The Winds of Dune (58 page)

Receiving emergency reports, Stilgar grabbed two reliable Fedaykin soldiers and raced for the nearest launchpad. He was not a man to ponder overmuch during a crisis, but the very idea puzzled him. “This makes no sense. The qanat should have made an impenetrable water barrier.”

“Maybe sandtrout got into the canal and broke it open, Stil,” said the Fedaykin pilot, throwing himself into the craft and activating the prestart sequence on the rotors. “Millions of them could have breached the liner seal and stolen the water.”

Stilgar shook his head as he made sure the ’thopter was desert-rigged, complete with Fremkit, ropes, and survival tools. “How could the inspection teams not have noticed the water line drying out?” He already suspected a far more sinister answer.

The city of Arrakeen had considered itself safe. No sandworm had
managed to pass through the gap in all the years since Muad’Dib had blasted open the Shield Wall during his final battle with Shaddam IV.

But something had allowed this monster worm through. It could not have been an accident.

Scrambling into the cockpit, he settled in beside the pilot, who set the articulated wings in motion, just as the third man jumped into the back. Within moments, the craft lifted off like a predatory bird startled from a fresh kill.

They soared out over the patchwork mosaic of Arrakeen, above the helter-skelter shacks of people who had given up everything to make a pilgrimage to Dune. Stilgar touched the comm in his ear, listening to frantic descriptions. He guided the pilot, although the area of tumult was clear even from a distance.

In a rush, the craft came upon the large segmented worm rolling through and crushing habitation complexes, with no apparent goal. The Fremen pilot stared in such open amazement that he reacted sluggishly to a sudden downdraft, and the ’thopter gave a sickening shudder before he regained control and brought them level again. The second Fedaykin uttered an automatic prayer before adding, “It is the spirit of Muad’Dib! He has taken the form of Shai-Hulud and returned to avenge himself upon us.”

Remembering his earlier encounter with a worm in the desert, when it seemed that Paul
might
have been inside the beast, Stilgar felt a thrill of superstitious fear himself. Nevertheless, he infused his retort with scorn. “Why would Muad’Dib be angry with
us
? We are his people, and followed his orders.”

That other worm had not tried to harm him.

Even so, he knew the awestruck people down there would make up their own stories. Stilgar could imagine the chants that the doomed victims would shout as the behemoth approached, “The spirit of Muad’Dib! The spirit of Muad’Dib!” Those devoured by the rogue worm would be celebrated as martyrs by the Qizarate.

Though he did not understand what drove this sandworm, he did know how he could stop it. Stilgar reached behind him. “Hand me the Fremkit.” Opening it, he set aside the first-aid supplies, paracompass, thumper, and stilltent. He needed only the hooks, goad, spreaders, and rope.

He raised his voice to the pilot over the louder-than-normal throb of the wings; something must be wrong with the soundproofing and moisture seals in the cabin. “Take me down as close as possible. I need to jump onto its back.”

The pilot was astonished, but he was Fremen and Fedaykin. “The vibration of our engines will surely disturb the creature, Stil. There is a risk.”

“We are in the hands of Shai-Hulud.”

This would be entirely different from summoning a worm in the open desert, which Stilgar had done countless times before. A man alone on the dunes could make preparations; he could plant a thumper in the proper spot; he could watch the worm’s approach by the ripple in the sand; he knew where it would emerge and could make his move at the precise moment.

But this worm was already aboveground, and highly agitated. The slightest misstep and he would fall into that maw.

Stilgar opened the ’thopter’s hatch to a sudden roar of engine noise. Angry winds rushed by, bringing with them the distant racket of panic and destruction. Stilgar secured his tools tightly to his body where they would be readily accessible. He held a climbing hook in each hand and extended the long telescoping rods to their full length. He would have to secure himself to the worm before he could take out his spreaders, before he could anchor his rope.

“I am ready.”

The pilot lowered the ’thopter, and Stilgar prepared to leap out of the hatch. He knew that when he landed on the behemoth’s back, the curved ring segments would give him little purchase.

At the last moment before he could jump, the sandworm thrashed about, reacting to the vibration and noise of ornithopter wings. It turned its sinuous neck upward and lunged up at them.

With a squawk, the pilot aborted and used the jetpods to lift the ’thopter higher in the air. Stilgar clung to the open hatchway to keep himself from being thrown out. The worm continued to stretch itself upward in response to the annoying pulse and noise, and reached its apex only meters below the fleeing aircraft. The stench of spice exhalations boiled out of its tunnel-like maw as the monster paused for a quivering motionless instant, then began to withdraw.

Stilgar saw his chance—and leaped. He fell, dropping and dropping, as the worm retracted below him. The additional few seconds gave him time to spread his arms and point his hooks. He smashed hard against the worm’s back and began to slide down the pebbly surface, bouncing from one ring segment to the next, whipping his long, flexible hooks as he struggled for purchase. Finally, the sharp end of a hook snagged in a gap, and he anchored himself there, hanging on by one hand. He swung his other arm up and set the second hook between the rings.

Not pausing, he roped himself in place and then planted the spreader, ratcheting it open to expose raw, tender flesh. Normally in such a process, other Fremen would help him plant additional spreaders and set more hooks, but Stilgar had to do this alone.

Above, the ’thopter hovered out of reach.

