He bent the fingers of one hand like a claw, and raised it high. “The Harkonnens have no idea of our combined strength. Like a desert hawk, we will dig our talons into the Baron’s backside.”
* * *
Inside the terminal building of the Carthag Spaceport, the Baron scowled and paced while preparations continued for his departure to Giedi Prime. He loathed the dry, dusty climate of Arrakis.
Pausing to catch his breath, he held on to a railing, his feet barely skimming the floor. Though by no means nimble, his suspensor belt helped the obese man maintain the impression that he was capable of doing anything he wished.
Spotlights marked the fused-sand landing field. Illumination splashed across fuel storage silos, skeletal cranes, suspensor barges, and blocky hangars constructed from prefab components— all modeled after the architecture of Harko City.
He was in a particularly foul mood this evening. His trip home had been delayed for days while he formulated a rebuttal to a notification from the Spacing Guild and CHOAM, who wanted to audit his spice-handling procedures. Again. He had cooperated fully with the usual audit only five months ago, and another should not have been due for at least another nineteen months. From Giedi Prime, his lawtechs had filed a detailed letter of inquiry into the matter, which would undoubtedly delay the Guild and CHOAM, but he had a bad feeling about this. It was all tied in with the Emperor’s crackdown on spice stockpiling. Things were changing, and not for the better.
As the holder of the Arrakis fief, House Harkonnen was the only Landsraad member legally entitled to any stockpiles at all, but those stocks could only be large enough to fill expected short-term demand from customers placing orders for melange, and each hoard had to be documented in periodic reports to the Emperor. It was all quite involved, and for every shipment that the Baron sent out by Heighliner, a tax was owed to House Corrino.
The customers, for their part, were only permitted to order amounts to fulfill their own short-term needs— for food additives, spice fibers, medicinal applications, and the like. For centuries, there had been no means of enforcing the prohibition against ordering too much, which led, inevitably, to hoarding. And everyone had looked the other way. Until now.
“Piter! How much longer?”
The furtive Mentat had been watching crews haul crates and supplies onto the Harkonnen frigate under the yellow-white glow. He’d appeared to be daydreaming, but the Baron knew de Vries was keeping a silent inventory, watching every object loaded aboard, ticking it off against a list inside his brain.
“I estimate another standard hour, my Baron. We have much to bring back to Giedi Prime, but these local workers are slow. If you like, I could have one tortured to increase the speed of the others.”
The Baron considered the suggestion, but shook his head. “We have time before the Heighliner arrives. I will wait in the frigate lounge. The sooner I get my feet off this damned planet, the better I’ll feel.”
“Yes, my Baron. Shall I prepare refreshments? It helps for you to rest.”
“I don’t need rest,” the Baron answered, more harshly than he’d intended. He disliked any implication of weakness or inability to perform his duties.
The Bene Gesserit had afflicted him with this disgusting, debilitating disease. He’d once been blessed with a perfect body, but that horse-faced Mohiam had turned it into an offensive flesh-dumpling, though it retained the sexual drive and sharp mind he’d had in his youth.
The disease itself was a closely held secret. If Shaddam ever decided the Baron was a failing leader, unable to perform the necessary functions on Arrakis, House Harkonnen would be replaced by another noble family. Thus, the Baron actively fostered the impression that his corpulence resulted from gluttony and a hedonistic lifestyle— an impression that was not difficult for him to maintain.
In fact, he decided with a smile, upon returning to Harkonnen Keep he would announce an extravagant feast there. To keep up appearances, he would encourage his guests to overindulge as much as he did.
The Baron’s various physicians had suggested that he spend time in the dry desert climate, asserting that it was better for his health. But he hated Arrakis, despite the wealth he reaped from melange. He returned to Giedi Prime whenever possible, sometimes just to repair the damage his thickheaded nephew “Beast” Rabban had done while he was gone.
The workers continued their loading and the guards formed an escort cordon to the ship. Piter de Vries accompanied the Baron across the warm landing field and up the frigate ramp. On board, the Mentat prepared a tiny glass of sapho juice for himself and brought a decanter of expensive kirana brandy for his master. The Baron sat in a heavily cushioned couch, rebuilt to accommodate his bulk, and summoned the latest intelligence briefing brought by the frigate captain.
