This phenomenon has been repeated many times in human history, not only with water and the products of arable land, but with hydrocarbon fuels such as petroleum and coal which were controlled through pipelines and other distribution networks. At one time, when distribution of electricity was only through complicated mazes of lines strung across the landscape, even this energy resource fell into the role of a hydraulic-despotism substance.
RM Syaksa proposes that the Lord Leto is building the Empire toward an even greater dependence upon melange. It is worth noting that the aging process can be called a disease for which melange is the specific treatment, although not a cure. RM Syaksa proposes that the Lord Leto may even go so far as introducing a new disease which can only be suppressed by melange. Although this may appear farfetched, it should not be discarded out of hand. Stranger things have happened, and we should not overlook the role of syphilis in early human history.
TRANSPORT/GUILD
The three-mode transportation system once peculiar to Arrakis (that is, on foot with heavy loads relegated to suspensor-borne pallets; in the air via ornithopter; or off-planet by Guild transport) is coming to dominate more and more planets of the Empire. Ix is the primary exception.
We attribute this in part to planetary devolution into sedentary and static life-styles. And partly it is the attempt to copy the pattern of Arrakis. The generalized aversion to things Ixian plays no small part in this trend. There is also the fact that the Fish Speakers promote this pattern to reduce their work in maintaining order.
Over the Guild's part in this trend hangs the absolute dependence of the Guild Navigators upon melange. We are, therefore, keeping a close watch upon the joint effort of Guild and Ix to develop a mechanical substitute for the Navigators' predictive talents. Without melange or some other means of projecting a heighliner's course, every translight Guild voyage risks disaster. Although we are not very sanguine about this Guild-Ixian project, there is always the possibility and we shall report on this as conditions warrant.
THE GOD EMPEROR
Other than some small increments of growth, we note little change in the bodily characteristics of the Lord Leto. A rumored aversion to water has not been confirmed, although the use of water as a barrier against the original sandworms of Dune is well documented in our records, as is the water-death by which Fremen killed a small worm to produce the spice-essence employed in their orgies.
There is considerable evidence for the belief that the Lord Leto has increased his surveillance of Ix, possibly because of the Guild-Ixian project. Certainly, success in that project would reduce his hold upon the Empire.
He continues to do business with Ix, ordering replacement parts for his Royal Cart.
A new ghola Duncan Idaho has been sent to the Lord Leto by the Tleilaxu. This makes it certain that the previous ghola is dead, although the manner of his death is not known. We call your attention to previous indications that the Lord Leto himself has killed some of his gholas.
There is increasing evidence that the Lord Leto employs computers. If he is, in fact, defying his own prohibitions and the proscriptions of the Butlerian Jihad, the possession of proof by us could increase our influence over him, possibly even to the extent of certain joint ventures which we have long contemplated. Sovereign control of our breeding program is still a primary concern. We will continue our investigation with, however, the following caveat:
As with every report preceding this one, we must address the Lord Leto's prescience. There is no doubt that his ability to predict future events, an oracular ability much more powerful than that of any ancestor, is still the mainstay of his political control.
We do not defy it!
It is our belief that he knows every important action we take far in advance of the event. We guide ourselves, therefore, by the rule that we will not knowingly threaten either his person or such of his grand plan as we can discern. Our address to him will continue to be:
"Tell us if we threaten you that we may desist."
And:
"Tell us of your grand plan that we may help."
He has provided no new answers to either question during this period.
THE IXIANS
Other than the Guild-Ix project, there is little of significance to report. Ix is sending a new Ambassador to the Court of the Lord Leto, one Hwi Noree, a niece of the Malky who once was reputed to be such a boon companion of the God Emperor. The reason for the choice of replacement is not known, although there is a small body of evidence that this Hwi Noree was bred for a specific purpose, possibly as the Ixian representative at the Court. We have reason to believe that Malky also was genetically designed with that official context in mind.
We will continue to investigate.
THE MUSEUM FREMEN
These degenerate relics of the once-proud warriors continue to function as our major source of reliable information about affairs on Arrakis. They represent a major budget item for our next reporting period because their demands for payment are increasing and we dare not antagonize them.
It is interesting to note that although their lives bear little resemblance to that of their ancestors, their performance of Fremen rituals and their ability to ape Fremen ways remains flawless. We attribute this to Fish Speaker influence upon Fremen training.
THE TLEILAXU
We do not expect the new ghola of Duncan Idaho to provide any surprises. The Tleilaxu continue to be much chastened by the Lord Leto's reaction to their one attempt at changing the cellular nature and the psyche of the original.
