Imperial Patent Czar

It didn’t take the invaders long to make permanent changes in the prosperous underground cities. Many innocent Ixians died and many disappeared, while C’tair waited for someone to find and kill him.

During brief sojourns from his shielded hiding room, C’tair learned that Vernii, the former capital city of Ix, had been renamed Hilacia by the Tleilaxu. The fanatical usurpers had even changed Imperial records to refer to the ninth planet in the Alkaurops system as Xuttuh, rather than Ix.

C’tair wanted to strangle any Tleilaxu he found, but instead he developed a subtler plan.

He dressed like a low-level worker and doctored forms to show that he had once been a minor line supervisor, one step above a suboid, who had watched over a labor crew of twelve men. He’d read enough about hull-plate welding and sealing so that he could claim it had been his job. No one would expect much from him.

All around him, the Bene Tleilax were gutting his city and rebuilding it into a dark hell.

He abhorred the changes, loathed the Tleilaxu gall. And from what he could see, Imperial Sardaukar had actually assisted in this abomination.

C’tair could do nothing about it at the moment; he had to bide his time. He was alone here: his father exiled to Kaitain and afraid to return, his mother murdered, his twin brother taken away by the Guild. Only he remained on Ix, like a rat hiding within the walls.

But even rats could cause significant damage.

Over the months, C’tair learned to blend in, to appear to be an insignificant and cowed citizen. He kept his eyes averted, his hands dirty, his clothes and hair unkempt. He could not let it be known that he was the son of the former Ambassador to Kaitain, that he had faithfully served House Vernius — and still would, if he could find a way to do it. He had walked freely through the Grand Palais, had escorted the Earl’s own daughter. Acts that, if known, would mean a death sentence for him.

Above all, he could not let the rabid antitechnology invaders discover his shielded hiding place or the devices he had hoarded there. His stockpile might just be the last hope for the future of Ix.

Throughout the grottoes of the city, C’tair watched signs being torn down, streets and districts being renamed, and the little gnomes — all men, no women — occupying huge research facilities for their secret, nefarious operations. The streets, walkways, and facilities were guarded by diligent, thinly disguised Imperial Sardaukar or the invaders’ own shapeshifting Face Dancers.

Shortly after their victory was secured, the Tleilaxu Masters had showed themselves and encouraged the suboid rebels to vent their anger on carefully selected and approved targets. Standing back, clothed in a simple workman’s jumpsuit, C’tair had watched the smooth-skinned laborers cluster around the facility that had manufactured the new self-learning fighting meks.

“House Vernius has brought this upon themselves!” screamed a charismatic suboid agitator, almost certainly a Face Dancer infiltrator. “They would bring back the thinking machines. Destroy this place!”

While the helpless Ixian survivors had watched in horror, the suboids smashed the plaz windows and used thermal bombs to ignite the small manufactory. Filled with religious fervor, they howled and threw rocks.

A Tleilaxu Master on a hastily erected podium had bellowed into comspeakers and amplifiers. “We are your new masters, and we will make certain the manufacturing abilities of Ix are fully in accord with the strictures of the Great Convention.” The flames continued to crackle, and some of the suboids had cheered, but most didn’t seem to be listening. “As soon as possible, we must repair this damage and return this world to normal operations — with better conditions for the suboids, of course.”

C’tair had looked around, watched the building burn, and felt sick inside.

“All Ixian technology must henceforth be scrutinized by a strict religious review board, to assure its suitability. Any questionable technology will be scrapped. No one will ask you to endanger your souls by working on heretical machines.” More cheering, more smashed plaz, a few screams.

C’tair had realized, though, that the cost of this takeover would be enormous for the Tleilaxu, even with Imperial support. Since Ix was one of the major powerhouse economies in the Imperium, the new rulers could not afford to let the production lines remain idle. The Tleilaxu would make a show of destroying some of the questionable products, such as the reactive meks, but he doubted any of the truly profitable Ixian devices would be discontinued.

Despite the promises of the new masters, the suboids had been put back to work — as they were bred to do — but this time they followed only Tleilaxu designs and orders. C’tair realized that, before long, the manufactories would begin pouring out merchandise again; and shiploads of solaris would flow back into the Bene Tleilax coffers to pay them for this costly military adventure.

Now, though, the secrecy and security developed by generations of House Vernius would work against them. Ix had always shrouded itself in mystery, so who would notice the difference? Once the paying customers were satisfied with the exports, no one in the Imperium would much care about internal Ixian politics. Anyone on the outside would forget all that had happened here. It would be cleanly swept under the rug.

That must be what the Tleilaxu were counting on, C’tair thought. The entire world of Ix — he would never refer to it, not even in his mind, as Xuttuh — was walled off from the Imperium as an enigma … much as the homeworlds of the Bene Tleilax had been for centuries.

The new masters restricted travel off-planet and imposed curfews with deadly force. Face Dancers rooted out “traitors” from hiding rooms similar to C’tair’s and executed them without fanfare or ceremony. He saw no end to the repression, but he vowed not to give up. This was his own world, and he would fight for it, in any way he could.

C’tair told no one his name, called little attention to himself — but he listened, absorbed every whispered story or rumor, and he planned. Not knowing whom to trust, he assumed everyone was an informant, either a Face Dancer or simply a turncoat. Sometimes an informant was easily recognizable by the directness of a line of inquiry: Where do you work? Where do you live? What are you doing on this street?

But others were not so easy to detect, such as the gnarled old woman with whom he had initiated a conversation. He’d only meant to ask directions to a work site where he had been assigned. She hadn’t sought him out at all, except to appear harmless … somewhat like a child with a grenade in its pocket.

“Such an interesting choice of words,” she’d said, and he didn’t even remember his own phrasing. “And your inflection … you are Ixian nobility, perhaps?” She looked meaningfully at some of the ruined stalactite buildings in the ceiling.

He had stammered an answer. “N-no, although I have been a s-servant all my life, and perhaps I picked up some of their distasteful mannerisms. My apologies.” He had bowed and departed quickly, without ever getting directions from her.

His response had been awkward and perhaps incriminating, so he’d thrown away the clothes he’d been wearing and hadn’t gone down that narrow street again. Afterward, he had paid more attention than ever before to masking his own vocal identity markers. Whenever possible, he avoided talking to strangers at all. It appalled C’tair that so many opportunistic Ixians had switched allegiance to the new masters, forgetting House Vernius in less than a year.

In the first days of confusion following the takeover, C’tair had hoarded scraps of abandoned technology, from which he had constructed the cross-dimensional “Rogo” transceiver. Soon, though, all but the most primitive technology had been confiscated and made illegal. C’tair still snatched what he could, scavenging anything that might prove valuable. He considered the risk well worth taking.

His fight here might continue for years, if not decades.

He thought back to the childhood he’d shared with D’murr, and the crippled inventor, Davee Rogo, who had befriended the boys. In his private laboratory, secreted inside an ignored coal vein in the upper crust, old Rogo had taught the youths many interesting principles, had shown them some of his failed prototypes. The inventor had chuckled, his bright eyes sparkling as he goaded the boys into disassembling and reassembling some of his complicated inventions. C’tair had learned a great deal under the crippled man’s tutelage.

