Staban sucked in a breath and interrupted. “We don’t care who the planetary governor is, so long as we are able to perform our own work, unmolested.”
“And that is why I do business with you, my dear Staban, ahhh,” Fenring said. “For all the good intentions—or bad—of the new Harkonnen overlords, the Padishah Emperor does not like a bottleneck in the flow of spice, nor does he care for a single disreputable source of melange. Imperial governors are so notoriously… ummm… unreliable. After all, look what happened to poor Duke Atreides, hmmm?”
Gurney felt a flush of angry heat through his skin, took a deep breath for courage. He reached up and removed the nostril plugs, the covering over his mouth, slid down the cowl to expose the prominent inkvine scar on his cheek, the scar that Rabban himself had inflicted upon him after the horrible rape and beating he had committed against Gurney’s sister, right before his very eyes… “Yes, look what happened to the Atreides. Look what happened to my Duke.” He waited a beat as Fenring studied him, worked through his thoughts and memories, tried to recognize who Gurney was.
“You are one of the Duke’s men. A well-known one, hmmm.” He pursed his lips. “Ah yes, Halleck, isn’t it?”
“Gurney Halleck.”
“Most unfortunate what happened to your Duke, yes, most unfortunate, indeed. And I’m not surprised some of the Duke’s men survived, though I am surprised that you would fall in among the smugglers.”
“I had few choices,” Gurney answered in a growl. He sipped his diluted spice beer, and the waitress shuffled over with Fenring’s water. It looked murky from some oily additive. Fenring sipped, grimaced, but thanked the waitress anyway.
“The Atreides fell, and it was not entirely due to the Harkonnens. There was treachery.” Gurney leaned over the table. “Was it treachery from the Emperor?”
Fenring looked astonished by the suggestion. Staban reacted with alarm. “He didn’t mean that, sir—”
The Count glared at Gurney. “I assure you, hmmm, that the Emperor takes no part in the petty squabbles of Landsraad nobles.”
The Swordmaster rested his elbows on the table. “Then we must have been imagining things when we fought enemies in Harkonnen livery who were quite clearly trained as Sardaukar.”
Fenring paused for a moment too long before saying, “Then the Baron must have hired some mercenaries with excellent training.”
Gurney didn’t believe him for a moment, but let the matter drop. Fenring knew something, though he probably was not involved in the planning. As a minimum, he and the Emperor looked the other way and let the Harkonnens commit their treachery. He took a deep calming breath. That assessment wasn’t his focus right now. “Politics and politics,” he said, “and damn it all to the Seven Hells. I know who the traitor was—Jessica, the concubine of my beloved Duke, the woman who shared his bed, the mother of—” His voiced hitched. “The mother of Paul Atreides, dear Paul. All of them gone now.” He drew a deep breath, felt his face flush. “There must be an accounting against the Harkonnens, sir.” His voice was hard and determined, and just across the table from him Fenring’s eyes bored into his, like a laser cutter. “Even before House Atreides moved to this damned desert planet, we knew there was a plot. We knew the Duke’s enemies had gathered against him. Duke Leto Atreides formally declared Kanly on the Baron Vladimir Harkonnen. There are rules and expectations to that ancient blood feud.” Gurney waited a beat. “And now I insist on my right. Sir, on behalf of my fallen House and my noble Duke, I demand satisfaction.”
Fenring’s eyes lit up, and a sardonic smile curled at the edges of his mouth. He sat back, took another unconscious sip of the murky water. “Yes, rules, hmmm. Rules.”
“I demand that the forms be obeyed.”
“But, ahhh, Duke Leto is dead now,” Fenring pointed out. “As is his son and heir Paul.”
“I know. And when all the lights go out, darkness only wins until another flame lights the shadows. I am the Duke’s last remaining lieutenant. I claim the right of Kanly. I will finish this battle against House Harkonnen—in my own way.”
Fenring let out a long and weary sigh and drained half of his water in one gulp. “Hmmm, vows of revenge are so tedious, so boring to me. Is that why you brought me here?”