A recent envoy from the Tleilaxu renewed their attempts to entice us into a joint venture, the avowed purpose being the production of a totally female society without the need for males. For all of the obvious reasons, including our distrust of everything Tleilaxu, we responded with our usual polite negative. Our Embassy to the Lord Leto's Decennial Festival will make a full report of this to him.
Respectfully submitted:
The Reverend Mothers Syaksa, Yitob, Mamulut, Eknekosk and Akeli.
Odd as it may seem, great struggles such as the one you can see emerging from my journals are not always visible to the participants. Much depends on what people dream in the secrecy of their hearts. I have always been as concerned with the shaping of dreams as with the shaping of actions. Between the lines of my journals is the struggle with humankind's view of itself--a sweaty contest on a field where motives from our darkest past can well up out of an unconscious reservoir and become events with which we not only must live but contend. It is the hydra-headed monster which always attacks from your blind side. I pray, therefore, that when you have traversed my portion of the Golden Path you no longer will be innocent children dancing to music you cannot hear.
--THE STOLEN JOURNALS
Nayla moved in a steady, plodding pace as she climbed the circular stairs to the God Emperor's audience chamber atop the Citadel's south tower. Each time she traversed the southwest arc of the tower, the narrow slitted windows drew dust-defined golden lines across her path. She knew that the central wall beside her confined a lift of Ixian make large enough to carry her Lord's bulk to the upper chamber, certainly large enough to hold her relatively smaller body, but she did not resent the fact that she was required to use the stairs.
The breeze through the open slits brought her the burnt-flint smell of blown sand. The lowlying sun ignited the light of red mineral flakes in the inner wall, ruby matches glowing there. Now and then she cast a glance through a slitted window at the dunes. Never once did she pause to admire the things to be seen around her.
"You have heroic patience, Nayla," the Lord had once told her.
Remembrance of those words warmed Nayla now.
Within the tower, Leto followed Nayla's progress up the long circular stairs that spiraled around the Ixian tube. Her progress was transmitted to him by an Ixian device which projected her approaching image quarter-size onto a region of three-dimensional focus directly in front of his eyes.
&nb
sp; How precisely she moves, he thought.
The precision, he knew, came from a passionate simplicity.
She wore her Fish Speaker blues and a cape-robe without the hawk at the breast. Once past the guard station at the foot of the tower, she had thrown back the cibus mask he required her to wear on these personal visits. Her blocky, muscular body was like that of many others among his guardians, but her face was like no other in all of his memory--almost square with a mouth so wide it seemed to extend around the cheeks, an illusion caused by deep creases at the corners. Her eyes were pale green, the closely cropped hair like old ivory. Her forehead added to the square effect, almost flat with pale eyebrows which often went unnoticed because of the compelling eyes. The nose was a straight, shallow line which terminated close to the thin-lipped mouth.
When Nayla spoke, her great jaws opened and closed like those of some primordial animal. Her strength, known to few outside the corps of Fish Speakers, was legendary there. Leto had seen her lift a one-hundred-kilo man with one hand. Her presence on Arrakis had been arranged originally without Moneo's intervention, although the majordomo knew Leto employed his Fish Speakers as secret agents.
Leto turned his head away from the plodding image and looked out the wide opening beside him at the desert to the south. The colors of the distant rocks danced in his awareness--brown, gold, a deep amber. There was a line of pink on a faraway cliff the exact hue of an egret's feathers. Egrets did not exist anymore except in Leto's memory, but he could place that pale pastel ribbon of stone against an inner eye and it was as though the extinct bird flew past him.
The climb, he knew, should be starting to tire even Nayla. She paused at last to rest, stopping at a point two steps past the three-quarter mark, precisely the place where she rested every time. It was part of her precision, one of the reasons he had brought her back from the distant garrison on Seprek.
A Dune hawk floated past the opening beside Leto only a few wing lengths from the tower wall. Its attention was held on the shadows at the base of the Citadel. Small animals sometimes emerged there, Leto knew. Dimly on the horizon beyond the hawk's path he could see a line of clouds.
What a strange thing those were to the Old Fremen in him: clouds on Arrakis and rain and open water.
Leto reminded the inner voices: Except for this last desert, my Sareer, the re-modeling of Dune into verdant Arrakis has gone on remorselessly since the first days of my rule.
The influence of geography on history went mostly unrecognized, Leto thought. Humans tended to look more at the influence of history on geography.
Who owns this river passage? This verdant valley? This peninsula? This planet?
None of us.
Nayla was climbing once more, her gaze fixed upward on the stairs she must traverse. Leto's thoughts locked on her.
In many ways, she is the most useful assistant I have ever had. I am her God. She worships me quite unquestioningly. Even when I playfully attack her faith, she takes this merely as testing. She knows herself superior to any test.
