this barren place held more mysteries than a lifetime could ever unravel.

He would have preferred to have been left to his own devices. He wanted to wander alone across the Great Bled with his instruments and logbooks, studying the character of lava rock and the stratified layers of dunes.

However, when Glossu Rabban, nephew of the Baron and heir apparent to House Harkonnen, announced his intention to go into the deep desert to hunt one of the legendary sandworms, such an opportunity was too great for Kynes to ignore.

As a mere Planetologist in the entourage, a scientist instead of a warrior, he felt like the odd man out. Harkonnen desert troops brought along weaponry and explosives from the armored central keep. They took a troop transport led by a man named Thekar, who claimed to have once lived in a desert village, though he was now a water merchant in Carthag. He had more of a Fremen look to him than he admitted, though none of the Harkonnens seemed to notice.

Rabban had no specific plan for tracking one of the huge sinuous beasts. He didn’t want to go to a spice-harvesting site, where his crew might disrupt the work. He wanted to hunt down and kill such a beast by himself. He just brought along all the weaponry he could imagine and relied upon his instinctive talent for destruction … .

Days earlier, Kynes had arrived on Arrakis by diplomatic shuttle, landing in the dirty though relatively new city. Eager to get started, he had presented his Imperial assignment papers to the Baron himself. The lean, red-haired man had scrutinized Kynes’s orders carefully, then verified the Imperial seal. He pursed his thick lips before he grudgingly promised his cooperation. “So long as you know enough to stay out of the way of real work.”

Kynes had bowed. “I like nothing better than to be alone and out of the way, m’Lord Baron.”

He’d spent his first two days in the city purchasing desert gear, talking to people from the outlying villages, learning what he could about the legends of the desert, the warnings, the customs, the mysteries to explore. Understanding the importance of such things, Kynes spent a substantial sum to obtain the best stillsuit he could find for desert survival, as well as a paracompass, water distilleries, and reliable note-keeping devices.

It was said that many tribes of the enigmatic Fremen lived in the trackless wastes. Kynes wanted to talk with them, to understand how they squeezed survival from such a harsh environment. But the out-of-place Fremen seemed reticent within the boundaries of Carthag, and they hurried away whenever he tried to talk with them ….

Kynes didn’t much care for the city himself. House Harkonnen had erected the new headquarters en masse when, four decades earlier, Guild manipulations had given them Arrakis as a quasi-fief to govern. Carthag had been built with the rapidity of inexhaustible human labor, without finesse or attention to detail: blocky buildings constructed of substandard materials for ostentatious purposes or functionality. No elegance whatsoever.

Carthag did not appear to belong here; its architecture and placement were offensive to his sensibilities. Kynes had an innate ability to see how the fabric of an ecosystem meshed, how the pieces fit together in a natural world. But this population center was wrong, like a pustule on the skin of the planet.

Another outpost to the southwest, Arrakeen, was a more primitive city that had grown slowly, naturally, nestled against a mountainous barrier called the Shield Wall. Perhaps Kynes should have gone there first. But political requirements had forced him to establish his base with the rulers of the planet.

At least that had given him the opportunity to search for one of the giant sandworms.

The large ‘thopter transport carrying Rabban’s hunting party lifted off, and soon Kynes received his initial glimpse of the true desert. Kynes peered out the windowplaz at the rippled wastelands below. From experiences in other desert regions, he was able to identify dune patterns … shapes and sinuous curves that revealed much about seasonal wind patterns, prevailing air currents, and the severity of storms. So much could be learned from studying these ripples and lines, the fingerprints of weather. He pressed his face to the plaz observation ports; none of the other passengers appeared to be interested at all.

The Harkonnen troops fidgeted, hot in their heavy blue uniforms and armor. Their weapons clattered against each other and scraped the floor plates. The men seemed uneasy without their personal body, shields, but the presence of a shield and its Holtzman field would drive any nearby worms into a killing frenzy. Today, Rabban himself wanted to do the killing.

Glossu Rabban, the twenty-one-year-old son of the planet’s former lackluster governor, sat up front near the pilot, looking for targets out on the sand. With severely cropped brown hair, he was broad-shouldered, deep-voiced, and short-tempered. Icy pale blue eyes looked out from a sunburned face. He seemed to do everything possible to be the opposite of his father.

“Will we see worm tracks from the sky?” he asked.

Behind him, Thekar the desert guide leaned very close, as if wishing to remain within Rabban’s personal space. “The sands shift and mask the passage of a worm. Often they travel deep. You will not see a worm moving until it approaches the surface and is ready to attack.”

The tall, angular Kynes listened intently, taking mental notes. He wanted to record all of these details in his logbook, but that would have to wait until later.

“Then how are we going to find one? I heard the open desert is crawling with worms.”

“Not that simple, m’Lord Rabban,” Thekar responded. “The great worms have their own domains, some extending to hundreds of square kilometers. Within these boundaries they hunt and kill any intruders.”

Growing impatient, Rabban turned around in his seat. His skin grew darker. “How do we know where to find a worm’s domain?”

Thekar smiled, and his dark, close-set eyes took on a distant look. “All of the desert is owned by Shai-Hulud.”

“By what? Stop evading my questions.” Within another moment, Kynes was sure Rabban would cuff the desert man across the jaw.

“You have been on Arrakis for so long, and you did not know this, m’Lord Rabban? The Fremen consider the great sandworms to be gods,” Thekar answered quietly. “They name him, collectively, Shai-Hulud.”

“Then today we shall kill a god,” Rabban announced in a loud voice, causing the other hunters in the back of the compartment to cheer. He turned sharply toward the desert guide. “I depart for Giedi Prime in two days, and must have a trophy to take back with me. This hunt will be successful.”

Giedi Prime, Kynes thought. Ancestral homeworld of House Harkonnen. At least I won’t have to worry about him once he’s gone.

“You will have your trophy, m’Lord,” Thekar promised.

“No doubt about that,” Rabban said, but in a more ominous tone.

Seated alone in the rear of the troop transport, huddled in his desert gear, Kynes felt uncomfortable in such company. He had no interest in the glorious ambitions of the Baron’s nephew … but if this excursion gave him a good look at one of the monsters, it could be worth months of intensive effort on his own.

Rabban stared out through the front of the transport; his hard, squinting eyes were surrounded by thick folds of skin. He scrutinized the desert as if it were a delicacy he intended to eat, seeing none of the beauty Kynes noted in the landscape.

“I have a plan, and this is how we’ll follow it.” Rabban turned to the troops and opened the comsystem to the spotter ornithopters flying in formation around the transport. They cruised out over the expanse of open sand. The dune ripples below looked like wrinkles on an old man’s skin.

“That outcropping of rock down there” — he gestured, and read off the coordinates — “will be our base. About three hundred meters from the rock we’ll touch down in the open sand, where we’ll drop Thekar with a gadget he calls a thumper. Then we’ll lift off to the safety of the rock outcroppings, where the worm can’t go.”

The lean desert man looked up in alarm. “Leave me out there? But m’Lord, I’m not —”

“You gave me the idea.” He turned back to address the uniformed troops. “Thekar here says that this Fremen device, a thumper, will bring a worm. We’ll plant one along with enough explosives to take care of the beast when it comes. Thekar, we will leave you behind to rig the explosives and trigger the thumper. You can run across the sands and make it to safety with us before a worm can come, right?” Rabban gave him a delicious little grin.

“I — I …” Thekar stammered. “It appears I have no choice.”

“Even if you can’t make it, the worm will probably go for the thumper first. The explosives will get the beast before you become its next target.”

“I take comfort in that, m’Lord,” Thekar said.

Intrigued by the Fremen device, Kynes considered obtaining one for himself. He wished he could watch this desert native up close to witness how he ran across the sands, how he eluded pursuit from the vibration-sensitive “Old Man of the Desert.” But the Planetologist knew enough to remain quiet and avoid Rabban’s notice, hoping that the hot-blooded young Harkonnen wouldn’t volunteer him to assist Thekar.

Inside the personnel compartment at the back of the craft, the Bator — a commander of a small troop — and his underlings looked through the weapons stockpile, removing lasguns for themselves. They rigged explosives to the stakelike mechanism that Thekar had brought along. A thumper.

With curious eyes, Kynes could see that it was just a spring-wound clockwork device that would thunk out a loud, rhythmic vibration. When plunged into the sand, the thumper would send reverberations deep below the desert to where “Shai-Hulud” could hear them.

“As soon as we land, you’d better rig up these explosives fast,” Rabban said to Thekar. “The engines of these ornithopters will do a good job of attracting the worm, even without the help of your Fremen toy.”

“I know that all too well, m’Lord,” Thekar said. His olive skin now had a grayish, oily tinge of terror.

The ornithopter struts kissed the sands, throwing up loose dust. The hatch opened, and Thekar — determined, now — grabbed his thumper and sprang out, landing with spread feet on the soft desert. He flashed a longing glance back up at the flying craft, then turned toward the dubious safety of the line of solid rock some three hundred meters away.

The Bator handed the explosives down to the hapless desert man, while Rabban gestured for them to hurry. “I hope you don’t become worm food, my friend,” he said with a laugh. Even before the doors could close on the ornithopter, the pilot lifted off the sands again, leaving Thekar alone.

Kynes and the other Harkonnen soldiers rushed to the starboard side of the transport, crowding the windowplaz to watch their guide’s desperate actions out on the open sands. The desert man had reverted to a different, feral human being as they watched.

“Excuse me. Just how much explosive does it take to kill a worm?” Kynes asked curiously.

“Thekar should have plenty, Planetologist,” the Bator answered. “We gave him enough to wipe out an entire city square.”

Kynes turned his attention back to the drama below. As the craft rose higher, Thekar worked in a flurry, grabbing the explosive components, piling them in a mound and linking them together with shigawire cables. Kynes could see tiny ready lights winking on. Then the whip-thin man stabbed his thumper into the sand next to the deadly cache, as if he were pounding a stake into the heart of the desert.

The troop ‘thopter swerved and arrowed straight toward the bulwark of rock where the great hunter Rabban would wait in comfort and safety. Thekar triggered the thumper’s spring-wound mechanism and began to run.

Inside the ornithopter, some of the soldiers placed bets on the outcome.

Within moments the craft alighted on the ridge of blackened, pitted rock that looked like a reef in the soft desert. The pilot shut down his engines, and the ‘thopter doors opened. Rabban shoved his troops aside to be the first to stand upon the shimmering rock. The others in the party piled out afterward; Kynes waited his turn and emerged from the rear.

The guards took up watch positions, directing the oil lenses of their binoculars at the small running figure. Rabban stood tall, holding a high-powered lasgun, though Kynes couldn’t imagine what he intended to do with the weapon at this point. Through a spotting-scope, the Baron’s nephew stared out into the heat-addled air, seeing the ripples and mirages. He centered on the clacking thumper and the dark landmark of piled explosives.

One of the high spotter ‘thopters reported possible wormsign about two kilometers to the south.

Out on the desert, Thekar ran frantically, kicking up sand. He advanced toward the archipelago of safety, the rocky islands in the sea of sand — but he was still many minutes away.

Kynes watched the odd manner in which Thekar placed his footsteps. He seemed to jitter and hop erratically, running like a spastic insect. Kynes wondered if this was some sort of arrhythmic pattern to fool an oncoming sandworm. Was this technique something that desert travelers learned? If so, who could teach it to Kynes? He had to know everything about this place and its people, the worms and the spice and the dunes. Not only was it his Imperial directive: Pardot Kynes wanted to know for himself. Once he became involved in a project, he hated unanswered questions.

The group waited, and time passed slowly. The soldiers talked. The desert man continued his peculiar running, moving imperceptibly closer. Kynes could feel the stillsuit micro-sandwich layers sucking up his droplets of sweat.

He knelt and studied the umber rock at his feet. Basaltic lava, it contained eroded pockets that had been formed from leftover gaseous bubbles in the molten rock, or softer stone eaten away by the legendary Coriolis storms of Arrakis.

Kynes picked up a handful of sand and let it run through his fingers. Not unexpectedly, he saw that the grains of sand were quartz particles, shimmering in the sun with a few flecks of darker material that might have been magnetite.

At other places he had seen rusty colorations in the sand, striations of tan, orange, and coral, hinting at various oxides. Some of the coloring could also have been from weathered deposits of the spice melange, but Kynes had never seen unprocessed spice in the wild before. Not yet.

Finally, the spotter ‘thopters overhead confirmed an approaching worm. A large one, moving fast.

The guards rose to their feet. Looking out onto the blurry landscape, Kynes saw a ripple on the sand, like an immense finger being drawn beneath the surface, disturbing the upper layers. The size of it astounded him.

“Worm’s coming in from the side!” the Bator called.

“It’s going straight for Thekar!” Rabban shouted, with cruel glee. “He’s between the worm and the thumper. Awe, bad luck.” His wide face now showed a different kind of anticipation.

Even from this distance, Kynes could see Thekar put on a burst of speed, forgetting his staggering walk as he saw the mound of the approaching worm tunneling toward him faster and faster. Kynes could well imagine the look of horror and hopeless despair on the desert man’s face.

Then with a grim resolve and a sudden desperation, Thekar came to a full stop and lay flat on the sand, motionless, staring up at the sky, perhaps praying fervently to Shai-Hulud.

With the tiny footstep vibrations stopped, the distant thumper seemed as loud as an Imperial band. Thump, thump, thump. The worm paused — then altered its path to head straight toward the cache of explosives.

Rabban gave a twitch of a shrug, nonchalant acceptance of an irrelevant defeat.

Kynes could hear the underground hiss of shifting sands, the approach of the behemoth. It came closer and closer, attracted like an iron filing to a deadly magnet. As it neared the thumper, the worm dived deeper underground, circled, and came up to engulf that which had attracted it, angered it — or whatever instinctive reaction these blind leviathans experienced.

When the worm rose from the sands, it revealed a mouth large enough to swallow a spacecraft, ascending higher and higher, its maw opening wider as its flexible jaws spread like the petals of a flower. In an instant it engulfed the insignificant black speck of the thumper and all the explosives. Its crystal teeth shone like tiny sharp thorns spiraling down its bottomless gullet.

From three hundred meters away, Kynes saw ridges of ancient skin, overlapping folds of armor that protected the creature in its passage beneath the ground. The worm gulped the booby-trapped bait and began to wallow into the sands again.

Rabban stood up with a demonic grin on his face and worked small transmitting controls. A hot breeze dusted his face, peppering his teeth with grains of sand. He pushed a button.

A distant thunderclap sent a tremor through the desert. The sands shifted in tiny avalanches from the fingernail dunes. The sequenced bomb ripped through the internal channels of the worm, blasting open its gut and splitting its armored segments.

As the dust cleared, Kynes saw the writhing, dying monstrosity that lay in a pool of disrupted sand, like a beached fur-whale.

“That thing’s more than two hundred meters long!” Rabban cried, taking in the extent of his kill.

The guards cheered. Rabban turned and pounded Kynes on the back with nearly enough strength to dislocate his shoulder.

“Now there’s a trophy, Planetologist. I’m going to take this back to Giedi Prime with me.”

Almost unnoticed, Thekar finally arrived, sweating and panting, hauling himself up to safety on the rocks. He looked behind him with mixed emotions at the faraway dead creature sprawled on the sands.

Rabban led the charge as the worm ceased its final writhing. The eager guards sprinted across the sands, shouting, cheering. Kynes, anxious now to see the amazing specimen up close, hurried along, stumbling as Harkonnen troops plowed a battered path ahead of him.

Many minutes later, panting and hot, Kynes stood awestruck in front of the towering mass of the ancient worm. Its skin was scaled, covered with gravel, thick with abrasion-proof calluses. Yet between the segments that sagged open from the explosions, he saw pink, tender skin. The gaping mouth of the worm itself was like a mine shaft lined with crystal daggers.

“It’s the most fearsome creature on this miserable planet!” Rabban crowed. “And I’ve killed it!”

The soldiers peered, none of them wanting to approach closer than several meters. Kynes wondered how the Baron’s nephew intended to haul this trophy back with him. With the Harkonnen penchant for extravagance, however, he assumed Rabban would find a way.

The Planetologist turned to see that the exhausted Thekar had plodded up beside them. His eyes held a silvery sheen, as if some inner fire blazed bright. Perhaps by coming so close to death and seeing the Fremen desert god laid low by Harkonnen explosives, his perspective on the world had changed.

“Shai-Hulud,” he whispered. Then he turned to Kynes, as if sensing a kindred spirit. “This is an ancient one. One of the oldest of the worms.”

Kynes stepped forward to look at the encrusted skin, at its segments, and wondered how he might go about dissecting and analyzing the specimen. Certainly Rabban couldn’t object to that? If necessary, Kynes would invoke his assignment from the Emperor to make the man understand. But as he approached closer, intending to touch it, he saw that the skin of the old worm was shimmering, moving, shifting. The beast itself wasn’t still alive — its nerve functions had ceased even to twitch … and yet its outer layers trembled and shifted, as if melting.

While Kynes stared in amazement, a rain of translucent cellular flaps dripped off the hulk of the old worm, like scales shed to the churned sand, where they vanished.

“What’s going on?” Rabban cried, his face purpling. Before his eyes the worm seemed to be evaporating. The skin sloughed off into tiny flopping amoebalike patches that jiggled and then burrowed into the sand like molten solder. The ancient behemoth slumped into the desert.

