Dune: The Machine Crusade (18 page)

Serena smiled. Xavier and Vorian would be coming home. “Contact the Grand Patriarch. We must prepare a suitable welcome for our heroes.”

OF ALL THE battles he had faced and all the enemies he had fought, Xavier Harkonnen feared this ordeal more than any of them. But now that he had returned to Salusa Secundus, he could not shirk the obligation.

Duty, honor, and responsibility had formed the foundation of his character since his military training with the Salusan Militia.

As soon as the Jihad fleet had returned to the League capital, he took a white Salusan stallion and rode up along the pathway to the Tantor Estate, the old noble holdings where he’d spent his childhood. He’d had no sleep, but could not delay.

Over the years, the great house had been mostly shut down. Old Emil Tantor and his wife Lucille, the kindly couple who had taken in the orphaned six-year-old Xavier, had raised him as their foster son and then formally adopted him. Later, they’d unexpectedly had a son of their own.

Vergyl.

Decades earlier, Xavier had married Octa and moved away to the Butler Estate, and then Vergyl had gone off to join the Army of the Jihad. Six years ago, Lucille Tantor had died in a flyer crash, leaving the old man alone. In the years afterward, Emil had made himself quietly content, living in one of the smaller outbuildings, where a few faithful servants attended him.

Someday, the Tantor Estate should have been Vergyl’s legacy. Now it would become the home of the young man’s widow and his children….

Xavier dismounted and tied the stallion to an ornate post at the front of the main house. Then, with heavy heart and sinking stomach, he set off to look for the man he called father. The terrible news he brought would likely destroy the old man, but it would be no kindness to withhold it. Xavier only hoped he had made his way here quickly enough that rumors hadn’t already found Emil in his secluded home.

Helpful servants, impressed with the immaculate green-and-crimson Jihad uniform, directed him to Emil Tantor, who sat outside under a gazebo surrounded by hummingbird feeders. Golden creatures hovered about the sweet nectar, their wings a blur in the air. They kept the old man company as he sat reading a leatherbound book of legends and history.

“I remember when you used to read aloud to me, and to Vergyl,” Xavier said.

Emil smiled at him, his lips parting to expose bright teeth. The elder Tantor’s hair was like a cloud of pale smoke from a greenwood fire. His skin was dark and deeply creased with age, but his brown eyes were bright, not diluted with weariness. He set the book aside and lurched to his feet, slightly more unsteady than he realized. “Xavier, my boy! A delightful surprise. What brings you—”

Then he seemed to understand. The old man sensed something in Xavier’s reluctance, the screaming grief barely contained like a monster inside of him. Emil took in the formal uniform, Xavier’s rigid posture, and the hesitation in his eyes. “Oh, no,” he said. “Not my son.”

Xavier said numbly, as if reading from a report that he could not believe himself, “We defeated the thinking machines at the battle for IV Anbus. We saved the world from falling under the domination of Omnius and stopped them from establishing another base in their encroachment on League territory.” His breath hitched. “But then, when we thought it was all over and our victory assured, a group of cymeks attacked. They caused a great deal of damage and many deaths. They destroyed ballistas, javelins.” He swallowed. “And captured Vergyl.”

“Captured?” Emil Tantor perked up, clinging to a thin thread. “There’s hope that he might still be alive? Answer me honestly, Xavier.”

Xavier averted his eyes. “We humans exist on hope. It’s what separates us from thinking machines.” But in truth, he had fought the robots and cymeks for so many years that he knew their precision and viciousness. In his own heart, Xavier harbored no hope that his adoptive brother would ever be saved. Even if his little brother had been whisked away to become a slave somewhere deep within the Synchronized Worlds, how could Xavier or the Jihad forces ever hope to free him?

As he continued, his words cracked with swelling emotions that threatened to choke him. “I wish I could tell you he died swiftly, cleanly, painlessly— I was there, but too far away. I could do nothing to save my own brother.”

Emil accepted the answer in silence, not questioning the presumption that Vergyl would never return. He reached out a strong hand and clasped Xavier’s wrist. “Can you at least say that he met his end bravely?”

Xavier nodded, tears sparkling in his eyes. “That much I can promise you without any hesitation whatsoever.” He took the old man by the arm and led him with slow, painstaking footsteps back toward the small house. They sat on a bench on the lawn and opened one of the family’s oldest bottles of Mervignon wine to toast the memory of Vergyl.

“Your brother always looked up to you, Xavier, wanted to be like you. After Ellram, I had to sign a special dispensation for him to join the Jihad when he was only seventeen. Your mother had grave reservations about it, and while I feared for his safety, I feared more the disappointment that boy would experience if I held him back. I knew he would try to join no matter what I said, even if he had to lie, so I wanted him to at least have the protection of our family name and his relationship with you.”

“I should have protected him better.”

“He’s… a man, Xavier. You couldn’t coddle him.”

“No, I suppose not.” He looked off into the distance. A golden hummingbird buzzed past his face. “Those first few years, I made sure he was stationed on Giedi Prime, where he would watch over the war memorial construction. I thought he’d be safe there.”

“Your brother always wanted to be in the thick of things.”

Xavier remembered back. On Giedi Prime, bright and promising Cuarto Vergyl Tantor had fallen in love and had married Sheel when he’d turned twenty-one.

Emil sipped from his red wine and let out a long, satisfied sigh. “I suppose now I have all the excuse I need to bring Sheel and my grandchildren here. Someone’s got to keep me company, and it’ll be good to hear young voices around here again.”

Xavier nodded. “I’ll see that they’re brought here with all possible speed, Father, and I promise—” He drew in a deep breath and started anew, “I promise I will return home as often as I can.”

The old man smiled at him and patted his hand. “I would like that, Xavier. You are my only son now.”

O
n the open-air stage of the Zimia Memorial Plaza, the two newly returned war heroes were quite a contrast, standing side by side. Each was dressed in a Jihad uniform, and both were in their mid-forties, but Xavier Harkonnen looked older than that, with crow’s-feet around his tired eyes and a heavy peppering of gray hair at his temples.

Sharply different, Vorian Atreides had an unlined complexion and supple muscles. As the son of Agamemnon, recipient of a painful life-extension process, Vor was not ordinary by any stretch of the imagination.

The two men were different in character, each fulfilling their duties in their own ways, according to their own standards. Both loved Serena Butler, and both had gone to war as officers in her Jihad. Their ranks and status were nearly the same, down to the medals on their chests and the plaques of commendation that adorned their offices, though Vor was technically one grade below Xavier.

Now, as Xavier scanned the sea of faces in the crowd, he felt the weight of age and experience on his shoulders. Fresh orange marigolds decorated the numerous memorials, statues, and makeshift shrines to Manion the Innocent.

The League citizens considered the successful defense of IV Anbus an overwhelming victory that prevented the thinking machines from gaining a critical foothold closer to League territory. Grand Patriarch Iblis Ginjo had declared a day of celebration to welcome the Jihad soldiers home.

But others would never return to their families. Like Vergyl…

A vision of power and grace, the Priestess of the Jihad made her way through the rejoicing crowd toward the stage, waving to her people. As usual she was surrounded by an entourage of powerful Seraphim, assigned Jipol guards, and handlers.

Iblis Ginjo walked beside her in a gold-trimmed black suit, holding his large head high. Xavier saw the Grand Patriarch for what he was— a man who shared Xavier’s goals in the general sense, but one willing to utilize morally ambiguous options to achieve his ends. Xavier wished Serena would notice some of this, but she had isolated herself more and more, believing the slanted reports her advisors gave her.

On one side of the stage, a hundred uniformed jihadis stood at attention. Some bore the marks of combat, either in the healing packs on their skin or in the haunted looks in their eyes. They would receive medals, but Xavier thought they would have been better off resting, to recover from the rigors of combat.

Many of the ground soldiers and Ginaz mercenaries had suffered severe wounds; most of the escapees from Vergyl’s destroyed ballista were injured, burned, and barely alive. Making the hospital situation even worse, another fast commando ship had just brought a load of refugees from Ix, the now-embattled Synchronized World where underground rebels were barely surviving against cymek hunters.

They had enough blood, pain, and medical emergencies to keep Zimia’s best doctors and the army’s finest battlefield surgeons busy for a long time.

