Dune

Watching it, Odrade reminded herself that the Sisterhood had three of Murbella’s children, all female. The Breeding Mistresses were excited. In time, Reverend Mothers born of this line might match that Honored Matre ability.

In time we probably don’t have.

But Odrade shared the excitement of the Breeding Mistresses. That speed! Add that to the nerve-muscle training, the great pranabindu resources of the Sisterhood! What that might create lay wordlessly within her.

“She did that for us, not for him,” Bellonda said.

Odrade was not sure. Murbella resented the constant watch over her but she had come to an accommodation with it. Many of her actions obviously ignored the people behind the comeyes. This record showed her returning to her place in the bed beside Idaho.

“I have restricted access to that record,” Bellonda said. “Some acolytes are becoming troubled.”

Odrade nodded. Sexual addiction. That aspect of Honored Matre abilities created disturbing ripples in the Bene Gesserit, especially among acolytes. Very suggestive. And most of the Sisters on Chapterhouse knew the Reverend Mother Sheeana, alone among them, practiced some of these techniques in defiance of a general fear this could weaken them.

“We must not become Honored Matres!” Bell was always saying that. But Sheeana represents a significant control factor. She teaches us something about Murbella.

One afternoon, catching Murbella alone in her no-ship quarters and obviously relaxed, Odrade had tried a direct question. “Before Idaho, were none of you ever tempted to, let us say, ‘join in the fun’?”

Murbella had recoiled with angry pride. “He caught me by accident!”

The same kind of anger she showed to Idaho’s questions. Remembering this, Odrade leaned over her worktable and called up the original record.

“Look at how angry she gets,” Bellonda said. “A hypnotrance injunction against answering such questions. I’d stake my reputation on it.”

“That’ll come out in the Spice Agony,” Odrade said.

“If she ever gets to it!”

“Hypnotrance is supposed to be our secret.”

Bellonda chewed on the obvious inference. No Sister we sent out in the original Scattering ever returned.

It was written large in their minds: “Did renegade Bene Gesserit create the Honored Matres?” Much suggested it. Then why did they resort to sexual enslavement of males? Murbella’s historical prattlings did not satisfy. Everything about this went against Bene Gesserit teaching.

“We have to learn,” Bellonda insisted. “What little we know is very disturbing.”

Odrade recognized the concern. How much of a lure was this ability? Very big, she thought. Acolytes complained that they dreamed about becoming Honored Matres. Bellonda was rightly worried.

Create or arouse such unbridled forces and you built carnal fantasies of enormous complexity. You could lead whole populations around by their desires, by their fantasy projections.

There was the terrible power the Honored Matres dared use. Let it be known that they had the key to blinding ecstasy and they had won half the battle. The simple clue that such a thing existed, that was the beginning of surrender. People at Murbella’s level in that other Sisterhood might not understand this but the ones at the top . . . Was it possible they merely used this power without caring or even suspecting its deeper force? If that were the case, how were our first Scattered Ones lured into this dead end?

Earlier, Bellonda had offered her hypothesis:

Honored Matre with captive Reverend Mother taken prisoner in that first Scattering. “Welcome, Reverend Mother. We would like you to witness a small demonstration of our powers.” Interlude of sexual demonstration followed by a display of Honred Matre physical speed. Then—withdrawal of melange and injection of the adrenaline-based substitute laced with a hypnodrug. In that hypothetical trance, the Reverend Mother was sexually imprinted.

That coupled to the selective agony of melange withdrawal (Bell suggested) might make the victim deny her origins.

Fates help us! Were the original Honored Matres all Reverend Mothers? Do we dare test this hypothesis on ourselves? What can we learn of this from that pair in the no-ship?

Two sources of information lay there under the Sisterhood’s watchful eyes but the key had yet to be found.