Staban Tuek quickly broke in, looking uneasy. “My companion focuses too much on revenge and forgets the more relevant part of this discussion. He has developed a plan of action—a fascinating one, I think you’ll agree.
“The Harkonnens supply Rabban’s military outpost in Carthag with offworld water, shipped from their homeworld, Giedi Prime. The water costs little, although the transportation is expensive. A supply tanker of water, enough to fulfill the extravagant needs of the Harkonnen troops, arrives each month. To the people on Giedi Prime, it is mere water, practically free. To the people of Arrakis, it is a treasure worth more than spice. For some it is worth more than life itself.”
“We intend to hijack the tanker and take the water,” Gurney interrupted, catching Fenring’s attention again. “We need to enlist your assistance, your connections, Count Fenring. We require access to the Guild Heighliner. When it arrives, we need to know the crew and defenses aboard the Harkonnen tanker when it’s still up in orbit. Once we get aboard, we’ll handle the rest.”
Staban interjected, “Stealing that tanker will be a great embarrassment for Rabban—and thus Gurney gets his revenge and can declare Kanly complete. And we smugglers receive a water prize worth a huge number of solaris here on Arrakis.”
Fenring sounded dubious. “And why would I assist you in this? What possible reason would I have?”
Gurney chose to state the matter flat out. “Because we will pay you an enormous bribe.”
Staban looked as if he had just swallowed sand and choked on it.
Fenring did not laugh, nor dismiss the suggestion. “And the Guild itself will require tremendous payments, hmmmm.” He tapped his fingers on the tabletop. “I admit there is a measure of amusement in placing Rabban in an awkward position. It is never good to have a planetary governor who grows too complacent. Giving him a black eye could be very beneficial.”
Gurney knotted and unknotted his fists on the table. “We will pay the inducement. We will round up additional spice, and you will have the funds you need.”
“I haven’t even quoted the price yet, hmmm. You may find it overwhelming.”
“We will pay it,” Gurney said, and Staban glared at him. Fenring’s eyes narrowed, flicking back and forth as he performed calculations in his mind. Gurney was reminded of how Thufir Hawat had concentrated with remarkable focus and intensely, when he performed Mentat projections.
Then Fenring quoted an amount so astronomical that Staban gasped and looked at him in disbelief. Gurney had made calculations of his own, knowing the smugglers and the Atreides fighters would find ways to gather extra spice in their raids, perhaps with the cooperation of desert villagers, maybe even the Fremen.
“We will pay it,” the Atreides man said again.
III
It was not difficult to rally the desert villagers and the Fremen against the Harkonnens. Gurney had known it wouldn’t be. He knew Beast Rabban.
Less than a week after their secret meeting with Fenring, smuggler scouts and spice hunters on the edge of the desert plateau spotted a black flag of smoke curling up from the elbow of a canyon, the site of one of the hardscrabble graben villages. A squalid town that collected droplets of moisture from the air with huge skimmers and condensers, people who coaxed useful minerals and metals from the rocks and scavenged just enough spice from the open desert to trade in the cities for supplies and medicines they needed, and no luxuries. The smoke had wafted up, dissipating for hours before a spotter reported it.
After checking the weather report and verifying there were no sandstorms or turbulent cyclones on the flight path, Gurney flew the low-altitude ornithopter. Beside him, a concerned-looking Orbo rode, along with Staban and ten other armed smugglers in seats at t
he back, all clad in desert gear. Even after being stranded here for a year in the smuggler crew, Gurney still found it awkward to prepare for combat without a personal shield, but no one on Arrakis wore a shield. Not only did the sand and dust make the devices malfunction, the pulsing field-effect invariably attracted and maddened a giant sandworm.
No amount of personal protection was worth the risk of facing a monster like that.
Gruff Orbo looked through the ’thopter’s scratched and pitted plaz window as Gurney flew in toward the smoke.
