Herbert, Frank – Dune 6 – Children of the Mind

But he had never touched Wang-mu that way. Nor was it right for him to do it now — she was not his wife, only his … friend? Was she that? She had said she loved him — was that only a way to help him find his way into this body?

Then, suddenly, he felt himself falling away from himself, felt himself recede from Peter and become something else, something small and bright and terrified, descending down into darkness, out into a wind too strong for him to stand against it —

“Peter!”

The voice called him, and he followed it, back along the almost invisible philotic threads that connected him to … himself again. I am Peter. I have nowhere else to go. If I leave like that, I’ll die.

“Are you all right?” asked Wang-mu. “I woke up because — I’m sorry, but I dreamed, I felt as if I was losing you. But I wasn’t, because here you are.”

“I was losing my way,” said Peter. “You could sense that?”

“I don’t know what I sensed or not. I just — how can I describe it?”

“You called me back from darkness,” said Peter.

“Did I?”

He almost said something, but then stopped. Then laughed, uncomfortable and frightened. “I feel so odd. A moment ago I was about to say something. Something very flippant — about how having to be Peter Wiggin was darkness enough by itself.”

“Oh yes,” said Wang-mu. “You always say such nasty things about yourself.”

“But I didn’t say it,” said Peter. “I was about to, out of habit, but I stopped, because it wasn’t true. Isn’t that funny?”

“I think it’s good.”

“It makes sense that I should feel whole instead of being subdivided — perhaps more content with myself or something. And yet I almost lost the whole thing. I think it wasn’t just a dream. I think I really was letting go. Falling away into — no, out of everything.”

“You had three selves for several months,” said Wang-mu. “Is it possible your aiъa hungers for the — I don’t know, the size of what you used to be?”

“I was spread all over the galaxy, wasn’t I? Except I want to say, ‘Wasn’t he,’ because that was Ender, wasn’t it. And I’m not Ender because I don’t remember anything.” He thought a moment. “Except maybe I do remember some things a little more clearly now. Things from my childhood. My mother’s face. It’s very clear, and I don’t think it was before. And Valentine’s face, when we were all children. But I’d remember that as Peter, wouldn’t I, so it doesn’t mean it comes from Ender, does it? I’m sure this is just one of the memories Ender supplied for me in the first place.” He laughed. “I’m really desperate, aren’t I, to find some sign of him in me.”

Wang-mu sat listening. Silent, not making a great show of interest, but also content not to jump in with an answer or a comment.

Noticing her made him think of something else. “Are you some kind of, what would you call it, an empath? Do you normally feel what other people are feeling?”

“Never,” said Wang-mu. “I’m too busy feeling what I’m feeling.”

“But you knew that I was going. You felt that.”

“I suppose,” said Wang-mu, “that I’m bound up with you now. I hope that’s all right, because it wasn’t exactly voluntary on my part.”

“But I’m bound up with you, too,” said Peter. “Because when I was disconnected, I still heard you. All my other feelings were gone. My body wasn’t giving me anything. I had lost my body. Now, when I remember what it felt like, I remember ‘seeing’ things, but that’s just my human brain making sense of things that it can’t actually make sense of. I know that I didn’t see at all, or hear, or touch or anything at all. And yet I knew you were calling. I felt you — needing me. Wanting me to come back. Surely that means that I am also bound up with you.”

She shrugged, looked away.

“Now what does that mean?” he asked.

“I’m not going to spend the rest of my life explaining myself to you,” said Wang-mu. “Everyone else has the privilege of just feeling and doing sometimes without analyzing it. What did it look like to you? You’re the smart one who’s an expert on human nature.”

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *