Paul of Dune

By the time a puffy-eyed military medic arrived with his kit, Gurney’s emergency measures had already brought the young man around. Enno coughed, then rolled over to vomit some of the water he had swallowed. The doctor, after nodding respectfully to Gurney, gave Enno a stimulant and wrapped him with a blanket to keep him from going into shock.

Enno eventually pushed the blanket away and forced himself to sit up. He looked around with glazed eyes. Grinning weakly, he raised a hand and opened his tightly clenched fist to reveal the water-slick gold coin in his palm. “As you ordered, Commander.” He touched his dripping hair with wonder. “Am I alive?”

“You are now” Gurney said. “You’ve been revived.”

“I died… from too much water. Truly, I am blessed with abundance!”

The Fremen recruits began to mutter and whisper with a clear undertone of awe. A drowned Fremen!

Their reaction made Gurney uneasy. These spiritual people were as incomprehensible as they were admirable. Many splinter groups followed Muad’Dib’s religion by borrowing tenets from Fremen mysticism; others participated in water-worshipping cults. Upon learning of this drowning incident, Paul’s bureaucratic priesthood, the Qizarate, could very well choose to make Enno into an inspirational figure.

The trainees stood around the pool, dripping, as though they had all been baptized. They seemed more determined than ever. Gurney knew he’d have no trouble loading the Guild ship with eager, inspired fighters like the best of these men.

The Fremen were ready to set forth and shed blood in the name of Muad’Dib.

3

The universe is an ancient desert, a vast wasteland with only occasional habitable planets as oases. We Fremen, comfortable with deserts, shall now venture into another.

—Stilgar, From the Sietch to the Stars

Shortly after the overthrow of the Padishah Emperor, the armies of Muad’Dib had begun to spread out from Dune like echoes of thunder. Heavily armed legions traveled from one rebellious system to the next, spreading the Truth, consolidating the Imperium for Muad’Dib.

As part of the initial surrender terms, Muad’Dib had appointed Stilgar governor of Arrakis and promised him an additional title as Minister of State, but the Fremen naib had no use for such designations or for the duties associated with them. He was a man of the desert — a leader of brave Fremen warriors, not a soft functionary who sat at a desk.

Aboard a heavily loaded military frigate, Stilgar and the legion under his command were headed for the most important battlefield on his list of assignments. He’d been ordered to take over Kaitain, once the long-standing capital of the Corrino Imperium. Excitement and anticipation flowed through him. This would be the greatest razzia raid in Fremen history.

The tall, rugged man sat at a wide windowport, staring into the Heighliner’s cavernous bay, where row after row of armored frigates hung in separate cradles waiting to be deployed. The immensity of the ship made Stilgar feel small, yet it reinforced his belief in the greatness of Muad’Dib.

Until recently, he had never been off-planet, and he felt both the thrill and fear of exploring the unknown. The great distances he had traveled by sandworm across Dune’s Tanzerouft wasteland were as nothing compared to the sheer vastness separating the stars.

He had seen so many new things since helping assemble the fighters for the Jihad that unusual and astonishing sights seemed almost commonplace. He had learned that most inhabited worlds possessed far more water than Dune, and that their populations were much softer than the Fremen. Stilgar had delivered speeches, inspired men, recruited them for the holy war. Now his best Fremen fighters would seize Kaitain, the jewel in the crown of the fallen Corrino Imperium.

He took a sip of water… not because he was thirsty, but because it was there. How long have I taken water for granted? When did I start drinking water because it is a thing to do, rather than a thing for survival?

For days now, military frigates had been shuttling up to orbital space from the surface of Dune, locking into cradles within the Heighliner’s hold, preparing for departure. Such a battle could not be commenced without thorough, time-consuming preparations. Once the Guild ship was fully loaded, though, the actual foldspace journey would be brief.

Stilgar descended to the open cargo deck of the frigate. Although these military ships had many individual cabins for passengers, his Fremen fighters chose to eat and sleep in the cavelike atmosphere of the large, metal- walled bay. The Fremen soldiers still considered the ship’s standard amenities to be luxuries: ready food supplies, spacious quarters, plentiful water even for bathing, moist air that made stillsuits unnecessary.

Stilgar leaned against a bulkhead and surveyed his people, smelling the familiar odors of spice coffee, food, and close human bodies. Even here in a metal ship in space, he and his men tried to re-create some of the comforting familiarity of sietch life. He scratched his dark beard and looked at the Fremen commandos, who were so anxious to fight that they needed no rousing speech from him.

Many sat reading copies of Irulan’s book, The Life of Muad’Dib, Volume 1, a record of how Paul Atreides had left Caladan to go to Dune, how the evil Harkonnens had killed his father and destroyed his home, how he and his mother had run into the desert to the Fremen, and how he had eventually emerged to become the living legend, Paul-Muad’Dib.

Printed on cheap but durable spice paper, copies of the book were given freely to any citizen who asked, and were included as part of any new soldier’s kit. Irulan had started writing the chronicle even before her father had gone into exile on Salusa Secundus.

Stilgar could not quite fathom the woman’s motives in writing such a story, since he could see she had gotten some of the details wrong, but neither could he deny the effectiveness of the book. Whether propaganda or inspirational religious text, the story of the most powerful man in the galaxy was spreading throughout the planets of the Imperium.

Two young men saw Stilgar and ran up, calling his name. “Will we be departing soon?” asked the younger, who had cowlicks of thick, dark hair that stuck out in all directions.

“Is it true we are going to Kaitain?” The older boy had recently undergone a growth spurt and stood taller than his half brother. These were the sons of Jamis — Orlop and Kaleff — young men who had become the responsibility of Paul Atreides when he killed their father in a knife duel. The two of them held no grudge, and they idolized Paul.

“We fight for Muad’Dib wherever the Jihad takes us.” Stilgar had checked the schedule and knew the Heighliner was due to depart within the hour.

The siblings could barely contain themselves. Around Stilgar, the chatter of gathered fighters on the cargo deck took on a different tone, as he felt a vibration through the hull of the immense Heighliner. The foldspace engines were powering up. Remembering so many raids against the Harkonnens, followed by the adrenaline glow of victory over Shaddam IV, was better than any dose of spice.

In a rush of excitement, Stilgar raised his bearded chin and shouted, “On to Kaitain!”

The fighters cheered resoundingly and stomped their feet on the deck plates, causing so much ruckus that he almost didn’t feel the shifting as space folded around him.

***

THE GUILD VESSEL disgorged thousands of military frigates onto the pampered world that had been the Imperium’s capital for thousands of years. Kaitain could not possibly withstand the onslaught. The warriors of Muad’Dib knew little about Imperial history, and did not revere the museums and monuments to legendary figures: Faykan Butler, Crown Prince Raphael Corrino, Hassik Corrino III. Kaitain had remained in flux since Shaddam’s defeat and exile; noble families of the Landsraad either flooded in to fill the local power vacuum or packed up their embassies and escaped to safer worlds. Those who remained behind tried to claim neutrality, but the Fremen