Paul of Dune

among the Fremen he had learned yet another set of skills.

The battle was a long, difficult moment of insanity for him, though his fellow soldiers came to regard him as a Blessed One, a fanatic of fanatics. By the time the fighting ended, the survivors glanced in his direction with awe, as if they believed he was possessed by a holy spirit.

In the smoldering aftermath, he heard wailing voices call, “Muad’Dib, save me! Muad’Dib!” With a start, Paul wondered if someone had recognized him, then realized that the wounded were merely invoking any help they could imagine.

No wonder a hardened Gurney gave no more than lukewarm responses when asked to lead more and more offensives. Planets fell, one after another, and now Paul became aware of the truly heavy toll he had placed on his friend. Affable Gurney, the troubadour warrior whose talent with a baliset was as well known as his skill with a sword. He had made the man an earl of Caladan, then denied him any time to settle there and make a real life. Gurney, I am sorry. And you did not complain for a moment.

As far as he knew, Stilgar still felt that he belonged with his Fremen warriors, but Paul made up his mind to find a new, planetbound assignment for Gurney, a role that might give him a sense of accomplishment, something other than… this. He deserved better.

Paul was covered with blood, and his borrowed uniform was torn, but he had only superficial cuts and scrapes. Suk doctors and scavengers combed the battlefield, tending the injured and harvesting the dead. He saw groups of Tleilaxu moving furtively from one fallen warrior to another, taking the most time with the greatest of the dead fighters. The Tleilaxu had always served as handlers of the dead, but these men seemed to be collecting samples….

Simply one more horror among all the others.

Paul looked up with eyes that were blue-within-blue from spice addiction, but dry of tears. He saw a shaven-headed man, formerly a Fremen but now a priest, a member of the Qizara. The priest seemed to be experiencing a state of rapture. He raised his hands over the clouds of dust and curls of smoke, absorbing the horror of the battlefield that still throbbed in the air. He looked directly at Paul, but did not recognize him. With Paul’s haunted eyes and blood-spattered face, and covered from head to foot with the filth of battle, he wondered if even Chani would know who he was.

“You are blessed by God, protected so that you can continue our holy work,” the priest said to him. He swept his gaze slowly across the battlefield, and a smile appeared on his lips. “Ehknot, behold the invincibility of Muad’Dib.”

Paul did behold, but did not see what the priest saw. And at the moment, no matter what the priest said, he did not feel at all invincible.

2

When negotiating the dangerous waters of the Imperium, it is wise to calculate the odds of various outcomes that might follow important decisions. This is art, not science, but at the most basic level it is a methodical process, and a matter of balance.

— Acolyte’s Manual of the Bene Gesserit

Lady Margot Fenring had not been to the Bene Gesserit home-world in some time, but it had not changed. Sienna tiles still covered the roofs of the sprawling Mother School complex, which surrounded the main buildings that dated back thousands of years. To the Sisterhood, Wallach IX was a ship of constancy floating in a vast and changing cosmic sea.

For all their intense study of human nature and society, the Sisterhood was an extremely conservative organization. “Adapt or die” was a primary Bene Gesserit axiom, though they seemed to have forgotten how to follow it. Margot had gradually come to realize this. As far as she was concerned, they were not her superiors. The unparalleled disaster of Paul Atreides and the almost complete loss of Bene Gesserit political power had eroded her respect for them.

She and her husband had spent years in isolation among the Tleilaxu, raising Marie, developing an overall plan. And now the Mother Superior had summoned her with orders to bring her daughter in “for inspection.”

Since childhood, Lady Margot had been trained to obey the commands of her superiors — commands that had required her to bear the child in the first place — but the Sisterhood might not get the answers they anticipated. Margot came to Wallach IX on her own terms.

She hoped the Sisterhood had no additional breeding plans for her. Yes, Lady Margot looked considerably younger than her years, and her willowy beauty had been enhanced by careful and regular consumption of melange and a regimen of prana-bindu exercises. With good fortune, her seductive appearance and reproductive functions would last for several more decades… and Hasimir was so understanding.

But little Marie should be her culminating achievement. The Sisterhood had to be made to see that.

Margot had commanded the nanny Tonia Obregah-Xo to remain behind in Thalidei, though the woman had obviously expected to accompany them to Wallach IX. Tonia sent regular reports to the Mother School, using clandestine methods that were only too familiar to Margot herself. Once, Lady Margot had intercepted a message to the Sisterhood and had surreptitiously added her own postscript. That had caused rancor among the Bene Gesserits and a change in secret reporting procedures, but Margot had wanted to let them know that she was her own woman, and that she served at her pleasure, not theirs.

Nevertheless, she had agreed to make the journey and let the Reverend Mothers “inspect” five-year-old Marie all they wanted, but the Sisterhood would not control her destiny. Too much was at stake.

Now, she and Count Fenring sat on a garden bench with the girl between them. All of them waiting. Waiting. An obvious and childish game the Sisters were playing. Behind them was the stylized black quartz statue of a kneeling woman: Raquella Berto-Anirul, the founder of the ancient school. Thick rain clouds hung over the school, and the temperature was cool, though not uncomfortable. The courtyard sheltered them from the wind.

Finally, Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam approached with a group of five Sisters, her bird-bright gaze intent on little Marie.

Lady Margot stood. “I have brought my daughter as requested, Reverend Mother.” An automatic response.

Mohiam frowned pointedly at Count Fenring. “We do not often allow males to enter the grounds of the Mother School.”

“Your hospitality is, ahh, noted.” He smiled, keeping a protective hand on the little girl’s shoulder. The Bene Gesserits knew full well that Count Hasimir Fenring was a deadly assassin and master spy himself, so Lady Margot had no doubt that her husband’s presence here caused great consternation among their order.

Hasimir was himself a failed Kwisatz Haderach, a genetic eunuch and a dead end near the finish line of the millennia-long breeding program. But the actual Kwisatz Haderach, Paul Atreides, had backfired on them, with consequences too disastrous to imagine. From this point on, with Marie’s amazing potential, Count Fenring and Lady Margot were perfectly capable of developing and implementing their own dynastic schemes.

Both she and her husband had worked for inept superiors. The failures of Shaddam Corrino IV were not unlike those of the Sisterhood. Through a strange and cruel twist of fate, two immense and foolish courses of action had merged into one another to amplify a horrible result. The human race would be a long time recovering from Muad’Dib.

Reverend Mother Mohiam bent forward, turning her attention to the young girl. “So this is the child.” Reaching out, the old woman passed a hand through the child’s light blonde hair. “I see you have your mother’s lovely features.”

She’s also noticed a similarity to Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, Margot thought.

“And such milky smooth skin.” Mohiam rubbed one of the girl’s forearms. Marie endured the attention in silence. “Like your mother’s.”

Mohiam’s hand went quickly into a pocket of her robe, surreptitiously depositing the hair and skin samples