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maula pistols, even some lasguns. Those most be trusted men, she thought, to
carry lasguns in Paul's presence when he obviously wore a shield generator.
She could see the shimmering of its field around him. One burst of a lasgun
into that field and the entire citadel would be a hole in the ground.
Her guard stopped ten paces from the foot of the dais, parted to open an
unobstructed view of the Emperor. She noted now the absence of Chani and
Irulan, wondered at it. He held no important audience without them, so it was
said.
Paul nodded to her, silent, measuring.
Immediately, she decided to take the offensive, said: "So, the great Paul
Atreides deigns to see the one he banished."
Paul smiled wryly, thinking: She knows I want something from her. That
knowledge had been inevitable, she being who she was. He recognized her
powers. The Bene Gesserit didn't become
Reverend Mothers by chance.
"Shall we dispense with fencing?" he asked.
Would it be this easy? she wondered. And she said: "Name the thing you want."
Stilgar stirred, cast a sharp glance at Paul. The Imperial lackey didn't like
her tone.
"Stilgar wants me to send you away," Paul said.
"Not kill me?" she asked. "I would've expected something more direct from a
Fremen Naib."
Stilgar scowled, said: "Often, I must speak otherwise than I think. That is
called diplomacy."
"Then let us dispense with diplomacy as well," she said. "Was it necessary to
have me walk all that distance. I am an old woman."
"You had to be shown how callous I can be," Paul said. "That way, you'll
appreciate magnanimity."
"You dare such gaucheries with a Bene Gesserit?" she asked.
"Gross actions carry their own messages," Paul said.
She hesitated, weighed his words. So -- he might yet dispense with her . . .
grossly, obviously, if she . . . if she what?
"Say what it is you want from me," she muttered.
Alia glanced at her brother, nodded toward the draperies behind the throne.
She knew Paul's reasoning in this, but disliked it all the same. Call it wild
prophecy: She felt pregnant with reluctance to take part in this bargaining.
"You must be careful how you speak to me, old woman," Paul said.
He called me old woman when he was a stripling, the Reverend Mother thought.
Does he remind me now of my hand in his past? The decision I made then, must I
remake it here? She felt the weight of decision, a physical thing that set her
knees to trembling. Muscles cried their fatigue.
"It was a long walk," Paul said, "and I can see that you're tired. We will
retire to my file:///F|/rah/Herbert,%20Frank/Dune%202%20-%20Dune%20Messiah.txt
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file:///F|/rah/Herbert,%20Frank/Dune%202%20-%20Dune%20Messiah.txt private
chamber behind the throne. You may sit there." He gave a hand-signal to
Stilgar, arose.
Stilgar and the ghola converged on her, helped her up the steps, followed Paul
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through a passage concealed by the draperies. She realized then why he had
greeted her in the hall: a dumb-
show for the guards and Naibs. He feared them, then. And now -- now, he
displayed kindly benevolence, daring such wiles on a Bene Gesserit. Or was it
daring? She sensed another presence behind, glanced back to see Alia
following. The younger woman's eyes held a brooding, baleful cast. The
Reverend Mother shuddered.
The private chamber at the end of the passage was a twenty-meter cube of
plasmeld, yellow glowglobes for light, the deep orange hangings of a desert
stilltent around the walls. It contained divans, soft cushions, a faint odor
of melange, crystal water flagons on a low table. It felt cramped, tiny after
the outer hall.
Paul seated her on a divan, stood over her, studying the ancient face --
steely teeth, eyes that hid more than they revealed, deeply wrinkled skin. He
indicated a water flagon. She shook her head, dislodging a wisp of gray hair.
In a low voice, Paul said: "I wish to bargain with you for the life of my
beloved."
Stilgar cleared his throat.
Alia fingered the handle of the crysknife sheathed at her neck.
The ghola remained at the door, face impassive, metal eyes pointed at the air
above the
Reverend Mother's head.
"Have you had a vision of my hand in her death?" the Reverend Mother asked.
She kept her attention on the ghola, oddly disturbed by him. Why should she
feel threatened by the ghola? He was a tool of the conspiracy.
"I know what it is you want from me," Paul said, avoiding her question.
Then he only suspects, she thought. The Reverend Mother looked down at the
tips of her shoes exposed by a fold of her robe. Black . . . black . . . shoes
and robe showed marks of her confinement: stains, wrinkles. She lifted her
chin, met an angry glare in Paul's eyes. Elation surged through her, but she
hid the emotion behind pursed lips, slitted eyelids.
"What coin do you offer?" she asked.
"You may have my seed, but not my person," Paul said. "Irulan banished and
inseminated by artificial --"
"You dare!" the Reverend Mother flared, stiffening.
Stilgar took a half step forward.
Disconcertingly, the ghola smiled. And now Alia was studying him.
"We'll not discuss the things your Sisterhood forbids," Paul said. "I will
listen to no talk of sins, abominations or the beliefs left over from past
Jihads. You may have my seed for your plans, but no child of Irulan's will sit
on my throne."
"Your throne," she sneered.
"My throne."
"Then who will bear the Imperial heir?"
"Chani."
"She is barren."
"She is with child." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]