Dune: House Atreides (64 page)

"I've tried speaking to the Landsraad Council," Leto said, "but they're useless, noncommittal. They won't do anything to help us. But my distaff cousin Shaddam

. . ." He passed his tongue over the inside of his lower lip. "I've only met him three times, but my maternal grandmother was also a child of Elrood's. I can claim blood ties. When Shaddam becomes the new Emperor, I will petition him to offer you amnesty as a gesture of forgiveness. When I swear the eternal loyalty of House Atreides, I will ask him to remember the great history of House Vernius."

"Why would he assent to that?" Kailea wanted to know. "What's the advantage for him?"

"It would be the right thing to do," Rhombur said. "The fair thing." His sister looked at him as if he had lost his mind.

"He'll do it to establish the tenor of his reign," Leto said. "Any new Emperor wants to create an identity, show how he's different from his predecessor, not locked into old ways and old decisions. Shaddam just might be in a forgiving mood. Word has it that he was not on the best of terms with his father anyway, and he'll certainly want to show his own colors after more than a century under Elrood."

Kailea threw herself into Leto's arms, and he hugged her awkwardly. "It would be so wonderful to have our freedom back, Leto -- and our family holdings!

Maybe there's something we can salvage from Ix after all."

"Let's all keep our hopes up, Kailea," Rhombur said with cautious optimism.

"Try to envision it, and it just might happen."

"We must not be afraid to ask," Leto said.

"All right," Rhombur said. "If anyone can accomplish this, it's you, my friend."

Fiery with determination and optimism, Leto began to develop plans for his formal procession to Kaitain. "We'll do something they won't expect," he said.

"Rhombur and I will show up for the coronation, together."

He met the Mentat advisor's alarmed gaze. "It is dangerous to bring the son of Vernius, m'Lord."

"And precisely what they will not expect."

What senses do we lack that we cannot see or hear another world all around us?

-The Orange Catholic Bible

Some considered the rocky wilderness of Forest Guard Station to be beautiful, a pristine and natural wonderland. But Baron Vladimir Harkonnen disliked being so far from enclosed buildings, sharp angles, metal, and plaz. The cold air smelled harsh and unpleasant without the familiar fumes of industry, lubricants, and machinery. Too raw, too hostile.

The Baron knew the importance of their destination, though, and entertained himself by watching the even greater discomfort exhibited by his twisted Mentat.

With a dirty robe and mussed hair, Piter de Vries struggled to keep up. Though his mind operated like a powerful machine, his body was pampered, scrawny, and weak.

"Everything is so primitive out here, my Baron, so filthy and cold," de Vries said, his eyes feral. "Are you certain we have to go this far? Have we no alternative, other than jaunting out into the forest?"

"Some people pay dearly to visit places like this," the Baron said. "They call them resorts."

"Piter, shut your mouth and keep up with us," Rabban said. They trudged up a steep hillside toward an ice-glazed and cave-pocked wall of sandstone.

Scowling, the Mentat returned the jab with his own barbed words. "Isn't this the place where that little boy bested you and all your hunting team, Rabban?"

The Baron's nephew turned back, his thick-lidded eyes staring at de Vries, and growled, "I'll hunt you next time if you don't watch your tongue."

"Your uncle's priceless Mentat?" de Vries said in a carefree tone. "But how would he possibly replace me?"

"He has a point," the Baron agreed, with a chuckle.

Rabban muttered something to himself.

Earlier, the Baron's guards and hunting experts had combed the isolated hunting preserve, a security check so that the three men could walk alone, without their usual entourage. Carrying a maula pistol on his hip and a heat-scattering rifle slung over his shoulder, Rabban insisted that he could take care of any gaze hounds or other predators that might attack. The Baron didn't share such complete confidence in his nephew, considering the fact that a small boy had indeed outwitted him -- but at least out here they could stay away from prying eyes.

At the top of a bluff the three of them rested on a ledge, then ascended another slope. Rabban led the way, clawing aside thick scrub brush until they reached more exposed sandstone. There, a low crack yielded a black space between crumbling stone and the ground.