He scanned the report with a frown that deepened into an outright scowl. Until now, the Baron had heard nothing about the outrageous Atreides attack upon Beakkal— and the surprisingly supportive Landsraad reaction. The damnable nobles had actually sympathized with Leto, even applauding his brutal retaliation. And now the Emperor had devastated Zanovar.
Things were heating up.
“These are unsettled times, my Baron, with many aggressive actions. Remember Grumman and Ecaz.”
“This Duke Atreides”— the Baron raised his briefing packet, clutching it in pasty, ring-studded fingers— “has no respect for law and order. If I were ever to launch Harkonnen forces upon another family, Shaddam would send Sardaukar down my throat. Yet Leto gets away with murder.”
“Technically, the Duke violated no laws, my Baron.” De Vries paused to make detailed mental projections. “Leto is well liked among the other Houses, and he has their tacit support. Do not underestimate the Atreides popularity, which seems to grow every year. Many of the Houses look up to the Duke. They see him as a hero—”
The Baron gulped his brandy and gave a disbelieving snort. “For some unknown reason.” With a grunt, he leaned back on the couch, pleased to hear the rumble of engines starting at last. The frigate rose from the glassy ground and into the blackness of night.
“Think, my Baron.” De Vries rarely risked such a tone with him. “The death of Leto’s son may have been a short-term victory for us, but now it is becoming a victory for House Atreides as well. The tragedy has generated much sympathy for the Duke. The Landsraad members will grant him leniency, and he can get away with actions no one else would dare. Beakkal is a case in point.”
Irked by the success of his nemesis, the Baron blew air through his puffy lips. Outside the windows of the frigate, at the edge of orbit, he watched the atmosphere fade into starlit indigo. Exasperated, he turned back to de Vries. “But why do they like Leto so much, Piter? Why him, and not me? What exactly has an Atreides ever done for them?”
The Mentat furrowed his brow. “Popularity can be an important coin, if spent properly. Leto Atreides actively tries to woo the Landsraad. You, my Baron, choose to hammer your rivals into submission. You use acid instead of honey, not courting them as you could.”
“It has always been difficult for me.” He narrowed his spider-black eyes and swelled his chest with fresh determination. “But if Leto Atreides can do it, then by all the demons in the cosmos, I can do it as well!”
De Vries smiled. “Allow me to suggest that you consult an advisor, my Baron, perhaps even hire an etiquette instructor to reshape your actions and moods.”
“I don’t need a man to tell me how to hold my fork in a dainty fashion.”
De Vries cut him off before his annoyance could grow. “There are many skills, my Baron. Etiquette, like politics, is a complex weaving of fine threads. It is difficult for an untrained person to keep track of them all. You are the leader of a Great House. Therefore, you must perform better than any commoner.”
Baron Harkonnen remained silent as the frigate pilot guided them toward the giant Guild ship above. He finished his potent, smoky brandy. He didn’t like to admit it, but knew his Mentat had spoken trul
y. “And where would we find such an… etiquette advisor?”
“I suggest obtaining one from Chusuk, which is well-known for its courtliness and manners. They make balisets, write sonnets, and are considered highly refined and cultured.”
“Very well.” A glint of humor flickered across the Baron’s face. “And I’ll want Rabban to go through the same instruction.”
De Vries kept himself from smiling. “I am afraid your nephew may be beyond redemption.”
“Probably. I want him to try, anyway.”
“It shall be arranged, my Baron, the moment we reach Giedi Prime.”
The Mentat took a sip of his sapho juice while his master poured another snifter of kirana brandy and quaffed it.
Mentats accumulate questions the way others accumulate answers.
— Mentat Teaching
When word came that Gurney and Thufir had at last returned from Ix and were taking a shuttle down from the Heighliner in orbit, Rhombur insisted on meeting them at the spaceport in person. He was both anxious and uneasy to hear what they had found on his once-beautiful planet.