Now C’tair recalled his Navigator brother’s lack of interest when he’d told him of the wavy vision he’d seen in the rubble. Perhaps the ghost of Davee Rogo had not come back from the dead to provide instructions. He’d never seen a similar apparition, before or since. But that experience, whether a supernatural message or a hallucination, had permitted C’tair to accomplish a very human purpose: remaining in communication with his twin, maintaining the bond of love as D’murr became lost in the mysteries of the Guild.

Trapped in his various hiding places, C’tair had to live vicariously, soaring across the universe in his brother’s mind whenever they made contact via the transceiver. Over the months he learned with excitement and pride of D’murr’s first solo flights through foldspace as a trainee Pilot in his own Guild ship. Then, a few days ago, D’murr had been approved for his first commercial assignment, navigating an unmanned colony transport craft that plied the void far beyond the Imperium.

If his outstanding work for the Guild continued, the Navigator trainee who had been D’murr Pilru would be promoted to transporting goods and personnel between the primary worlds of the Houses Major, and perhaps along the coveted Kaitain routes. He would become an actual Navigator, possibly even working his way up to Steersman … .

But the communications device exhibited persistent problems. The silicate crystals had to be sliced with a cutteray and connected in a precise manner; then they functioned only briefly before disintegrating from the strain. Hairline cracks rendered them useless. C’tair had used the device on four occasions to reach his brother, and after each time he’d had to painstakingly cut and refit new crystals.

C’tair established careful ties to black market groups that furnished him with what he required. The contraband silicate crystals surreptitiously bore laser-scribed approvals by the Religious Review Board. Ever resourceful, the black marketers had their own means of counterfeiting the approval marks, and had scribed them everywhere, thus frustrating the controlling efforts of the occupation forces.

Still, he dealt with the furtive salesmen as little as possible to reduce his own risk of being caught … but that also limited the number of times he could talk with his brother.

C’TAIR STOOD BEHIND a barricade with other restless, sweaty people who studiously refused to recognize each other. He looked out across the sprawling grotto floor to the construction yards where the skeleton of the partially built Heighliner sat. Overhead, portions of the projected sky remained dark and damaged, and the Tleilaxu showed no inclination to repair it.

Suspensor-borne searchlights and speakers hovered over the crowd as the gathered people waited for an announcement and further instructions. No one wanted to ask, and no one wanted to hear.

“This Heighliner is of an unapproved Vernius design,” the floating speakers boomed in a sexless voice that resonated against the rock walls, “and does not meet the standards of the Religious Review Board. Your Tleilaxu masters are returning to the previous design, so this craft is to be dismantled immediately.”

A soft susurration of dismay crept across the crowd.

“Raw materials are to be salvaged and new work crews established. Construction begins again in five days.”

C’tair’s mind whirled as maroon-robed organizers marched through the crowds, assigning teams. As the son of an ambassador he’d had access to information that had not been available to others of his age. He knew the old-style Heighliners had a significantly smaller cargo capacity and operated less efficiently. But what possible religious objection could the invaders have to increased profits? What did the Tleilaxu have to gain from less efficient space transport?

Then he remembered a story that his ambassador father had told back in a time of smug assurance, that old Emperor Elrood had been displeased with the innovation, since it curtailed his tariff revenue. Pieces began to fit into place. House Corrino had provided disguised Sardaukar troops to maintain an iron grip on the Ixian population, and C’tair realized that reverting to the old Heighliner design might be how the Tleilaxu intended to repay the Emperor for his military support.

Wheels within wheels within wheels …

He felt sick inside. If true, it was such a petty reason for so many lives to have been lost, for the glorious traditions of Ix to have been destroyed, for the overthrow of an entire noble family and a planetary way of life. He was angry with everyone involved — even with Earl Vernius, who should have foreseen this and taken steps not to create such powerful enemies.

The call to work came across the PA system, and C’tair was assigned to join suboid crews as they dismantled the partially finished ship and salvaged its parts in the grotto yard. Struggling to maintain a bland expression on his face as he wielded a construction laser to sever components, he wiped sweat from his dark hair. He wished instead that he could use the laser to attack the Tleilaxu. Other teams hauled the girders and plates away, stacking them for the next assembly project.

With ringing and clanging all around him, C’tair recalled a better, more ordered time, when he’d stood with D’murr and Kailea on the observation deck above. So long ago, it seemed. They had watched a Navigator guide the last new Heighliner out of the grotto. Perhaps it would be the last such ship ever built … unless C’tair could help overthrow these destroyers.

The magnificent ship gradually fell to pieces, and the echoing sounds and chemical smells were horrific. Did suboids work this way all the time? If so, he could begin to imagine how they might have been dissatisfied enough to consider a rebellion. But C’tair could not believe the violence had been entirely at the workers’ instigation.

Had this all been part of the Emperor’s plan? To destroy House Vernius and quash progress? Where and how the Bene Tleilax came into play in the scheme of influences, C’tair wasn’t certain. Of all races, these were the most hated people in the known galaxy. Surely, Elrood could have found any number of Great Houses to take over the operations on Ix without disrupting the economics of the Imperium. What else could the Padishah Emperor have in mind for these religious fanatics? Why would he dirty his hands with them?

In disgust, C’tair watched other changes in the grotto, facilities being modified, as he continued the work of dismantling the Heighliner. The new Tleilaxu overlords were busy little creatures, always hurrying about in a mysterious manner, setting up clandestine operations in the largest structures on Ix, locking formerly open facilities, shuttering windows, erecting stun-fences and minefields. Keeping their filthy little secrets.

C’tair took it as his mission to learn all those secrets, by whatever means necessary, however long it might take him. The Tleilaxu must fall … .

The ultimate question: Why does life exist? The answer: For life’s sake.

-ANONYMOUS, thought to be of Zensunni origin

Two Reverend Mothers stood talking on a treeless knoll: one old, one young. Behind clouds, the waning sun, Laoujin, threw the long shadows of their hooded black robes down the slope. Over the centuries an untold number of other Reverend Mothers had stood on the same spot, under the same sun, discussing grave matters relevant to their times.

If the two women wished, they could revisit those past crises through Other Memory. The Reverend Mother Anirul Sadow Tonkin made such thought-journeys more than most; each circumstance was just another minor step along the long, long road. Over the past year she had let her bronze-brown hair grow long, until its locks hung down to her narrow chin.

At the base of the knoll a whitecrete building was under construction. Like worker bees, female laborers, each one with an entire blueprint in her mind, operated heavy equipment, preparing to lift roof modules into place. To the rare outside observer, Wallach IX with its Bene Gesserit libraries and schools seemed always the same, but the Sisterhood was ever adapting for survival, ever changing, ever growing.

“They’re working too slowly. I wanted them finished already,” Anirul said, rubbing her forehead; she had been experiencing chronic headaches of late. As Mohiam came closer to term, Anirul’s responsibilities as Kwisatz Mother were tremendous. “Do you realize how few days remain until the baby is due?”

“Blame no one but yourself, Anirul. You demanded that this be no ordinary birthing facility,” Mother Superior Harishka said sternly. The Kwisatz Mother flushed and looked away. “Every Sister knows how important it is. Many of them suspect this is not just another child to be lost in the web of our breeding programs. A few have even been talking about the Kwisatz Haderach.”