In the end, only skeletal, cartilaginous ribs and milky teeth were left. Then even these remains sank slowly, dissolving into mounds of loose gelatin covered by sand.

The Harkonnen troops stepped back to a safer distance.

To Kynes, it seemed as if he had seen a thousand years of decay in

only a few seconds. Accelerated entropy. The hungry desert seemed eager to swallow every shred of evidence, to conceal the fact that a human had defeated a sandworm.

As Kynes thought about it, more in confusion and growing amazement than in dismay at losing all chance of dissecting the specimen, he wondered just how strange the life cycle of these magnificent beasts must be.

He had so much to learn about Arrakis … .

Rabban stood, seething and furious. The muscles in his neck stretched taut like iron cables. “My trophy!” He whirled, clenched his fists, and struck Thekar full across the face, knocking him flat onto the sands. For a moment, Kynes thought the Baron’s nephew might actually kill the desert man, but Rabban turned his rage and fury on the still-dissolving, shuddering heap of the sandworm sinking into the exploded sands.

He screamed curses at it. Then as Kynes watched, a determined look came into Rabban’s cold, menacing eyes. His sunburned face flushed a deeper red. “When I return to Giedi Prime, I’ll hunt something a lot more satisfying.” Then, as if distracted from all thoughts of the sandworm, Rabban turned and stalked away.

One observes the survivors, and learns from them.

-Bene Gesserit Teaching

0f all the fabled million worlds in the Imperium, young Duncan Idaho had never been anywhere but Giedi Prime, an oil-soaked, industry-covered planet filled with artificial constructions, square angles, metal, and smoke. The Harkonnens liked to keep their home that way. Duncan had known nothing else in his eight years.

Even the dark and dirt-stained alleys of his lost home would have been a welcome sight now, though. After months of imprisonment with the rest of his family, Duncan wondered if he would ever again go outside the huge enslavement city of Barony. Or if he would live to see his ninth birthday, which shouldn’t be too far off now. He wiped a hand through his curly black hair, felt the sweat there.

And he kept running. The hunters were coming closer.

Duncan was beneath the prison city now, with his pursuers behind him. He hunched down and rushed through the cramped maintenance tunnels, feeling like the spiny-backed rodent his mother had let him keep as a pet when he was five. Ducking lower, he scuttled along in tiny crawl spaces, smelly air shafts, and power-conduit tubes. The big adults with their padded armor could never follow him here. He scraped his elbow on the metal walls, worming his way into places no human should have been able to navigate.

The boy vowed not to let the Harkonnens catch him — at least not today. He hated their games, refused to be anyone’s pet or prey. Negotiating his way through the darkness by smell and instinct, he felt a stale breeze on his face and noted the direction of the air circulation.

His ears recorded echoes as he moved: the sounds of other prisoner children running, also desperate. They were supposedly his teammates, but Duncan had learned through previous failures not to rely on people whose feral skills might not match his own.

He swore he would get away from the hunters this time but knew he would never be entirely free of them. In this controlled environment the stalking teams would catch him again and run him through the paces, over and over. They called it “training.” Training for what, he didn’t know.

Duncan’s right side still ached from the last episode. As if he were a prized animal, his tormentors had put his injured body through a skin-knit machine and ace-cellular repair. His ribs still didn’t quite feel right, but they had been getting better each day. Until now.

With the locator beacon implanted in the meat of his shoulder, Duncan could never really escape from this slaveholding metropolis. Barony was a megalithic construction of plasteel and armor-plat, 950 stories tall and 45 kilometers long, with no ground-level openings whatsoever. He always found plenty of places to hide during the Harkonnen games, but never any freedom.

The Harkonnens had many prisoners, and they had sadistic methods of making them cooperate. If Duncan won in this training hunt, if he eluded the searchers long enough, the keepers had promised that he and his family could return to their former lives. All the children had been promised the same thing. Trainees needed a goal, a prize to fight for.

He ran by instinct through the secret passageways, trying to muffle his footfalls. Not far behind, he heard the blast and sizzle of a stun gun firing, a child’s high-pitched squeal of pain, and then teeth-chattering spasms as another one of the young boys was brought to ground.

If the searchers captured you, they hurt you — sometimes seriously and sometimes worse, depending upon the current supply of “trainees.” This was no child’s game of hide-and-seek. At least not for the victims.

Even at his age, Duncan already knew that life and death had a price. The Harkonnens didn’t care how many small candidates suffered during the course of their training. This was how the Harkonnens played. Duncan understood cruel amusements. He had seen others do such things before, especially the children with whom he shared confinement, as they pulled the wings off insects or set tiny rodent babies on fire. The Harkonnens and their troops were like adult children, only with greater resources, greater imaginations, greater malice.

Without making a sound, he found a narrow, rusted access ladder and scrambled up into the darkness, wasting no time on thought. Duncan had to do the unexpected, hide where they’d have trouble reaching him. The rungs, pitted and scarred with age, hurt his hands.

This section of ancient Barony still functioned; power conduits and suspensor tubes shot through the main structure like wormholes — straight, curved, hooking off at oblique angles. The place was one enormous obstacle course, where the Harkonnen troops could fire upon their prey without risking damage to more important structures.

Above him in a main corridor, he heard booted feet running, filtered voices through helmet communicators, then a shout. A nearby pinging sound signaled that the guards had homed in on his locator implant.

Hot white lasgun fire blasted the ceiling over his head, melting through metal plates. Duncan let go of the ladder and allowed himself to drop, freefall. One armed guard peeled up the hot-edged floor plate and pointed down at him. The others fired their lasguns again, severing the struts so that the ladder fell in tandem with the small boy.

He landed on the floor of a lower shaft, and the heavy ladder clattered on top of him. But Duncan didn’t cry out in pain. That would only bring the pursuers closer … though he had no real hope of eluding them for long because of the pulsing beacon in his shoulder. How could anyone but Harkonnens win this game?

He pushed himself to his feet and ran with a new, frantic desire for freedom. To his dismay, the small tunnel ahead opened into a wider passage. Wider was bad. The bigger men could follow him there.

He heard shouts behind, more running feet, gunfire, and then a gurgling scream. The pursuers were supposed to be using stun guns, but Duncan knew that this late in the day’s hunt, most everyone else would have been captured — and the stakes were higher. The hunters didn’t like to lose.

Duncan had to survive. He had to be the best. If he died, he couldn’t go back to see his mother again. But if he lived and defeated these bastards, then perhaps his family would get their freedom … or as much freedom as Harkonnen civil service workers could ever have on Giedi Prime.

Duncan had seen other trainees who had defeated the pursuers before, and those children had disappeared afterward. If he could believe the announcements, the winners and their captive families had been set free from the hellhole of Barony. Duncan had no proof of this, though, and had plenty of reasons to question what the Harkonnens told him. But he wanted to believe them, could not give up hope.

He didn’t understand why his parents had been thrown into this prison. What had minor government office workers done to deserve such punishment? He remembered only that one day life had been normal and relatively happy … and the next, they were all here, enslaved. Now young Duncan was forced nearly every day to run and fight for his life, and for the future of his family. He was getting better at it.

He remembered that last normal afternoon out on a manicured lawn planted high up in one of the Harko City terraces, one of the rare balcony parks the Harkonnens allowed their subjects to have. The gardens and hedges were carefully fertilized and tended, because plants did not fare well in the residue-impregnated soil of a planet that had been too long abused.

Duncan’s parents and other family members had been playing frivolous lawn games, tossing self-motivated balls at targets on the grass, while internal high-entropy devices made the balls bounce and ricochet randomly. The boy had noticed how different, how dry and structured the games of adults were compared with the reckless romping he did with his friends.

A young woman stood near him, watching the games. She had chocolate-colored hair, dusky skin, and high cheekbones, but her pinched expression and hard gaze detracted from what might have been remarkable beauty. He didn’t know who she was and understood only that her name was Janess Milam, and she worked with his parents somehow.

As Duncan had watched the adult yard game, listening to the laughter, he smiled at the woman and observed, “They’re practicing to be old men.” It became apparent, though, that Janess had no real interest in him or his opinion, for she’d given him a sharp verbal brush-off.

Under the hazy sunlight Duncan had continued to watch the game, but with increasing curiosity about the stranger. He sensed tension in her. Janess, who didn’t participate, frequently glanced over her shoulder, as if watching for something.

Moments later Harkonnen troops had come, grabbing Duncan’s parents, himself, even his uncle and two cousins. He understood intuitively that Janess had been the cause of it all, for whatever reason. He’d never seen her again, and he and his family had been in prison for half a year now … .

Behind him, an overhead trapdoor opened with a hiss. Two blue-uniformed pursuers dropped through, pointed at him, and laughed in triumph. Weaving from side to side, Duncan dashed ahead. A lasgun blast ricocheted off the wall plates, leaving a lightning-bolt scorch mark down the corridor.

Duncan smelled the ozone from the singed metal. If even one of those bolts hit him, he’d be dead. He hated the way the hunters snickered, as if they were merely toying with him.

A pair of pursuers charged out of a side passage only a meter in front of him, but Duncan moved too fast. They didn’t recognize him or react quickly enough. He struck one stout man in the knee and knocked him sideways before dashing between the two at a full run.

The stout man stumbled, then shouted as a laser bolt singed his armor, “Stop firing, you idiot! You’ll hit one of us!”

Duncan ran as he’d never run before, knowing his child’s legs couldn’t outrace adults conditioned for fighting. But he refused to give up. It wasn’t in his blood.

Ahead, where the corridor opened, he saw bright lights at an intersection of passageways. As he approached, he skidded to a stop only to find that the cross-passage was no tunnel at all, but a suspensor tube, a cylindrical shaft with a Holtzman field in the center. Levitating bullet-trains shot down the tube without resistance, traveling from one end of the enormous prison city to the other.

There were no doors, no open passageways. Duncan could run no farther. The men surged close behind him, extending their guns. If he surrendered, he wondered if they would still shoot him down. Probably, he thought, since I’ve gotten their adrenaline going.

The suspensor field shimmered in the center of the horizontal shaft in front of him. He vaguely knew what it would do. He had only one place left to go, and he wasn’t sure what would happen — but he knew he’d be punished, or most likely slaughtered, if the guards captured him.

So as they pressed closer, Duncan turned around and gazed into the suspensor field. Taking a deep breath for courage, he swung his short arms behind him and leaped out into the open shimmering tube.

His curly black hair rippled in the breeze as he plummeted. He shouted, the sound halfway between a despairing wail and a cry of glorious release. If he died here, at least he would be free!

Then the Holtzman field wrapped around him and caught him with a jolt. Feeling as if his stomach had just lurched to the center of his chest, Duncan found himself adrift in an invisible net. He floated without falling, hanging in the neutral center of the field. This force held the bullet-trains suspended as they careened through mammoth Barony. It could certainly hold him.

He saw the guards rushing to the edge of the platform, shouting at him in anger. One shook a fist. Two others pointed their guns.

Duncan flailed in the field, trying to swim — anything to move away.

With a shout of alarm, a guard knocked the other’s lasgun aside. Duncan had heard about the nightmarish effects of a lasgun beam crossing a Holtzman field: They produced an interacting destructive potential as deadly as forbidden atomics themselves.

So the guards fired their stun weapons instead.

Duncan writhed in the air. Though he could get no leverage, at least he made a moving target as he squirmed and spun. Stun blasts arced on either side of him, diverted into curving paths.

Despite the confining embrace of the Holtzman field, he felt the air pressure change around him, sensed the currents of movement. He rotated himself, bobbing in the air — until he saw the oncoming lights of a bullet-train.

And he was at the center of the field!

Duncan thrashed, desperate to move. He drifted toward the opposite edge of the levitation zone, away from the guards. They continued to fire, but the change in air pressure pushed their stun blasts even farther off the mark than before. He saw the uniformed men making adjustments.

Below him were other doorways, ramps, and platforms that led into the bowels of Barony. Maybe he could reach one … if he could just escape the confining field.

Another stun blast tore past and this time caught the edge of his back near his shoulder, numbing him, making the muscles and skin crawl with a sensation like a thousand stinging insects.

Duncan finally wrenched himself away from the field and dropped. Falling facedown, he saw the platform just in time. He reached out with his good arm and snagged a railing. The bullet-train screamed past, whistling as it displaced air … missing him by centimeters.

He hadn’t had time to pick up much momentum in his fall; even so, the jarring stop nearly ripped his other arm out of its socket. Duncan scrambled up and ran into a tunnel, but found only a tiny alcove with metawalls. He could see no exit. The hatch was sealed and locked. He pounded on it, but couldn’t go anywhere.

Then, the outer door clanged shut behind him, sealing him into a small armor-walled box. He was trapped. This time it was over.

Moments later, the guards unsealed the rear hatch. Their stares, as pointed as their weapons, held a mixture of anger and admiration. Duncan waited with resignation for them to gun him down.

Instead, the hunt captain smiled without humor and said, “Congratulations, boy. You made it.”

EXHAUSTED AND BACK in his cell, Duncan sat with his mother and father. They ate their daily meal of bland cereals, starch-cakes, and protein chips — nutritionally satisfying yet almost maliciously made with either foul flavors or no taste whatsoever. So far the boy hadn’t been told more by his captors, just that he’d “made it.” That had to mean freedom. He could only hope.

The family’s cell was filthy. Though his parents tried to keep it clean, they had no brooms, mops, or soap, and very little water, which couldn’t be wasted on mere sanitation.

During the months of confinement, Duncan had undergone vigorous and violent “training,” while his family sat fearfully offstage, doing nothing with their days. All of them had been given numbers, slave-cell addresses, and (with the exception of Duncan) nothing to do — no labor, no entertainment. They simply awaited any change in their sentence … and dreaded that such a change would someday come.

Now with excitement and pride Duncan told his mother of his adventures, how he had outwitted the pursuers, how he had been resourceful enough to defeat even the best Harkonnen trackers. None of the other children had succeeded on this day, but Duncan was certain he’d done what was necessary to buy freedom.

Any minute now they’d be released. He tried to imagine his family standing together again, free, outside, looking up into a clear, starlit night.

His father gazed proudly at the boy, but his mother found it difficult to believe that such a thing could possibly be true. She had good reason not to trust Harkonnen promises.

Before long, the cell lights flickered, and the opaque door field became transparent, then opened. A group of blue-uniformed prison guards stood beside the smiling hunt captain who had chased him. Duncan’s heart leaped. Are we going to be set free?

He didn’t like the hunt captain’s smile, though.

The uniformed men stepped aside in deference to a man with broad shoulders, thick lips, and big muscles. His face was sunburned and ruddy, as if he had spent a great deal of time far from gloomy Giedi Prime.

Duncan’s father sprang to his feet, then bowed clumsily. “M’Lord Rabban!”

Ignoring the parents, Rabban’s eyes sought out only the round-faced young trainee. “The captain of the hunt tells me you’re the best boy,” he said to Duncan. As he stepped into the cell, the guards hustled in behind him. Rabban grinned.

“You should have seen him in today’s exercise, m’Lord,” the hunt captain said. “Never had a more resourceful pup.”

Rabban nodded. “Number 11368, I’ve seen your records, watched holos of your hunts. How are your injuries? Not too bad? You’re young, so you’ll heal quickly.” His eyes hardened. “Lots more fun left in you. Let’s see how you do against me.”

He turned about. “Come with me for the hunt, boy. Now.”

“My name is Duncan Idaho,” the boy responded, in a defiant tone. “I’m not a number.” His voice was thin and high-pitched, but held a gruff bravery that shocked his parents. Surprised, the guards turned to stare at him. Duncan looked to his mother for support, as if hoping for some kind of challenge or reward. Instead, she tried to hush him.

Rabban coolly snatched a lasgun from the guard standing next to him. Without the slightest pause, he fired a lethal blast into the chest of Duncan’s father. The man slammed against the wall. Before his corpse could slide to the floor, Rabban shifted his weapon and incinerated the head of Duncan’s mother.

Duncan screamed. Both of his parents tumbled to the floor, lifeless mounds of blistering, burned flesh.

“Now you have no name, 11368,” Rabban said. “Come with me.”

The guards grabbed him, not even letting Duncan rush to his fallen parents. Not even giving him time to cry.

“These men will have to prepare you before we can begin the next round of fun. I need a good hunt for a change.”

The guards dragged Duncan, kicking and screaming, out of the noisome cell. He felt dead inside — except for an icy flame of hatred that blossomed in his chest and burned away all vestiges of his childhood.

The populace must think their ruler is a greater man than they, else why should they follow him? Above all a leader must be a showman, giving his people the bread and circuses they require.

-DUKE PAULUS ATREIDES

The weeks of preparation for his sojourn on Ix passed in a blur as Leto tried to drink up a year’s worth of memories and store them, fixing all the images of his ancestral home in his mind. He would miss Caladan’s moist salty air, its fog-shrouded mornings, and the musical afternoon rainstorms. How could a stark, colorless machine planet compare with this?

Of the many palaces and vacation villas on the water-rich planet, Castle Caladan, perched high on a cliff over the sea, was the true place where Leto belonged, the main seat of government. Someday, when he finally put on the ducal signet ring, he would be the twenty-sixth Duke Atreides to sit in the Castle.

