Sisterhood of Dune

by Brian Herbert; Kevin J. Anderson

“If you do not choose the side of righteousness, Sire, the Butlerians will do it for you. You see the group of your loyal subjects I’ve brought here. Throughout the Imperium, I have millions of followers who are just as dedicated as these. I swear that we are all prepared to stand by your side and fight. Provided you do what is right.” He raised his eyebrows, waiting.

  Emperor Salvador was clearly intimidated, though he tried not to show it. “And a Landsraad vote will satisfy you?”

  “The Landsraad vote goes without saying. No, my people require a more visible gesture on your part, a dramatic demonstration of your support.” Manford pretended that the idea had just occurred to him, though he had planned it carefully on the voyage from Zenith. “For instance, consider the historic headquarters of the Suk School, right here in Zimia. Those arrogant doctors, with their extremist medical experiments, are trying to reshape humanity. A human being should take care of his body and pray for health, not rely on machines to keep him alive. We need to enhance our minds and bodies through our own aspirations and hard work, not through artificial means. It would be a generous first step if you closed down the Suk School here—a highly visible gesture that sends a clear message.”

  Emperor Salvador looked from side to side, as if wishing Roderick were there. “I will consider it … in the spirit of maintaining a good relationship with you and your followers. What you ask will take time, but I think I can let you have your way with the old Suk School headquarters—provided you cause no further trouble here.”

  Manford spread his hands helplessly, not showing his sense of triumph, though the Emperor had conceded easily. “The Butlerians have a lot of energy and enthusiasm, Sire. I have to give them some release for their passions … but it’s a vast Imperium, and there is a great deal of work for us to do. We could go to the outer planets, or we could remain here in Zimia. Perhaps if you provided us with a fleet—say, two hundred mothballed ships from the Army of Humanity?—we could go elsewhere and continue our work far from Salusa Secundus. For the time being.”

  Manford could see perspiration on the Emperor’s forehead as he considered this. “Now that you mention it, we do have military vessels that are no longer being used. Perhaps I could scrape together a couple of hundred decommissioned ships. You will need to pilot and crew them yourselves, but you can devote them entirely to your efforts—provided they go far from here.”

  Manford smiled and looked at Anari, who wore a contented expression. “I was optimistic that we could reach a satisfactory accommodation, Sire,” he said. “I can gather my own people to serve aboard the new fleet, and we will be back to take care of the Suk School, at the proper time.” He signaled for the palanquin bearers to turn about and leave. As he departed, Manford pretended not to notice that Emperor Salvador let out a quavering sigh of relief.

  All Sisters have common training, a common wardrobe, and presumably a common mind-set, but beneath the surface they are as diverse and separate as the roots that spread out from a single tree.

  —REVEREND MOTHER RAQUELLA BERTO-ANIRUL, MANUAL OF THE SISTERHOOD

  Sister Candys Venport was filled with excitement and fascination as she ran up to Valya. “It’s Sister Anna! You should see this for yourself.”

  Valya lurched to her feet, ready to follow the girl through the tunnels. “Is she hurt?” The Emperor’s sister had very little common sense, and could easily have gotten herself in trouble. On the other hand, since returning from the survival quest and finding Ingrid’s body, Anna was more serious about her studies, and had been showing more dedication to them.

  “Not hurt.” The girl tugged on Valya’s hand. “She’s done much better than Sabine or I ever could.”

  Inside the small chamber, Anna sat cross-legged on the floor, staring intently at the wall panel that enclosed the hive of burrowing insects. Her concentration interrupted, Anna blinked and turned around, surprised to see Valya there. “Straight lines…” She sounded exhausted. “Who would imagine it’s so difficult just to make straight lines?”

  At first, Valya didn’t understand what the young woman meant, but Candys ran forward to point at the tunnels made by the scuttling nematodes. Most of the burrows swirled around in the random curves of nature, but in one corner of the panel, all the lines were perfectly straight, exactly horizontal and vertical, intersecting in precise perpendicular junctions.