Anirul tucked a loose strand of bronze hair behind her ear. Unavoidable. All the Sisters know of our dream, but few suspect how close it is to reality.” She shifted her skirts around her and sat down on the soft grass of the knoll. She gestured toward the construction where the sounds of carpentry rang clear in the air. “Mohiam is due to deliver in a week, Mother Superior. We don’t even have the roof on yet.

“They will finish, Anirul. Calm yourself. Everyone is doing her best to follow your orders.”

Anirul reacted as if slapped, then covered her reaction. Does Reverend Mother see me as an untempered and impetuous girl? Perhaps she had been too insistent with her instructions for the facility, and sometimes Mother Superior looked at her with a certain amount of resentment. Is she jealous that Other Memory chose me to lead such an ambitious program? Does she resent my knowledge?

“I’m not as young as you’re treating me,” Anirul said, against the better judgment of the voices. Very few of the Bene Gesserit had the weight of history inside them the way she did. Very few knew all of the machinations, every step of the Kwisatz Haderach program, every failure or success over the millennia, every deviation in the plan, for more than ninety generations. “I have the knowledge to succeed.”

Mother Superior frowned at her. “Then put more faith in our Mohiam. She’s delivered nine daughters for the Sisterhood already. I trust her to control the exact moment at which she chooses to give birth, even to delay her labor if necessary.” A scrap of brittle hair blew out of its prim containment and feathered across the old woman’s cheek. “Her role in this is more important than any birthing facility.”

Anirul challenged the chastising tone. “True. And we must not have another failure, like the last.”

Not even a Reverend Mother could master all facets of embryonic development. Through her internal processes she could set her own metabolism, but not the metabolism of the child. Selecting her baby’s sex was an adjustment of the mother’s chemistry, choosing the precise egg and sperm to unite. But once the zygote started growing in the womb, the offspring was effectively on its own, beginning a process of growing away from the mother.

Anirul said, “I can feel that this daughter will be vital, a crux point.”

A loud thump sounded below, and Anirul grimaced. One of the roof sections had tumbled into the interior of the building, and the Sister workers rushed about to correct the mistake.

Mother Superior uttered a profanity.

THROUGH HERCULEAN EFFORTS the birthing facility was completed, on time, while Kwisatz Mother Anirul marched back and forth. Only hours before the scheduled birth, construction workers and robos put on the finishing touches. Medical equipment was brought in and connected. Glowglobes, beds, blankets … even a warm blaze in the archaic wood-burning fireplace Mohiam had requested.

As Anirul and Harishka inspected the job, still smelling of dust and construction materials, they paused to watch the noisy entrance of a motorized gurney bearing an enormously pregnant Gaius Helen Mohiam. She was alert and sitting up, already experiencing increased contractions. Reverend Mothers and white-smocked medical attendants escorted her in, clucking excitedly like hens.

“This was too close, Mother Superior,” Anirul said. “I don’t appreciate additional stress points in an already-complex task.”

“Agreed,” said Harishka. “The Sisters will be reprimanded for their lethargy. Though, if your designs had been less ambitious …” She let the thought hang in the air.

Ignoring Mother Superior, Anirul noted the trim and decoration of the room, with its intricate ivory and pearl inlays and ornate wood carvings. Perhaps she should have had them concentrate more on functionality than on extravagance … .

Harishka crossed her thin arms over her chest. “The design of this new facility is similar to what we had before. Was it really necessary?”

“This is not similar at all,” Anirul said. Her face flushed, and she washed the defensive tone out of her words. “The old birthing room simply wasn’t functional anymore.”

Mother Superior gave a condescending smile; she understood the need for an untainted building, with no old memories, no ghosts. “Anirul, through our Missionaria Protectiva we manipulate the superstitions of backward peoples … but we Sisters aren’t supposed to be superstitious ourselves.”

Anirul took the comment with good humor. “I assure you, Mother Superior, such conjecture is preposterous.”

The older woman’s almond eyes glittered. “Other Sisters are saying you thought the old birthing room had a curse on it, which caused the first child’s deformities … and its mysterious death.”

Anirul drew herself up straight. “This is hardly the proper time to discuss such a thing, Mother Superior.” She scanned the frantic preparations: Mohiam placed on the birthing bed, Sisters gathering warm karthan-weave towels, liquids, pads. An incubator chamber blinked with monitors on the wall. First-ranked midwives bustled around, preparing for unforeseen complications.

On her gurney, Mohiam looked entirely composed now, her thoughts turned inward, meditating. But Anirul noticed how old she appeared, as if the last shreds of youth had been drained from her.

Harishka placed a sinewy hand on Anirul’s forearm in a sudden and surprising display of closeness. “We all have our primal superstitions, but we must master them. For now, worry about nothing except this child. The Sisterhood needs a healthy daughter, with a powerful future.”

Medical personnel checked equipment and took up their positions around Mohiam, who reclined on a bed, inhaling deeply; her cheeks flushed red with exertion. Two of the midwives propped her up in the ages-old delivery position. The pregnant woman began to hum to herself, allowing only a flicker of discomfort to cross her face as she experienced increasingly severe contractions.

Standing aloof, yet sharply observant, Anirul considered what Mother Superior had just told her. Secretly, Anirul had consulted a Feng Shui master about the old birthing facility. A withered old man with Terrasian features, he was a practitioner of an ancient Zensunni philosophy which held that architecture, furniture placement, and maximum utilization of color and light all worked to promote the well-being of a facility’s inhabitants. With a sage nod, he declared that the old facility had been set up incorrectly, and showed Anirul what needed to be done. They’d had only a month before the expected delivery date, and the Kwisatz Mother had had not a moment to lose.

Now as she observed the abundance of light flowing down upon Mohiam’s bed from actual windows and skylights, rather than from clusters of artificial glowglobes, Anirul assured herself she hadn’t been “superstitious.” Feng Shui was about aligning oneself properly with Nature and being intensely aware of one’s surroundings — a philosophy that was, ultimately, very much in the Bene Gesserit way of thinking.

Too much rode on this single birth. If there was a chance, even a small one, Anirul wanted no part in denying it. Using the power of her position, she had demanded a new birthing facility, built according to the Feng Shui master’s recommendations. Then she’d sent the old man away, letting the other Sisters believe he had merely been a visiting gardener.

Now she glided closer to Mohiam’s bed, looking down at her patient as the time neared. Anirul hoped the old man was right. This daughter was their last, best chance.

IT HAPPENED QUICKLY, the moment Mohiam set her mind to it. A baby’s insistent crying filled the chamber, and Anirul lifted a perfect girl-child in the air for Mother Superior to see. Even the voices in Other Memory cheered at the victory. Everyone beamed triumphantly, delighted with the long-anticipated birth. Agitated, the child kicked and flailed.

Sisters toweled off infant and mother, giving Mohiam a long drink of juice to restore her body fluids. Anirul handed the baby to her. Still breathing hard from the exertion of the delivery, Mohiam took the girl and looked at her, allowing an uncharacteristically proud smile to cross her face.

“This child shall be named Jessica, meaning ‘wealth,’ ” Mohiam announced proudly, still panting. When other Sisters moved away, Mohiam stared at Anirul and Harishka, who stood close to her. In a directed whisper that only they could hear, she said, “I know this child is part of the Kwisatz Haderach program. The voices in Other Memory have told me. I have seen a vision, and I know the terrible future if we fail with her.”