His mother Helena spent much time fussing over him, seeing omens in many things, and quoting passages she considered important from the Orange Catholic Bible. She was distressed to be losing her son for a year, but would not countermand the Old Duke’s orders — not in anyone’s hearing, at least. Her expression was troubled, and Leto realized it especially alarmed her that Paulus had chosen to send him to Ix, of all places. “It’s a festering hotbed of suspect technology,” she said to him when her husband was gone, far out of earshot.

“Are you sure you aren’t just reacting because Ix is the main rival to House Richese, Mother?” he asked.

“I think not!” Her long, slender fingers paused as they laced up an elegant collar on his shirt. “House Richese relies on old, tried-and-true technology — established devices that fall safely within prescribed guidelines. No one questions Richesian adherence to the strictures of the Jihad.”

She looked at him, her dark eyes hard, then cracking with tears. She stroked his shoulder. From a recent spurt of growth, he was almost her height. “Leto, Leto, I don’t want you to lose your innocence there, or your soul,” she told him. “There’s too much at stake.”

Later, in the dining hall during a quiet family meal of fish stew and biscuits, Helena had once again begged the Old Duke to send him somewhere else. Paulus merely laughed at her concerns, though, until finally her quiet but firm refusal to back down drove him to rage. “Dominic is my friend — and by God our son couldn’t learn at the hands of a better man!”

Trying to concentrate on his own meal, yet disturbed over his mother’s protestations, Leto had nonetheless stood by his father. “I want to go there, Mother,” he said, gently resting his spoon beside his bowl, then repeated the line she always told him. “It’s for the best.”

During Leto’s upbringing, Paulus had made many choices with which Helena disagreed: putting the young man to work with villagers, taking him out to meet citizens face-to-face, letting him make friends with commoners, encouraging him to get his hands dirty. Leto could see the wisdom in this, since he would be Duke of these people someday, but Helena still objected on various grounds, often quoting passages from the Orange Catholic Bible to justify her opinions.

His mother was not a patient woman and not warm to her only child, though she maintained a perfect front during important meetings and public events. She always fussed about her own appearance, and often said she would never have any more children. Bringing up one son and running the ducal household already took up most of her valuable time, which could otherwise have been spent studying the Orange Catholic Bible and other religious texts. It was obvious that Helena had borne a son only out of duty to House Atreides, rather than out of any desire to nurture and raise a child.

No wonder the Old Duke sought out the companionship of other women who proved less prickly.

Sometimes at night, behind the massive doors of layered Elaccan teak, Leto heard the loud, reverberating arguments of his father and mother. Lady Helena could disagree all she wanted about sending their son to Ix, but Old Duke Paulus was House Atreides. His word was law, in the Castle and on Caladan, no matter how much his distraught wife tried to sway his opinion.

It’s for the best.

Leto knew that theirs had been an arranged marriage, a bargain struck among the Houses of the Landsraad to fulfill the requirements of the important families. It had been a desperate action on the part of crumbling Richese, and House Atreides could always hope the former grandeur of the innovative technological House might rise again. In the meantime, the Old Duke had received substantial concessions and rewards for taking in one of the many daughters of House Richese.

“A noble household has little room for the swooning and romanticism lesser peoples feel when hormones guide their actions,” his mother had once said to him, explaining the politics of marriage. He knew such a fate undoubtedly lay in store for him as well. His father even agreed with her in this regard, and was more adamant about it than she.

“What’s the first rule of the House?” the Old Duke would say, ad nauseam. And Leto would have to repeat it, word for word: “Never marry for love, or it will bring our House down.”

At fourteen, Leto had never been in love himself, though he had certainly felt the fires of lust. His father encouraged him to dally with the village girls, to toy with anyone he found attractive — but never to promise anything. Leto doubted, given his position as heir apparent to House Atreides, that he would ever have much chance to fall in love, especially not with the woman he would eventually take as his wife ….

One morning, a week before Leto was scheduled to leave, his father clapped a hand on his shoulder and took him along as he went about his rounds to meet the people, making a point to greet even the servants. The Duke led a small honor guard into the seaside town below the Castle, doing his own shopping, seeing his subjects and being seen. Paulus often went on such outings with his son — and Leto always considered these to be wonderful times.

Out under the pale blue sky, the Old Duke laughed easily, beaming with infectious good nature. The people smiled when the hearty man walked among them. Leto and his father strolled together along the bazaar, past the stalls of vegetables and fresh fish to inspect beautiful tapestries woven from beaten ponji fibers and fire-threads. There Paulus Atreides often bought baubles or keepsakes for his wife, especially after they had quarreled, though the Duke didn’t seem to understand Helena’s interests enough to select anything appropriate for her.

At an oyster stall the Old Duke suddenly paused and gazed up at the cloud-scudded sky, struck by what he considered a brilliant idea. He looked down at his son, and a broad grin split his bushy beard. “Ah, we need to send you off with an appropriate spectacle, lad. Make your leave-taking a memorable event for all of Caladan.”

Leto forced himself not to cringe. He had heard his father’s crazy ideas before, and knew the Old Duke would follow through, regardless of common sense. “What do you have in mind, sir? What do I need to do?”

“Nothing, nothing. I shall announce a celebration in honor of my heir and son.” He grabbed Leto’s hand and raised it up in the air, as if in a triumphant wave, then his voice boomed out, subduing the crowds. “We are going to have a bullfight, an old-fashioned extravaganza for the populace. It will be a day of celebration for Caladan, with holoprojections transmitted around the globe.”

“With Salusan bulls?” Leto asked, picturing in his mind the spine-backed beasts, their black heads studded with multiple horns, their eyes faceted. When he had been a younger boy, Leto had often gone into the stables to look at the monstrous animals. Stablemaster Yresk, one of his mother’s old retainers from Richese, tended the bulls for Paulus’s occasional spectacles.

“Naturally,” the Old Duke said. “And as usual, I’ll fight them myself.” He swept his arm out in a flourish, as if imagining a colorful cape there. “These old bones are agile enough to dodge around a lumbering monster like that. I’ll have Yresk prepare one — or would you like to pick the beast yourself, lad?”

“I thought you weren’t going to do that anymore,” Leto said. “It’s been almost a year since you …”

“Wherever did you get that idea?”

“Your advisors, sir. It’s too risky. Isn’t that why others have been fighting the bulls in your place?”

The old man laughed. “What a foolish notion! I’ve been out of the ring for only one reason: The bulls went downhill for a while, some genetic imbalance that made them unworthy. That’s changed, though, and new bulls are being brought in now, tougher than ever. Yresk says they’re ready to fight, and so am I.” He put his arm around Leto’s narrow shoulders. “What better occasion for a corrida de toros than the leave-taking of my son? You’ll attend this bullfight — your first. Your mother can’t say you’re too young anymore.”

Leto nodded, reluctantly. His father would never be swayed, once his mind was made up. At least Paulus had the training, and would wear a personal shield.

Using personal shields, Leto himself had fought human opponents, aware of a shield’s advantages and limitations. A shield could block projectile fire and fast-moving weapons of death, but any blade traveling below the threshold speed could pass through to the unprotected flesh beneath. A rampaging Salusan bull, with its sharp horns, might well move slowly enough to pierce even the most finely tuned shield.

He swallowed hard, wondering about the new, enhanced bulls. The old ones Stablemaster Yresk had shown him seemed dangerous enough — they’d killed three matadors that Leto could remember ….

Consumed by his fresh idea, Duke Paulus made the announcement at the bazaar, over the public address system implanted in booths and stalls. Upon hearing this, people in the marketplace cheered and their eyes glittered. They laughed, partly in anticipation of the performance itself — and also because of the declared day of rest and celebration.

Leto’s mother wouldn’t like this at all, he knew — Paulus in the fight and Leto in attendance — but Leto also understood that as soon as Helena began to object, the Old Duke would be more determined than ever.

THE BOWL OF the Plaza de Toros sprawled under the noonday sun. The stands spread out in an immense broad grid, so filled with people that in the farthest reaches they looked like tiny colored pixels. The Duke had never charged any fee to witness his performances; he was too proud of them, enjoyed showing off too much.

Enormous green-and-black banners flapped in the breeze, while fanfare blasted from speakers. Pillars emblazoned with Atreides hawk crests sparkled with emblems that had been newly polished and painted for the event. Thousands of floral bouquets harvested from the fields and lowlands had been placed about the bullring — an unsubtle hint that the Duke liked the people to strew the ground with blossoms each time he dispatched a bull.

Below, in the preparation chambers at ground level, Paulus girded up before the fight. Leto stood with him behind a barricade, listening to the impatient crowd. “Father, I’m uneasy about the risk you’re taking. You shouldn’t do this … especially not for me.”

The Old Duke brushed aside the comment. “Leto, lad, you must understand that governing people and winning their loyalty consists of more than just signing papers, collecting taxes, and attending Landsraad meetings.” He straightened his magenta cape, preened in front of a mirror.

“I depend on those people out there to produce the most that Caladan can provide. They must do so willingly, with hard work — and not just for their own profit, but for their honor and glory. If House Atreides was ever to go to war again, these people would shed their blood for me. They would lay down their lives under our banner.” He fiddled with his armor. “Tighten this for me?”

Leto grabbed the string fasteners of the back leather plate, tugged them, and cinched the knots tight. He kept silent but nodded to show he understood.

“As their Duke, I need to give them something back, prove that I’m worthy. And it’s not just for entertainment, but to instill in their minds that I’m a man of grand stature, of heroic proportions … someone blessed by God to rule them. I can’t do that unless I put myself before them. Leadership is not a passive process.”

Paulus checked his shield belt, then smiled through his beard. ” ‘No one is too old to learn,’ ” he quoted. “That’s a line from the Agamemnon play — just to show you that I’m not always sleeping when I appear to be.”

Thufir Hawat, the stern-faced weapons master, stood beside his Duke. As a loyal Mentat, Hawat would not speak out against his superior’s decisions; instead, he gave the best advice he could, whispering to Paulus the patterns he had seen in the movements of this new batch of mutated Salusan bulls.

Leto knew his mother would be up in the stands in the ducal spectator box. She would be dressed in her finery, wearing colorful gauzy veils and robes, playing her part, waving to the people. The night before, once again, there had been much heated discussion behind the bedroom doors; finally, Duke Paulus had simply silenced her with a barked command. Afterward he had gone to sleep, resting for the following day’s exertions.

The Duke put on his green-bordered cap, then took the equipment he would need to conquer the wild bull: his poniards and a long, feathered vara with nerve toxin on the lance tip. Thufir Hawat had suggested that the stablemaster slightly tranquilize the bull to deaden its rampaging impulses, but the Duke was a man who loved to face a challenge. No drug-dulled opponent for him!

Paulus clipped the activation pack onto his shield belt and powered up the field. It was only a half shield, used to guard his side; the Duke used a garishly brilliant cape called a muleta to cover his other side.

Paulus bowed first to his son, then his Mentat, and then the trainers waiting at the entrance to the arena. “Time for the show to begin.” Leto watched him swirl about and, like a bird on a mating display, strut out into the open Plaza de Toros. At his appearance, cheers thundered out with a roar far louder than any Salusan bull’s.

Leto stood behind the barricade, blinking into the glare of the open sun. He smiled as his father made a slow circuit of the arena, waving his cape, bowing, greeting his ecstatic people. Leto could sense the love and admiration they had for this brave man, and it warmed his heart.

Waiting there in the shadows, Leto vowed to do all he could to study his father’s triumphs, so that one day he would command such respect and devotion from the people. Triumphs … this would be another in a long list of them for his father, Leto assured himself. But he couldn’t help worrying. Too much could change in the flicker of a shield, the flash of a sharp horn, the stamp of a hoof.

Tones sounded, and an announcer’s voice gave introductory details of the impending corrida de toros. With a flourish of a sequined glove, Duke Paulus gestured toward the broad reinforced doors on the opposite side of the arena.

Moving to another archway for a better view, Leto reminded himself that this would be no sham performance. His father would be battling for his very life.

Stableboys had been tending the ferocious beasts, and Stablemaster Yresk had personally selected one for the day’s corrida. After inspecting the animal, the Old Duke had been satisfied, certain the crowd would be equally pleased by its ferocity. He looked forward to the fight.

Heavy gates opened with a grinding of suspensor hinges, and the Salusan bull charged out, shaking its massive, multiple-horned head in the dazzling light. Its faceted eyes glittered with feral rage. The scales on the mutated creature’s back reflected iridescent colors from its black hide.

Duke Paulus whistled and waved his cape. “Over here, stupid!” The spectators laughed.

Turning toward him, the bull lowered its head with a loud bubbling snort. Leto noticed that his father hadn’t yet switched on his protective shield. Instead, Paulus snapped and fluttered his colorful cape, trying to draw the wrath of the beast. The Salusan bull pawed and snorted on the sandy arena floor, then charged. Leto wanted to cry out, to warn his father. Had the man simply forgotten to switch on his protection? How could he possibly survive without a shield?

But the bull thundered past, and Paulus swept his cape gracefully to one side, letting the creature strike the diversionary target. Its hooked horns shredded the bottom of the fabric into ragged frays. While it was coming about, the Old Duke turned his back to the bull, exposed and overconfident. He bowed mockingly toward the crowd before he stood straight — then calmly, patiently, flicked on his personal shield.

The bull attacked again, and now the Duke used his poniard to toy with it, pricking through its thick, scaled hide before slashing a stinging yet minor wound along its flank. The creature’s faceted eyes saw multiple images of its colorfully garbed tormentor.

It charged again.

Moving too fast to penetrate the shield, Leto thought. But if the bull tires and slows, he could be even more dangerous ….

As the fight continued, Leto saw how his father was playing this up for all the spectacle he could muster, tantalizing the audience to amuse them. Old Paulus could have killed the Salusan bull at any time, yet he drew out the moment, savored it.

From the reactions of the spectators, Leto knew this would be an event talked about for years. The rice farmers and fishermen led such dreary, hardworking lives. But this celebration would fix a proud image of their Duke forever in their minds. Look what Old Paulus was doing, they would say, despite his age!

Eventually the bull became exhausted, its eyes reddened with blood, its snorts heavy and tired as it spilled its life fluid onto the powdery surface of the arena. Duke Paulus himself now chose to end the fight. He had dragged the sport along for nearly an hour. Though dripping with sweat, he somehow maintained his regal appearance and did not allow his manner to show weariness, or his fine clothes to be disheveled.

Up in the stands, Lady Helena continued to wave her pennants, smiling fixedly down at the spectacle.

By now, the Salusan bull was like a maddened machine, a rampaging monster that had few vulnerable spots in its black-scaled armor. As the beast ran at him again, its gait staggering, its gleaming horns pointed like spears, Duke Paulus feinted to the left, then returned as the bull surged past.

Then Paulus swung sideways, tossed his flapping cape to the dust, and gripped the shaft of his vara lance in both hands. He threw all of his strength into a powerful side thrust. Flawlessly performed, magnificently executed. The blade of the lance drove home through a chink in the Salusan bull’s armored hide, sliding through an intersection of bone and skull, skewering straight through to impale both of the creature’s separated brains — the most difficult, most sophisticated way to kill it.

The bull ground to a halt, wheezing, groaning — and suddenly dead. Its carcass slumped like a crashing spaceship onto the ground.

Planting his foot on the horned head of the bull, Duke Paulus heaved against his lance, pulled the bloodied blade out, and dropped it onto the ash-covered ground. Next he drew his sword and, raising it high, twirled it in a triumphant gesture.

As one, the people in the stands surged to their feet, screaming, howling, and cheering. They waved their banners, snatched bouquets from flowerpots, and tossed the blossoms onto the arena floor. They sang out Paulus’s name over and over.

Reveling in the adoration, the Atreides patriarch smiled and turned about, opening his coat so that the spectators could see his blood-spattered, sweat-drenched form. He was the hero now; he had no need to show off his finery.

After the throbbing cheers had died down, many minutes later, the Duke raised his sword again and struck downward, hacking repeatedly until he had severed the head of the bull. Finally, he plunged the bloody sword into the soft ground of the plaza and used both hands to grasp the horns of the bull and lift its head high.

“Leto!” he shouted over his shoulder, his voice booming into the acoustics of the Plaza de Toros. “Leto, my son, come out here!”

Leto, still in the shadows of the archway, hesitated a moment, then marched forth. He held his head high as he crossed the hoof-trampled dirt to stand at his father’s side. The crowd cheered with renewed enthusiasm.

Old Duke Paulus turned and presented his son with the bloodied head of his kill. “I give you Leto Atreides!” he announced to the audience while pointing at his son. “Your future Duke!”

The crowd continued to applaud and shout hurrahs. Leto grasped one of the bull’s horns; he and his father stood together holding the defeated beast’s head high, the trophy oozing thick red drops onto the sand.

As Leto heard the people echo his name, he felt deep stirrings within, and wondered for the first time if this was truly what it felt like to be a leader of men.

N’kee: Slow-acting poison that builds up in the adrenal glands; one of the most insidious toxins permitted under the accords of Guild Peace and the restrictions of the Great Convention. (See War of Assassins.)

-The Assassins’ Handbook

Mmmm, the Emperor will never die, you know, Shaddam.” A small man with oversize dark eyes and a weasel face, Hasimir Fenring, sat opposite the shield-ball console from his visitor, Crown Prince Shaddam. “At least not while you’re young enough to enjoy the throne.”