  “It’s like what I did with the fogwood trees back in the Imperial garden,” Anna said. “These burrowers respond to me. They must be telepathically sensitive, like fogwood trees.” Anna looked at Valya’s stunned expression, and the Princess’s face fell. “Are you disappointed? When you told me to meditate on their movements, wasn’t this what I was supposed to do?”

  “No—I mean yes, this is fine, I’m just … surprised.” She would have to look into it further. “I’m very impressed. I wonder if other Sisters can do this.”

  “It’s a knack I have,” Anna said. The girl might be spoiled, immature, and emotionally unstable, yet now Valya revised her opinion. If carefully guided, those mental powers might be useful, though she doubted if Anna Corrino had the maturity or drive to achieve anything significant.

  Before she could take Anna to see the Reverend Mother, Dorotea stopped at the door to the chamber. She seemed stern and hardened. “Sister Valya, I’ve been looking for you. I’d like you to join me, along with some specially chosen Sisters, at an important private meeting.”

  “Can I go along?” Anna rose to her feet. “I could share some ideas for a meeting.”

  “This meeting is not for acolytes. Valya belongs with us.”

  Anna looked stung and disappointed, and a flash of jealousy rippled across her face. Trying to calm the Corrino girl, Valya said, “I’ll come back to you as soon as I can. Sister Candys, will you take Anna back to her quarters? Dorotea and I have some business to discuss.” She wondered what the other woman was up to.

  Despite the ever-growing number of Sisters being trained on Rossak, it was not difficult to find true privacy. The great cliff city had once been populated with nearly a hundred thousand Sorceresses, their mates, and children, along with all the normal Rossak inhabitants and offworlders who came to harvest the jungle’s wealth. The Omnius plagues, however, had wiped out so much of the population that large sections of the tunnels were now empty.

  Dorotea led Valya to a windowless room, where Valya quickly assessed the nine other women gathered there, including Sister Perianna, who had recently returned from Salusa, along with Sister Esther-Cano, Sister Ninke, Sister Woodra, and five more whom she did not know.

  “I told them we could trust you—I hope I’m not wrong about you,” Dorotea said to her. “You seem to be the Reverend Mother’s darling, but I know you’ve also worked with Karee Marques. I believe you’re dedicated to our cause. We’re meeting here to discuss the future of the Sisterhood.”

  “You can trust me,” Valya said automatically. She began evaluating the women in her mind, to discover the common denominator.

  Dorotea announced to all the women, “We’re here because we’re concerned that Reverend Mother Raquella has lost her way.”

  Valya’s brow furrowed. “In what way? She created the Sisterhood—so doesn’t she define the goals of the order, as the only Reverend Mother?”

  “The Sisterhood has its own identity,” Dorotea said.

  “And we have much to offer,” said Perianna. “The Emperor has discovered this. Many noble families and commercial interests also see the value in our training. But if the Reverend Mother throws her support on the side of the Machine Apologists, she will damage our reputation.”

  “Not just our reputation,” said Sister Woodra, “but our souls. The very core of the Sisterhood is to help women achieve superiority with their bodies and minds, keeping them from the seductive lure of machines.”

  Valya hid her surprise and took a seat. Already she guessed she would have to report this discussion to Raquella. “And how do you think the Reverend Mother has strayed from t
his? She has voices and memories the rest of us cannot hear. I am inclined to trust her judgment.”

  “None of us knows what a Reverend Mother is,” said Dorotea.

  “Yet,” said Ninke.

  “Raquella has changed,” Dorotea continued. “I have watched it. Isn’t it possible that those voices and memories in her head can deceive her as well as advise her?”

  Valya pretended to consider the point. “We’ll never know for sure until we discover how to create other Reverend Mothers, so we can compare one to another.”

  “She’s done almost nothing to investigate the murder of Sister Ingrid!” Dorotea said.

  “Murder? Isn’t it more likely she just slipped from the path?” Valya kept her tone casual. “There’s a reason the cliffside trail is restricted. She probably went where she wasn’t supposed to go.”