"It's down here," Rabban said. "Come on."

The Baron knelt and shined a ring-light into the opening of a cave. "Follow me, Piter."

"I'm not a spelunker," the Mentat replied. "Besides, I'm tired."

"You're just not physically fit enough," the Baron countered as he took a deep breath to feel his own muscles. "You need more exercise. Keep yourself in shape."

"But this isn't what you purchased me for, my Baron."

"I purchased you to do anything I tell you to do." He bent and crawled through the opening; the tiny but powerful beam of light on his finger probed the darkness ahead.

Though the Baron tried to maintain his physique in a perfect condition, he had been plagued with body aches and unexpected weakness over the past year. No one had noticed -- or perhaps no one had dared mention -- the fact that he'd also begun to gain weight, through no change in his diet. His skin had a thicker, pastier appearance. He had considered discussing his problem with medical experts, maybe even a Suk doctor, no matter the incredible expense of consulting one. Life, it seemed, was an endless string of problems.

"It smells like bear piss in here," de Vries complained as he squirmed through the hole.

"How would you know what bear piss smells like?" Rabban said, pushing the Mentat deeper inside to make room for himself.

"I've smelled you. A wild animal can't be any more rank than that."

The three men stood up inside, and the Baron illuminated a small glowglobe, which floated up to shine against the near wall in the back of the low cave.

The place was rough and moss-covered, smudged with dust, showing no sign of human habitation.

"Quite a good mimetic projection, isn't it?" the Baron said. "The best work our people have done." He reached forward with a ring-studded hand, and the image of the wall blurred, became indistinct.

Rabban located a slight protrusion of rock and pushed; the entire rear wall rumbled back and fell away to reveal an access tube.

"A very special hiding place," the Baron said.

Lights flared on, illuminating a passage that led into the heart of the bluff.

After they stepped inside and sealed the false-wall projection behind them, de Vries looked around in amazement. "You kept this a secret even from me, my Baron?"

"Rabban found this cave on one of his hunts. We've . . . made some modifications using a new technology, an exciting technique. I think you'll see the possibilities, once I explain it all to you."

"Quite an elaborate hiding place," the Mentat agreed. "One can't be too careful about spies."

The Baron raised his hands toward the ceiling and shouted at the top of his lungs, "Damn Crown Prince Shaddam to the cesspits! No -- make that to the lowest depths of a filth-encrusted, lava-blasted hell-grotto!"

The treasonous outburst shocked even de Vries, and the Baron chuckled. "Here, Piter -- and nowhere else on Giedi Prime -- I'm not in the least worried about eavesdroppers."

He led them into a main chamber. "We three could hide here and resist an attack even from contraband atomics. No one would find us. Nullentropy bins hold supplies and weapons to last forever. I have placed everything vital to House Harkonnen in here, from genealogical records to financial documents, to our blackmail material -- all the nasty, fascinating details we have on the other Houses."

Rabban took a seat at a highly polished table and punched a button on a panel.

Suddenly the walls became transparent, glowing yellow to spotlight distorted corpses, twenty-one in all, hanging suspended in the gaps between plaz sheets, on display.

"Here's the construction team," Rabban said. "It's our special . . . memorial to them."

"Rather pharaonic," the Baron said, in a lighthearted tone.

The flesh of the corpses was discolored and bloated, the faces contorted in macabre death grimaces. The victims' expressions contained a larger measure of sad resignation than terror of impending death. Anyone building such a secret chamber for the Harkonnens must have realized they'd be doomed from the start.

"They'll be unpleasant enough to look at while they rot," the Baron said, "but we'll eventually have nice clean skeletons to admire."

The remaining walls were layered with intricate scrollwork showing blue Harkonnen griffins as well as gross and pornographic images of human and human-animal copulation, suggestive designs, and a mechanical clock that would have offended most observers. Rabban looked at it and chuckled as the male and female parts interacted in a steady, eternal rhythm.

De Vries turned around, analyzing the details and applying them to his own Mentat projection.

The Baron smiled. "The room is surrounded by a shielding projection that renders an object invisible in all wavelengths. No scanner can detect this enclosure by sight, sound, heat, or even touch. We call it a no-field. Think of it. We're standing in a place that doesn't exist as far as the rest of the universe is concerned. It's the perfect spot for us to discuss our . . .

delicious plans."

"I've never heard of such a field -- not from the Guild, not from Ix," de Vries said. "Who invented it?"

"You may remember our . . . visiting researcher from Richese."

"Chobyn?" the Mentat asked, then answered his own question. "Yes, that was his name."

"He came to us in secret with a cutting-edge technique the Richesians had developed. It's a new and risky technology, but our friend Chobyn saw its possibilities. He wisely brought it to House Harkonnen for our private exploitation, provided we give him sufficient remuneration."

"And we've certainly paid him enough," Rabban added.

"Worth every solari," the Baron continued. He drummed his fingers in a habitual rhythm on the tabletop. "Inside this no-globe, not a soul can overhear us, not even a Guild Navigator and his damnable prescience. We've now got Chobyn working on . . . something even better for us."

Rabban impatiently slumped back in one of the seats. "Let's get on with what we need to talk about."

De Vries sat down at the self-scrubbing table, eyes bright, Mentat capabilities already whirling and grasping the implications of an invisibility technology.

How it could be used . . .

The Baron shifted his gaze from his blunt-featured nephew to his twisted Mentat.

What an utter contrast these two are, representing the extremes of the intellectual spectrum. Rabban and de Vries both needed constant supervision, the former because of his thick skull and short fuse, and the latter because his brilliance could be equally dangerous.

Despite his obvious deficiencies, Rabban was the only Harkonnen who could possibly succeed the Baron. Certainly Abulurd wasn't qualified. Other than those two bastard daughters the Bene Gesserit had forced from him, the Baron had no children of his own. He therefore had to train his nephew in the proper uses and abuses of power, so he could eventually die content with the knowledge that House Harkonnen would continue as it always had.

It would be even better, though, if the Atreides were destroyed . . . .

Perhaps Rabban should have two Mentats to guide him, instead of the customary one. Because of his bullish nature, Rabban's rule would be especially brutal, perhaps on a scale never before seen on Giedi Prime, despite the Harkonnens'

long history of torture and harsh treatment of slaves.

The Baron's expression became grim. "Down to business. Now listen, both of you. Piter, I want you to use your full Mentat abilities."

De Vries removed his small bottle of sapho juice from a pocket inside his robe.

He gulped, and smacked his lips in a manner that the Baron found repulsive.

"My spies have reported very distressing information," the Baron said. "It involves Ix and some plans that the Emperor seems to have made before he died."

He drummed his fingers in time to the little ditty that always ran through his head. "This plot has serious implications for our family's fortunes. CHOAM and the Guild don't even know about it."

Rabban grunted. De Vries sat up straight, awaiting more data.

"It seems that the Emperor and the Tleilaxu have made some kind of an alliance to do unorthodox and highly illegal work."

"Sligs and shit go together," Rabban said.

The Baron chuckled at the analogy. "I've learned that our dearly departed Emperor was personally behind the takeover on Ix. He forced House Vernius to go renegade and set the Tleilaxu up so they could begin research, adapting their methods to sophisticated Ixian facilities."

"And what research is that, my Baron?" de Vries asked.

The Baron dropped his bomb. "They seek a biological method to synthesize melange. They think they can produce their own spice artificially and cheaply, thereby cutting Arrakis -- us -- out of the distribution channels."

Rabban snorted. "Impossible. Nobody can do that."

But de Vries's mind spun as related information clicked into place. "I would not underestimate the Tleilaxu -- especially when combined with the facilities and technology on Ix. They'll have everything they need."

Rabban drew himself up. "But if the Emperor can make synthetic spice, what happens to our holdings? What happens to all the spice stockpiles we've spent years building up?"

"Provided the new synthetic is cheap and effective, Harkonnen spice-based fortunes would evaporate," de Vries said stonily. "Practically overnight."

"That's right, Piter!" The Baron slammed a ringed fist on the table.