With a sharp, darting gaze Fenring watched the black shield-ball come to rest on a low-scoring point. Completing his turn at the game, the heir to the Imperium clearly wasn’t happy about the result. They had been close companions for most of their lives, and Fenring knew exactly how to distract him at the right moment.

From the game room of Fenring’s luxurious penthouse, Shaddam could see the lights of his father’s Imperial Palace glittering on the gentle hillside a kilometer away. With Fenring’s aid he had disposed of his older brother Fafnir years and years ago, and still the Golden Lion Throne seemed no closer.

Shaddam went over to the balcony and drew a long, deep breath.

He was a strong-featured man in his mid-thirties, with a firm chin and aquiline nose; his reddish hair was cut short and oiled and styled into a perfect helmet. In an odd way, he looked similar to the century-old busts of his father sculpted during the early decades of Elrood’s reign.

It was early evening, and two of Kaitain’s four moons hung low in the sky beyond the gigantic Imperial building. Illuminated gliders rode the calm skies of dusk, chased by flocks of songbirds. Sometimes, Shaddam just needed to get away from the sprawling Palace.

“A hundred and thirty-six years as Padishah Emperor,” Fenring continued in his nasal voice. “And old Elrood’s father ruled for more than a century himself. Think about it, hmm-m-m-ah? Your father took the throne when he was only nineteen, and you’re almost twice that age.” The narrow-faced man looked with huge eyes at his friend. “Doesn’t that bother you?”

Shaddam didn’t respond, stared at the skyline, knowing he should return to the game … but he and his friend had bigger games to play.

After his long years of close association Fenring knew that the Imperial heir could not deal with complex problems when other amusements distracted him. Very well, then, I will end this diversion.

“My turn,” he said. Fenring lifted a rod on his side of the shimmering shield globe and dipped it through the shield to engage a spinning interior disk. This in turn caused a black ball in the center of the globe to levitate into the air. With expert timing, Fenring withdrew the rod, and the ball dropped into the center of an oval receptacle bearing the highest mark.

“Damn you, Hasimir, another perfect game for you,” Shaddam said, returning from the balcony. “When I’m Emperor, though, will you be wise enough to lose to me?”

Fenring’s oversize eyes were alert and feral. A genetic-eunuch, incapable of fathering children because of his congenital deformities, he was still one of the deadliest fighters in the Imperium, so single-mindedly ferocious that he was more than a match for any Sardaukar.

“When you’re Emperor?” Fenring and the Crown Prince held so many deadly secrets between them that neither could imagine keeping knowledge from the other. “Shaddam, are you listening to what I’m telling you, hmmm?” He gave an annoyed sigh. “You’re thirty-four years old, sitting on your hands and waiting for your life to begin — your birthright. Elrood could last another three decades, at least. He’s a tough old Burseg, and the way he gulps spice beer, he might outlive both of us.”

“So why even talk about it?” Shaddam toyed with the shield-ball controls, clearly wanting to play another round. “I’ve got what I need here.”

“You’d rather play games until you’re an old man? I thought you had better things in store for you, hm-m-m-m-ah? The destiny of your Corrino blood.”

“Ah, yes. And if I don’t achieve my destiny,” Shaddam said in a bitter tone, “where does that leave you?”

“I’ll do fine, thank you.” Fenring’s mother had been trained as a Bene Gesserit before entering Imperial service as lady-in-waiting to Elrood’s fourth wife; she had raised him well, preparing him for great things.

But Hasimir Fenring was disgusted with his friend. At one time, in his late teens, Shaddam had been much more ambitious to claim the Imperial throne, even to the point of encouraging Fenring to poison the Emperor’s eldest son, Fafnir, who had been forty-six and eagerly awaiting the crown himself.

Now Fafnir was dead for fifteen years, and still the old vulture showed no signs of ever dying. At the very least, Elrood should abdicate with good grace. Meanwhile, Shaddam had lost his drive, and instead occupied his time enjoying the pleasures of his station. Being Crown Prince posed few hardships in life. But Fenring wanted much more — for his friend, and for himself.

Shaddam glowered at the other man. The Crown Prince’s mother, Habla, had cast him aside as an infant — her only child by Elrood — and let her lady-in-waiting, Chaola Fenring, serve as wet nurse. From boyhood, Shaddam and Hasimir had talked about what they would do when he ascended to the Golden Lion Throne. Padishah Emperor Shaddam IV.

But for Shaddam such conversations no longer held their childhood magic. Too many years of reality had settled in, too much waiting to no purpose. His grip on hope and his enthusiasm for the job had faded into apathy. Why not spend the days playing shield-ball?

“You’re a bastard,” Shaddam said. “Let’s start another game.”

Ignoring his friend’s suggestion, Fenring shut down the console. “Maybe so, but the Imperium has too many critical matters that require attention, and you know as well as I do that your father is bungling the job. If a company head ran his business the way your father runs the Empire, he’d be sacked. Think of the CHOAM scandal, for example, the soostone skimming operation.”

“Ah, yes. Can’t argue with you on that, Hasimir.” Shaddam heaved a deep sigh.

“Royal impersonators — a Duke, a Duchess … a whole damned family of fakes, right under your father’s nose. Who was watching? Now they’ve disappeared to a rogue planet somewhere beyond Imperial control. That should never have occurred, hmm-m-m-m? Just imagine the lost profits for Buzzell and the adjoining systems. What was Elrood thinking?”

Shaddam looked away. He didn’t like to bother with serious Imperial matters. They gave him headaches. Given his father’s apparent vigor, such details seemed distant and, by and large, irrelevant to him.

But still Fenring persisted. “The way it looks now, you won’t get a chance to do better. One hundred and fifty-five years, and still in remarkable health. Fondil III before him lived to be one hundred seventy-five. What’s the longest a Corrino Emperor has ever lived?”

Shaddam frowned and looked longingly at the gaming apparatus. “You know I don’t pay attention to things like that, even when the tutor gets angry with me.”

Fenring jabbed a finger at him. “Elrood will live to two hundred, mark my words. You have a serious problem, friend … unless you listen to me.” He raised his thin eyebrows.

“Ah, yes, more ideas from the Assassins’ Handbook, I suppose. Be careful with that information. You can get in a lot of trouble with it.”

“Timid people are destined for nothing better than timid jobs. You and I, Shaddam, have much more in our futures. Think of the possibilities, hypothetically of course. Besides, what’s wrong with poison? It works nicely and affects only the targeted person, as required by the Great Convention. No collateral deaths, no loss of revenue, no destruction of inheritable property. Nice and neat.”

“Poisons are for House-to-House assassinations, not for what you’re talking about.”

“You didn’t complain when I took care of Fafnir, hm-m-m-m-ah? He’d be in his sixties now, still waiting to taste the throne. Do you want to wait that long?”

“Stop,” Shaddam insisted, digging in his heels. “Don’t even imagine such a course. This isn’t right.”

“And denying you your birthright is? How effective an Emperor would you be if you couldn’t exercise power until you were old and senile — like your father? Look what’s happened on Arrakis. By the time we replaced Abulurd Harkonnen, the damage to spice production was already done. Abulurd had no idea how to crack the whip, so the workers didn’t respect him. Now the Baron cracks it too much, and so morale is way down, leading to rampant defections and sabotage. But you can’t really blame the Harkonnens. It all traces back to your father, the Padishah Emperor, and the bad decisions he’s made.” He continued more quietly. “You owe it to the stability of the Imperium.”

Shaddam glanced up at the ceiling, as if searching for spy-eyes or other listening devices, though he knew that Fenring kept his private penthouse impeccably shielded and regularly scanned. “What kind of poison are you considering? Hypothetically speaking, only?” Again he stared across the lights of the city at the Imperial Palace. The shimmering structure seemed like a legendary grail, an unattainable prize.

“Perhaps something slow-acting, hm-m-m-m? So Elrood will appear to be aging. No one will question what’s happening, since he’s so old already. Leave it to me. As our future Emperor, you shouldn’t concern yourself with the details of such matters — I have always been your expediter, remember?”

Shaddam chewed his lower lip. No one in the Imperium knew more about this man than he did. But could his friend ever turn on him? Possibly … though Fenring knew full well his best path to power lay through Shaddam. How to keep this ambitious friend under control, how to stay a step ahead of him — that was the challenge.

Emperor Elrood IX, aware of Hasimir Fenring’s deadly skills, had made use of him in a number of clandestine operations, all of which had been successful. Elrood even suspected Fenring’s role in Crown Prince Fafnir’s death, but accepted it as part of Imperial politics. Over the years, Fenring had murdered at least fifty men and a dozen women, some of whom had been his lovers, of either sex. He took a measure of pride in being a killer who could face the victim or strike behind his back, without compunction.

There were days Shaddam wished he and the pushy Fenring had never formed a boyhood relationship: Then he wouldn’t be hemmed in with difficult choices that he didn’t want to think about. Shaddam should have abandoned his crib-companion as soon as he could walk. It was risky to be around such an unrelenting assassin, and at times he felt tainted by the association.

Still, Fenring was his friend. There was an attraction between them, an undefinable something of which they’d spoken on occasion without fully understanding it. For the present Shaddam found it easier to accept the friendship — and for his own sake, he hoped it was friendship — instead of trying to sever it. That course of action could be extremely dangerous.

Close beside him, Shaddam heard a voice that broke his train of thought. “Your favorite brandy, my Prince.” Looking to one side, Shaddam saw Fenring offering him a large snifter of smoky-dark kirana brandy.

He accepted the snifter but stared at the liquid suspiciously, swirling it around. Was there another color to it, something not quite mixed in? He put his nose over the lip, inhaling the aroma as if he were a connoisseur — though he was actually trying to detect any foreign chemical. The brandy smelled normal. But then Fenring would have made sure of that. He was a subtle and devious man.

“I can drag out the snooper if you like, but you never need worry about poison from me, Shaddam,” Fenring said with a maddening smile. “Your father, however, is in an entirely different position.”

“Ah, yes. A slow-acting poison, you say? I suspect you already have a substance in mind. How long will my father live after you begin the process? If we do this at all, I mean.”

“Two years, maybe three. Long enough to make his decline appear natural.”

Shaddam raised his chin, trying to look regal. His skin was perfumed, his reddish hair pomaded and slicked back. “You understand, I might only entertain such a treasonous idea for the sake of the Imperium — to avoid continued calamities at the hands of my father.”

A crafty smile worked at the edges of the weasel face. “Of course.”

“Two or three years,” Shaddam mused. “Time for me to prepare for the great responsibilities of leadership, I suppose … while you attend to some of the more unpleasant tasks of empire.”

“Aren’t you going to drink your brandy, Shaddam?”

Shaddam met the hard gaze of the oversize eyes, and felt fear course along his spine. He was in too deep not to trust Fenring now. He drew another shaky breath and sipped the rich liqueur.

THREE DAYS LATER, Fenring slipped like a ghost through the shields and poisonsnoopers of the Palace and stood over the sleeping Emperor, listening to the smooth purr of his snores.

Not a care in the universe, this one.

No one else could have gotten into the most secure sleeping chamber of the ancient Emperor. But Fenring had his ways: a bribe here, a manipulated schedule there, a concubine made ill, a doorman distracted, the Chamberlain sent off on an urgent errand. He had done this many times before, practicing for the inevitable. Everyone in the Palace was used to Fenring slinking around, and they knew better than to ask too many questions. Now, according to his precise assessment which would have made even a Mentat proud — Fenring had three minutes. Four, if he was lucky.

Enough time to change the course of history.

With the same perfect timing he had demonstrated during the shield-ball game, as well as during his rehearsals on mannequins and two unfortunate serving women from the kitchen storehouses, Fenring froze in place and waited, gauging the breathing of his victim like a Laza tiger about to pounce. In one hand he cradled a long microhair needle between two slender fingers, while in the other hand he held a mist-tube. Old Elrood lay on his back, in the precisely correct position, looking like a mummy, his parchment skin stretched tight over his skull.

Guided by a certain hand, the mist-tube moved closer. Fenring counted to himself, waiting ….

In a space between Elrood’s breaths, Fenring squeezed a lever on the tube and sprayed a powerful anesthetic mist in the old man’s face.

There was no discernible change in Elrood, but Fenring knew the nerve deadener had taken effect, instantaneously. Now he made his thrust. A fiber-fine, self-guiding needle snaked up the old man’s nose, through sinus cavities, and into the frontal lobe of his brain. Fenring paused no more than an instant to dispense the chemical time bomb, then withdrew. A few seconds and it was done. Without any evidence or even any pain. Undetectable and multilayered, the internal machinery had been set in motion. The tiny catalyst would grow and do its damage, like the first rotten cell in an apple.

Each time the Emperor consumed his favorite beverage — spice beer — his own brain would release tiny doses of catalytic poison into his bloodstream. Thus an ordinary component of the old man’s diet would be chemically converted into chaumurky — poison administered in a drink. His mind would gradually rot away … a metamorphosis that would be most enjoyable to watch.

Fenring loved to be subtle.

Kwisatz Haderach: “Shortening of the Way.” This is the label applied by the Bene Gesserit to the unknown for which they sought a genetic solution: a male Bene Gesserit whose organic mental powers would bridge space and time.

-Terminology of the Imperium

It was another cold morning. The small blue-white sun Laoujin peeked over terra-cotta-tiled rooftops, dissipating the rain.

Reverend Mother Anirul Sadow Tonkin held the collar of her black robe shut against the moisture-laden wind that whipped up from the south and dampened her short bronze-brown hair. Her hurried footsteps carried her across the wet cobblestones, straight toward the arched doorway of the Bene Gesserit administration building.

She was late and ran, even though it was unseemly for a woman of her status to be seen rushing about like a red-faced schoolgirl. Mother Superior and her selected council would be waiting in the chapter chamber — for a meeting that could not begin without Anirul. Only she had the Sisterhood’s complete breeding projections and the full knowledge from Other Memory in her head.

The sprawling Mother School complex on Wallach IX was the base of Bene Gesserit operations throughout the Imperium. The historic first sanctuary of the Sisterhood had been erected here, dating from post-Butlerian Jihad days at the beginnings of the great schools of the human mind.

Some of the buildings in the training enclave were thousands of years old and echoed with ghosts and memories; others had been constructed in more recent centuries, with styles carefully designed to match the originals. The bucolic appearance of the Mother School complex fostered one of the primary precepts of the Sisterhood: minimal appearance, maximum content. Anirul’s own features were long and narrow, giving her a doelike face, but her large eyes had a depth of millennia in them.

The half-timbered stucco-and-wood structures, a combination of classical architectural styles, had moss-streaked sienna roof tiles and beveled fume-enhancement windows, designed to concentrate natural light and warmth from the tiny sun. The simple, narrow streets and alleys, in tandem with the quaintly archaic appearance of the instructional enclave, belied the subtle complexities and sheer weight of history taught inside. Haughty visitors would not be impressed, and the Sisterhood did not care a whit.

Throughout the Imperium the Bene Gesserit kept a low profile, but they were always to be found in vital areas, tilting the political equilibrium at crux points, watching, nudging, achieving their own aims. It was best when others underestimated them; the Sisters encountered fewer obstacles that way.

With all of its superficial deficiencies and difficulties, Wallach IX remained the perfect place to develop the psychic muscles required of Reverend Mothers. The planet’s intricate hive of structures and workers was too valuable, too steeped in history and tradition to be replaced. Yes, there were warmer climates on more hospitable worlds, but any acolyte who could not endure these conditions had no place among the agonies, harsh environments, and often painful decisions a true Bene Gesserit would face.

Keeping her quick breaths under control, Reverend Mother Anirul mounted the rain-slick steps of the administration building, then paused to look back across the plaza. She stood straight, tall, but she felt the weight of history and memory bearing down on her — and for a Bene Gesserit, there was little difference between the two. The voices of past generations echoed in Other Memory, a cacophony of wisdom and experience and opinions available to all Reverend Mothers, and particularly acute in Anirul.

On this spot the first Mother Superior, Raquella Berto-Anirul — after whom Anirul herself had taken her name — had delivered her legendary orations to the embryonic Sisterhood. Raquella had forged a new school from a group of desperate and pliable acolytes still stinging from centuries under the yoke of thinking machines.

Did you realize what you were beginning, so long ago? Anirul asked herself. How many plots, how many plans … so much you pinned upon a single, secret hope. Sometimes, the buried presence of Mother Superior Raquella actually answered her from within. But not today.

From her access to the multitude of memory-lives buried in her psyche, Anirul knew the precise stairstep on which her illustrious ancestor had stood, and could hear the exact, long-ago words. A chill coursed her spine, making her pause. Though still young in years and smooth-skinned, she contained an Oldness within her, as did all living Reverend Mothers — but in her, the voices spoke louder. It was reassuring to have the comforting crowd of memories there to provide advice in times of need. It prevented foolish mistakes.

But Anirul would be accused of distraction and foolish delay if she did not get to the meeting. Some said she was far too young to be the Kwisatz Mother, but Other Memory had revealed more to her than to any other Sister. She comprehended the precious, millennia-old genetic quest for the Kwisatz Haderach better than the other Reverend Mothers because the past lives had revealed everything to her, while keeping the details hidden from most Bene Gesserit.