  “That isn’t all. We’ve heard rumors that there may even be forbidden thinking machines hidden here on Rossak!” said Sister Esther-Cano, lowering her voice to a nervous whisper.

  A gasp circled the room, and Valya did not have to feign her surprise. How could these others possibly know about the breeding computers? She had stopped Ingrid before she could tell anyone else. Valya made a disbelieving snort. “That sounds like a Butlerian witch hunt.”

  Dorotea pressed her lips together and nodded slowly. “When the Reverend Mother sent me away to my first assignment on Lampadas, she wanted me to study Manford Torondo, to analyze his followers and their supposedly irrational actions. I don’t think she expected me to listen. However, I saw Manford’s truth there. I listened to the recorded speeches of Rayna Butler. And though I didn’t live through those times myself, I learned how horrific the thinking machines truly were.”

  Valya sat back and listened as the women discussed rumors they had heard, and expressed their fears. She had no intention of throwing in with these women. She nodded at appropriate times, responded with a troubled expression or contemplative look. It seemed she had infiltrated them.

  * * *

  WHEN SHE REPORTED to the Reverend Mother, the old woman received the news with a grave expression, and told Valya to continue befriending the group. “You seem to have a natural talent for deception.”

  She heard no condemnation in the statement, but even so, Valya felt naked in front of the old woman, with her soul bared and all her thoughts and motivations laid out for observation and analysis. Valya kept her eyes down, a deliberate attempt to elicit sympathy. “I’m sorry if you think I’m untrustworthy, Reverend Mother.”

  “The ability to lie convincingly can be useful, provided it is used for the proper purpose. Once you understand what it is to lie, you can move to truth—our truth.”

  Valya averted her eyes as the Reverend Mother continued, “Sister Valya, I know you harbor a burning desire to redeem House Harkonnen, and I accept that I can never entirely divert you from your goal. But I have looked deep into your soul and I believe that you are in the right place at the right time for the welfare of the Sisterhood.” The old woman’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t view you on a scale of good or bad. Rather, I see you as a means by which our order can achieve true greatness. The two goals are not necessarily contradictory.”

  She had already sensed Raquella grooming both her and Sister Dorotea, even pitting them against each other. To see who was better.

  Raquella paused with a gentle smile. “You will achieve what you wish to achieve. I believe you are one of the most capable young women I’ve ever met, and this is why I have entrusted you with so much.”

  Valya smiled with pride, but felt odd, as if she had been cleverly and deviously manipulated away from a path she had set for herself.

  “And if you became a Reverend Mother like myself, then you would be powerful indeed.”

  A hunt will always be successful, provided one is willing to redefine the goals as needed.

  —VORIAN ATREIDES, PRIVATE JOURNALS, KEPLER PERIOD

  Riding the great sandworm left Vorian awestruck. During the journey across the desert, Ishanti never let down her guard. Nevertheless, she took the adventure in stride, as if controlling such a creature was an everyday activity.

  While the behemoth slid across the sand with the speed of a Coriolis storm, the woman seemed worried that Vor was unprepared for the deep desert. “Where is your face mask, your noseplugs? How much extra water do you carry? And food? You are not ready for this place.”

  Still holding on to the ropes, Vor coughed from the stirred-up dust and cinnamon reek that wafted around the sandworm. “I was in a skimcraft, returning to the spice harvester. I didn’t expect to find my whole crew slaughtered—and I didn’t plan to be shot down.”

  Her grimace showed what she thought of his explanation. “If one could foresee every accident, we would all be prepared. Only those who learn to accept the unpredictable will survive.”

  “You were certainly unpredictable. I don’t know who you are any better than I know those two assassins.” He flashed her his best smile. “Frankly, I prefer your company to theirs.”

  “Naib Sharnak will decide what to do with you.” She prodded the sandworm with one of her goads, and the beast raced onward.

  By now, hunger tightened his stomach, and the dust and extreme dryness of the air had parched his throat. As if to teach him a lesson, Ishanti had not offered him any water, though occasionally he watched her sip from tubes at her collar.

