Heretics of Dune (Page 110)

Surely, though, Waff was reviewing now his agreement with the Bene Gesserit, seeing at last the ways he had compromised his people, how he had put his precious Tleilaxu civilization in terrible jeopardy. Yes, his composure was wearing thin, but only Bene Gesserit eyes detected this. It would be time soon to begin rebuilding his awareness into a pattern more amenable to the Sisterhood’s needs. Let him stew a bit longer.

Odrade returned her attention to the view, loading the suspense of this delay. The Bene Gesserit had chosen this embassy location because of the extensive rebuilding that had changed the entire northeastern quarter of the old city. They could build and remodel here in their own way and for their own purposes. Ancient structures designed for easy access by people on foot, wide lanes for official groundcars and occasional squares in which ornithopters might land – all of that had been changed.

Keeping up with the times.

These new buildings stood much closer to the green-planted avenues whose tall and exotic trees flaunted their enormous water consumption. ‘Thopters were relegated to rooftop landing pads on selected buildings. Pedestrian lanes clung to narrow elevations attached to the buildings. Coin-operated, key-operated and palm-identification liftslots had been inset into the new buildings, their glowing energy fields masked by dark brown, vaguely transparent covers. The liftslots were spines of darker color in the flat gray of plascrete and plaz. Humans dimly seen in the tubes gave the effect of impurities moving up and down in otherwise pure mechanical sausages.

All in the name of modernization.

Waff stirred behind her and cleared his throat.

Odrade did not turn. The two guardian Sisters knew what she was doing and gave no sign. Waff’s mounting nervousness was merely confirmation that all went well.

Odrade did not feel that all was going truly well.

She interpreted the view out her window as just another disquieting symptom of this disquieting planet. Tuek, she recalled, had not liked this modernization of his city. He had complained that some way must be found to stop it and preserve the old landmarks. His Face Dancer replacement continued that argument.

How like Tuek himself this new Face Dancer was. Did such Face Dancers think for themselves or just play out their parts in accordance with a Master’s orders? Were they still mules, these new ones? How much different were these Face Dancers from the fully human?

Things about the deception worried Odrade.

The false Tuek’s councillors, the ones fully involved in what they thought of as "the Tleilaxu plot," spoke of public support for modernization and openly gloated that they had their way at last. Albertus regularly reported everything to Odrade. Each new report worried her more. Even the obvious subservience of Albertus bothered her.

"Of course, the councillors do not mean public public support," Albertus said.

She could only agree. The behavior of the councillors signaled that they had powerful backing among the middle echelons of the priesthood, among the climbers who dared joke about their Divided God at weekend parties… among those being soothed by the hoard Odrade had found at Sietch Tabr.

Ninety thousand long tons! Half a year’s harvest from the deserts of Rakis. Even a third of it represented a significant bargaining chip in the new balances.

I wish I had never met you, Albertus.

She had wanted to restore in him the one who cares. What she had actually done was easily recognized by one trained in the Missionaria Protectiva’s ways.

A groveling sycophant!

It made no difference now that his subservience was driven by an absolute belief in her holy association with Sheeana. Odrade had never before focused on how easily the Missionaria Protectiva’s teachings destroyed human independence. That was always the goal, of course: Make them followers, obedient to our needs.

The Tyrant’s words in that secret chamber had done more than ignite her fears for the Sisterhood’s future.

"I bequeath to you my fear and loneliness."

From that millennial distance, he had planted doubts in her as surely as she had planted them in Waff.

She saw the Tyrant’s questions as though they had been limned with glowing light on her inner eye.

"WITH WHOM DO YOU ALLY?"

Are we no more than a secret society? How will we meet our end? In a dogmatic stink of our own creation?

The Tyrant’s words had been burned into her consciousness. Where was the "noble purpose" in what the Sisterhood did? Odrade could almost hear Taraza’s sneering response to such a question.

"Survival, Dar! That’s all the noble purpose we need. Survival! Even the Tyrant knew that!"

Perhaps even Tuek had known it. And what had that bought him in the end?

Odrade felt a haunting sympathy for the late High Priest. Tuek had been a superb example of what a tightly knit family could produce. Even his name was a clue: unchanged from Atreides days on this planet. The founding ancestor had been a smuggler, confidant of the first Leto. Tuek had come from a family that held firmly to its roots, saying: "There is something worth preserving in our past." The example this set for descendants was not lost on a Reverend Mother.

But you failed, Tuek.

These blocks of modernization visible out her window were a sign of that failure – sops to the rising power elements in Rakian society, those elements that the Sisterhood had worked so long to foster and strengthen. Tuek had seen this as a harbinger of the day when he would be too weak politically to prevent the things implied by such modernization:

A shorter and more upbeat ritual.

New songs, more in the modern manner.

Changes in the dancing. ("Traditional dances take so long!") Above all, fewer ventures into the dangerous desert for the young postulants from the powerful families.