The idea of a Kwisatz Haderach had been the Sisterhood’s dream for thousands upon thousands of years, conceived in dark underground meetings even before the victory of the Jihad. The Bene Gesserit had many breeding programs aimed at selecting and enhancing various characteristics of humanity, and no one understood them all. The genetic lines of the messiah project had been the most carefully guarded secret for much of the Imperium’s recorded history, so secret in fact that even the voices in Other Memory refused to divulge the details.

But to Anirul they had told the whole scheme, and she grasped the full implications. Somehow she had been chosen as this generation’s Kwisatz Mother, the guardian of the Bene Gesserit’s most important goal.

The notoriety and the power, however, did not excuse her for being late to the council meetings. Many still saw her as young and impetuous.

Swinging open a heavy door covered with hieroglyphics in a language only Reverend Mothers remembered, she passed through into a foyer where ten other Sisters, all dressed in hooded black aba robes like her own, stood in a cluster. A low murmur of conversation filled the air inside the nondescript building. Treasures can be hidden within a drab and unpretentious shell, said one popular Bene Gesserit dictum.

The other Sisters moved aside for Anirul as she glided through their midst like a swimmer parting water. Though her body was tall and large-boned, Anirul succeeded in projecting a grace in her movements … but it did not come easily to her. Whispering, they fell in behind her as she entered the octagonal chapter chamber, the meeting place of the ancient order’s leadership. Her footsteps creaked across the worn planks of the floor, and the door groaned shut, locking behind them.

White Elacca-wood benches rimmed the timeworn room; Mother Superior Harishka sat on one, like a common acolyte. Of mixed parentage, showing bloodlines from distinctive branches of humanity, the Mother Superior was old and bent, with dark almond eyes peering out from beneath her black hood.

The Sisters moved to the sides of the chamber and seated themselves on empty white benches, as Mother Superior had. Presently the rustling of robes ceased, and no one spoke. From somewhere, the old building creaked. Outside, drizzle fell in silent curtains, muffling the struggling blue-white sunlight.

“Anirul, I await your report,” Mother Superior finally said with just a glimmer of annoyance at her tardiness. Harishka commanded the entire Sisterhood, but Anirul was vested with full authority to make command decisions on the project. “You have promised us your genetic summary and projections.”

Anirul took her position in the center of the chamber. Overhead, a vaulted ceiling spread like a flower to the tops of Gothic stained-glasplaz windows; within each window section, panes contained the family crests of great historical leaders of the order.

Fighting back nervousness, Anirul took a deep breath and suppressed the multitude of voices within her. Many of the Bene Gesserit Order would not like what she had to say. Though the voices of past lives might offer her comfort and support, she was about to give her own assessment, and had to stand by it. She also had to be completely honest; Mother Superior was adept at sensing the slightest deceit. Mother Superior noticed everything, and now her almond eyes flashed with expectation, as well as impatience.

Anirul cleared her throat and covered her mouth as she began her report in a directed-whisper that carried to the ears of everyone in the sealed room, but nowhere else. Nothing escaped into the ambient air for any concealed listening device. They all knew of her work, but she gave them the details anyway, adding to the import of her announcement.

“Thousands of years of careful breeding have brought us closer than ever before to our goal. For ninety generations, a plan begun even before the Butlerian warriors led us to freedom from the thinking machines, we of the Sisterhood have planned to create our own weapon. Our own superbeing who will bridge space and time with his mind.”

Her words droned on. The other Bene Gesserit did not stir, though they appeared bored with her standard summary of the project. Very well, I will give them something to awaken their hopes.

“With the dance of DNA, I have determined we are, at most, only three generations removed from success.” Her pulse accelerated. “Soon, we will have our Kwisatz Haderach.”

“Take care when you speak of this secret of all secrets,” Mother Superior warned, but her delight could not be covered by her sternness.

“I take care with every aspect of our program, Mother Superior,” Anirul countered, in too haughty a tone. She caught herself, kept her narrow face expressionless, but others had already seen the slip. There would be more murmurings about her brashness, her youth and unsuitability for such an important role. “That is why I am so certain of what we must do. The gene samples have been analyzed, all possibilities projected. The path is plainer now than ever before.”

So many Sisters before her had worked toward this incredible goal, and now it was her duty to administer the final breeding decisions and supervise the birth and upbringing of a new girl-child, who would in all probability be the grandmother of the Kwisatz Haderach himself.

“I have the names of the final genetic pairings,” Anirul announced. “Our mating index indicates that these will produce the highest likelihood of success.” She paused, savoring the absolute attention the others paid to her.

To any outsider, Anirul appeared to be no more than another Reverend Mother, indistinguishable from the rest of her Sisters and not terribly talented or gifted in any way. The Bene Gesserit were good at keeping secrets, and the Kwisatz Mother was one of the greatest of these.

“We need a particular bloodline from an ancient House. This will produce a daughter — our equivalent to the mother of the Virgin Mary — who must then take the mate we choose. These two will be the grandparents, and their offspring, also a daughter, will be trained here on Wallach IX. This Bene Gesserit woman will become the mother of our Kwisatz Haderach, a boy-child to be raised by us, under our complete control.” Anirul let out her last words with a slow sigh, and considered the immensity of what she had said.

Only a few decades more, and the astounding birth would occur potentially within Anirul’s lifetime. Thinking back through the tunnels of Other Memory, grasping the canvas of time that had spread out in preparation for this event, Anirul realized how lucky she was to be alive now, in this period of time. Her predecessors stood in a spectral line inside her mind, eagerly watching and waiting.

When the unparalleled breeding program finally came to fruition, the Bene Gesserit would no longer need to remain a subtle, manipulative presence in the politics of the Imperium. Everything would belong to them, and the archaic galactic feudal system would fall.

Though no one spoke, Anirul detected concern in the hawkish eyes of her Sisters, bordering on a doubt that none of them dared express. “And what is this bloodline?” Mother Superior asked.

Anirul did not hesitate, drew herself taller. “We must have a daughter by … the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen.”

She read the surprise on their faces. Harkonnens? They had been part of the overall breeding programs, of course — all Landsraad Houses were — but no one would have imagined the Bene Gesserit savior springing from the seed of such a man. What did such a lineage bode for the Kwisatz Haderach? Given a Harkonnen-bred superman, could the Bene Gesserit hope to control him?

All of these questions-and many more-passed between the Sisters, without the utterance of a sound or even a directed-whisper. Anirul saw it plainly.

“As all of you know,” she said at last, “the Baron Harkonnen is a dangerously cunning and manipulative man. Though we can be certain he is generally aware of the numerous Bene Gesserit breeding programs, our plan cannot be revealed. Still, we must find a way for him to impregnate a chosen Sister without telling him why.”

Mother Superior pursed her wrinkled lips. “The Baron’s sexual appetites run exclusively to men and boys. He will have no interest in accepting a female lover — especially not one thrust upon him by us.”

Anirul nodded soberly. “Our seductive abilities will be taxed as never before.” She gave a challenging look to the powerful Reverend Mothers in attendance. “But I have no doubt that with all the resources of the Bene Gesserit, we will find a way to coerce him.

In response to the strict Butlerian taboo against machines that perform mental functions, a number of schools developed enhanced human beings to subsume most of the functions formerly performed by computers. Some of the key schools arising out of the Jihad include the Bene Gesserit, with their intense mental and physical training, the Spacing Guild, with the prescient ability to find a safe path through foldspace, and the Mentats, whose computerlike minds are capable of extraordinary acts of reasoning.

-Ikbhan’s Treatise on the Mind, Volume I

As he made ready to depart from home for an entire year, Leto tried to hold on to his self-confidence. He knew this was an important step for him, and understood why his father had chosen Ix as a place to study. But he would still miss Caladan terribly.

It was not the young ducal heir’s first trip to a different star system. Leto and his father had explored the multiple worlds of Gaar and the fog-bound planet of Pilargo, where Caladanian primitives were thought to have originated. Those had been mere outings, exciting sight-seeing trips.

However, the prospect of going away for so long, and all alone, made him worry more than he’d expected. He didn’t dare show it, though. I will be Duke someday.

Dressed in Atreides finery, Leto stood with the Old Duke at the Cala Municipal Spaceport, awaiting a shuttle that would carry him to a Guild Heighliner. Two suspensor-borne suitcases hovered near his feet.

His mother had suggested he take retainers, cargo cases full of garments and diversions, and supplies of good Caladanian food; Duke Paulus, on the other hand, had laughed and explained how when he was Leto’s age he’d survived for months on the battlefield with only the few possessions in a pack on his back. He did, however, insist that Leto take one of Caladan’s traditional fishing knives in a sheath at his back.

Siding with his father, as usual, Leto chose to be minimal in his packing. Besides, Ix was a rich industrial planet, not a wilderness; he wouldn’t suffer many privations during his schooling.

When anyone could see her, the Lady Helena bore the decision with stoic good grace. Now she stood beside the departure group dressed in fine robes and a shimmering cape. Though he knew his mother genuinely feared for his well-being, Lady Atreides would never show anything but the most perfect public face.

Adjusting the oil lenses of his father’s field glasses, Leto peered away from the shifting pastels of the dawn horizon, up into the vestiges of night. A glinting speck moved against the stars. When he touched the zoompad, the speck grew until Leto recognized a Heighliner in low orbit surrounded by the shimmering blur of a shield defensive system.

“Do you see it?” Paulus asked, standing at his son’s shoulder.

“It’s there — with full shields activated. Are they worried about military action? Here?” With such severe political and economic consequences, Leto couldn’t imagine anyone attacking a Guild craft. Although the Spacing Guild had no military power of its own, it could — through withdrawal of transportation services — cripple any solar system. And with elaborate surveillance mechanisms, the Guild could trace and identify rogue attackers and send messages off to the Emperor, who in turn would dispatch Imperial Sardaukar according to mutual treaty.

“Never underestimate the tactics of desperation, lad,” Paulus said, but did not elaborate further. From time to time he had told his son stories of trumped-up charges against particular people, situations fabricated in the past in order to wipe out enemies of the Emperor or the Guild.

Leto thought that of all the things he was leaving behind, he would miss his father’s insights most, the Old Duke’s brief and perceptive lessons tossed off the cuff. “The Empire functions beyond mere laws,” Paulus continued. “An equally strong foundation is the network of alliances, favors, and religious propaganda. Beliefs are more powerful than facts.”

Leto stared through the thick sky at the magnificent, distant ship and frowned. It was often difficult to separate truth from fiction ….

He watched a speck of orange appear below the immense orbiting craft. The color became a streak of descending light that resolved into the shape of a shuttle, which soon hovered over the Cala landing field. Four white gulls whipped around, soaring in the stirred air currents from the shuttle’s descent, then flew shrieking out to the sea cliffs.

Around the shuttle, a shield shimmered and flickered off. All along the spaceport fences, pennants snapped in a salty morning breeze. The shuttle, a white bullet-shaped craft, floated across the field toward the embarkation platform on which Leto and his parents stood separate from the honor guard. A crowd of onlookers and well-wishers waved and shouted from the outskirts of the landing field. The craft and platform connected, and a door slid open in the fuselage.

His mother came forward to say her goodbyes, embracing him without words; she had threatened simply to watch from one of the towers in Castle Caladan, but Paulus had convinced her otherwise. The crowd cheered and shouted their farewells; Duke Paulus and Lady Helena stood hand in hand and waved back at them.

“Remember what I told you, son,” Paulus said, referring to intense counseling he had given the boy in recent days. “Learn from Ix, learn from everything.”

“But use your heart to know what is true,” his mother added.

“Always,” he said. “I’ll miss you both. I’ll make you proud of me.”

“We already are, lad.” The older man stepped back to the formal guard escort. He exchanged Atreides salutes with his son — an open right hand beside the temple — and all the soldiers did the same. Then Paulus bounded forward to give Leto a hearty hug ….

Moments later the robo-piloted shuttle rose away from the black cliffs, churning seas, and cloud-wreathed croplands of Caladan. Inside, Leto sat in a plush chair in the observation lounge, peering out a windowport. As the craft reached the indigo darkness of space, he saw the metallic island of the Guild Heighliner with sunlight glinting off its surface.

At their approach, a yawning black hole opened in the underside. Leto took a deep breath, and the immense ship swallowed the shuttle. He envisioned what he had once seen in a filmbook about Arrakis, a sandworm inhaling a spice harvester. The metaphor unsettled him.

The shuttle slid smoothly into the docking port of a Wayku passenger ship that hung in its designated berth inside the cavernous hold of the Heighliner. Leto boarded, his suitcases floating along behind, and made up his mind to do as his father had instructed.

Learn from everything. His determined curiosity pushing his intimidation aside, Leto climbed a stairway to the main passenger lounge, where he found a seat on a bench by another window. Two soostone merchants sat nearby, their rapid conversation sprinkled with jargon. Old Paulus had wanted Leto to learn how to fend for himself. So, to enhance the experience, Leto was traveling as an ordinary passenger, with no special amenities, no pomp or entourage, no indication that he was the son of a Duke.

His mother had been horrified.

Aboard the ship, Wayku vendors wearing dark glasses and earclamp headsets moved from passenger to passenger, selling confections and perfumed beverages at exorbitant prices. Leto waved off a persistent vendor, though the spicy-salty broths and broiled meat sticks smelled delicious. He could hear an overflow of music from the man’s headset, saw his head, shoulders, and feet moving to the beat of music piped into his skull. The Wayku did their jobs, tended to the customers, but managed to live in their own sensory cacophony; they preferred the universe within to any spectacle they might experience outside.

This mass-transit craft, operated by the Wayku under Guild contract, carried passengers from system to system. A disgraced House Major whose planets had all been destroyed in the Third Coalsack War, the Wayku were gypsies now and lived as nomads aboard Guild Heighliners. Although ancient surrender terms prevented members of their race from setting foot on any planet in the Imperium, the Guild had, for undisclosed reasons, granted them sanctuary. For generations, the Wayku had showed no interest in petitioning the Emperor for amnesty or a revocation of the severe restrictions placed upon them.

Looking through the window of the lounge, Leto saw the dimly illuminated cargo hold of the Heighliner, a vacuum chamber so large that this passenger ship was, by comparison, even smaller than a grain of pundi rice in the belly of a fish. He could see the ceiling high overhead, but not the walls kilometers away. Other ships, large and small, were arrayed in the hold: frigates, cargo haulers, shuttles, lighters, and armored monitors. Strapped-together stacks of “dump boxes” — unpiloted cargo containers designed to dump material directly from low orbit onto a planet’s surface — hung next to the main exterior hatches.

Guild regulations, etched on ridulian crystals mounted to the main wall of every room, prohibited passengers from leaving the isolation of their ship. Through adjacent windows Leto snatched glimpses of passengers inside other craft — a potpourri of races bound for all parts of the Imperium.

The Wayku deckhands finished their first round of service, and the passengers waited. The trip through foldspace took no more than an hour, but preparations for departure sometimes required days.

Finally, with no announcement whatsoever, Leto detected a faint, smooth purring that seemed to come from far away. He could feel it in every muscle of his body. “We must be heading out,” he said, turning to the soostone merchants, who seemed unimpressed. From the quick diverting of their eyes and the way they studiously ignored him, Leto thought they must consider him an uncultured yokel.

In an isolated chamber high atop the craft, a Guild Navigator swimming in a tank of gas saturated with melange began to encompass space with his mind. He envisioned and threaded a safe passage through the fabric of foldspace, transporting the Heighliner and its contents across a vast distance.

At dinner the previous evening in the Castle’s dining hall, Leto’s mother had wondered aloud if Navigators might somehow violate the machine-human interaction prohibited by the Butlerian Jihad. Knowing Leto would soon be off to Ix and at risk of moral tainting, she innocently made the suggestion as she nibbled on a mouthful of lemon-broiled fish. She often used a most reasonable tone when she uttered her provocative statements. The effect was like dropping a boulder into a pool of still water.

“Oh, nonsense, Helena!” Paulus said, wiping his beard with a napkin. “Where would we be without Navigators?”

“Just because you have become accustomed to a thing, does not make it right, Paulus. The Orange Catholic Bible says nothing about morality being defined by personal convenience.”

Before his father could argue the point, Leto interrupted. “I thought that Navigators just saw the way, a safe way. Holtzman generators actually operate the spacecraft.” He decided to add a quote he remembered from the Bible. ” ‘The highest master in the material world is the human mind, and the beasts of the field and the machines of the city must be forever subordinate.’ “

“Of course, dear,” his mother said, and dropped the subject.

Now, he didn’t notice any change of sensation upon passing into foldspace. Before Leto knew it, the Heighliner arrived in another solar system — Harmonthep, according to the transport schedule.

Once there, Leto had to wait for five more hours as cargo ships and shuttles went in and out of the Heighliner hold, as well as transports and even a superfrigate. Then the Guild ship moved off again, folding space to a new solar system — Kirana Aleph, this time — where the cycle occurred once more.

Leto took a nap in the sleeping compartments, then emerged to buy two of the sizzling meat sticks and a potent cup of stee. Helena might wish he’d been escorted by Atreides house guards, but Paulus had insisted that there was only one way for his son to learn to take care of himself. Leto had an agenda and instructions, and he vowed to do just that.