  In his life, Vor had never been really thirsty, like this. Though he’d spent the past month on Arrakis, his metabolism had not yet adjusted to the drastic changes. Even under tight rations with the spice-harvesting crew, he still retained plenty of water fat, but now his throat felt like hot ashes. His skin was dry, his eyes burned; he could sense the arid world stealing moisture from him, every drop of perspiration, every hint of vapor from an exhaled breath.

  Though he might be parched and miserable, he knew Ishanti would not simply let him perish, since she had gone to the trouble of rescuing him. On the other hand, she was under no obligation to coddle him, nor did he ask her to. He attempted to drive his thoughts away from his thirst.

  Hours later, when they neared a line of gray mountains, Ishanti explained in patient detail, as if to a child, how to dismount from the exhausted sandworm. Vor paid careful attention and, when the time came, tried to imitate her as she sprang down, bounded onto the soft sands, and then froze in place as the cranky beast slithered onward, thrashing its hot tail in annoyance. When it had moved far enough off, Ishanti gestured silently to Vor, and they danced away from the retreating creature; he and the woman went motionless again as the great worm paused, turned in their direction, and lumbered back toward the open expanse of desert. Ishanti let out a sigh of relief, then urged Vor to hurry to the cliffs. “You’re a fast learner. Good.”

  Though he was filled with questions about what to do next, he sensed her impatience with his inquiries, so he just followed. She led him into the rocks with an easy confidence, as if she had come this way many times before. He studied the ground for any clue as to where she might be taking him and discovered that Ishanti was following marks: well-placed pebbles, small signs that looked almost natural. Only a few feet had trod these rocks to beat down a trail—or someone might have erased the footprints after each passage.

  He remembered the abandoned camp that he and the spice crew had found in the rocks, and now he was intrigued, thinking he might finally get to meet the mysterious “Freemen” of Arrakis. They were the reason he had chosen this out-of-the-way planet in the first place.

  Vor didn’t notice the cave until they were upon it. The opening was disguised by an elbow of rock that required a sharp left turn; another well-placed boulder blocked the entrance from view. Ishanti paused to open a moisture-sealed door, and they found themselves facing three desert-robed men with half-drawn knives. When Ishanti raised her hand and gave a sign, they let her pass, but the men stopped Vor from entering.

  “I don’t vouch for him, yet,” Ishanti said. “He mus
t still pass our tests.”

  Vor studied them, saw their tough stance, their confident readiness for combat, noted the unusual milky-white blades of their daggers. He decided not to ask questions, not to beg for his life, or surrender—he just faced the desert people, letting them make their own judgments based on what they saw. The guards seemed to appreciate that.

  “This man is the only survivor of a spice-harvesting crew,” Ishanti continued. “Let him pass. We need to speak to the Naib.” The three stepped aside but did not lower their guard.

  In a cool, shadowy grotto lit by a single glowglobe, Ishanti introduced him to a grizzled, older man who wore his long gray-black hair in a thick braid; he had a high forehead, a calm expression, hard eyes. She gestured for Vor to sit on one of the patterned fiber rugs over the stone floor, and took a place close beside him. Vor remained respectfully silent as Ishanti summarized what had happened to the spice-harvesting crew at the hands of two seemingly indestructible hunters, and how she had helped Vorian escape.

  The man, Naib Sharnak, regarded Vor coolly, like a doctor performing a dissection, then lifted his chin. “Two people massacred an entire spice-harvesting crew, shot down your aircraft, and made Ishanti nervous? And you say they were after you?”

  “They said they were after me. I’ve never seen or heard of them before.”

  One of the Naib’s people brought in an elaborate service of spice coffee that was so potent Vor could barely drink it, despite his thirst. They did not offer him water, though he craved it.

  “I myself have many questions about the young man and woman who caused such damage,” Ishanti said, narrowing her deep-blue eyes. “I represent Combined Mercantiles here. If one of our competitors has discovered a secret weapon or dispatched mercenary assassins, then I must make my report. They were not normal people—perhaps not entirely human. They won’t be easy to kill.”