Page 84 of Hunters Of Dune (Dune 7)

For the time being, he would simply have to hide and let the battle flow past him. The Lost Tleilaxu man did not care which faction won, or if they all destroyed each other. He was on Tleilax. He belonged here.

With the attention of the combatants diverted, Uxtal slipped away, crawled under a fence, and raced across a churned muddy field to the nearby slig farm. No one would have the slightest interest in a filthy low-caste farmer like Gaxhar. He could be safe there and demand sanctuary from the old man!

Scrambling for shelter, Uxtal reached a section of pens on the other side of the farm, where the farmer kept his fattest sligs. Looking back toward his now-burning laboratory, he saw a group of black-uniformed Valkyries marching swiftly across the field. It was just his bad luck--they would come here soon, he was sure of it. Why would they bother with a man who raised sligs? Other female fighters searched outlying buildings, intent on rooting out Honored Matres who had gone into hiding to lay an ambush. Had they seen him?

Ducking frantically out of sight, Uxtal slid into an empty, muddy pen on the other side of a gate where the fat sligs were kept. A small feed-storage shed was elevated on stone blocks, leaving a small space beneath. Uxtal squirmed into the cramped space where the dominating women--of either faction--would not see him.

Agitated by his presence, the sligs began to slither around in the mud and squeal in peculiar high-pitched tones on the other side of the gate. Uxtal crawled toward the building. The stench and filth made him want to retch.

"It's almost feeding time," a voice said.

Twisting to look through the gap under the shed, Uxtal saw the elderly slig farmer standing at the fence, peering through the slats at him. The slig farmer began tossing bloody scraps of raw meat--more human body parts--into the empty pen. Some of them landed very close to Uxtal. He pushed them away. "Stop, you fool! I'm trying to hide. Don't call attention to me!"

"You have blood on you now," Gaxhar said in a frighteningly casual voice. "That could draw them toward you."

Nonchalantly, the farmer raised the gate and let the hungry sligs through. Five of them: a most inauspicious number. The creatures were great slabs of flesh, their flopping bodies coated with dense mucous, their flat underbellies lined with grinding mouths that could churn any biological matter into digestible mush.

Uxtal scrambled away. "Get me out of here! I command it!"

The largest slig in the pen shoved into the crawl space where the Lost Tleilaxu was trapped, and fell on him. More sligs charged forward, pushing and colliding to reach the fresh meat. The loud grunting sounds easily drowned out the Lost Tleilaxu man's screams.

"I liked it better when all the Masters were dead," Gaxhar muttered.

The slig farmer heard gunfire and explosions in the distance. The city of Bandalong was already a raging inferno, but the battle did not come close to his farm. The lower-caste menial laborers in the nearby hovels were not worthy of notice.

Later, when his sligs had finished feeding, Gaxhar killed the largest and best one, which he had raised with painstaking care. That evening, with the last few sparks of battle rumbling through the city, he invited a few friends from the village to his home for a feast.

"No need to keep such fine meat for unworthy people anymore," he told them. He had fashioned a table and chair from crates and boards. His other guests sat on the floor. In these simple surroundings, the low-caste Tleilaxus ate until their bellies ached, and then they ate even more.

Love is one of the most dangerous forces in the universe. Love weakens, while deceiving us into believing it is a good thing.

--MOTHER SUPERIOR ALMA MAVIS TARAZA

M

urbella.

He was supposed to be watching the no-ship. He knew that. But her name, her presence, her scent, her addictive control had grown even stronger since he'd started contemplating the possibility of bringing Murbella back as a ghola. It could be done; he knew it.

For him, the heart call had never entirely stopped in the nineteen years since he had broken from her. It was as if she had caught him in her own net, as deadly as the gossamer mesh cast by the old man and woman. Everything was too quiet during his lonely and tedious shift on the navigation bridge, giving him too many opportunities to think and obsess on her.

Now he intended to do something about it, to solve the problem. He pushed aside his rational assessment that it was a poor solution, a dangerous one, and he forged ahead.

