Dune (Page 90)

"But we’ve no shields!"

"Do they know that?"

Again the ‘thopter shuddered.

Paul twisted to peer back. "Only one of them appears to be fast enough to keep up with us."

He returned his attention to their course, watching the storm wall grow high in front of them. It loomed like a tangible solid.

"Projectile launchers, rockets, all the ancient weaponry – that’s one thing we’ll give the Fremen," Paul whispered.

"The storm," Jessica said. "Hadn’t you better turn?"

"What about the ship behind us?"

"He’s pulling up."

"Now!"

Paul stubbed the wings, banked hard left into the deceptively slow boiling of the storm wall, felt his cheeks pull in the G-force.

They appeared to glide into a slow clouding of dust that grew heavier and heavier until it blotted out the desert and the moon. The aircraft became a long, horizontal whisper of darkness lighted only by the green luminosity of the instrument panel.

Through Jessica’s mind flashed all the warnings about such storms – that they cut metal like butter, etched flesh to bone and ate away the bones. She felt the buffeting of dust-blanketed wind. It twisted them as Paul fought the controls. She saw him chop the power, felt the ship buck. The metal around them hissed and trembled.

"Sand!" Jessica shouted.

She saw the negative shake of his head in the light from the panel. "Not much sand this high."

But she could feel them sinking deeper into the maelstrom.

Paul sent the wings to their full soaring length, heard them creak with the strain. He kept his eyes fixed on the instruments, gliding by instinct, fighting for altitude.

The sound of their passage diminished.

The ‘thopter began rolling off to the left. Paul focused on the glowing globe within the attitude curve, fought his craft back to level flight.

Jessica had the eerie feeling that they were standing still, that all motion was external. A vague tan flowing against the windows, a rumbling hiss reminded her of the powers around them.

Winds to seven or eight hundred kilometers an hour , she thought. Adrenaline edginess gnawed at her. I must not fear , she told herself, mouthing the words of the Bene Gesserit litany. Fear is the mind-killer .

Slowly her long years of training prevailed.

Calmness returned.

"We have the tiger by the tail," Paul whispered. "We can’t go down, can’t land . . . and I don’t think I can lift us out of this. We’ll have to ride it out."

Calmness drained out of her. Jessica felt her teeth chattering, clamped them together. Then she heard Paul’s voice, low and controlled, reciting the litany:

"Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past me I will turn to see fear’s path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."

What do you despise? By this are you truly known.

– from "Manual of Muad’Dib" by the Princess Irulan

"They are dead, Baron," said Iakin Nefud, the guard captain. "Both the woman and the boy are certainly dead."

The Baron Vladimir Harkonnen sat up in the sleep suspensors of his private quarters. Beyond these quarters and enclosing him like a multishelled egg stretched the space frigate he had grounded on Arrakis. Here in his quarters, though, the ship’s harsh metal was disguised with draperies, with fabric paddings and rare art objects.

"It is a certainty," the guard captain said. "They are dead."

The Baron shifted his gross body in the suspensors, focused his attention on an ebaline statue of a leaping boy in a niche across the room. Sleep faded from him. He straightened the padded suspensor beneath the fat folds of his neck, stared across the single glowglobe of his bedchamber to the doorway where Captain Nefud stood blocked by the pentashield.

"They’re certainly dead, Baron," the man repeated.

The Baron noted the trace of semuta dullness in Nefud ‘s eyes. It was obvious the man had been deep within the drug’s rapture when he received this report, and had stopped only to take the antidote before rushing here.

"I have a full report," Nefud said.

Let him sweat a little , the Baron thought. One must always keep the tools of statecraft sharp and ready. Power and fear – sharp and ready .

Chapter Fifteen

"Have you seen their bodies?" the Baron rumbled.

Nefud hesitated.

"Well?"

"M’Lord . . . they were seen to dive into a sandstorm . . . winds over eight hundred kilometers. Nothing survives such a storm, m’Lord. Nothing! One of our own craft was destroyed in the pursuit."

The Baron stared at Nefud , noting the nervous twitch in the scissors line of the man’s jaw muscles, the way the chin moved as Nefud swallowed.

"You have seen the bodies?" the Baron asked.

"M’Lord – "

"For what purpose do you come here rattling your armor?" the Baron roared. "To tell me a thing is certain when it is not? Do you think I’ll praise you for such stupidity, give you another promotion?"

Nefud ‘s face went bone pale.

Look at the chicken , the Baron thought. I am surrounded by such useless clods. If I scattered sand before this creature and told him it was grain, he’d peck at it .

"The man Idaho led us to them, then?" the Baron asked.

"Yes, m’Lord!"

Look how he blurts out his answer , the Baron thought. He said: "They were attempting to flee to the Fremen, eh?"

"Yes, m’Lord."

"Is there more to this . . . report?"

"The Imperial Planetologist, Kynes, is involved, m’Lord. Idaho joined this Kynes under mysterious circumstances . . . I might even say suspicious circumstances."