Finally, on the third stop, a Wayku deckhand ordered Leto to descend three decks and board an automatic shuttle. She was a stern-looking woman in a gaudy uniform and did not seem to be in the mood for conversation. Her headset thrummed with an undercurrent of melody.

“Is this Ix?” Leto inquired, reaching for his suspensor-buoyed suitcases. They followed him as he moved.

“We are in the Alkaurops system,” she said. Her eyes couldn’t be seen because of her dark glasses. “Ix is the ninth planet. You get off here. We’ve already jettisoned the dump boxes.”

Leto did as he was instructed, making his way toward the indicated shuttle, though he wished he had been given more warning and more information. He didn’t know exactly what he was supposed to do once he arrived on the high-tech industrial world, but he assumed Earl Vernius would greet him or at least send some sort of welcoming party.

He took a deep breath and tried not to let his anxiety grow too intense.

The robo-piloted shuttle plummeted out of the Heighliner hold toward the surface of a planet traced with mountains, clouds, and ice. The automated shuttle functioned according to a limited set of instructions, and conversation wasn’t in its repertoire of skills. Leto was the only passenger aboard, apparently the only traveler bound for Ix. The machine planet welcomed few visitors.

As he looked out the porthole, though, Leto had a sinking feeling that something had gone wrong. The Wayku shuttle approached a high mountain plateau with Alpine forests in sheltered valleys. He saw no buildings, none of the grand structures or manufacturing facilities he had expected. No smoke in the air, no cities, no sign of civilization at all.

This couldn’t possibly be the heavily industrialized world of Ix. He looked around, tensing up, ready to defend himself. Had he been betrayed? Lured here and stranded?

The shuttle came to a stop on a stark plain strewn with flecked granite boulders and small clumps of white flowers. “This is where you get out, sir,” the robo-pilot announced in a synthesized voice.

“Where are we?” Leto demanded. “I’m supposed to be going to the capital of Ix.”

“This is where you get out, sir.”

“Answer me!” His father would have used a booming voice to wrench a reply from this stupid machine. “This can’t be the capital city of Ix. Just look around you!”

“You have ten seconds to exit the craft, sir, or you will be forcibly ejected. The Guild operates on a tight schedule. The Heighliner is already prepared to depart for the next system.”

Cursing under his breath, Leto nudged his drifting luggage and stepped onto the rubble-strewn surface. Within seconds the white, bullet-shaped craft rose and dwindled to a pinpoint of orange light in the sky, before it disappeared from view entirely.

His pair of suitcases hovered beside him, and a clean-smelling wind ruffled his hair. Leto was alone. “Hello?” he shouted, but no one answered.

He shivered as he stared at rugged mountain ridges dusted with snow and glacial ice. Caladan, mostly an ocean world, had very few mountains approaching this grandeur. But he had not come to see mountains. “Hello! I’m Leto Atreides, from Caladan!” he called out. “Is anyone here?”

A sick feeling clenched his chest. He was far from home on an unknown world, with no way to find out where in the vast universe he was. Is this even Ix? The brisk wind was cold and sharp, but the open plain remained eerily quiet. Oppressive silence hung in the thin air.

He had spent his life hearing the lullaby of the ocean, the songs of gulls, and the bustle of villagers. Here he saw nothing, no welcoming party, no signs of habitation. The world looked untouched … empty.

If I’ve been stranded here, will anyone be able to find me?

Thickening clouds concealed the sky, though he saw a distant blue sun through a break in the cover. He shivered again and wondered what he should do, where he should go. If he was going to be a Duke, he had to learn to make decisions.

A drizzle of sleet began to fall.

The paintbrush of history has depicted Abulurd Harkonnen in a most unfavorable light. Judged by the standards of his older half brother, Baron Vladimir, and his own children Glossu Rabban and Feyd-Rautha Rabban, Abulurd was a different sort of man entirely. We must, however, assess the frequent descriptions of his weakness, incompetence, and foolhardy decisions in light of the ultimate failure of House Harkonnen. Though exiled to Lankiveil and stripped of any real power, Abulurd secured a victory unmatched by anyone else in his extended family: He learned how to be happy with his life.

-Landsraad Encyclopedia of Great Houses, post-Jihad edition

Though the Harkonnens were formidable foes in the arena of manipulations, subterfuge, and disinformation, the Bene Gesserit were undisputed masters.

In order to achieve the next step in their grand breeding scheme, a plan that had been in place since ten generations before the downfall of thinking machines, the Sisterhood needed to find a fulcrum that would make the Baron bend to their will.

It didn’t take them long to figure out the weak point in House Harkonnen.

Presenting herself as a new domestic servant on cold and blustery Lankiveil, the young Bene Gesserit Sister Margot Rashino-Zea infiltrated the household of Abulurd Harkonnen, the Baron’s younger half brother. Beautiful Margot, hand-selected by Kwisatz Mother Anirul, had been trained in the ways of spying and ferreting out information, of connecting mismatched tidbits of data to construct a broader picture.

She also knew sixty-three ways to kill a human being using nothing but her fingers. The Sisterhood worked hard to maintain their appearance as brooding intellectuals, but they also had their commandos. Sister Margot was counted among their best.

The lodge house of Abulurd Harkonnen sat on a rugged spit of land that extended into deep water bordered by narrow Tula Fjord. A fishing village surrounded the wooden mansion; farms pushed inland into the thin and rocky valleys, but most of the planet’s food supply came from the frigid sea. Lankiveil’s economy was based on the rich whalefur industry.

Abulurd lived at the base of dripping mountains, whose tops were rarely seen through the looming steel-gray clouds and lingering mist. The main house and surrounding village was the closest thing to a capital center this frontier world had to offer.

Since strangers were rare, Margot took precautions not to be noticed. She stood taller than many of the stocky and muscular natives, so she disguised herself with a slight stoop. She dyed her honey-blonde hair dark and cut it thick and shaggy, a style favored by many of the villagers. With chemicals, she treated her smooth, pale skin to make it weathered and lend it a darker cast. She blended in, and everyone accepted her without a second glance. For a woman trained by the Sisterhood, maintaining the sham was easy.

Margot was only one of numerous Bene Gesserit spies dispatched to the widespread Harkonnen holdings, where they would surreptitiously scour any and all business records. The Baron had no reason to suspect such scrutiny at this time — he’d had very few dealings with the Sisterhood — but if any of their female spies were discovered, the lean and vicious man would have no compunctions against torturing them for explanations. Luckily, Margot thought, any well-trained Bene Gesserit could stop her own heart long before inflicted pain could force her to reveal secrets.

Traditionally, the Harkonnens were adept at manipulation and concealment, but Margot knew she would find the necessary incriminating evidence. Though other Sisters had argued for digging closer to the heart of Harkonnen operations, Margot had concluded that Abulurd would make the perfect patsy. The younger Harkonnen demibrother had, after all, run the spice operations on Arrakis for seven years: He must have some information. If anything needed to be hidden, the Baron would likely do it here, unexpectedly, right under Abulurd’s nose.

Once the Bene Gesserit uncovered a few of the Harkonnens’ mistakes and held proof of the Baron’s financial indiscretions, they would have the blackmail weapon so desperately needed to advance their breeding program.

Dressed as an indigenous villager in dyed wools and furs, Margot slipped into the rustic great house at the docks. The structure stood tall and was composed of massive wood, stained dark. Fireplaces in every room filled the air with resinous smoke, and glowglobes tuned to yellow-orange did their best to approximate sunlight.

Margot cleaned, she dusted, she helped with the cooking … she searched for financial records. Two days in a row, the Baron’s amiable half brother greeted her, smiling, welcoming; he noticed nothing whatsoever amiss. A trusting sort, he seemed unconcerned for his own safety, and allowed locals and strangers to wander into the main rooms and guest quarters of his mansion, even close to his person. He had gray-blond hair, long to his shoulders, and a seamed, ruddy face that was disarmed by a perpetual half smile. It was said that he’d been a favorite of his father Dmitri, who had encouraged Abulurd to take over the Harkonnen holdings … but Abulurd had made so many bad choices, so many decisions based on people rather than business necessities. It had been his downfall.

Wearing warm and prickly Lankiveil clothing, Margot kept her gray-green eyes downcast and concealed behind lenses that made them appear brown. She could have made herself into a golden-haired beauty and had, in fact, considered seducing Abulurd and simply taking the information she needed, but she had decided against that plan. The man seemed unshakably devoted to his squat and wholesome native wife, Emmi Rabban, the mother of Glossu Rabban. He had fallen in love with her long ago on Lankiveil, married her to the dismay of his father, and carried her with him from world to world during his chaotic career. Abulurd seemed impervious to any feminine temptations but hers.

Instead, Margot used simple charm and quiet innocence to gain access to written financial records, dusty ledgers, and inventory rooms. No one questioned her.

In time, taking advantage of every surreptitious opportunity, she found what she needed. Using flash-memorization techniques learned on Wallach IX, Margot scanned through stacks of etched ridulian crystals and absorbed columns of numbers, cargo manifests, lists of equipment decommissioned or placed into service, suspicious losses, storm damage.

In nearby rooms, groups of women skinned and gutted fish, chopped herbs, peeled roots and sour fruits for steaming cauldrons of fish stew, which Abulurd and his wife served for the entire household. They insisted on eating the same meals, at the same tables, as all of their workers. Margot finished her surreptitious scanning well before the meal call sounded throughout the rooms of the great house ….

Later, in private while listening to a blustery storm outside, she reviewed the data in her mind and studied spice-production records from Abulurd’s tenure on Arrakis and the Baron’s current filings with CHOAM, along with the amounts of melange spirited away from Arrakis by various smuggler organizations.

Normally, she would have set aside the data until entire teams of Sisters had a chance to analyze it. But Margot wanted to discover the answer herself. Pretending to sleep, she dived into the problem behind her eyelids with abandon, falling into a deep trance.

The numbers had been masterfully manipulated, but after Margot stripped away the masks and thin screens, she found her answer. A Bene Gesserit could see it, but she doubted even the Emperor’s financial advisors or CHOAM accountants would detect the deception.

Unless it was pointed out to them.

Her discovery suggested serious underreporting of spice production to CHOAM and the Emperor. Either the Harkonnens were selling melange illicitly — doubtful, because that could easily be tracked — or accumulating secret stockpiles of their own.

Interesting, Margot thought, raising her eyebrows. She opened her eyes, went over to a reinforced window casement, and stared out at the liquid metal seas, the choppy waves trapped within the bottleneck fjords, the murky black clouds hovering above the rugged bulwarks of rock. In the bleak distance, fur-whales set up an eerie, humming song.

The following day she booked passage on the next Guild Heighliner. Then, shucking her disguise, she rode up in a cargo hauler filled with processed whalefur. She doubted that anyone on Lankiveil had noticed her arrival or her departure.

Four things cannot be hidden — Love, smoke, a pillar of fire, and a man striding across the open bled.

-Fremen Wisdom

Alone in the quiet, stark desert — exactly as it should be. Pardot Kynes found that he worked best with nothing but his own thoughts and plenty of time to think them. Other people provided too many distractions, and few others had the same focus or the same drive.

As Imperial Planetologist to Arrakis, he needed to absorb the huge landscape into every pore of his being. Once he got into the right mind-set he could actually feel the pulse of a world. Now, standing atop a rugged formation of black-and-red rock that had been uplifted from the surrounding basin, the lean, weathered man stared in both directions at the vastness. Desert, desert everywhere.

His map screen named the mountainous line Rimwall West. His altimeter proclaimed the tallest peaks to be substantially higher than six thousand meters … yet he saw no snow, glaciers, or ice, no signs of precipitation whatsoever. Even the most rugged and atomic-blasted mountaintops on Salusa Secundus had been covered with snow. But the air here was so desperately dry that exposed water could not survive in any form.

Kynes stared southward across the ocean of sand to the world-girdling desert known as the Funeral Plain. No doubt geographers could have found ample distinctions to categorize the landscape into further labeled subsections — but few humans who ventured out there ever returned. This was the domain of the worms. No one really needed maps.

Bemused, Kynes remembered ancient sailing charts from the earliest days of Old Terra, their mysterious unexplored areas marked simply, “Here Be Monsters.” Yes, he thought as he recalled Rabban’s hunt of the incredible sandworm. Here be monsters indeed.

Exposed atop the serrated ridge of the Rimwall, he removed the stillsuit’s nostril plugs and rubbed a sore spot where the filter constantly brushed against his nose. Then he pulled away the covering on his mouth so he could take a deep breath of the scorched, brittle air. According to his desert-prep instructions, he knew he should not expose himself unnecessarily to such water loss, but Kynes needed to draw in the aromas and vibrations of Arrakis, needed to sense the heartbeat of the planet.

He smelled hot dust, the subtle saltiness of minerals, the distinct tastes of sand, weathered lava, and basalt. This was a world entirely without the moist scents of either growing or rotting vegetation, without any odor that might betray the cycles of life and death. Only sand and rock and more sand.

Upon closer inspection, though, even the harshest desert teemed with life, with specialized plants, with animals and insects adapted to hostile ecological niches. He knelt to scrutinize shadowy pockets in the rock, tiny hollows where the barest breath of morning dew might collect. There, lichens gripped the rough stone surface.

A few hard pellets marked the droppings of a small rodent, perhaps a kangaroo rat. Insects might make their homes here at high altitude, along with a bit of windblown grass or hardy and solitary weeds. On the vertical cliffs, even bats took shelter and surged out at dusk to hunt night moths and gnats. Occasionally in the enamel-blue sky he spotted a dark fleck that must have been a hawk or a carrion bird. For such larger animals, survival must be particularly hard.

How, then, do the Fremen survive?

He’d seen their dusty forms walking the village streets, but the desert people kept to themselves, went about their business, then vanished. Kynes noticed that the “civilized” villagers treated them differently, but it wasn’t clear whether this came from awe or disdain. Polish comes from the cities, went an old Fremen saying, wisdom from the desert.

According to a few sparse anthropological notes he had found, the Fremen were the remnants of an ancient wandering people, the Zensunni, who had been slaves dragged from world to world. After being freed, or perhaps escaping, from their captivity they had tried to find a home for centuries, but were persecuted everywhere they went. Finally, they’d gone to ground here on Arrakis-and somehow they had thrived.

Once, when he’d tried to speak to a Fremen woman as she walked past, the woman had fixed him with the gaze of her shockingly blue-within-blue eyes, the whites completely swallowed in the indigo of pure spice addiction. The sight had jolted all questions from his mind, and before Kynes could say anything else to her, the Fremen woman had hurried on her way, hugging her tattered brown jubba cloak over her stillsuit.

Kynes had heard rumors that entire Fremen population centers were hidden out in the basins and the rocky buttresses of the Shield Wall. Living off the land, when the land itself provided so little life … how did they do it?

Kynes still had much to learn about Arrakis, and he thought the Fremen could teach him a great deal. If he could ever find them.

IN DIRTY, ROUGH-EDGED Carthag, the Harkonnens had been reluctant to outfit the unwanted Planetologist with extravagant equipment. Scowling at the Padishah Emperor’s seal on Kynes’s requisition, the supply master had authorized him to take clothes, a stilltent, a survival kit, four literjons of water, some preserved rations, and a battered one-man ornithopter with an extended fuel supply. Those items were enough for a person like Kynes, who was a stranger to luxury. He didn’t care about formal trappings and useless niceties. He was much more focused on the problem of understanding Arrakis.

After checking the predicted storm patterns and prevailing winds, Kynes lit off in the ornithopter toward the northeast, heading deeper into the mountainous terrain surrounding the polar regions. Because the mid-latitudes were broiling wastelands, most human habitation clustered around the highlands.

He piloted the old surplus ‘thopter, listening to the loud hum of its engines and the flutter of movable wings. From the air, and all alone: This was the best way to see the vistas below, to get a broad perspective on the geological blemishes and patterns, the colors of rock, the canyons.

Through the sand-scratched front windows he could see dry rills and gorges, the diverging brooms of alluvial fans from ancient floods. Some of the steep canyon walls appeared to have been cut by water abrasion, like a shigawire strand sawing through strata. Once, in the distance shimmering with the ripples of a heat mirage, he thought he saw a sparkling salt-encrusted playa that could easily have been a dried sea bottom. But when he flew in that direction, he couldn’t find it.

Kynes became convinced that this planet had once held water. A lot of it. The evidence was there for any Planetologist to see. But where had it all gone?

The amount of ice in the polar caps was insignificant, mined by water merchants and hauled down to the cities, where it was sold at a premium. The caps certainly did not hold enough to explain vanished oceans or dried rivers. Had the native water somehow been destroyed or removed from the planet … or was it just hiding?

Kynes flew on, keeping his eyes open and searching, constantly searching. Diligently compiling his journals, he took notes of every interesting thing he spotted. It would take years to gather enough information for a well-founded treatise, but in the past month he had already transmitted two regular progress reports back to the Emperor, just to show he was doing his appointed job. He’d handed these reports to an Imperial Courier and a Guild representative, one in Arrakeen, the other in Carthag. But he had no idea if Elrood or his advisors even read them.

Kynes found himself lost most of the time. His maps and charts were deplorably incomplete or absolutely wrong, which puzzled him. If Arrakis was the sole source of melange — which, therefore, made this planet one of the most important in the Imperium — then why was the landscape so poorly charted? If the Spacing Guild would just install a few more high-resolution satellites, much of the problem could be solved. No one seemed to know the answer.