Anirul and Mother Superior exchanged uneasy glances. In a whisper Harishka responded, looking sidelong as if hoping the spontaneous revelation might weaken the Kwisatz Mother’s hold over the program. “You are commanded to secrecy. Your child is to be the grandmother of the Kwisatz Haderach.”

“I suspected as much.” Mohiam sank back on her pillow to consider the immensity of this revelation. “So soon…”

Outside the building, clapping and cheering rang out as news of the birth passed quickly around the training areas. Balconies above the library enclaves and discussion chambers overflowed with acolytes and teachers celebrating the felicitous event, though only a handful knew the full significance of this child in the breeding program.

Gaius Helen Mohiam gave the child to the midwives, refusing to form any sort of parental bond that was forbidden by the Bene Gesserit. Though she maintained her composure, she felt drawn, bone-weary, and old. This Jessica was her tenth daughter for the Sisterhood, and she hoped her childbearing duties were now at an end. She looked at young Reverend Mother Anirul Sadow Tonkin. How could she do better than she had already done? Jessica … their future.

I am indeed fortunate to participate in this moment, Anirul thought as she looked down at the exhausted new mother. It struck her as odd that of all the Sisters who had worked toward this goal for thousands of years, of all those who now watched eagerly in Other Memory, she was the one to supervise the birth of Jessica. Anirul herself would guide this child through years of training toward the critically important sexual union she must have, to carry the breeding program to its penultimate step.

Wrapped in a blanket, the baby girl had finally stopped crying and lay peacefully in the sheltering warmth of its enclosed bed.

Squinting down through the protective plaz, Anirul tried to imagine what this Jessica would look like as a grown woman. She envisioned the baby’s face elongating and thinning, and could visualize a tall lady of great beauty, with the regal features of her father Baron Harkonnen, generous lips, and smooth skin. The Baron would never meet his daughter or know her name, for this would be one of the most closely guarded secrets of the Bene Gesserit.

One day, when Jessica was of age, she would be commanded to bear a daughter, and that child must be introduced to the son of Abulurd Harkonnen, the Baron’s youngest demibrother. At the moment Abulurd and his wife had only one son, Rabban-but Anirul had set in motion a means of suggesting that they have more. This would improve the odds of one male surviving to maturity; it would also improve the gene selection, and improve the odds of good sexual timing.

A vast jigsaw puzzle remained apparent to Anirul, each of its pieces a separate event in the incredible Bene Gesserit breeding program. Only a few more components needed to slip into place now, and the Kwisatz Haderach would become a reality in flesh and blood — the all-powerful male who could bridge space and time, the ultimate tool to be wielded by the Bene Gesserit.

Anirul wondered now, as she often had without daring to speak of it, if such a man could cause the Bene Gesserit to once again find genuine religious fervor, like the fanaticism of the crusading Butler family. What if he made others revere him as a god?

Imagine that, she thought. The Bene Gesserit — who used religion only to manipulate others — ensnared by their own messianic leader. She doubted that could ever happen.

Reverend Mother Anirul went out to celebrate with her Sisters.

The surest way to keep a secret is to make people believe they already know the answer.

-Ancient Fremen Wisdom

Umma Kynes, you have accomplished much,” said one-eyed Heinar as the two men sat on a rocky promontory above their sietch. The Naib treated him as an equal now, even with overblown respect. Kynes had stopped bothering to argue with the desert people every time they called him “Umma,” their word for “prophet.”

He and Heinar watched the coppery sunset spill across the sweeping dunefield of the Great Erg. Far in the distance, a fuzzy haze hung on the horizon, the last remnants of a sandstorm that had passed the previous day.

Powerful winds had washed the dunes clean, scrubbed their surfaces, recontoured the landscape. Kynes relaxed against the rough rock, sipping from a pungent cup of spice coffee.

Seeing her husband about to go above ground, outside the sietch, a pregnant Frieth had hurried after the two men as they waited to bid the sun farewell for another day. An elaborate brass coffee service sat between them on a flat stone. Frieth had brought it, along with a selection of the crunchy sesame cakes Kynes loved so well. By the time he remembered to thank her for her kind attentiveness, Frieth had already vanished like a shadow back into the caves.

After a long moment, Kynes nodded distractedly at the Naib’s comment. “Yes, I’ve accomplished much, but I still have plenty to do.” He thought of the remarkably complex plans required to complete his dream of a reborn Dune, a planetary name little known in the Imperium.

Imperium. He rarely thought of the old Emperor now — his own priorities, the emphasis of his life, had changed so greatly. Kynes could never go back to being a mere Imperial Planetologist, not after all he’d been through with these desert people.

Heinar clasped his friend’s wrist. “It is said that sunset is a time for reflection and assessment, my friend. Let us look to what we have done, rather than permit the empty gulf of the future to overwhelm us. You have been on this planet for only a little more than a year, yet already you have found a new tribe, a new wife.” Heinar smiled. “And soon you will have a new child, a son perhaps.”

Kynes returned the smile wistfully. Frieth was nearly through her gestation period. He was somewhat surprised that the pregnancy had happened at all, since he was gone so frequently. He still wasn’t certain how to react to his impending role as a first-time father. He had never thought about it before.

However, the birth would fit in neatly with the overall plan he had for this astounding planet. His child, growing up to lead the Fremen long after Kynes himself was gone, could help continue their efforts. The master plan was designed to take centuries.

As a Planetologist, he had to think in the long term, something the Fremen were not in the habit of doing — though, given their long, troubled past, they should have been accustomed to it. The desert people had an oral history going back thousands of years, tales told in the sietch describing their endless wanderings from planet to planet, a people enslaved and persecuted, until finally they had made a home here where no one else could bear to live.

The Fremen way was a conservative one, little changed from generation to generation, and these people were not used to considering the broad scope of progress. Assuming their environment could not be adapted, they remained its prisoners, rather than its masters.

Kynes hoped to change all that. He had mapped out his great plan, including rough timetables for plantings and the accumulation of water, milestones for each successive achievement. Hectare by hectare, Dune would be rescued from the wasteland.

His Fremen teams were scouring the surface, taking core samples from the Great Bled, geological specimens from the Minor Erg and the Funeral Plain — but many terraforming factors still remained unknown variables.

Pieces fell into place daily. When he expressed a desire for better maps of the planet’s surface, he was astonished to learn that the Fremen already had detailed topographical charts, even climatic surveys. “Why is it that I couldn’t get these before?” Kynes said. “I was the Imperial Planetologist, and the maps I received from satellite cartography were woefully inaccurate.”

Old Heinar had smiled at him, squinting his one eye. “We pay a substantial bribe to the Spacing Guild to keep them from watching us too closely. The cost is high, but the Fremen are free — and the Harkonnens remain in the dark, along with the rest of the Imperium.”

Kynes was astonished at first, then simply pleased, to have much of the geographical information he needed. Immediately he dispatched traders to deal with smugglers and obtain genetically engineered seeds of vigorous desert plants. He had to design and build an entire ecosystem from scratch.

In large council meetings, the Fremen asked their new “prophet” what the next step might be, how long each process would take, when Dune would become green and lush. Kynes had tallied up his estimates and calmly looked down at the number. In the manner of a teacher answering a child who has asked an absurdly simple question, Kynes shrugged and told them, “It will take anywhere from three hundred to five hundred years. Maybe a little more.”