“Be prepared for whatever news they bring, Prince,” Duncan Idaho said. Immaculate in his green-and-black Atreides uniform, the young Swordmaster wore a determined expression on his round face. “They will tell us the truth.”
Rhombur’s expression did not flicker, but he turned his eyes toward Duncan. “I have not heard a detailed report from Ix in years, and I am eager for any news at all. It could not be worse than what I’ve already imagined.”
The Prince walked with exaggerated care, but kept his balance and accepted no assistance. Rather than choosing more traditional honeymoon activities, his new wife Tessia had worked with him unceasingly, helping Rhombur become proficient in his cyborg body. Like an overprotective father, Dr. Yueh worried about his patient, testing functions and nerve impulse transmissions until Rhombur finally ordered the Suk doctor out of his private apartments.
Now, moving with determination and buoyed by Tessia’s faith in him, Rhombur took no discouragement from the curious or pitying stares. He combated their instinctive avoidance of his freakish appearance with grins in response. His good-natured personality shamed others into accepting him.
Outside the Cala Municipal Spaceport, under skies thick with clouds, the two watched the fingernail scratch of the descending shuttle’s ionization trail. As a light rain began to fall, Rhombur and Duncan drew deep breaths of the salty air, pleased to feel the dampness on their skin and hair.
The Guild shuttle aligned itself with a marked landing grid and settled into Caladan’s embrace. People pushed forward to greet emerging passengers.
Dressed in the faded cloaks of down-on-their-luck merchants, Gurney Halleck and Thufir Hawat followed a line of disembarking visitors. They looked like a million others in the Imperium, but these two had defied all odds, infiltrating Ix right under the noses of the Tleilaxu. Recognizing them, Rhombur rushed forward. His hurried movements became jerky instead of smooth, but he did not care.
“Do you have information, Gurney?” Rhombur spoke in the coded Atreides battle language. “Thufir, what did you find?”
Gurney, who had experienced so much horror in the Harkonnen slave pits, looked deeply disturbed. Thufir walked on legs as stiff and leaden as Rhombur’s own. The weathered Mentat took a deep breath to marshal his thoughts, choosing his words carefully. “My Lord Prince, we have witnessed much. Oh, what these eyes have seen.… And as a Mentat, I can never forget.”
* * *
Leto Atreides called a private war counsel in one of the tower chambers. These apartments had been used by his mother Lady Helena as a personal sitting room before she’d been exiled to the Eastern Continent, but the chambers had remained unused for some time. Until now.
Servants dusted the corners and windowsills and built a roaring fire in the river-rock fireplace. Rhombur had little physical need to rest and relax, and stood waiting like a prominent piece of furniture.
Initially, Leto sat in one of his mother’s embroidered cushion chairs, where she used to curl up and read daily devotions from the Orange Catholic Bible. But he thrust the chair away, selecting instead a taller wooden one. These were not comfortable times.
Thufir Hawat presented his detailed summary of what they had seen and done. As the Mentat dictated the brutal facts, his companion frequently interjected emotional comments, hammering home his revulsion and disgust.
“Sadly, my Duke,” Hawat said, “we have overestimated the capabilities and accomplishments of C’tair Pilru and his supposed freedom fighters. We found little organized resistance. The Ixian people are broken. Sardaukar forces— two legions of them— and Tleilaxu spies are everywhere.”
Gurney added, “They sent Face Dancers to mimic Ixians and slip into rebel cells. The resistance fighters have been massacred several times.”
“We did observe widespread discontent, but no organization,” Hawat continued. “However, given the proper catalyst, I project that the Ixian population will rise up and overthrow the Tleilaxu.”
“Then we must provide that catalyst.” Rhombur took a heavy step forward. “Me.”
Duncan shifted in one of the chairs, unwilling to relax. “I see tactical difficulties. The invaders have become entrenched. They won’t be expecting a surprise attack after all this time, of course, but even with full Atreides military forces, it would be suicide. Especially against Sardaukar.”
Gurney noted, “Why does Shaddam have Imperial soldiers inside Ix? As far as I know, it’s not authorized by the Landsraad.”