Once or twice he had considered challenging the bigger man to a duel, to slay him in front of the other smugglers for the insult of smashing the baliset. The smuggler caves were without music now, and Gurney found them a much sadder, lonelier place. But he knew that if he challenged Orbo, who had many friends among the smugglers, he would damage his own position among them. Even if he won the duel, he would have to leave. Gurney didn’t want that, couldn’t afford it. He needed these hardened smugglers, especially now that he was so close to achieving what he wanted so badly. He had not forgiven Orbo, but gave the matter no further thought now, blocking it away like putting it inside a walled fortress. He did not allow the incident to fester within him the way the thought of Rabban did.
The way the traitor Jessica festered within him.
“I know what that is,” Orbo said, pointing down at the surface. The rattling hum of the engine and flutter of the articulated wings nearly drowned out his voice.
Gurney looked to the side, through the window past Orbo. “What is it? What’s out there?”
Orbo simply stared out the window.
Just behind Gurney, Staban leaned close. “His village is out there. He came from the desert people and joined us. Sometimes we bring water and supplies to that settlement.”
As Gurney flew in, he realized with a sinking sensation what the curling smoke meant. “Looks like someone else found it, too.”
Orbo just stared gloomily. He’d already figured this out himself.
The smugglers were greatly uneasy as Gurney brought the ’thopter around the high cliffs and into the elbow canyon. Black starbursts of explosions marked the desert floor and cliff walls. The once huddled buildings of the small outpost had been smashed and burned. Bodies lay sprawled in the streets, their skin blackened, some of their desert stillsuits smoldering as slow-burning fires ate through the sandwiched fabric and cooked the dead flesh underneath.
Gurney had barely landed the ’thopter when Orbo cracked open the door and burst out, his boots sinking into the stirred gravel and sand. He didn’t even affix his nose plugs or breathing mask. He bounded forward, letting out primal sounds as the other smugglers followed.
Gurney shut down the rotors, racked the articulated wings into their resting position, then joined Staban outside. While Orbo and the smugglers searched the mangled remnants of huts, the low dwellings built into cliff walls, the supply sheds that had been leveled with explosives, frantically looking for survivors, Gurney knew they would find none. Rabban would not have left any.
Orbo came back, his face distraught. Soot smeared his cheeks and desert cloak. Other smugglers had dragged out the bodies of dead villagers, laying them out on the bleak canyon floor.
“Who did this?” Orbo sobbed. “Why?”
“You know who did it,” Gurney said. “Perhaps your people didn’t pay Rabban the tithes he demanded, or maybe his men were just bored.”
“No survivors?” Staban asked.
“They’re all dead. He wanted to burn everything so no one would find this village at all. A single sandstorm can wipe out the rest of the evidence.”
“Rabban doesn’t care about any evidence he leaves behind,” Gurney said. “He’s perfectly happy to let you find it. Dozens of other villages in the pan and graben have suffered the same fate in the past year. Rabban needs to make everyone fear him.” He clenched his jaw. “Any fool would know this is wasteful, not leadership.”
When he glanced up, he caught a flicker of movement in the cliffs, in the shadows of rock, while a figure, a human figure, darted into a cleft. As Gurney watched, a camouflage cloak swirled up and he could no longer see the person.
“Fremen,” Staban muttered.
Gurney was intrigued. “An eyewitness, maybe?”
“More likely just drawn to the smoke to investigate—and to scavenge what he can.”
Gurney looked down at the bodies lined up outside the village, recalling a rumor he’d heard that Fremen took corpses and extracted the water from their flesh. Yes, water was indeed a precious commodity here. If Gurney and the smugglers hadn’t flown in, maybe the Fremen would have stolen the bodies so that no one knew what happened to them. He looked around at the cliffs, saw no further movement, could no longer see a hint of where the furtive Fremen had vanished. He suspected others were also watching, camouflaged as well. They would be listening.
Gurney looked at Orbo, then at the smuggler leader, and spoke loudly. “Staban, this is the time for revenge. You have made me wait too long. Now Orbo’s village is destroyed, his entire family. Staban, your father is also dead—because of the Harkonnens.” He raised his voice to a shout, “And all you Fremen, I know you’re listening. Spread the word among your sietches. Tell the desert people in the graben villages and those hidden in the deepest wilds that we need a huge amount of spice… not for our own profit, but to make the proper bribes. Tell them we have a way to hurt the Beast who did this.”