Some of the Fremen bit back groans of despair, while the rest listened stoically to the Umma, and then set about doing what he asked. Three hundred to five hundred years. Long-term thinking, beyond their personal lifetimes. The Fremen had to alter their ways.

Seeing a vision from God, the would-be assassin Uliet had sacrificed himself for this man. From that moment on, the Fremen had been fully convinced of Kynes’s divine inspiration. He had only to point, and any Fremen in the sietch would do as he bid.

The feeling of power might have been abused by any other person. But Pardot Kynes simply took it in stride and continued his work. He envisioned the future in terms of eons and worlds, not in terms of individuals or small plots of land.

Now, as the sun vanished below the sands in a brassy symphony of color, Kynes drained the last drops of his spice coffee, then wiped a forearm across his sandy beard. Despite what Heinar had said, he found it difficult to reflect patiently on the past year … the demands of the labors for centuries to come seemed so much more significant, so much more demanding of his attention.

“Heinar, how many Fremen are there?” he asked, staring across the serene open desert. He’d heard tales of many other sietches, had seen isolated Fremen in the Harkonnen towns and villages … but they seemed like the ghosts of an endangered species. “How many in the whole world?”

“Do you wish us to count our numbers, Umma Kynes?” Heinar asked, not in disbelief, simply clarifying an order.

“I need to know your population if I’m to project our terraforming activities. I must understand just how many workers we have available.”

Heinar stood up. “It shall be done. We shall number our sietches, and rally the people in them. I will send sandriders and distrans bats to all the communities, and we shall have an accounting for you soon.”

“Thank you.” Kynes picked up his cup, but before he could gather the dishes himself, Frieth rushed out of the cave shadows — she must have been waiting there for them to finish — and gathered up the pieces of the coffee service. Her pregnancy hadn’t slowed her down at all.

The first Fremen census, Kynes thought. A momentous occasion.

BRIGHT-EYED AND EAGER, Stilgar came to Kynes’s cavern quarters the next morning. “We are packing for your long journey, Umma Kynes. Far to the south. We have important things to show you.”

Since his recovery from the Harkonnen knife wound, Stilgar had become one of Kynes’s most devoted followers. He seemed to draw status from his relationship with the Planetologist, his brother-in-law. Stilgar served not for himself, though, but for the greater good of the Fremen.

“How long will the journey be?” Kynes inquired. “And where are we going?”

The young man’s grin sparkled, a broad display of white. “A surprise! This is something you must see, or you may not believe. Think of it as a gift from us to you.”

Curious, Kynes looked over at his work alcove. He would bring along his notes to document this journey. “But how long will it take?”

“Twenty thumpers,” Stilgar answered in the terminology of the deep desert, then called over his shoulder as he left, “Far to the south.”

Kynes’s wife Frieth, now enormously pregnant, nevertheless spent long hours working the looms and the stillsuit-repair benches. This morning Kynes finished his coffee and breakfasted at her side, though they spoke little to each other. Frieth simply watched him, and he felt he didn’t understand a thing.

Fremen women seemed to have their own separate world, their own place in the society of these desert dwellers, with no connection to the interaction Kynes had found elsewhere in the Imperium. It was said, though, that Fremen women were among the most vicious of fighters on the battlefield, and that if an enemy were left wounded and at the mercy of these ferocious women, he would be better served to kill himself outright.

Then, too, there was the unanswered mystery of the Sayyadinas, the holy women of the sietch. Thus far Kynes had seen only one of their number, dressed in a long black robe like that of a Bene Gesserit Reverend Mother — and no Fremen seemed willing to tell him much about them. Different worlds, different mysteries.

Someday, Kynes thought it might be interesting to compile a sociological study of how different cultures reacted and adapted to extreme environments. He wondered what the harsh realities of a world could do to the natural instincts and traditional roles of the sexes. But he already had too much work to do. Besides, he was a Planetologist, not a sociologist.

Finishing his meal, Kynes leaned forward and kissed his Fremen wife. Smiling, he patted her rounded belly beneath her robes. “Stilgar says I must accompany him on a journey. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“How long?” she inquired, thinking of the baby’s impending birth. Apparently Kynes, obsessed with his long view of events on this planet, had not noted his own child’s expected due date and had forgotten to allow for it in his plans.

“Twenty thumpers,” he said, though he wasn’t exactly certain how much distance that meant.

Frieth raised her eyebrows in quiet surprise, then lowered her gaze and began to clean up their breakfast dishes. “Even the longest journey may pass more quickly when the heart is content.” Her tone betrayed only the slightest disappointment. “I shall await your return, my husband.” She hesitated, then said, “Choose a good worm.”

Kynes didn’t know what she meant.

Moments later, Stilgar and eighteen other young Fremen decked out in full desert garb led Kynes through the tortuous passages down and out of the barrier mountain and onto the enormous western sea of sands. Kynes felt a pang of worry. The parched expanse seemed too far and too dangerous. Now he was glad he wasn’t alone.

“We’re going across the equator and below, Umma Kynes, to where we Fremen have other lands, our own secret projects. You shall see.”

Kynes’s eyes widened; he had heard only grim and terrible stories about the uninhabitable southern regions. He stared into the forbidding distance as Stilgar rapidly checked over the Planetologist’s stillsuit, tightening fastenings and adjusting filters to his own satisfaction. “But how will we travel?” He knew the sietch had its own ornithopter, just a skimmer actually, not nearly large enough to carry so many people.

Stilgar looked at him with an expectant expression. “We shall ride, Umma Kynes.” He nodded toward the youth who had long ago taken a wounded Stilgar back to the sietch in Kynes’s groundcar. “Ommun will become a sandrider this day. It is a great event among our people.”

“I’m sure it is,” Kynes said, his curiosity piqued.

In their desert-stained robes the Fremen marched out across the sand, walking single file. Beneath the robes they wore stillsuits, and on their feet temag desert boots. Their indigo-blue eyes gazed out of the far past.

One dark figure raced forward along a dune crest several hundred meters ahead of the rest of his group. There he took a long dark stake and shoved it into the sand, tinkering with controls until finally Kynes could hear the reverberating thump of repetitive pounding.

Kynes had already seen such a thing during Glossu Rabban’s ultimately frustrating worm hunt. “He’s trying to make a worm come?”

Stilgar nodded. “If God wishes.”

Kneeling on the sands, Ommun removed a cloth-wrapped bundle of tools. These he sorted and laid out neatly. Long iron hooks, sharp loads, and coils of rope.

“Now what is he doing?” Kynes asked.

The thumper pounded its rhythm into the sand. The Fremen troop waited, carrying packs and supplies.

“Come. We must be ready for the arrival of Shai-Hulud,” Stilgar said, nudging the Planetologist to follow as they trudged into position on the sun-drenched dunes. The Fremen whispered among themselves

Presently Kynes detected what he had experienced only once before, the unforgettable hissing, rushing roar of a sandworm’s approach as it was drawn inexorably to the throb of the thumper.

On top of the dune Ommun crouched, grasping his hooks and goads. Long curls of rope hung at his waist. He remained perfectly motionless. His Fremen brethren waited on the crest of a nearby dune.

“There! Do you see it?” Stilgar said, hardly able to suppress his excitement. He pointed off to the south where the sand rippled as if a subterranean warship were heading straight for the thumper.

Kynes didn’t know what was going on. Did Ommun intend to battle the great beast? Some sort of a ceremony or sacrifice before their long journey across the desert?