Leto was not convinced. “The Emperor makes his own rules. Remember Zanovar.” His dark eyebrows drew together.
“We have the moral high ground, Leto,” Rhombur insisted, “just like we did on Beakkal.”
After having waited so long for revenge, the Prince was now filled with fire. Partly through Tessia’s efforts, but more of his own volition, a new core inside him had come alive. Rhombur paced the room with precise steps, mechanical legs humming, as if his mind was so restless that it had to burn off excess energy. “I was destined to become the Earl of House Vernius, like my father before me.”
He raised an arm, fist clenched, then lowered it. The servomotors and pulley musculature dramatically increased his strength. Rhombur had already demonstrated that he could crush rocks in the palm of his hand. He turned his scarred face toward the Duke, who still sat brooding in the hard chair.
“Leto, I’ve watched how your people view you with love, respect, and loyalty. Now, Tessia has helped me realize that for all these years I was trying to regain Ix for the wrong reasons. My heart wasn’t in it, because I did not see how much it mattered. I was indignant at losing what was mine. I was angry at the Tleilaxu for crimes against me and my family. But what about the Ixian people? Even the poor, duped suboids who followed promises of a better life?”
“Aye, those promises led them right over a cliff,” Gurney said. “ ’When the shepherd is a wolf, the flock becomes only so much meat.’ ”
Though Rhombur stood close to the orange flames in the fireplace, he couldn’t feel the heat. “I want to regain my world, not for myself, but because it’s what the people of Ix need. If I am to be Earl Vernius, then I serve them. Not the other way around.”
Hawat’s memory-haunted face softened into a smile. “You have learned an important lesson, Prince.”
“Yes, but putting it into practice will require considerable work,” Duncan said. “Unless we have some hidden advantage or secret weapon, our military forces will be in great danger. Remember what we’ll be up against.”
Leto considered Rhombur’s plight and acknowledged that the Vernius line would die with him, no matter what he achieved on Ix. And he felt a warm glow inside to think of Jessica’s pregnancy. He himself would have another child— a son, he hoped, though she would not say. He felt a pang, knowing she would soon depart for Kaitain….
The Duke had never imagined how his life would play out, how h
e would grow to care for Jessica after he’d first resented her presence so much. The Bene Gesserits had coerced him into keeping her here at Castle Caladan. Angered by their obvious manipulations, he had vowed never to take her as a lover… but he’d eventually played right into the Sisterhood’s plans. They had bribed him with information about Harkonnen schemes, a new kind of battleship—
Leto sat up with a start, and a slow smile spread across his lean face. “Wait!” They all fell silent as he organized his thoughts; the only sound in the room was the crackle of the fire. “Thufir, you were present when the Bene Gesserit witches made a bargain with me to keep Jessica here.”
Puzzled, Hawat tried to follow the Duke’s train of thought. Then the Mentat’s eyebrows raised. “They traded you information. There was an unseen ship, a vessel sporting new technology that rendered it optically invisible, even to scanners.”
Leto pounded his fist on the table and leaned forward. “The prototype of that Harkonnen ship crashed on Wallach IX. The Sisters have the vessel in their possession. Wouldn’t it be helpful if we could convince them to give us that technology…?”
Duncan lurched to his feet. “With undetectable ships, we could infiltrate an entire force into Ix before the Sardaukar could rally to the Tleilaxu defense.”
His face a mask of determination, Leto rose slowly and said, “They owe me, by the hells! Thufir, send a message to the Mother School asking for Bene Gesserit cooperation. More than any other House, we have the right to that information, since the technology was used against us.”
He looked over at Rhombur, a predatory smile cracking his stern countenance. “And then, my friend, we shall spare no effort to regain Ix.”
The less we know, the longer the explanation.
— Bene Gesserit Azhar Book (renegade copy)
With a collective memory that stretched into the murky shadows of history, the ancient Mother Superior Harishka had no need for advice from her Sisters. Yet recollections from the deep past were not always applicable to the future or to the current tapestry of Imperial politics.
Dune: House Corrino Page 12