spokesman (though Uxtal had thought that all of those creatures were identical, like drones in an insect hive). Watching them, scribbling notes, he wondered for the first time if Face Dancers might have their own secret organization, as the Tleilaxu leaders did. No, of course not.
The shape-shifters were bred to be followers, not independent thinkers.
Uxtal paid close attention, remembering not to speak. Later, he would transcribe this meeting and disseminate the information to other Elders of the Lost Tleilaxu. His job was to serve as an assistant; if he performed well enough, he could rise through the ranks, eventually achieving the title of Elder among his people. Could there be a grander dream? To become one of the new Masters!
Elder Burah and the present kehl, or council, represented the Lost Tleilaxu race and their Great Belief. Besides Burah, only six Elders existed—a total of seven, while eight was the holy number. Though he would never speak it aloud, Uxtal felt they should appoint someone else soon, or even promote him, so that the prescribed numbers were in proper balance.
As he surveyed the Face Dancers, Burah's lips pressed together in a petulant frown. 'I demand a report on your progress. What records have you salvaged from the destroyed Tleilaxu worlds? We barely know enough of their technology to continue with the sacred work. Our fallen stepbrothers knew much more than we have recovered. This is not acceptable.'
The placid-looking 'leader' of the Face Dancers smiled in his Guildsman's uniform. He addressed his shape- shifter comrades, as if he hadn't even heard Elder Burah speak. 'I have received our next set of commands. Our primary instructions remain the same. We are to find the no-ship that escaped from Chapterhouse. The search must continue.'
To Uxtal's surprise, the other Face Dancers turned away from Burah, focusing instead on their own spokesman. Flustered, the Elder pounded a small fist on the table. 'An escaped no-ship? What do we care about a no-ship? Who are you—which one? I can never tell you apart, not even by scent.'
The Face Dancer leader looked at Burah and seemed to consider whether or not to answer the question. 'At the moment, I am called Khrone.'
Sitting against the copper-plated wall, Uxtal flicked his gaze from the innocent-looking Face Dancers to Elder Burah. He couldn't grasp the undercurrents here, but he sensed a strange threat. So many things were just slightly beyond the edge of his comprehension.
'Your priority,' Burah doggedly continued, 'is to rediscover how to manufacture melange using axlotl tanks. From old knowledge we took with us into the Scattering, we know how to use the tanks to create gholas—but not to make spice, a technique that our stepbrothers developed during the Famine Times, long after our line of Tleilaxu departed.'
When the Lost Tleilaxu returned from the Scattering, their stepbrothers had accepted them only hesitantly, allowing them back into the fold of their race as no more than second-class citizens. Uxtal didn't think it was fair. But he and his fellow outsiders, all of them prodigal sons according to the original Tleilaxu, accepted the deprecatory comments they received, remembering an important quote from the catechism of the Great Belief: 'Only those who are truly lost can ever hope to find the truth. Trust not in your maps, but in the guidance of God.'
As time passed, the returned Elders came to see that it was not they who were 'lost,' but the original Masters who had strayed from the Great Belief. Only the Lost Tleilaxu—forged in the rigors of the Scattering—had kept the veracity of God's commands, while the heretical ones wallowed in delusions. Eventually, the Lost Tleilaxu had realized that they would have to reeducate their misguided brothers, or remove them. Uxtal understood, having been told so many times, that the Lost Tleilaxu were far superior.
The original Masters were a suspicious lot, however, and they had never entirely trusted outsiders, not even outsiders of their own race. In this case, their problematic paranoia had not been misguided, for the Lost Tleilaxu were indeed in league with the Honored Matres. They used the terrible women as tools for reasserting the Great Belief upon their complacent stepbrothers. The whores had wiped out the original Tleilaxu worlds, eliminating every last original Master (a more extreme reaction than Uxtal had anticipated). Victory should have been simple enough to achieve.
During this meeting, however, Khrone and his fellows were not acting as expected. In the copper-walled chamber, Uxtal noticed subtle changes in their demeanor, and he saw the concern on Elder Burah's face.
'Our priorities are different from yours,' Khrone said baldly.
Uxtal stifled a gasp. Burah was so displeased that his grayish expression turned a bruised purple. 'Different priorities? How could any orders supersede mine, an Elder of the Tleilaxu?' He laughed with a sound like dull metal scraped across slate. 'Oh, now I remember that silly story! Do you mean your mysterious old man and old woman who communicate with you from afar?'
'Yes,' Khrone said. 'According to their projections, the escaped no-ship holds something or someone supremely important to them. We must find it, capture it, and deliver it to them.'
Uxtal found this all so incomprehensible that he had to speak up. 'What old man and old woman?' No one ever told him the things he needed to know. Burah glanced dismissively at his assistant. 'Face Dancer delusions.'
Khrone looked down at the Elder as if he were a maggot. 'Their projections are infallible. Aboard that no-ship is, or will be, the necessary fulcrum to influence the battle at the end of the universe. That takes precedence over your need for a convenient source of spice.'
'But… but how do they know this?' Uxtal asked, surprised that he was finding the nerve to speak. 'Is it a prophecy?' He tried to imagine a numerical code that might apply, one buried in the sacred writings.
Burah snapped at him. 'Prophecy, prescience, or some sort of bizarre mathematical projection — it does not matter!'
As Khrone stood, he seemed to grow taller. 'On the contrary, you do not matter.' He turned to his fellow Face Dancers while the Elder sat in speechless shock. 'We must turn our minds and our efforts to discovering where that vessel has gone. We are everywhere, but it has been three years and the trail has grown cold.'
The other seven shape-shifters nodded, speaking in a sort of rapid humming undertone that sounded like the buzz of insects. 'We will find them.'
'They cannot escape.'
'The tachyon net extends far and it draws tighter.'
'The no-ship will be found.'
'I do not give you permission for this foolish search!' Burah shouted. Uxtal wanted to cheer for him. 'You will heed my commands. I told you to scour the conquered Tleilaxu planets, investigate the laboratories of the fallen Masters, and learn their methods of creating spice with axlotl tanks. Not only do we require it for ourselves, but it is a priceless commodity that we can use to break the Bene Gesserit monopoly and claim the commercial power that is our due.' He delivered this grand speech, as if expecting the Face Dancers to stand up and shout their approval.
'No,' Khrone said emphatically. 'That is not our intention.'
Uxtal remained aghast. He himself had never dreamed of challenging an Elder, and this was a mere Face Dancer! He shrank back against the copper wall, wishing he could melt into it. This wasn't the way things were supposed to happen. Angry and confused, Burah twisted back and forth in his chair. 'We created Face Dancers, and you will follow our orders.' He sniffed and got to his feet. 'Why am I even discussing this with you?'
In unison, as if they shared a single mind, the entire contingent of Face Dancers stood. From their positions around the table, they blocked Elder Burah's exit. He sat back down on his high seat, and now he seemed nervous.
'Are you certain you Lost Tleilaxu created us… or did you simply find us out in the Scattering? True, in the distant shadows of the past, a Tleilaxu Master was responsible for our seed stock. He made modifications and dispatched us to the ends of the universe shortly before the birth of Paul Muad'Dib. But we have evolved since then.'
As if a veil had been lifted simultaneously from their faces, Khrone and his companions blurred and shifted. Their nondescript human expressions melted away, and the Face Dancers returned to their blank state, a bland yet unnervingly inhuman set of features: sunken black-button eyes, pug noses, slack mouths. Their skin was pale and malleable, their vestigial hair bristly and white. Using a genetic map, they could form their muscles and epidermis into any desired pattern to mimic humans.
