Heretics of Dune by Frank Herbert

So the threat from Schwangyu had to be a real threat that he discovered and faced and solved on his own.

Taraza had not known what would happen to Patrin because of all this.

Taraza did not really care what happened to Patrin. Or to me. Or to Lucilla.

But what about the ghola?

Taraza must care!

It was not logical that she would . . . Teg dumped this line of reasoning. Taraza did not want him to act logically. She wanted him to do exactly what he was doing, what he had always done in the tight spots.

The unexpected.

So there was a species of logic to all of this but it kicked the performers out of the nest into chaos.

From which we must make our own order.

Grief welled up in his consciousness. Patrin! Damn you, Patrin! You knew and I didn’t! What will I do without you?

Teg could almost hear the old aide’s response, that stiffly formal voice Patrin always used when he was chiding his commander.

“You will do your best, Bashar.”

The most coldly progressive reasoning said Teg would never again see Patrin in the flesh nor hear the old man’s actual voice. Still . . . the voice remained. The person persisted in memory.

“Shouldn’t we be going?”

It was Lucilla, standing close in front of his position beneath the tree. Duncan waited beside her. Both of them had shouldered their packs.

While he sat thinking, night had fallen. Rich starlight created vague shadows in the glade. Teg lifted himself to his feet, took his pack and, bending to avoid the low branches, emerged into the glade. Duncan helped Teg shoulder his pack.

“Schwangyu will consider this eventually,” Lucilla said. “Her searchers will come after us here. You know it.”

“Not until they have followed out the false trail and found the end of it,” Teg said. “Come.”

He led the way westward through an opening in the trees.

Three nights he had led them along what he called “Patrin’s memory-path.” As he walked on this fourth night, Teg berated himself for not projecting the logical consequences of Patrin’s behavior.

I understood the depths of his loyalty but I did not project that loyalty into a most obvious result. We were together so many years I thought I knew his mind as I knew my own. Patrin, damn you! There was no need for you to die!

Teg admitted to himself then that there had been a need. Patrin had seen it. The Mentat had not permitted himself to see it. Logic could move just as blindly as any other faculty.

As the Bene Gesserit often said and demonstrated.

So we walk. Schwangyu does not expect this.

Teg was forced to admit that walking the wild places of Gammu created a whole new perspective for him. This entire region had been allowed to overgrow with plant life during the Famine Times and the Scattering. It had been replanted later but mostly as a random wilderness. Secret trails and private landmarks guided today’s access. Teg imagined Patrin as a youth learning this region — that rocky butte visible in starlight through a gap in the trees, that spiked promontory, these lanes through giant trees.

“They will expect us to make a run for a no-ship, ” he and Patrin had agreed, fleshing out their plan. “The decoy must take the searchers in that direction.”

Patrin had not said that he would be the decoy.

Teg swallowed past a lump in his throat.

Duncan could not be protected in the Keep, he justified himself.

That was true.

Lucilla had jittered through their first day under the life-shield that protected them from discovery by the instruments of aerial searchers.

“We must get word to Taraza!”

“When we can.”

“What if something happens to you? I must know all of your escape plan.”

“If something happens to me, you will not be able to follow Patrin’s path. There isn’t time to put it in your memory.”

Duncan took little part in the conversation that day. He watched them silently or dozed, awakening fitful and with an angry look in his eyes.

On the second day under the shielding blanket, Duncan suddenly demanded of Teg: “Why do they want to kill me?”

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 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170 171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180 181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190 191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200 201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210 211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220 221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229

Leave a Reply 0

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