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

“The Golden Path still stands open,” he said.

“I don’t trust you!”

“Because we are not equals?”

“Yes!”

“But we’re interdependent.”

“What need have you for me?”

Ahhh, the cry of youth unsure of its niche. He felt the strength within the secret bonds of dependency and forced himself to be hard. Dependency fosters weakness!

“You are the Golden Path,” he said.

“Me?” It was barely a whisper.

“You’ve read those journals you stole from me,” he said. “I am in them, but where are you? Look at what I have created, Siona. And you, you can create nothing except yourself.”

“Words, more tricky words!”

“I do not suffer from being worshipped, Siona. I suffer from never being appreciated. Perhaps . . . No, I dare not hope for you.”

“What’s the purpose of those journals?”

“An Ixian machine records them. They are to be found on a faraway day. They will make people think.”

“An Ixian machine? You defy the Jihad!”

“There’s a lesson in that, too. What do such machines really do? They increase the number of things we can do without thinking. Things we do without thinking—there’s the real danger. Look at how long you walked across this desert without thinking about your face mask.”

“You could have warned me!”

“And increased your dependency.”

She stared at him a moment, then: “Why would you want me to command your Fish Speakers?”

“You are an Atreides woman, resourceful and capable of independent thought. You can be truthful just for the sake of truth as you see it. You were bred and trained for command—which means freedom from dependence.”

The wind whirled dust and sand around them while she weighed his words. “And if I agree, you’ll save me?”

“No.”

She had been so sure of the opposite answer that it was several heartbeats before she translated that single word. In that time, the wind fell slightly, exposing a vista across the dune-scape to the remnants of Habbanya Ridge. The air was suddenly chilled with that cold which did as much to rob the flesh of moisture as did the hottest sunlight. Part of Leto’s awareness detected an oscillation in weather control.

“No?” She was both puzzled and outraged.

“I do not make bloody bargains with people I must trust.”

She shook her head slowly from side to side, but her gaze remained fixed on his face. “What will make you save me?”

“Nothing will make me do it. Why do you think you could do to me what I will not do to you? That is not the way of interdependence.”

Her shoulders slumped. “If I cannot bargain with you or force you . . .”

“Then you must choose another path.”

What a marvelous thing to observe the explosive growth of awareness, he thought. Siona’s expressive features hid nothing of it from him. She focused on his eyes and glared at him as though seeking to move completely into his thoughts. New strength entered her muffled voice.

“You would have me know everything about you—even every weakness?”

“Would you steal what I would give openly?”

The morning light was harsh on her face. “I promise you nothing!”

“Nor do I require that.”

“But you will give me . . . water if I ask?”

“It is not just water.”

She nodded. “And I am Atreides.”

The Fish Speakers had not withheld the lesson of that special susceptibility in the Atreides genes. She knew where the spice originated and what it might do to her. The teachers in the Fish Speaker schools never failed him. And the gentle additions of melange in Siona’s dried food had done their work, too.

“These little curled flaps beside my face,” he said. “Tease one of them gently with a finger and it will give up drops of moisture heavily laced with spice-essence.”

He saw the recognition in her eyes. Memories which she did not know as memories were speaking to her. And she was the result of many generations in which the Atreides sensitivity had been increased.

Even the urgency of her thirst would not yet move her.

To ease her through the crisis, he told her about Fremen children poling for sandtrout at an oasis edge, teasing the moisture out of them for quick vitalization.

“But I am Atreides,” she said.

“The Oral History tells it truthfully,” he said.

“Then I could die of it.”

“That’s the test.”

“You would make a real Fremen out of me!”

“How else can you teach your descendants to survive here after I am gone?”

She pulled away her mask and moved her face to within a handsbreadth of his. A finger came up and touched one of the curled flaps of his cowl.

“Stroke it gently,” he said.

Her hand obeyed not his voice but something from within her. The finger movements were precise, eliciting his own memories, a thing passed from child to child to child . . . the way so much information and misinformation survived. He turned his face to its limit and looked sideways at her face so close to his. Pale blue drops began to form at the flap’s edge. Rich cinnamon smells enveloped them. She leaned toward the drops. He saw the pores beside her nose, the way her tongue moved as she drank.