Leaving the spreader where it was, Stilgar climbed up to the next ring. Fortunately he had landed near the worm’s head, so he didn’t have far to go. Meanwhile, the creature continued its rampage, and only the rope prevented Stilgar from falling to his death.

When he was in place on top of the head, he cranked the next spreader open wider and took up his goad. He jabbed the worm, yelled in an attempt to turn it. “Haiiiii-yoh!” He had no reason to believe this beast had ever been ridden before, had ever heard a steersman’s call. The sandworm fought back like a nightmare bull, intent on
him
rather than on the cacophony of tempting noises at the outskirts of the city.

The beast balked and thrashed, but Stilgar persisted, inflicting pain until at last it turned its bulk and began to retreat. The cracked Shield Wall towered ahead, where only a narrow slot allowed access to the safe desert beyond. He drove the creature to greater speed, and it plunged forward along its swath of destruction as if it sensed the arid dunes beyond. Reddish-brown cliffs towered on either side of him, and Stilgar held on. If the worm thrashed at the wrong instant, the rider would be thrown off or smashed against the rock.

The creature shot through the broken qanat barrier, flinching as it squirmed over the line of moist sand. Looking down, Stilgar saw that the qanat had been smashed, and the water it contained had seeped out into the desert. From this height, he could not tell if this particular worm, or something else, had initially destroyed the canal barriers.

Exhausted after the destruction it had caused, the worm plunged toward the arid basin. Stilgar prepared for a dangerous dismount. Thank Shai-Hulud, he had done it many times before—and down he slid, skillfully landing on his feet on the sand before tucking his knees, and rolling.

After the worm had charged off into the distance, fleeing the inhabited zone, Stilgar got to his feet again and brushed sand from his stillsuit. Trudging back toward the city, he realized that his ordeal had been exhilarating in another way: Of all the teeming millions in Arrakeen, only a handful knew how to ride a wild worm.

After too long, Stilgar again experienced the thrill of being a true Fremen.

We are taught that patience is a virtue, but I have come to realize that it is also a weakness. More often than not, a thing must be done now.

—
BRONSO OF IX

T
he small ship arrived on Wallach IX carrying workers, visitors, and four Sisters wearing traditional black robes and uniforms, designating low to mid rank. These four had no particular importance; their travel documents were in order, and they attracted no attention. But they were not what they appeared to be.

Also among the passengers, segregated from the Sisters, were three men who had been assigned to the Mother School as temporary gardeners. Bene Gesserit acolytes usually tended the courtyards and gardens, but outsiders were brought in for specialized activities.

After exiting, the four Sisters casually wandered among the crowd at the spaceport near the school complex. The trio of quiet gardeners waited their turn, leaving the ship last, moving to the cargo-claim area where they picked up their tools. Giving no sign that they recognized each other, they joined up with the four women.

Bronso had waited a great many years for this, and now he would wait no longer. The pieces had finally fallen into place.

Shortly after the death of his father, Bronso had petitioned for the return of his comatose mother from the Sisterhood’s medical advisers, and was flatly turned down. Later, when Tessia Vernius emerged from her years of unconsciousness and managed to smuggle a message to him,
he had learned the truth. As Earl Vernius of Ix, Bronso again asked for her release . . . and was ignored. He then filed a complaint with the Landsraad, but the nobles would take no direct action to free Tessia, claiming that she was a grown woman and a Sister of the order herself. Bronso hadn’t had the wealth, influence, or military might to take any action. When Jessica gave him her report seven years ago, she had told him little that he hadn’t already known.

All the while he had never stopped thinking of his trapped mother, never stopped searching for a way to get her out of the clutches of the Bene Gesserit.

Now, after being on the run for years, he had managed to slip a few Face Dancer infiltrators onto Wallach IX, if only briefly, and his spies had discovered the information he needed to know, where his mother was, and the security arrangements surrounding her.

All that remained was to implement a plan. The four Sisters and the other two men with him were Face Dancers.
His
Face Dancers.

As the visitors walked to the garden area near the outbuilding where Bronso knew Tessia was being held, one of the “Sisters” signaled the three gardeners. “Bring your tools and prepare for a hard day’s work. You have only a little time to complete your job.”

Bronso and the other two men followed meekly, behaving exactly the way the Bene Gesserits expected them to.

The Mother School gardens were a parade of spectacular colors, with geometrically laid out shrubberies at odds with wild and unruly botanical displays. Mother Superior Harishka, so it was said, had a penchant for exotic flora harvested from other planets. Such unique plants required a great deal of maintenance and specialized care, which could be provided only by offworld experts.

Bronso and his incognito crew had come ostensibly to replant a failed botanical area where the rugged native plants from Grand Hain had all died and needed to be replaced with something else. Dump boxes had been dropped from orbit ahead of time, filled with carefully harvested mosses, mulch, and chemically precise fertilizers for a new species line. Another armored dump box, ready to be resealed for retrieval, waited outside the dead area, filled with the leftover and obsolete Grand Hain fertilizers and mulch, which would be shipped away.

The men worked for hours under the supervision of their companion
Sisters, who acted appropriately aloof around mere laborers. Not once did the Face Dancers let their disguises slip; they were all true professionals, true performers—and perfectly content to carry out a tense and complicated assignment that did not require assassination. Bronso and the two workers moved in perfect harmony—excavating dead plants, digging trenches, turning over the soil and adding the chemical fertilizers as if it were merely another dance for them, even if no one watched their show.