For a Planetologist’s purposes, though, being lost caused little concern. He was an explorer, after all, which required him to wander about with no plan and no destination. Even when his ornithopter began to rattle, he pressed on. The ion-propulsion engine was strong and the battered craft handled reasonably well, even in powerful gusts and updrafts of hot air. He had enough fuel to last him for weeks.

Kynes remembered all too well the years he had spent on harsh Salusa, trying to comprehend the catastrophe that had ruined it centuries before. He had seen ancient pictures, knew how beautiful the former capital world had once been. But in his heart it would always remain the hellish place it was now.

Something epochal had happened here on Arrakis, too, but no witnesses or records had survived that ancient disaster. He didn’t think it could have been atomic, though that solution might be easy to postulate. The ancient wars before and during the Butlerian Jihad had been devastating, had turned entire solar systems into rubble and dust.

No … something different had happened here.

MORE DAYS, MORE WANDERING.

On a barren, silent ridge halfway around the world, Kynes climbed to the top of another rocky peak. He had landed his ‘thopter on a flat, boulder-strewn saddle, then walked up the slope, picking his way hand over hand with jangling equipment on his back.

In the unimaginative fashion of early cartographers, this curving arm of rock that formed a barrier between the Habanya Erg to the east and the great sink of the Cielago Depression to the west had been forever named False Wall West. He determined this would be a good spot to establish a data-collection outpost.

Feeling the exertion in his thighs and hearing the click-ticking of his overworked stillsuit, Kynes knew he must be perspiring heavily. Even so, his suit absorbed and recycled all of his bodily moisture, and he was in good shape. When he could stand it no longer, he drew a lukewarm sip through the catchtube near his throat, then continued to trudge upward on the rough surface. The best place to conserve water is in your own body, said conventional Fremen wisdom, according to the vendor who had sold him his equipment. He was accustomed to the slick stillsuit by now; it had become a second skin to him.

At the craggy pinnacle — about twelve hundred meters high, according to his altimeter — he stopped at a natural shelter formed by a broken tooth of hard stone. There, he set up his portable weather station. Its analytical devices would record wind speeds and directions, temperatures, barometric pressures, and fluctuations in relative humidity.

Around the globe, centuries-old biological testing stations had been erected in the days long before the properties of melange had been discovered. Back then, Arrakis had been no more than an unremarkable, dry planet with little in the way of desirable resources — of no interest to any but the most desperate of colonists. Many of those testing stations had fallen into disrepair, unattended, some even forgotten.

Kynes doubted the information gleaned from those stations would be very reliable. For now, he wanted his own data from his own instruments. With the whir of a tiny fan, an air-sampler gulped an atmospheric specimen and spilled out the composition readings: 23 percent oxygen, 75.4 percent nitrogen, 0.023 percent carbon dioxide, along with other trace gases.

Kynes found the numbers most peculiar. Perfectly breathable, of course, and exactly what one might expect from a normal planet with a thriving ecosystem. But in this scorched realm, those partial pressures raised enormous questions. With no seas or rainstorms, no plankton masses, no vegetative covering … where did all the oxygen come from? It made absolutely no sense.

The only large indigenous life-forms he knew of were the sandworms. Could there be so many of the beasts that their metabolisms actually had a measurable effect on the composition of the atmosphere? Did some odd form of plankton teem within the sands themselves? Melange deposits were known to have an organic component, but Kynes had no idea what its source could be. Is there a connection between the voracious worms and the spice?

Arrakis was one ecological mystery built upon another.

With his preparations complete, Kynes turned from the perfect spot for his meteorological station. Then he realized with startling abruptness that parts of the seemingly natural alcove atop this isolated peak had been intentionally fashioned.

He bent down, amazed, and ran his fingers over rough notches. Steps cut into the rock! Human hands had done this not long ago, chopping out easy access to this place. An outpost? A lookout? A Fremen observation station?

A chill shot down his spine, borne on a trickle of sweat that the stillsuit greedily drank. At the same time, he felt a thrill of excitement, because the Fremen themselves might become allies, a hardened people who had the same agenda as he did, the same need to understand and improve ….

As Kynes turned around in the open air, searching, he felt exposed. “Hello?” he called out, but only the desert silence answered him.

How is all of this connected? he wondered. And what, if anything, do the Fremen know about it?

Who can know whether Ix has gone too far? They hide their facilities, keep their workers enslaved, and claim the right of secrecy. Under such circumstances, how can they not be tempted to step beyond the restrictions of the Butlerian Jihad?

-COUNT ILBAN RICHESE, third appeal to the Landsraad

Use your resources and use your wits,” the Old Duke had always told him. Now, as he stood alone and shivering, Leto took stock of both.

He contemplated his grim and unexpected solitude on the wilderness surface of Ix — or wherever this place was. Had he been stranded here by accident or treachery? What was the worst case? The Guild should have kept a record of where he’d been unceremoniously discharged. His father and House Atreides troops could rally out and find him when he didn’t show up at his intended destination — but how long would that take? How long could he survive here? If Vernius was behind this treachery, would the Earl even report him missing?

Leto tried to be optimistic, but he knew it might be a long time before help could come. He had no food, no warm clothing, not even a portable shelter. He had to take care of this problem himself.

“Hello!” he shouted again. The vast emptiness snatched his words and drained them to nothing, without even bothering to echo them back.

He considered venturing forth in search of some land mark or settlement, but decided to stay put for the time being. Next, he mentally assessed the possessions he’d brought in his suitcases, trying to think of what he might use to send a message.

Then, from beside him, in a blue-green thicket of spiny plants struggling to survive in the tundra, came a rustling sound. Startled, Leto jumped back, then looked closer. Assassins? A group intending to take him captive? The ransom of a ducal heir might bring a mountain of solaris … as well as the wrath of Paulus Atreides.

He drew the curve-bladed fishing knife from its sheath at his back and made ready to fight. His heart pounded as he tried to guess his peril, to prepare in some way. An Atreides had no qualms about shedding necessary blood.

The branches and pointed leaves moved, then opened to reveal a round plaz pad on the ground. With a hum of machinery, a transparent lift tube emerged from beneath the surface, looking totally incongruous on the rugged landscape.

A stocky young man stood inside the transparent tube, grinning a warm welcome. He had blond, unruly hair that looked tousled despite careful combing; he wore loose military-style trousers and a color-shifting camouflage shirt. His pale, open face had soft edges from outgrown baby fat. A small pack hung on the stranger’s left shoulder, similar to the one he carried in his hand. He appeared to be about Leto’s age.

The transparent lift came to a stop, and a curved door rotated open. A breath of warm air brushed Leto’s hands and face. He crouched, ready to attack with his fishing knife, though he could not imagine this innocuous-looking stranger to be a killer.

“You must be Leto Atreides, right?” the young man said. He spoke in Galach, the common language of the Imperium. “So should we start out with a day hike?”

Leto’s gray eyes narrowed and fixed on the purple-and-copper Ixian helix adorning the boy’s collar. Trying to hide his immense relief and maintain a professional, even suspicious facade, Leto nodded and lowered the tip of the knife, which the stranger had pretended not to notice.

“I’m Rhombur Vernius. I, uh, thought you’d want to stretch a bit before we settle in down below. I heard you like being outdoors, though I prefer to be underground myself. Maybe after you spend a little time with us, you’ll feel at home in our cavern cities. Ix is really quite nice.”

He looked up at the clouds and high-altitude sleet. “Oh, why is it raining? Vermilion hells, I hate being in unpredictable environments.” Rhombur shook his head in disgust. “I told weather control to give you a warm, sunny day. My apologies, Prince Leto — but this is just too dreary for me. How about we go down to the Grand Palais?”

Catching himself rambling, Rhombur dropped both day packs inside the lift tube and nudged Leto’s floating luggage inside as well. “It’s good to meet you at last. My father’s been talking about Atreides this and Atreides that for so long. We’ll be studying together for some time, probably family trees and Landsraad politics. I’m eighty-seventh in line to the Golden Lion Throne, but I think you rank even higher than I do.”

Golden Lion Throne. The Great Houses were ranked according to an elaborate CHOAM-Landsraad system, and within each House was a sub-hierarchy based upon primogeniture. Leto’s ranking was indeed substantially higher than the Ixian Prince’s — through his mother he was actually a great-grandson of Elrood IX, through one of his three daughters by his second wife, Yvette. But the difference was meaningless; the Emperor had many great-grandchildren. Neither he nor Rhombur would ever get to be Emperor. Serving as Duke of House Atreides would offer enough of a challenge, Leto thought.

The young men exchanged the half handshake of the Imperium, interlocking fingertips. The Ixian Prince wore a firejewel ring on his right hand, and Leto felt no rough calluses.

“I thought I was in the wrong place after I’d landed,” Leto said, finally letting his uneasiness and confusion show through. “I believed I was stranded on some uninhabited rock. Is this really … Ix? The machine planet?” He pointed toward the spectacular peaks, the snow and rocks, the dark forests.

Remembering what his father had told him about the Ixian penchant for security, Leto noted Rhombur’s hesitation. “Oh, uh, you’ll see. We try not to make ourselves too obvious.”

The Prince gestured him into the tube, and the plaz door rotated shut. They plunged through what seemed to be a kilometer of rock. Rhombur continued to speak calmly even as they plummeted. “Because of the nature of our technical operations, Ix has countless secrets and many enemies who’d like to destroy us. We try to keep our dealings and our resources hidden from prying eyes.”

The two young men passed through a luminescent honeycomb of artificial material, then into a vast expanse of air that revealed a huge grotto-world, a fairyland protected deep within the crust of the planet.

Massive crowns of graceful support girders came into view, connected to diamond lattice columns so tall that the bottoms were not visible below. The plaz-walled capsule continued to descend, floating free on an Ixian suspensor mechanism. The capsule’s transparent floor gave Leto the unsettling illusion of dropping feetfirst through thin air. He held on to the side railing while his floating suitcases bobbed around him.

Overhead, he saw what looked like the cloudy Ixian sky and the blue-white sun peeking through. Projectors concealed on the surface of the planet transmitted actual weather images onto high-resolution screens that covered the rock ceilings.

This enormous underworld made the inside of even a Guild Heighliner look minuscule. Hanging down from the roof of the stone vault, Leto saw geometric inverted buildings, like inhabited crystal stalactites connected to each other by walkways and tubes. Teardrop-shaped aircraft sped noiselessly through the subterranean realm, flitting between structures and supports. Hang gliders carrying people flashed by in streaks of brilliant color.

Far down on the floor of the rough cavern he spotted a lake and rivers — all deep underground and protected from outsiders’ eyes.

“Vernii,” Rhombur said. “Our capital city.”

As the capsule slid between the hanging stalactite buildings, Leto could make out groundcars, buses, and an aerial tube-transport system. He felt as if he were inside a magical snowflake. “Your buildings are incredibly beautiful,” he said, his gray eyes drinking in all the details. “I always thought of Ix as a noisy industrial world.”

“We, uh, foster that impression for outsiders. We’ve discovered structural materials that are not only aesthetically pleasing but extremely light and strong. Living here underground, we’re both protected and hidden.”

“And it lets you keep the surface of the world in pristine condition,” Leto pointed out. The Prince of Ix looked as if he hadn’t even considered that advantage.

“The nobles and administrators live in the upper stalactite buildings,” Rhombur continued. “Workers, shift supervisors, and all the suboid crews live below in warrens. Everyone works together for the prosperity of Ix.”

“More levels beneath this city? People live even deeper down there?” “Well, not really people. They’re suboids,” Rhombur said, with a dismissive wave of one hand. “We’ve specifically bred them to perform drudgery without complaint. Quite a triumph of genetic engineering. I don’t know what we’d do without them.”

Their floating compartment skirted a tube-transport path and continued to follow the upside-down skyline. As they approached the most spectacular of the inverted ceiling palaces — a huge, angled structure hanging suspended like an archaic cathedral — Leto said, “I assume your Inquisitors await me?” He raised his chin and prepared himself for the ordeal. “I’ve never had a deep mental scan before.”

Rhombur laughed at him. “I can, uh, arrange a mind probe if you really wish to undergo the rigors … .” The Ixian Prince studied Leto intently. “Leto, Leto, if we didn’t trust you in the first place, you never would have been allowed on Ix. Security has, um, changed a lot here since your father’s day. Don’t listen to all those dark, sinister stories we spread about ourselves. They’re just to scare away the curious.”

The capsule finally settled onto a sprawling balcony constructed of interlocking tiles, and Leto felt a holding apparatus engage underneath them. The chamber began to move laterally toward an armorplaz building.

Leto tried not to let his relief show. “All right. I’ll defer to your judgment.”

“And I’ll do the same when we’re on your planet. Water and fish and open skies. Caladan sounds … uh, wonderful.” His tone said the exact opposite.

Household personnel clad in black-and-white livery streamed out of the armorplaz building. Forming a neat line on each side of the tube path, the uniformed men and women stood rigidly at attention.

“This is the Grand Palais,” Rhombur said, “where our staff will see to your every wish. Since you’re the only current visitor, you might be in for some pampering.”

“All these people just to serve … me?” Leto remembered the times when he’d had to scale and fillet the fish he caught, if he wanted to eat.

“You are an important dignitary, Leto. The son of a Duke, the friend of our family, an ally in the Landsraad. Do you expect anything less?”

“In truth, I’m from a House with no substantial wealth, on a planet where the only glamour comes from fishermen, harvesters of floating paradan melons, and pundi rice farmers.”

Rhombur laughed, a friendly peal. “Oh, and you’re modest, too!”

Followed by the suspensor-borne luggage, the young men walked side by side up three wide, elegant stairs into the Grand Palais.

Looking around the central lobby, Leto identified Ixian crystal chandeliers, the finest in all the Imperium. Crystal goblets and vases adorned marbleplaz tables, and on each side of a blackite reception desk were full-size lapisjade statuaries of Earl Dominic Vernius and his Lady Shando Vernius. Leto recognized the royal couple from triphotos he had seen.

The uniformed household staff filtered back into the building and took up positions where they would be available for instructions from superiors. Across the lobby, double doors opened and big-shouldered, bald Dominic Vernius himself approached, looking like some djinn out of a bottle. He wore a silver-and-gold sleeveless tunic trimmed in white at the collar. A purple-and-copper Ixian helix adorned his breast.

“Ah, so this is our young visitor!” Dominic effused with blustery good humor. Crow’s-feet became laugh lines around his bright brown eyes. His facial construction looked very much like that of his son Rhombur, except the fat he carried had set into ruddy folds and creases, and his dark bushy mustache made for a striking frame around white teeth. Earl Dominic was several centimeters taller than his son. The Earl’s features were not narrow and hard like the Atreides and Corrino bloodlines, but came instead from a lineage that had been ancient at the time of the Battle of Corrin.

Behind him came his wife Shando, former concubine of the Emperor, dressed in a formal gown. Her finely chiseled features, delicately pointed nose, and creamy skin suffused her appearance with a regal beauty that would have shone through even the most drab of garments. She looked slight and delicate at first glance, but carried a toughness and resilience about her.

Beside her, their daughter Kailea seemed to be trying to outshine even her mother in a brocaded lavender dress that set off copper-dark hair. Kailea looked a little younger than Leto, but she walked with a studied grace and concentration, as if she dared not let formality or appearances slip. She had thin arched eyebrows, striking emerald eyes, and a generous, catlike mouth above a narrow chin. With the faintest of smiles, Kailea executed an extravagant and perfect curtsy.

Leto nodded and responded to each introduction, trying to keep his eyes from the Vernius daughter. Hurriedly going through the motions his mother had drilled into him, Leto snapped open the seal on one of his suitcases and removed a heavy jeweled box, one of the Atreides family treasures. Holding it, he stood erect. “For you, Lord Vernius. This contains unique items from our planet. I also have a gift for Lady Vernius.”

“Excellent, excellent!” Then, as if impatient with overblown ceremony, Dominic accepted the gift and motioned for a servant to come and take it. “I’ll enjoy its contents this evening, when there is more time.” He rubbed his broad hands together. This man seemed to belong more in a smoky blacksmith’s shop or on a battlefield than in a fancy palace. “So, did you have a good trip to Ix, Leto?”

“Uneventful, sir.”

“Ah, the best kind of trip.” Dominic laughed easily.

Leto smiled, not certain how best to make a good impression on this man. He cleared his throat, embarrassed to confess his concerns and worries. “Yes, sir, except I thought I was abandoned when the Guild left me on your planet and I saw only wilderness.”

“Ah! I asked your father not to mention that to you — our little prank. I did the same to him on his first visit here. You must have imagined yourself good and lost.” Dominic beamed with pleasure. “You look rested enough, young man. At your age, space lag isn’t much of a factor. You left Caladan, what, two days ago?”

“Less than that, sir.”

“Amazing how quickly Heighliners can span great distances. Positively incredible. And we’re making improvements in Heighliner design, enabling each ship to carry a larger payload.” His booming voice made the accomplishments seem even more grandiose. “Our second construction is to be completed later today, another triumph for us. We’ll take you through all the modifications we’ve made, so you can learn them as part of your apprenticeship here.”