“Be ready,” Stilgar said and grasped Kynes’s arm. “We will help you in every way we can.”

Before the Planetologist could ask another question, a roaring vortex of sand formed around the thumper. Alert and battle-ready, Ommun skittered back, crouching down, ready to spring.

Then the enormous mouth of the sandworm emerged from the depths and engulfed the thumper. The monster’s broad-ringed back rose out of the desert.

Ommun sprinted, running with all his might to keep pace with the moving worm, but he wallowed in the loose sand. Then he sprang, onto the arched, segmented back using the hooks and claws to haul himself atop one of the worm segments.

Kynes stared in awe, unable to organize his thoughts or comprehend what the daring young man was doing. This can’t be happening, he thought. It’s not possible.

Ommun dug one of his scooplike hooks into the crevice between worm segments and then yanked hard, separating the well-protected rings and exposing pinkish flesh underneath.

The worm rolled to keep its sensitive exposed segment away from the abrasive sands. Ommun scrambled up and planted another hook, spreading wide a second segment so that the worm was forced to rise higher out of its secret world beneath the desert. At the highest point on the worm’s back, behind its huge head, the young Fremen planted a stake and dropped his long ropes so that they hung from the sides. Now he stood tall and proud on the worm, signaling for the others to come.

Cheering, the Fremen ran forward, bringing Kynes with them. He stumbled to keep up. Three other young men scaled the ropes, adding more of what they called “maker hooks” to keep the worm above the dunes. The big creature began to move forward, but in a confused fashion, as if unable to understand why these bothersome creatures were goading it.

As the Fremen kept pace, they tossed up supplies; packs were lashed to the worm’s back with more ropes. The first riders assembled a small structure as fast as they could. Prodded by Stilgar, an astonished Kynes ran up beside the towering worm. The Planetologist could feel friction heat rising from beneath, and he tried to imagine what awesome chemical fires formed a furnace deep within the worm itself.

“Up you go, Umma Kynes!” Stilgar shouted, helping him place his feet into loops in the ropes. Clumsily, Kynes scrambled up, his desert boots finding purchase on the worm’s rough hide. He climbed and climbed. The simmering energy of Shai-Hulud caused him to lose his breath, but Stilgar helped him to the top where the other Fremen riders had gathered.

They had assembled a crude platform and seat for him, a palanquin. The other Fremen stood, holding their ropes against the enormous worm as if it were a bucking steed. Gratefully, Kynes took the proffered seat and held on to the arms. He had a disconcerting feeling up here, as if he didn’t belong and could easily be toppled off and crushed to death. The rolling movement of the worm made his stomach lurch.

“Normally such seats are reserved for our Sayyadinas,” Stilgar said. “But we know you do not have the training to ride Shai-Hulud, and so this shall be a place of honor for our prophet. There is no shame in it.”

Kynes nodded distractedly and looked ahead. The other Fremen congratulated Ommun, who had successfully completed this important rite of passage. He was now a respected sandrider, a true man of the sietch.

Ommun pulled on the ropes and hooks, guiding the worm. “Haiiii-Yoh!” The huge sinuous creature raced across the sands, heading south … .

KYNES RODE ALL that day, with the dry, dusty wind blowing in his face and sunlight reflecting off the sands. He had no way of estimating the speed at which the worm cruised, but he knew it must be astonishing.

As the hot breezes whipped around him, he could smell freshets of oxygen and the flinty burned-stone odors of the worm’s passage. In the absence of extensive plant cover on Dune, the Planetologist realized the worms themselves must generate much of the atmospheric oxygen.

It was all Kynes could do to hold on to his palanquin. He had no way to access his notes and records in the pack on his back. What a magnificent report this would make — though he knew in his heart he could never give such information to the Emperor. No one but the Fremen knew this secret, and it must remain that way. We are actually riding a worm! He had other obligations now, new and far more important allegiances.

Centuries earlier, the Imperium had placed biological testing stations at strategic points on the surface of Dune, but such facilities had fallen into disrepair. In recent months Kynes had been reopening them, using a few Imperial troops assigned to the planet just to maintain appearances; for the most part, though, he staffed them with his own Fremen. He was amazed at the ability of his sietch brothers to infiltrate the system, find things for themselves, and employ technology. They were a marvelously adaptable breed — and adapting was the only way to survive on a place like Dune.

Under Kynes’s direction the Fremen workers stripped equipment from the isolated biological stations, took necessary items back to their sietches, and filled out paperwork to report the pieces as lost or damaged; the oblivious Imperium then replaced the losses with new instruments so that the station monitors could continue their work … .

After hours of rapid travel across the Great Flat, the enormous worm became sluggish, exhibiting obvious fatigue, and Ommun had difficulty exerting control. The worm showed signs of wanting to bury itself beneath the sand, increasingly willing to risk abrading its sensitive, exposed tissue.

Finally Ommun brought the behemoth around until it ground to a halt, exhausted. The troop of desert men dropped off while Kynes slid down the rough worm segments onto loose sand. Ommun tossed down the remaining packs and dismounted, letting the worm — too utterly tired to turn and attack them — wallow its way into the sands. The Fremen removed the hooks so the worm, their Shai-Hulud, could recover.

The men sprinted to a line of rock, where there would be caves and shelter, and — Kynes was surprised to see — a small sietch that welcomed them for the night with food and conversation. Word of the Planetologist’s dream had spread to all the secret places across Dune, and the sietch leader there told them it was his great honor to host Umma Kynes.

The next day the group set off again on another sandworm, and another. Kynes soon gained a more complete understanding of what Stilgar had meant with his assessment of a “twenty-thumper” journey.

The wind was fresh, and the sand was bright, and the Fremen took enormous pleasure in their grand adventure. Kynes sat atop his palanquin like an emperor himself, looking out over the desertscape. For him the dunes were endlessly fascinating, and yet strangely the same at so many latitudes.

Near Heinar’s sietch a month earlier, Kynes had flown alone in his small Imperial ornithopter, exploring aimlessly. He had been blown off course by a small storm. He’d held control, even against the gusting winds, but he had been awestruck to look down upon the open sands where the storm had scoured clean a flat white basin — a salt pan.

Kynes had seen such things before, but never here on Dune. The geological formation looked like a white mirrored oval, marking the boundaries of what had once been an open sea thousands of years ago. By his estimate, the pan was three hundred kilometers long. It thrilled him to imagine that in the past, this basin might have been a large inland ocean.

Kynes had landed the ‘thopter and stepped out in his stillsuit, ducking low and squinting into the blowing dust. He knelt and dug his fingers into the powdery white surface. He tasted his fingertip to confirm what he’d suspected. Bitter salt. Now he could have no doubt that there had once been open water on this world. But for some reason it had all disappeared.

As successive sandworms took them below the equator and into the deep southern portion of the wasteland planet, Kynes saw many other such things to remind him of his discovery: glinting depressions that might have been the remnants of ancient lakes, other open water. He mentioned these things to his Fremen guides, but they could explain them only by myths and legends that made no scientific sense. His fellow travelers seemed more intent on their destination.

Finally, after exhausting and long days, they left the last worm behind. The Fremen pushed on into the rocky landscapes of the deep southern regions of Dune, near the antarctic circle where the great Shai-Hulud refused to travel. Though a few water merchants had explored the northern ice caps, the lower latitudes remained primarily uninhabited, avoided, shrouded in mystery. No one came here — except for these Fremen.