Serena climbed to the stage, followed by Iblis. Though she showed no hesitation in spite of the most recent assassination attempt against her in the City of Introspection, white-robed bodyguards surrounded her, ready to thrust themselves into the line of fire if necessary.

Serena and the Grand Patriarch stood in front of Xavier and Vor, waving past them to the giddy crowd. Iblis raised his hands high for silence, while Serena gazed at both Primeros. Xavier felt an electric tingle upon looking into her lavender eyes, her still-lovely, beatific face. She seemed to be in a religious trance. Or… drugged?

“We are here to celebrate a tremendous victory.” Serena’s words echoed from powerful, unseen speakers. “The successful defense of IV Anbus will go down in the annals of the Jihad as one of our proudest moments. One day there will be no more thinking machines, no more tormentors of our collective soul. This is the moment of our greatest challenge— and I call upon all human beings to do their part. No, I call upon each of you to do
more
than your part.”

Serena looked warmly at the Grand Patriarch, and in her eyes Xavier saw adoration and respect that went beyond anything the man deserved. Did she not see how Iblis manipulated her, telling her only what she wanted to hear?

Presently, Iblis’s resonant voice filled the speakers of the plaza. “As we proved on Earth, on Giedi Prime, on Peridot Colony, Tyndall, and now IV Anbus— we can defeat Omnius! One planet at a time. We must seize and free the Synchronized Worlds… and for that, we always need more volunteers. Every League World must contribute fighters now, so that we may carry on the valiant war. Sons and daughters, fighters from all free regions and peoples. I even call on Ginaz to provide more of their best mercenaries, who have proved so effective. Train them, test them! With your help, thinking machine planets will fall in a chain reaction across the cosmos.”

Xavier’s stomach churned as he thought of his foster brother Vergyl; but he maintained his stoic composure. Standing erect, a dedicated soldier in every aspect of his demeanor, he saluted the crowd.

EVERY WORLD IN the League of Nobles remained at the highest state of alert. Twice in the past quarter century the capital city of Zimia had been the target of massive attacks— an initial assault by cymek walkers when Serena had been only a junior member of the League Parliament, and again several years after the atomic destruction of Earth. But humans had survived both times.

There were no safe harbors on the roiling sea of Serena Butler’s Jihad. Her people could never rest, never stop looking over their shoulders, until the scourge of thinking machines had been eliminated for all time.

As she walked like an angel through a Salusan military hospital outside Zimia, she felt more determined than ever. Despite all the colorful flowers of celebration and reverence to Manion, the sight of wounded fighters on healer beds brought home the urgency to her.

People were ultimately vulnerable, forced to spend their lives in fragile bodies that the thinking machines could easily destroy. Her murdered son was the most famous example, but little Manion had not been the first child brutalized by machines, nor had he been the last. And he had not suffered as much as some. She knew what Omnius and Erasmus were capable of. But the little boy’s death had triggered trillions of people to fight back against the machines, all under her banner. She heaved a deep sigh at the terrible losses of her people.

Serena wore a simple white hospital dress now, with a red version of the open-hand League symbol on the lapel. She administered a benevolent smile, soft words, and a gentle touch to each soldier as she moved from bed to bed.

One man had lost both arms in an artillery explosion and remained in a coma. Lingering at his bedside, Serena held a cool hand against his bandaged, waxen face and told him how proud she was of all he had sacrificed.

A young tan-skinned doctor went to the healer bed and began checking vital signs on an array of instruments. A badge on the lapel of his white shirt identified him as Dr. Rajid Suk, one of the most talented of the new battlefield surgeons. “I’m sorry, but he can’t hear you.”

“Oh, but he can.” Against her fingertips, Serena felt the patient’s cheek twitch. The eyelids flickered open. The man groaned in confusion and pain. Some of the patients called it a miracle.

“There are many paths to healing,” Dr. Suk said, calling out to his colleagues. “Serena, you brought this man out of his coma.”

The patient became aware of his grievous injuries and began to wail. On the healing bed, intravenous lines and probes adjusted automatically to improve his vital signs. A nurse stepped forward and adhered a white sedative pad to his chest. As the drug calmed him, the man looked up imploringly at Serena. She massaged his brow and whispered to him….