Gurney knew if his words resonated here, the message would spread. The survivors and bereaved from other villages Rabban had preyed upon… those people would help him. He wasn’t the only one with justification for a vendetta. So much blood had been spilled that the cost in spice was not even worth measuring.
They had three weeks to raise the enormous amount of melange before Count Fenring returned.
They would get more than they needed in two.
IV
Twelve men, all loyal, tried-and-true Atreides veterans for the mission.
Gurney selected them himself and disappointed others back in the smugglers’ hideout, because every one of his men who had survived Arrakeen still served the memory of their beloved Duke Leto and his family and wanted to share in Gurney Halleck’s quest to meet the requirements of Kanly. They all wanted to shed Harkonnen blood, but he could only take a small number on the mission up to the Guild Heighliner, where they would steal Rabban’s water tanker. A dozen men following him… and Gurney didn’t promise they would survive. He merely told them they might, and might not die. Brave and dedicated men, that was good enough for them.
“For House Atreides!” they called out in a cheer, joined by the other Atreides men who had failed to make the cut.
Staban Tuek then insisted that Gurney also take six of his original smugglers to ensure his own profit as well as Gurney’s vengeance. Orbo led this smaller group, but they would follow Gurney’s orders, to complete his plan.
The squad traveled surreptitiously to the battle-damaged spaceport at Arrakeen, much smaller than the large industrial platforms in Rabban’s city of Carthag. Following the attack a year ago, using modern weapons and old-style artillery, the Harkonnen invaders had damaged much of the Arrakeen spaceport, and although it had been patched and repaired to make it serviceable, no one had bothered to clean up all the battle debris, not thinking it mattered.
That’s how the Harkonnens were, and Carthag was their capital here, while Arrakeen was just a sad and painful memory of the all-too-brief Atreides rule. Gurney wanted to depart from the Arrakeen spaceport for a purpose, though. He despised Carthag and the pigsty stink of Harkonnens there. The frontier town of Arrakeen was more familiar to him, and more appropriate for the purpose of Kanly.
The forms must be obeyed, he thought.
By his reaction, Count Fenring had obviously been surprised to receive the enormous spice bribe he’d demanded. The amount was so exorbitant he’d never imagined that even the largest smuggling crew could achieve it, but
he accepted the shipment with good grace and no questions. In return, he provided the vital information Gurney had requested, Guild access cards, stolen uniforms, codes and schedules… basics that the raid required.
Gurney had led his own men into battle many times. They were well versed in Atreides code language, and would follow his orders instantly and efficiently. They understood his tactics instinctively, and never questioned an order in the slightest degree. He spent more of his time discussing the plan with Orbo and Staban’s men, all of whom gruffly acknowledged his instructions. They could smell profit and the adrenaline-rush of adventure. The thought of seizing an entire Harkonnen tanker filled with water destined for Rabban’s troops filled them with excitement and anticipation.
Back on Caladan, Gurney had often listened to half-drunk men in dockside taverns sharing preposterous stories about great fish they had nearly caught out on the sea, but had gotten away. The water tanker would be like that in Gurney’s secret plan, unrevealed to them, or to anyone else. His plan within a plan.
This big fish would get away… or it would seem to do so.
The men were silent, huddled with excitement and wrapped in desert clothes like refugees as they rode together in the rumbling liner that lifted off from the Arrakeen spaceport. The Guild pilot asked no questions of his passengers, merely acknowledged that their documents were correct and their passage was paid for, along with the additional bribe Gurney had paid to him, to ensure the man’s best work. Few workers were able to buy their way off the desert planet, particularly now that Rabban had clamped down on veteran spice crews in order to increase production, but Gurney had found a way to circumvent the system.
The Duke’s man knew that all necessary details were in order; Staban Tuek had enough connections to make it so. The only questionable part about their disguises, he realized, was that these men were intent and grim—and any workers truly escaping from Arrakis would be celebrating. But none of his team could find it within their hearts to fake that part, even though it had been suggested.
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