Dune [Frank Herbert's Dune Saga Collection: Books 1 - 6]

“Muad’Dib has charged me to question you to determine what it is the Tleilaxu intend you to do here,” Hayt said.

“Tleilaxu, Tleilaxu,” the dwarf sang. “I am the Tleilaxu, you dolt! For that matter, so are you.”

Hayt stared at the dwarf. Bijaz radiated a charismatic alertness that made the observer think of ancient idols.

“You hear that guard outside?” Hayt asked. “If I gave them the order, they’d strangle you.”

“Hai! Hai!” Bijaz cried. “What a callous lout you’ve become. And you said you came seeking truth.”

Hayt found he didn’t like the look of secret repose beneath the dwarf’s expression. “Perhaps I only seek the future,” he said.

“Well spoken,” Bijaz said. “Now we know each other. When two thieves meet they need no introduction.”

“So we’re thieves,” Hayt said. “What do we steal?”

“Not thieves, but dice,” Bijaz said. “And you came here to read my spots. I, in turn, read yours. And lo! You have two faces!”

“Did you really see me go into the Tleilaxu tanks?” Hayt asked, fighting an odd reluctance to ask that question.

“Did I not say it?” Bijaz demanded. The dwarf bounced to his feet. “We had a terrific struggle with you. The flesh did not want to come back.”

Hayt felt suddenly that he existed in a dream controlled by some other mind, and that he might momentarily forget this to become lost in the convolutions of that mind.

Bijaz tipped his head slyly to one side, walked all around the ghola, staring up at him. “Excitement kindles old patterns in you,” Bijaz said. “You are the pursuer who doesn’t want to find what he pursues.”

“You’re a weapon aimed at Muad’Dib,” Hayt said, swiveling to follow the dwarf. “What is it you’re to do?”

“Nothing!” Bijaz said, stopping. “I give you a common answer to a common question.”

“Then you were aimed at Alia,” Hayt said. “Is she your target?”

“They call her Hawt, the Fish Monster, on the out-worlds,” Bijaz said. “How is it I hear your blood boiling when you speak of her?”

“So they call her Hawt,” the ghola said, studying Bijaz for any clue to his purpose. The dwarf made such odd responses.

“She is the virgin-harlot,” Bijaz said. “She is vulgar, witty, knowledgeable to a depth that terrifies, cruel when she is most kind, unthinking while she thinks, and when she seeks to build she is as destructive as a coriolis storm.”

“So you came here to speak out against Alia,” Hayt said.

“Against her?” Bijaz sank to a cushion against the wall. “I came here to be captured by the magnetism of her physical beauty.” He grinned, a saurian expression in the big-featured face.

“To attack Alia is to attack her brother,” Hayt said.

“That is so clear it is difficult to see,” Bijaz said. “In truth, Emperor and sister are one person back to back, one being half male and half female.”

“That is a thing we’ve heard said by the Fremen of the deep desert,” Hayt said. “And those are the ones who’ve revived the blood sacrifice to Shai-hulud. How is it you repeat their nonsense?”

“You dare say nonsense?” Bijaz demanded. “You, who are both man and mask? Ahh, but the dice cannot read their own spots. I forget this. And you are doubly confused because you serve the Atreides double-being. Your senses are not as close to the answer as your mind is.”

“Do you preach that false ritual about Muad’Dib to your guards?” Hayt asked, his voice low. He felt his mind being tangled by the dwarf’s words.

“They preach to me!” Bijaz said. “And they pray. Why should they not? All of us should pray. Do we not live in the shadow of the most dangerous creation the universe has ever seen?”

“Dangerous creation . . .”

“Their own mother refuses to live on the same planet with them!”

“Why don’t you answer me straight out?” Hayt demanded. “You know we have other ways of questioning you. We’ll get our answers . . . one way or another.”

“But I have answered you! Have I not said the myth is real? Am I the wind that carries death in its belly? No! I am words! Such words as the lightning which strikes from the sand in a dark sky. I have said: ‘Blow out the lamp! Day is here!’ And you keep saying: ‘Give me a lamp so I can find the day.’”

“You play a dangerous game with me,” Hayt said. “Did you think I could not understand these Zensunni ideas? You leave tracks as clear as those of a bird in mud.”

Bijaz began to giggle.

“Why do you laugh?” Hayt demanded.

“Because I have teeth and wish I had not,” Bijaz managed between giggles. “Having no teeth, I could not gnash them.”

“And now I know your target,” Hayt said. “You were aimed at me.”

“And I’ve hit it right on!” Bijaz said. “You made such a big target, how could I miss?” He nodded as though to himself. “Now I will sing to you.” He began to hum, a keening, whining monotonous theme, repeated over and over.

Hayt stiffened, experiencing odd pains that played up and down his spine. He stared at the face of the dwarf, seeing youthful eyes in an old face. The eyes were the center of a network of knobby white lines which ran to the hollows below his temples. Such a large head! Every feature focused on the pursed-up mouth from which that monotonous noise issued. The sound made Hayt think of ancient rituals, folk memories, old words and customs, half-forgotten meanings in lost mutterings. Something vital was happening here—a bloody play of ideas across Time. Elder ideas lay tangled in the dwarf’s singing. It was like a blazing light in the distance, coming nearer and nearer, illuminating life across a span of centuries.