Dune

Taraza stepped away from her guards, appearing to make herself vulnerable. It was a calculated move they had debated in front of Sheeana. In the same language, Taraza said: “We release our grip on the Bene Tleilax.”

They waited while he weighed her words. Taraza reminded herself that the Tleilaxu name for themselves could be translated as “the un-nameable.” That was a label often reserved for gods.

This god obviously had not extended the discovery in here to what might be happening with his mimics among Ixians and Fish Speakers. Waff had more shocks coming. He appeared quite puzzled, though.

Waff confronted many unanswered questions. He was not satisfied with his reports from Gammu. It was a dangerous double game he played now. Did the Sisterhood play a similar game? But the Tleilaxu Lost Ones could not be shunted aside without inviting attack by the Honored Matres. Taraza herself had warned of this. Did the old Bashar on Gammu still represent a force worthy of consideration?

He voiced this question.

Taraza countered with her own question: “How did you change our ghola? What did you hope to gain?” She felt certain she already knew. But the pose of ignorance was necessary.

Waff wanted to say: “The death of all Bene Gesserit!” They were too dangerous. Yet their value was incalculable. He sank into a sulking silence, looking at the Reverend Mothers with a brooding expression that made his elfin features even more childlike.

A petulant child, Taraza thought. She warned herself then that it was dangerous to underestimate Waff. You broke the Tleilaxu egg only to find another egg inside—ad infinitum! Everything circled back to Odrade’s suspicions about the contentions that might still lead them to bloody violence in this room. Had the Tleilaxu really revealed what they had learned from the whores and the other Lost Ones? Was the ghola only a potential Tleilaxu weapon?

Taraza decided to prod him once more, using the approach of her Council’s “Analysis Nine.” Still in the language of the Islamiyat, she said: “Would you dishonor yourself in the land of the Prophet? You have not shared openly as you said you would.”

“We told you the sexual—”

“You do not share all!” she interrupted. “It’s because of the ghola and we know this.”

She could see his reactions. He was a cornered animal. Such animals were dangerous in the extreme. She had once seen a mongrel hound, a feral and tail-tucked survivor of ancient pets from Dan, cornered by a pack of youths. The animal turned on its pursuers, slashing its way to freedom in totally unexpected savagery. Two youths crippled for life and only one without injuries! Waff was like that animal right now. She could see his hands longing for a weapon, but Tleilaxu and Bene Gesserit had searched one another with exquisite care before coming here. She felt sure he had no weapon. Still . . .

Waff spoke, baited suspense in his manner. “You think me unaware of how you hope to rule us!”

“And there is the rot that the people of the Scattering took with them,” she said. “Rot at the core.”

Waff’s manner changed. It did not do to ignore the deeper implications of Bene Gesserit thought. But was she sowing discord?

“The Prophet set a locator ticking in the minds of every human, Scattered or not,” Taraza said. “He has brought them back to us with all of the rot intact.”

Waff ground his teeth. What was she doing? He entertained the mad thought that the Sisterhood had clogged his mind with some secret drug in the air. They knew things denied to others! He stared from Taraza to Odrade and back to Taraza. He knew he was old with serial ghola resurrections but not old in the way of the Bene Gesserit. These people were old! They seldom looked old but they were old, old beyond anything he dared imagine.

Taraza was having similar thoughts. She had seen the flash of deeper awareness in Waff’s eyes. Necessity opened new doors of reason. How deep did the Tleilaxu go? His eyes were so old! She had the feeling that whatever had been a brain in these Tleilaxu Masters was now something else—a holo-recording from which all weakening emotions had been erased. She shared the distrust of emotions that she suspected in him. Was that a bond to unite them?

The tropism of common thoughts.

“You say you release your grip on us,” Waff growled, “but I feel your fingers around my throat.”

“Then here is a grip on our throat,” she said. “Some of your Lost Ones have returned to you. Never has a Reverend Mother come back to us from the Scattering.”

“But you said you knew all of the—”

“We have other ways of gaining knowledge. What do you suppose happened to the Reverend Mothers we sent out into the Scattering?”

“A common disaster?” He shook his head. This was absolutely new information. None of the returned Tleilaxu had said anything at all about this. The discrepancy fed his suspicions. Whom was he to believe?

“They were subverted,” Taraza said.