When he had sent her to the rebellion and had told her to obey Siona in all things, she did not question. When Nayla doubted, even when she framed her doubts in words, her own thoughts were enough to restore faith ... or had been enough. Recent messages, however, made it clear that Nayla required the Holy Presence to rebuild her inner strength.
Leto recalled the first conversation with Nayla, the woman trembling in her eagerness to please.
"Even if Siona sends you to kill me, you must obey. She must never learn that you serve me."
"No one can kill you, Lord."
"But you must obey Siona."
"Of course, Lord. That is your command."
"You must obey her in all things."
"I will do it, Lord."
Another test. Nayla does not question my tests. She treats them as flea bites. Her Lord commands? Nayla obeys. I must not let anything change that relationship.
She would have made a superb Shadout in the old days, Leto thought. It was one of the reasons he had given Nayla a crysknife, a real one preserved from Sietch Tabr. It had belonged to one of Stilgar's wives. Nayla wore it in a concealed sheath beneath her robes, more a talisman than a weapon. He had given it to her in the original ritual, a ceremony which had surprised him by evoking emotions he had thought forever buried.
"This is the tooth of Shai-Hulud."
He had extended the blade to her on his silvery-skinned hands.
"Take it and you become part of both past and future. Soil it and the past will give you no future."
Nayla had accepted the blade, then the sheath.
"Draw the blood of a finger," Leto had commanded.
Nayla had obeyed.
"Sheath the blade. Never remove it without drawing blood."
Again, Nayla had obeyed.
As Leto watched the three-dimensional image of Nayla's approach, his reflections on that old ceremony were touched by sadness. Unless fixed in the Old Fremen way, the blade would grow increasingly brittle and useless. It would keep its crysknife shape throughout Nayla's life, but little longer.
I have thrown away a bit of the past.
How sad it was that the Shadout of old had become today's Fish Speaker. And a true crysknife had been used to bind a servant more strongly to her master. He knew that some thought his Fish Speakers were really priestesses-- Leto's answer to the Bene Gesserit.
"He creates another religion," the Bene Gesserit said.
Nonsense! I have not created a religion. I am the religion!
Nayla entered the tower sanctuary and stood three paces from Leto's cart, her gaze lowered in proper subservience.
Still in his memories, Leto said: "Look at me, woman!"
She obeyed.
"I have created a holy obscenity!" he said. "This religion built around my person disgusts me!"
"Yes, Lord."
Nayla's green eyes on the gilded cushions of her cheeks stared out at him without questioning, without comprehension, without the need of either response.
If I sent her out to collect the stars, she would go and she would attempt it. She thinks I am testing her again. I do believe she could anger me.
"This damnable religion should end with me!" Leto shouted. "Why should I want to loose a religion upon my people? Religions wreck from within-- Empires and individuals alike! It's all the same."
"Yes, Lord."
"Religions create radicals and fanatics like you!"
"Thank You, Lord."
The short-lived pseudo-rage sank back out of sight into the depths of his memories. Nothing dented the hard surface of Nayla's faith.
"Topri has reported to me through Moneo," Leto said. "Tell me about this Topri."
"Topri is a worm."
"Isn't that what you call me when you're among the rebels?"
"I obey my Lord in everything."
Touche!
"Topri is not worth cultivating then?" Leto asked.
"Siona assessed him correctly. He is clumsy. He says things which others will repeat, thus exposing his hand in the matter. Within seconds after Kobat began to speak, she had confirmation that Topri was a spy."
Everyone agrees, even Moneo, Leto thought. Topri is not a good spy.
The agreement amused Leto. The petty machinations muddied water which remained completely transparent to him. The performers, however, still suited his designs.
"Siona does not suspect you?" Leto asked.
"I am not clumsy."
"Do you know why I summoned you?"
"To test my faith."
Ahhh, Nayla. How little you know of testing.
"I want your assessment of Siona. I want to see it on your face and see it in your movements and hear it in your voice." Leto said. "Is she ready?"
"The Fish Speakers need that one, Lord. Why do You risk losing her?"
"Forcing the issue is the surest way of losing what I treasure most in her," Leto said. "She must come to me with all of her strengths
intact."
Nayla lowered her gaze. "As my Lord commands."
Leto recognized the response. It was a Nayla reaction to whatever she failed to understand.
"Will she survive the test, Nayla?"
"As my Lord describes the test ..." Nayla lifted her gaze to Leto's face, shrugged. "I do not know, Lord. Certainly, she is strong. She was the only one to survive the wolves. But she is ruled by hate."
"Quite naturally. Tell me, Nayla, what will she do with the things she stole from me?"