Dune

He saw the direction of her gaze, said: “A very exposed place, that down there.”

“But an easy place to hide,” she said. She looked at him. “It reminds me of a human mind . . . with all its concealments.”

“Ahhh,” he said.

“Ahhh? What does that mean—ahhh?” She was suddenly angry with him and the reason for it escaped her.

“You’d like to know what my mind conceals,” he said. It was a statement, not a question.

“How do you know I haven’t exposed you for what you are by my powers of prescience?” she demanded.

“Have you?” He seemed genuinely curious.

“No!”

“Sibyls have limits,” he said.

He appeared to be amused and this reduced Alia’s anger. “Amused? Have you no respect for my powers?” she asked. The question sounded weakly argumentative even to her own ears.

“I respect your omens and portents perhaps more than you think,” he said. “I was in the audience for your Morning Ritual.”

“And what does that signify?”

“You’ve great ability with symbols,” he said, keeping his attention on the ’thopter’s controls. “That’s a Bene Gesserit thing, I’d say. But, as with many witches, you’ve become careless of your powers.”

She felt a spasm of fear, blared: “How dare you?”

“I dare much more than my makers anticipated,” he said. “Because of that rare fact, I remain with your brother.”

Alia studied the steel balls which were his eyes: no human expression there. The stillsuit hood concealed the line of his jaw. His mouth remained firm, though. Great strength in it . . . and determination. His words had carried a reassuring intensity. “...dare much more . . .” That was a thing Duncan Idaho might have said. Had the Tleilaxu fashioned their ghola better than they knew—or was this mere sham, part of his conditioning?

“Explain yourself, ghola,” she commanded.

“Know thyself, is that thy commandment?” he asked.

Again, she felt that he was amused. “Don’t bandy words with me, you . . . you thing!” she said. She put a hand to the crysknife in its throat sheath. “Why were you given to my brother?”

“Your brother tells me that you watched the presentation,” he said. “You’ve heard me answer that question for him.”

“Answer it again . . . for me!”

“I am intended to destroy him.”

“Is that the mentat speaking?”

“You know the answer to that without asking,” he chided. “And you know, as well, that such a gift wasn’t necessary. Your brother already was destroying himself quite adequately.”

She weighed these words, her hand remaining on the haft of her knife. A tricky answer, but there was sincerity in the voice.

“Then why such a gift?” she probed.

“It may have amused the Tleilaxu. And, it is true, that the Guild asked for me as a gift.”

“Why?”

“Same answer.”

“How am I careless of my powers?”

“How are you employing them?” he countered.

His question slashed through to her own misgivings. She took her hand away from the knife, asked: “Why do you say my brother was destroying himself?”

“Oh, come now, child! Where are these vaunted powers? Have you no ability to reason?”

Controlling anger, she said: “Reason for me, mentat.”

“Very well.” He glanced around at their escort, returned his attention to their course. The plain of Arrakeen was beginning to show beyond the northern rim of the Shield Wall. The pattern of the pan and graben villages remained indistinct beneath a dust pall, but the distant gleam of Arrakeen could be discerned.

“Symptoms,” he said. “Your brother keeps an official Panegyrist who—”

“Who was a gift of the Fremen Naibs!”

“An odd gift from friends,” he said. “Why would they surround him with flattery and servility? Have you really listened to this Panegyrist? ‘The people are illuminated by Muad’Dib. The Umma Regent, our Emperor, came out of darkness to shine resplendently upon all men. He is our Sire. He is precious water from an endless fountain. He spills joy for all the universe to drink,’ Pah!”

Speaking softly, Alia said: “If I but repeated your words for our Fremen escort, they’d hack you into bird feed.”

“Then tell them.”

“My brother rules by the natural law of heaven!”

“You don’t believe that, so why say it?”

“How do you know what I believe?” She experienced trembling that no Bene Gesserit powers could control. This ghola was having an effect she hadn’t anticipated.

“You commanded me to reason as a mentat,” he reminded her.

“No mentat knows what I believe!” She took two deep, shuddering breaths. “How dare you judge us?”

“Judge you? I don’t judge.”

“You’ve no idea how we were taught!”

“Both of you were taught to govern,” he said. “You were conditioned to an overweening thirst for power. You were imbued with a shrewd grasp of politics and a deep understanding for the uses of war and ritual. Natural law? What natural law? That myth haunts human history. Haunts! It’s a ghost. It’s insubstantial, unreal. Is your Jihad a natural law?”