Leaving the navigation bridge unattended again, he gathered up her still-fresh garments from nullentropy storage and went to the quarters of Master Scytale. The grayish Tleilaxu opened his chamber suspiciously, looking at Duncan and his armful of clothing. Behind him, the dimly lit room fuzzed with exotic scents of incense or drugs, and he caught a glimpse of the young Scytale copy. The boy was wide-eyed, both fearful and fascinated to receive a visitor. The Tleilaxu Master rarely let his ghola see or interact with anyone else aboard the ship.

"Duncan Idaho." Scytale looked him up and down, and Duncan had the distinct feeling that he was being assessed. "How may I be of service?"

Did the Tleilaxu still look on him as one of their creations? He and Scytale had been held prisoner together aboard the no-ship on Chapterhouse, but Duncan had never considered Scytale to be a comrade in arms. Now, though, he needed something from him.

"I require your expertise." He extended the rumpled garments, and Scytale flinched in confusion, as if they were weapons. "I preserved these within days of when we left Chapterhouse. I have found loose hairs, and there may be skin cells, other DNA fragments."

Scytale looked at them, frowning. He did not touch the clothing. "For what purpose?"

"To create a ghola."

The Tleilaxu Master already seemed to know the answer. "Of whom?"

"Murbella." He kept finding himself drawn back to the idea as if it were an inescapable black hole and he had already passed the event horizon in his mind. He had dark amber strands of her hair on a pale green towel. "You can grow her again. The axlotl tanks are no longer being used."

The boy Scytale stood close to his elder, who pushed him backward. The older Master appeared intimidated. "The whole program has been halted. Sheeana will not allow any new gholas."

"She will allow this one. I--I will demand it." He lowered his voice, mumbling to himself. "They owe me that much."

Sheeana's possibly prescient dream had forced her to regroup, to reconsider her plans and exercise caution. But now that several years had passed, discussions had already begun about experimenting with another ghola child or two. The fascinating cells from Scytale's nullentropy capsule were just too tempting. . . .

"Duncan Idaho, I do not believe this is wise. Murbella is an Honored Matre--"

"A former Honored Matre. And a ghola grown from these cells will . . . will be different." He didn't know if she would come back with her full memories and knowledge of a Reverend Mother, all the changes the Spice Agony had wrought. Regardless, she would be here.

"You would not understand, Scytale. Long ago, she tried to enslave me, to bond me with her sexual powers--and I did the same. We were bound together in a mutual noose, and I cannot break it. My performance and concentration has suffered for years, though I use my strength to resist."

"Why, then, would you wish to bring her back?"

Duncan pushed the rumpled clothes forward. "Because then at least I wouldn't suffer from this endless, destructive withdrawal! It will not go away, so I must find a different solution. I have ignored it for too long."

The fact that he was here at all reinforced his knowledge of the hold that she still had. Even the thought of Murbella tied his hands. He should have been on guard, watching from the navigation bridge, waiting to hear the next report from Sheeana or Teg . . . but the idea of resurrecting Murbella had reopened the festering heartache, making her loss seem fresh and painful all over again.

The Tleilaxu Master seemed to understand much more than Duncan wanted him to see. "You yourself know the danger

in your suggestion. If you were as confident as you appear to be, you would not have waited until the others were down on the planet. You would not have come here like a thief, whispering your suggestion to me where no one else can hear." Scytale crossed his arms over his chest.

Duncan stared at him in silence, promising himself that he would not plead. "Will you do it? Is it possible to bring her back?"

"It is possible. As to your other question--" He could see Scytale calculating, trying to determine what sort of payment or reciprocal action he could pry out of Duncan.

The alarms startled them both. The danger lights, the warning of an imminent attack, the approaching ships--in so many years, the alert systems had been silent, and now the sounds were both startling and terrifying.

Duncan dropped the garments on the deck and ran for the nearest lift. He should have been on the navigation bridge. He should have been watching, not secretly talking with the Tleilaxu Master.

He would have time for guilt later.

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