Growing more and more excited, the troop walked for a day over gravelly ground, until finally Kynes saw what they had been so eager to show him. Here, the Fremen had created and tended a vast treasure.

Not far from the diminutive polar ice cap in a region where he had been told the weather was too cold and inhospitable for habitation, the Fremen of various sietches had set up a secret camp. Following the length of a wash, they entered a rugged canyon. The floor was composed of stones rounded from long-ago running water. The air was chilly, but warmer than he had ever expected so deep in the antarctic circle.

From a sheer cliff overhead where ice and cold winds at the top gave way to warmer air in the depths, water actually trickled from cracks in the rock-and ran seasonally along the length of the wash they had followed to get there. The Fremen teams had cleverly installed solar mirrors and magnifiers in the cliff walls to warm the air and melt frost from the ground. And there, in the rocky soil, they had nurtured plants.

Kynes was speechless. It was his dream, before his very eyes!

He wondered if the source could be water from hot springs, but upon touching it he found it to be cool. He tasted, and found it not sulfurous but refreshing — easily the best he had drunk since coming to Dune. Pure water, not recycled a thousand times through filters and stillsuits.

“Behold our secret, Umma Kynes,” Stilgar said. “We have done all this in less than a year.”

Tufts of hardy grass grew in moist patches on the floor of the arroyo, bright desert sunflowers, even the low, creeping vines of a tough gourd plant. But most amazing of all, Kynes saw rows of stunted young date palms, clinging to life, sucking up the moisture that found its way through cracks in the porous rock and seeped up from a water table beneath the canyon floor.

“Palm trees!” he said. “You’ve already begun.”

“Yes, Umma.” Stilgar nodded. “We can see a glimpse of Dune’s future here. As you promised us, it can be done. Fremen from all across the world have already begun your tasks of scattering grasses on the downwind sides of the dunes to anchor them.”

Kynes beamed. So, they had been listening to him after all! Those scattered grasses would spread out their webwork of roots, retaining water, stabilizing the dunes. With equipment stolen from the biological testing stations, the Fremen could continue their work of cutting catchbasins, erecting windstills, and finding other means to grasp every droplet of water borne on the wind … .

His group remained in the sheltered canyon for several days, and Kynes felt giddy with what he saw there. As they camped and slept and walked among the palmaries, Fremen from other sietches came at intervals. This place seemed to be a new gathering point for the hidden people. Emissaries arrived to gaze with awe upon the palm trees and plants growing in the open air, upon the faint smear of moisture oozing from the rocks.

One evening a single sandrider came trudging in carrying his gear, looking for Umma Kynes. Breathless, the newly arrived traveler lowered his eyes, as if he didn’t want to meet the Planetologist’s gaze.

“At your command, our numbering has been completed,” he announced. “We have received word from all the sietches, and we now know how many Fremen there are.”

“Good,” Kynes said, smiling. “I need an approximate number so I can plan for our work.” Then he waited expectantly.

The young man looked up and stared at him directly with blue-in-blue eyes. “The sietches are counted in excess of five hundred.”

Kynes drew a quick breath. Far more than he had suspected!

“And the number of actual Fremen on Dune is approximately ten million. Would you like me to compile the exact numbers, Umma Kynes?”

Kynes staggered backward with a gasp. Incredible! The Imperial estimates and the Harkonnen reports had implied mere hundreds of thousands, a million at the very most.

“Ten million!” He hugged the astonished young Fremen messenger. So many willing workers. With such an army of laborers, we can indeed remake an entire planet!

The messenger beamed and stepped back, bowing at the honor the Planetologist had shown him.

“And there is more news, Umma Kynes,” the man said. “I’ve been instructed to tell you that your wife Frieth has given birth to a strong young son who is sure to be the pride of his sietch one day.”

Kynes gasped and didn’t know what to say. He was a father! He looked at Ommun and Stilgar and the members of his exploration team. The Fremen raised their hands and shouted congratulations to him. He had not let it penetrate through his consciousness until now, but he felt a flood of pride washing over his surprise.

Considering his personal blessing, Kynes looked at the palm trees, at the growing grasses and flowers, and then up at the narrow slice of blue sky framed by canyon walls. Frieth had given birth to a son!

“And now the Fremen number ten million and one,” he said.

Hatred is as dangerous an emotion as love. The capacity for either one is the capacity for its opposite.

-Cautionary Instructions for the Sisterhood, Bene Gesserit Archives, Wallach IX

The two dim suns of the Kuentsing binary system shone through the murky skies of Bela Tegeuse. The blood-red nearer sun imparted a purplish cast to the afternoon sky, while the icy-white primary — too distant to add much heat or light — hovered like an illuminated hole in the twilit heavens. A scrubby-surfaced and unappealing planet, it was not on any of the main Guild transspace routes, and Heighliners didn’t often stop here.

In this dismal place, the Lady supervised her above-ground gardens and tried to remind herself that this was her temporary home. Even after the better part of a year, she felt herself a stranger here.

She stared into the cold gloom and across the agricultural fields at her hired local workers. Under a false name, she had used some of her remaining hoarded assets to buy a small estate, hoping to live here … and just survive until she could be reunited with the others. Since her desperate flight, she had not seen or heard from them, nor had she let her guard down for an instant. Elrood still lived, and the hunters were still out there.

Flat glowdisks spread full-spectrum light over the fields, pampering the rows of exotic vegetables and fruits that would be sold at a premium to wealthy functionaries.

Beyond the edges of the fields, the native vegetation of Bela Tegeuse was bristly and hardy, not welcoming at all. Kuentsing’s natural sunlight wasn’t bright enough to foster sufficient photosynthesis for the delicate plants in the Lady’s crops.

She felt the brisk cold against her face. Her sensitive skin, once caressed by an Emperor, was now chapped and raw from the harsh elements. But she had vowed to be strong, to adapt and endure. And it would have been so much easier to endure if only she could tell the people she cared about that she was alive and safe. She ached to see them, but didn’t dare make contact, because of the risk to herself and those who had fled with her.

Harvesting machinery clattered along the neat rows of crops, plucking ripe produce. The brilliant glowdisks cast extended shadows like stealthy creatures that prowled the fields. Some of the shaggy hired workers joined in a singsong chant as they moved about gathering crops too fragile for mechanical picking. Suspensor baskets ready for market waited at the pickup station.

Only a few of her most loyal household retainers had been allowed to accompany her here in this new life. She hadn’t wanted any loose ends, no one who could report to Imperial spies — neither had she wanted to put faithful companions in danger.

Only with extreme care did she dare talk with the few familiar people who lived near her on Bela Tegeuse. A handful of furtive conversations, quick glances, and smiles were the most she dared. Comeyes or operatives could be anywhere.

With a carefully laid trail of identity documents, the Lady had become a respectable woman named Lizett, a widow whose fictitious husband — a local merchant and minor official of CHOAM — had left her enough financial resources to run this modest estate.

Her entire existence had altered: no more pampered activities at court, no music, banquets, or receptions, no functions with the Landsraad — not even tedious Council meetings. She simply lived from day to day, remembering old times and longing for them while accepting the reality that this new life might be the best she could ever obtain.

Worst of all, she might never see her loved ones again.