Leto smiled, but already his head felt as if it might explode. He didn’t know how much more new input he could absorb. By the time the year was up, he would be a different person entirely.

There are weapons you cannot hold in your hand. You can only hold them in your mind.

-Bene Gesserit Teaching

The Bene Gesserit shuttle descended to the dark side of Giedi Prime, landing in the well-guarded Harko City spaceport just before midnight, local time.

Concerned about what the damned witches wanted from him now that he had come home from the desert hellhole of Arrakis, the Baron went to a shielded upper balcony of Harkonnen Keep to watch the lights of the arriving craft.

Around him, the monolithic blackplaz-and-steel towers shone garish lights into the smoke-smeared darkness. Walkways and roads were covered by corrugated awnings and filtered enclosures to protect pedestrians from industrial waste and acid rain. Given a little more imagination and attention to detail during its construction, Harko City could have been striking. Instead, the place looked stricken.

“I have the data for you, my Baron,” said a nasal but sharp voice behind him, as close as an assassin.

Startled, the Baron turned, flexing his well-muscled arms. He scowled. The gaunt-robed form of his personal Mentat, Piter de Vries, stood at the doorway to the balcony.

“Don’t ever sneak up on me, Piter. You slither like a worm.” The comparison brought to mind his nephew Rabban’s desert hunting expedition and its embarrassing results. “Harkonnens kill worms, you know.”

“So I’ve heard,” de Vries answered dryly. “But sometimes moving silently is the best way to acquire information.” A wry smile formed on his lips, which were stained red from the cranberry-colored sapho juice Mentats drank in order to increase their abilities. Always seeking physical pleasures, curious to experiment with additional addictions, the Baron had tried sapho himself, but found it to be bitter, vile stuff.

“It’s a Reverend Mother and her entourage,” de Vries said, nodding toward the lights of the shuttle. “Fifteen Sisters and acolytes, along with four male guards. No weapons that we could detect.”

De Vries had been trained as a Mentat by the Bene Tleilax, genetic wizards who produced some of the Imperium’s best human computers. But the Baron hadn’t wanted a mere data-processing machine with a human brain-he’d wanted a calculating and clever man, someone who could not only comprehend and compute the consequences of Harkonnen schemes, but who could also use his corrupt imagination to assist the Baron in achieving his aims. Piter de Vries was a special creation, one of the infamous Tleilaxu “twisted Mentats.”

“But what do they want?” the Baron muttered, gazing at the landed shuttle. “Those witches seem damned confident coming here.” His own blue-uniformed troops marched out like a wolf pack before any of the passengers emerged from the ship. “We could erase them in an instant with our most trivial House defenses.”

“The Bene Gesserit are not without weapons, my Baron. Some say they themselves are weapons.” De Vries raised a thin finger. “It’s never wise to incur the wrath of the Sisterhood.”

“I know that, idiot! So, what’s the Reverend Mother’s name and what does she want?”

“Gaius Helen Mohiam. As to what she wants … her Sisterhood has refused to say.”

“Damn them and their secrets,” the Baron grumbled, as he spun about on the plaz-enclosed balcony. He strode toward the corridor to go meet the shuttlecraft.

Piter de Vries smiled after him. “When a Bene Gesserit speaks, she often does so in riddles and innuendos, but her words also hold a great deal of truth. One simply needs to excavate it.”

The Baron responded with a deep grunt, kept going. Intensely curious himself, Piter followed.

On the way, the Mentat reviewed his knowledge of these black-robed witches. The Bene Gesserit occupied themselves with numerous breeding schemes, as if farming humanity for their own obscure purposes. They also commanded one of the greatest storehouses of information in the Imperium, using their intricate libraries to look at the broad movements of peoples, to study the effects of one person’s actions amidst interplanetary politics.

As a Mentat, de Vries would have loved to get his hands on that storehouse of knowledge. With such a treasure trove of data he could make computations and prime projections — perhaps enough to bring down the Sisterhood itself.

But the Bene Gesserit allowed no outsiders into their archives, not even the Emperor himself. Hence there wasn’t much on which even a Mentat could base his calculations. De Vries could only guess at the arriving witch’s intentions.

THE BENE GESSERIT liked to manipulate politics and societies in secret, so that few people could trace the exact patterns of influence. Nevertheless, the Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam knew how to plan and execute a spectacular entrance. With black robes swishing, flanked by two immaculately dressed male guards and followed by her troop of acolytes, she strode into the reception hall of the ancestral Harkonnen Keep.

Seated at a gleaming blackplaz desk, the Baron waited to receive her, accompanied by his twisted Mentat, who stood on one side with a few handpicked personal guards. To exhibit his utter contempt and lack of interest for these visitors, the Baron wore a sloppy, casual robe. He had prepared no refreshments for them, no fanfare, no ceremony whatsoever.

Very well, Mohiam thought, perhaps it’s best we keep this encounter a private matter anyway.

In a strong, firm voice she identified herself, then took one step closer to him, leaving her entourage behind. She had a plain face that showed strength rather than delicacy — not ugly, but not attractive either. In profile her nose, while unremarkable from the front, was revealed to be overlong. “Baron Vladimir Harkonnen, my Sisterhood has business to discuss with you.”

“I’m not interested in doing business with witches,” the Baron said, resting his strong chin on his knuckles. His spider-black eyes looked the assemblage over, assessing the physiques and physical appearance of her male guards. The fingers of his free hand tapped a nervous rhythm against his thigh.

“Nevertheless, you will hear what I have to say.” Her voice was iron.

Seeing the blustering rage building within the Baron, Piter de Vries stepped forward. “Need I remind you, Reverend Mother, where you are? We did not invite you to come here.”

“Perhaps I should remind you,” she snapped at the Mentat, “that we are capable of running a detailed analysis of all Harkonnen spice-production activities on Arrakis — the equipment used, the manpower expended, compared with spice production actually reported to CHOAM, as opposed to our own precise projections. Any anomalies should be quite … revealing.” She raised her eyebrows. “We’ve already done a preliminary study, based upon firsthand reports from our” — she smiled — “sources.”

“You mean spies,” the Baron said, indignantly.

She could see that he regretted these words as soon as they were uttered, for they hinted at his culpability.

The Baron stood up, flexing his arm muscles, but before he could counter Mohiam’s innuendo, de Vries interjected, “Perhaps it would be best if we made this a private meeting, just between the Reverend Mother and the Baron? There’s no need to turn a simple conversation into a grand spectacle … and matter of record.”

“I agree,” Mohiam said quickly, assessing the twisted Mentat with a glint of approval. “Why don’t we adjourn to your chambers, Baron?”

He pouted, his generous lips forming a dark rose. “And why should I take a Bene Gesserit witch into my private quarters?”

“Because you have no choice,” she said in a low, hard voice.

In shock, the Baron mused at her audacity, but then he laughed out loud. “Why not? We can’t get any less pretentious than that.”

De Vries watched them both with narrowed eyes. He was reconsidering his suggestion, running data through his brain, figuring probabilities. The witch had jumped too quickly at the idea. She wanted to be alone with the Baron. Why? What did she have to do in private?

“Allow me to accompany you, my Baron,” de Vries said, already strutting toward the door that would take them through halls and suspensor tubes to the Baron’s private suite.

“This matter is best kept between the Baron and myself,” Mohiam said.

Baron Harkonnen stiffened. “You don’t command my people, witch,” he said in a low, menacing tone.

“Your instructions then?” she asked, insolently.

A moment’s hesitation, and: “I grant your request for a private audience.”

She tipped her head in the slightest of bows, then glanced behind her at her acolytes and guards. De Vries caught a flicker of her fingers, some sort of witch hand signal.

Her birdlike eyes locked on to his, and de Vries drew himself up as she said, “There is one thing you can do, Mentat. Be so kind as to make certain my companions are welcomed and fed, since we won’t have time to stay for pleasantries. We must return posthaste to Wallach IX.”

“Do it,” Baron Harkonnen said.

With a look of dismissal toward de Vries, as if he were the lowest servant in the Imperium, she followed the Baron out of the hall ….

Upon entering his chambers, the Baron was pleased to note that he had left his soiled clothes in a pile. Furniture lay in disarray, and a few red stains on the wall had not been sufficiently scrubbed. He wanted to emphasize that the witch did not deserve fine treatment or a particularly well-planned welcome.

Placing his hands on his narrow hips, he squared his shoulders and raised his firm chin. “All right, Reverend Mother, tell me what it is you want. I have no time for further word games.”

Mohiam released a small smile. “Word games?” She knew that House Harkonnen understood the nuances of politics … perhaps not the kindhearted Abulurd, but certainly the Baron and his advisors. “Very well, Baron,” she said simply. “The Sisterhood has a use for your genetic line.”

She paused, relishing the look of shock on his hard face. Before he could splutter a response, she explained carefully chosen parts of the scenario. Mohiam herself didn’t know the details or the reasons; she simply knew to obey. “You are no doubt aware that for many years the Bene Gesserit have incorporated important bloodlines into our Sisterhood. Our Sisters represent the full spectrum of noble humanity, containing within us the desirable traits of most of the Great and Minor Houses in the Landsraad. We even have some representatives, many generations removed, of House Harkonnen.”

“And you want to improve your Harkonnen strain?” the Baron asked, warily. “Is that it?”

“You understand perfectly. We must conceive a child by you, Vladimir Harkonnen. A daughter.”

The Baron staggered backward, then chuckled as he brushed a tear of mirth from his eyes. “You’ll have to look elsewhere, then. I have no children, nor is it likely I’ll ever have any. The actual procreation process, involving women as it does, disgusts me.”

Knowing full well the Baron’s sexual preferences, Mohiam made no response. Unlike many nobles, he had no offspring, not even illegitimate ones lurking among planetary populations.

“Nevertheless, we want a Harkonnen daughter, Baron. Not an heir, or even a pretender, so you need not worry about any … dynastic ambitions. We have studied the bloodlines carefully and the desired mix is quite specific. You must impregnate me.”

The Baron’s eyebrows rose even higher. “Why, under all the moons of the Imperium, would I want to do that?” He raked his gaze up and down her body, dissecting her, sizing her up. Mohiam was rather plain-looking, her face long, her brown hair thin and unremarkable. She was older than he, near the end of her childbearing years. “Especially with you.”

“The Bene Gesserit determine these things through genetic projections, not through any mutual or physical attraction.”

“Well, I refuse.” The Baron turned about and crossed his arms over his chest. “Go away. Take your little slaves with you and get off Giedi Prime.”

Mohiam stared at him for a few more moments, absorbing the details of his chambers. Using Bene Gesserit analytical techniques, she learned many things about the Baron and his personality from the way he maintained this odorous private warren, a space that was not groomed and decorated for the view of formal visitors. He unknowingly exhibited a wealth of information about his inner self.

“If that is your wish, Baron,” she said. “My shuttle’s next stop will be Kaitain, where we have a meeting already scheduled with the Emperor. My personal data library on the ship contains copies of all the records that give evidence of your spice-stockpiling activities on Arrakis, and documentation of how you have altered your production deliberately to hide your private stores from CHOAM and House Corrino. Our preliminary analysis contains enough information to initiate a full-scale Guild bank audit of your activities and revocation of your temporary CHOAM directorship.”

The Baron stared back at her. An impasse, neither of them budging. But he saw behind her eyes the truth in her words. He did not doubt the witches had used their diabolical intuitive methods to determine exactly what he had done, how he had been making a secret fool out of Elrood IX. He also knew that Mohiam would not hesitate to follow through with her threat.

Copies of all the records … Even destroying this ship would do no good. The infernal Sisterhood obviously had other copies elsewhere.

The Bene Gesserit probably had blackmail material on Imperial House Corrino as well, perhaps even embarrassing data on the important but surreptitious dealings of the Spacing Guild and the powerful CHOAM Company. Bargaining chips. The Sisterhood was good at learning the weaknesses of potential enemies.

The Baron hated the Hobson’s choice she gave him, but he could do nothing about it. This witch could destroy him with a word, and in the end still force him to give her his bloodline.

“To make things easier on you, I have the ability to control my bodily functions,” Mohiam said, sounding reasonable. “I can ovulate at will, and I guarantee that this unpleasant task will not need to be repeated. From a single encounter with you, I can guarantee the birth of a girl-child. You need not worry about us again.”

The Bene Gesserit always had plans afoot, wheels within wheels, and nothing with them was ever as clear as it seemed. The Baron frowned, running through the possibilities. With this daughter they wanted so badly, did the witches — in spite of their denials — intend to create an illegitimate heir and claim House Harkonnen in the following generation? That was preposterous. He was already grooming Rabban for that position, and no one would question it.

“I …” He fumbled for words. “I need a moment to consider this, and I must speak with my advisors.”

Reverend Mother Mohiam all but rolled her eyes at the suggestion, but granted him leave, gesturing for the Baron to take his time. Tossing aside a bloodstained towel, she lounged back on the divan, comfortable to wait.

Despite his despicable personality, Vladimir Harkonnen was an attractive man, well built with pleasant features: reddish hair, heavy lips, pronounced widow’s peak. However, the Bene Gesserit instilled in all their Sisters the critical belief that sexual intercourse was a mere tool for manipulating men and for obtaining offspring to add to the genetically connected web of the Sisterhood. Mohiam never intended to enjoy the act, no matter her orders. Nevertheless, she did find it pleasurable to have the Baron under her thumb, to be able to force him into submission.

The Reverend Mother sat back, closed her eyes, and concentrated on the flow and ebb of hormones in her body, the inner workings of her reproductive system … preparing herself.

She knew what the Baron’s answer had to be.

“PITER!” THE BARON strode down the halls. “Where’s my Mentat?”

De Vries slipped out of an adjoining hall, where he’d been intending to use the hidden observation holes he’d placed in the Baron’s private chambers.

“I’m here, my Baron,” he said, then swigged from a tiny vial. The sapho taste triggered responses in his brain, firing his neurons, stoking his mental capabilities. “What did the witch request? What is she up to?”

The Baron wheeled, finally finding an appropriate target for his rage. “She wants me to impregnate her! The sow!”

Impregnate her? de Vries thought, adding this to his Mentat database. At hyper speed he reassessed the problem.

“She wants to bear my girl-child! Can you believe it? They know about my spice stockpiles, too!”

De Vries was in Mentat mode. Fact: The Baron would never have children any other way. He loathes women. Besides, politically, he is too careful to spread his seed indiscriminately.

Fact: The Bene Gesserit have broad genetic records on Wallach IX, numerous breeding plans, the results of which are open to interpretation. Given a child by the Baron — a daughter instead of a son? — what could the witches hope to accomplish?

Is there some flaw — or advantage — in Harkonnen genetics they wish to exploit? Do they simply wish to do this because they consider it the most humiliating punishment they can inflict upon the Baron? If so, how has the Baron personally offended the Sisterhood?

“The thought of it disgusts me! Rutting with that broodmare,” the Baron growled. “But I’m nearly mad with curiosity. What can the Sisterhood possibly want?”

“I’m unable to make a projection, Baron. Insufficient data.”

The Baron looked as if he wanted to strike de Vries, but refrained. “I’m not a Bene Gesserit stud!”

“Baron,” de Vries said calmly, “if they truly have information about your spice-stockpiling activities, you cannot afford to have that exposed. Even if they were bluffing, your reaction has no doubt already told them all they need to know. If they offer proof to Kaitain, the Emperor will bring his Sardaukar here to exterminate House Harkonnen and set up another Great House in our stead on Arrakis, just as they removed Richese before us. Elrood would like that, no doubt. He and CHOAM can withdraw their contracts from any of your holdings at any time. They might even give Arrakis and the spice production to, say, House Atreides … just to spite you.”

“Atreides!” The Baron wanted to spit. “I’d never let my holdings fall into their hands.”

De Vries knew he had struck the right chord. The feud between Harkonnen and Atreides had started many generations before, during the tragic events of the Battle of Corrin.

“You must do as the witch demands, Baron,” he said. “The Bene Gesserit have won this round of the game. Priority: Protect the fortunes of your House, your spice holdings, and your illicit stockpiles.” The Mentat smiled. “Then get your revenge later.”

The Baron looked gray, his skin suddenly blotched. “Piter, from this instant forward I want you to begin erasing the evidence and dispersing our stockpiles. Spread them to places where no one will think to look.”

“On the planets of our allies, too? I wouldn’t recommend that, Baron. Too many complexities setting it up. And alliances change.”

“Very well.” His spider-black eyes lit up. “Put most of it on Lankiveil, right under the nose of my stupid half brother. They’ll never suspect Abulurd’s collusion in any of this.”

“Yes, my Baron. A very good idea.”

“Of course it’s a good idea!” He frowned, looked around. Thinking of his half brother had reminded him of his cherished nephew. “Where is Rabban? Maybe the witch can use his sperm instead.”

“I doubt it, Baron,” de Vries said. “Their genetic plans are usually specific.”

“Well, where is he anyway? Rabban!” The Baron spun about and paced the hall, as if looking for something to stalk. “I haven’t seen him in a day.”

“Off on another one of his silly hunts, up at Forest Guard Station.” De Vries suppressed a smile. “You are on your own here, my Baron, and I think you’d better get to your bedchamber. You have a duty to perform.”

The basic rule is this: Never support weakness; always support strength.

-The Bene Gesserit Azhar Book,