Like an inspector surveying her troops, the Lady walked down the lanes of crops, assessing vermilion spiny fruits that dangled on suspended vines. She had worked hard to memorize the names of the exotic produce she grew. It was important to put up a convincing front, to be able to make idle conversation with anyone and avoid arousing suspicion.

Whenever she appeared outside her manor house, she wore a lovely necklace of Ixian manufacture, a disguised hologenerator. It shrouded her face with a field that distorted her fine features, softened her cheekbones, widened her delicate chin, altered the color of her eyes. She felt safe … enough.

Pausing to look up, she saw a glittering rain of shooting stars near the horizon. Across the dim landscape the lights of ranches and a distant village shimmered. But this was something else entirely. Artificial lights — transports or shuttles?

Bela Tegeuse was not a populous planet. Its fortunes and resources were small, its chief claim to history a dark and bloody one: Long ago, it had been the site of slave colonies, hardy but struggling villages from which slaves were harvested and subsequently planted on other worlds. She felt like a prisoner herself … but at least she had her life and knew her family was safe.

“No matter what, never let your guard down, my love,” her husband had warned as he parted company from her. “Never.”

In this constant state of alert, the Lady noticed the spotlights of three ornithopters as they approached from the distant spaceport. The flying craft cruised low across the flat, parched landscape. They had turned on their full nighttime search beacons, though this was the best daylight Bela Tegeuse could manage, at the height of the double afternoon.

She felt cold fingers wrap around her heart, but nonetheless stood tall and drew her dark blue cloak around her. Her House colors would have been preferable, but she no longer dared even keep such items in her wardrobe.

A voice called from the main house. “Madame Lizett! Someone is coming, and they refuse to answer our hails!”

Turning, she saw the narrow-shouldered figure of Omer, one of her primary assistants from the old days, a man who had accompanied her here, not sure what else to do. Certainly nothing else would be as important or fulfilling, Omer had assured her, and she was grateful for his devotion.

The Lady considered fleeing the approaching ‘thopters, but dismissed the idea. If these intruders were whom she feared they might be, she had no chance of escape. And if her intuition was wrong, she wouldn’t need to run.

The clustered ornithopters arrived overhead, wings fluttering and engines roaring. They set down roughly, indiscriminately, upon her planted fields, knocking her full-spectrum glowdisks out of alignment and crushing crops.

When the doors of the three ships slid open and troops emerged, she knew she was doomed.

In a dreamlike vision, she thought back to a happier time, the arrival of quite different troops. It had been in her younger days at the Imperial Court, when the headiness of being a royal courtesan had begun to fade. The Emperor had spent much time with her for a while, but after his interest waned he had moved on to other concubines. It was to be expected. She hadn’t felt snubbed, since Elrood continued to provide for her.

But then one day, after the rebellion on Ecaz had been crushed, she had watched a victory parade of Imperial fighters marching down the streets of Kaitain. The banners were so bright they made her eyes ache, the uniforms perfect and clean, the men so brave. At the head of the column, she had caught her first glimpse of her future husband, a proud warrior with broad shoulders and a broad grin. Even from a distance, his very presence had dazzled her, and she had felt her passions awaken, seeing him as the greatest among all of the returning soldiers … .

These soldiers arriving today on Bela Tegeuse were different, though — much more frightening in the dress gray-and-black of Sardaukar uniforms.

A Burseg troop commander stepped forward, flashing his rank insignia. With an upward chop of his hand, he signaled for his men to take up their positions.

Maintaining her pretense with only a shred of hope, the Lady strode forward to meet him, chin high. “I am Madame Lizett, the owner of this estate.” Her voice was hard as she scowled over at the destroyed crops. “Do you or your employers intend to make reparations for all the property damage your clumsiness just caused?”

“Shut your mouth!” one of the soldiers snapped, snatching up his lasgun.

Foolish, the Lady thought. I could have been wearing a shield. If so, and if he had fired, this section of Bela Tegeuse would have been obliterated in a pseudoatomic explosion.

The Burseg commander held up his hand to silence the soldier, and she recognized the planned gambit: a brash, uncontrolled soldier to intimidate her, a firm military leader showing the face of reason. Good soldier, bad soldier.

“We are here on Imperial orders,” said the Burseg. “We’re investigating the whereabouts of surviving traitors of a certain renegade House. Through the right of acquisition, we require your cooperation.”

“I am unfamiliar with the legalities,” the Lady said. “But I know nothing of renegades. I’m just a widow trying to run a modest farm here. Allow my attorneys to consult with you. I’ll be happy to cooperate in whatever manner I can, though I’m afraid you’ll be disappointed.”

“We won’t be disappointed,” the brash soldier growled.

Around them, her hired workers had ceased their activities, frozen in place. The Burseg stepped forward and stood directly in front of the Lady, who did not flinch. He studied her face, frowning. She knew her holo-masked appearance did not match what the man expected to see. She stared back at him, meeting his flat gaze.

Before she understood his intention, his hand snatched her Ixian necklace and yanked it away. She felt no different, but she knew her disguise had dissolved.

“That’s more like it,” said the Burseg. “You know nothing of renegades, eh?” He laughed scornfully.

She glared at him. Sardaukar troops continued to file out of the three ‘thopters, taking up positions around her. Some of them burst into her manor house, while others searched the barn, sun-silo, and other outbuildings. Did they expect her to be harboring a major military force? Compared to her accustomed lifestyle, it seemed she could barely afford new clothes and hot food.

Another grim-faced Sardaukar grabbed her arm. She tried to pull away, but he pushed up the sleeve of her cloak and, in a flash, scratched her with a small curette. She gasped, thinking the soldier had poisoned her, but the Sardaukar stood back calmly to analyze the blood sample he had stolen.

“Identity confirmed, sir,” he said, looking over at his Burseg commander. “Lady Shando Vernius of Ix.”

The troops stepped back, but Shando did not move. She knew what was coming.

For over a year, the old Emperor had grown increasingly irrational, his mind failing, his body trembling. Elrood suffered under more delusions than usual, more hatred than one body should have contained. But he remained the Emperor, and his decrees were followed explicitly.

The only question in her mind was whether they would torture her first to acquire information she didn’t have about Dominic’s whereabouts. Or whether they would just finish the job.

Through a side door of the big house, Omer came running, shouting. His black hair was in disarray. He waved a crude hunting weapon he had found in a storage locker. Such a fool, she thought. Brave, dear, and loyal — but nonetheless a fool.

“My Lady!” Omer shouted. “Leave her alone!”

A few of the Sardaukar aimed at him and at the shaggy workers in the field, but most kept their weapons trained on her. She looked up to the sky and thought of her loving husband and children and hoped only that they wouldn’t meet similar ends. Even at this moment she had to admit that, given the choice, she would do it all again. She did not regret the loss in prestige or riches that leaving the royal Court had cost her. Shando had known a love that few members of the nobility had ever experienced.

Poor Roody, she thought with a flash of pity. You never understood that kind of love. As usual, Dominic had been right. In her mind, she saw him again as he was when she had first met the Earl of House Vernius: a handsome young soldier, returned victorious from battle.

Shando raised one hand to touch the vision of Dominic’s face one last time …

Then all the Sardaukar opened fire.

I must rule with eye and claw — as the hawk among lesser birds.

-DUKE PAULUS ATREIDES,