During the final years of the Second Jihad, moreover, it appears that the Fedaykin were already becoming disenchanted with their Muad'Dib. Fedaykin veterans, returning from off-world battles, were uncomfortable with a vastly transformed Arrakis. The old sietches no longer seemed to be part of their lives, and the court of Muad'Dib was even more alien to them. These veterans soon became a source of discontent among the population, and it is believed that a number of them actually played roles in the attempt on Muad'Dib's life. Such a possibility is certainly not for-fetched: Service in the Fedaykin forced the Fremen out of "the ways of the fathers," and onto worlds they were ill-prepared to understand. Those who survived the service were forever changed, and as the reasons for their sacrifice grew more distant, they must have resented the man, whom they held responsible for the battles in the first place. Muad'Dib was a logical target for their unhappiness. In the end, however, the Fedaykin simply and quietly ceased, their time being passed.
Paul Muad'Dib may well have planned for just such an end for the Fedaykin. The army was loosely structured and did not boast a very strong hierarchy of officers. In fact, not one single name of a Fedaykin officer remains, a strange fact for an army that once conquered the known worlds. It would be logical to assume that Paul Muad'Dib wanted just such an arrangement so that the remnants of the Fedaykin would have no single organization or center to rally to once they found themselves without a place in the new order. Their popular name, after all, was Death Commandos, and Death Commandos, once their task is done, are not useful in a world gearing itself toward peaceful government through political manipulation.
Finally, while the chief effect of the Fedaykin was the establishment of Paul Muad'Dib as Emperor, there was another, more local effect as well. The rise of the Fedaykin assured the end of Fremen culture on Arrakis. The Fedaykin took the youngest, brightest, bravest, and strongest of the Fremen away from their sietches. As was mentioned before, those who returned could never comfortably fit into such a life again. Thus, it was only a matter of time before the old ways themselves ended.
Given the brief history of the Fedaykin, one must hold them in awe and in pity. Never was there a finer, more devoted army. But their time was brief and they ended without glory.
S.G.
Further references: ATREIDES, PAUL MUAD'DIB; STILGAR; Defa 'l-Fanini, Taaj 'l-Fremen 12 v. (Salusa Secundus: Morgan and Sharak). See especially Vol. 3, which concerns the history, military organization, and notable battles of the Fedaykin.
FENRING, COUNT HASIMIR
(10133-10225). Born on Kaitain to Cirni Lady Fenring (sister to Elrood IX), Fenring was raised in the Imperial Court and was the friend, from childhood, of the then na-Emperor, Shaddam (later Shaddam IV). He acquired, at a very early age, the necessary combination of wits, charm, and ruthlessness which enabled him not only to survive but to nourish in the intrigue-saturated atmosphere at Court. In so doing, he attracted the attention of many of the most powerful courtiers, who recognized his potential; and it should be noted as further evidence of his talent that he managed to refuse all approaches made to him without antagonizing anyone beyond bounds.
Fenring's capabilities were not observed solely by the nobles and pensioners making up the bulk of the Court. In 10147, acting on reports from one of her household spies, Reverend Mother Zoe Partherin, the emperor's Truthsayer, tested the fourteen-year-old with the gom jabbar. In her report to the Sisterhood, she stated only that the na-Count had acquitted himself well during the ordeal, but appeared to be lacking in certain qualities essential to his use in the Bene Gesserit plan. In a later, more private communication to the Wallach IX school, she revealed that what she had first taken as a delay in the boy's development was something more serious: Fenring was a genetic eunuch.
She noted, however, that Fenring might prove to be useful in spite of his deficiency, and continued to track his progress at Court.
In 10153, at the death of the old Count, Fenring inherited the title and responsibility for the rest of the family. His new duties did not interfere overmuch with the time spent with the na-Emperor — to the delight of his widowed mother, a woman who appreciated the advantages of royal patronage.
The young Count illustrated his worth to his Mend by laying out before him, in 10155, the details of an assassination plot against him. He also advised Shaddam that, rather than trying to take action against the plotters himself, he bring their scheme into the open, before the full Court, thus protecting himself by a display of preparedness.
That such a move would also make public knowledge of the existence of the hunter-seeker, an assassination weapon previously known only to members of House Corrino, was a detail Fenring had not missed. Nor had he overlooked the many indications that pointed back to Elrood IX, Shaddam's father, as the original source of the plot.
The emperor's possible complicity in the plan was not mentioned in Shaddam's address to the Court, and neither he nor Fenring demurred when a minor member of House Corrino was executed for plotting against the life of the Imperial heir. It is nonetheless an interesting matter of historical coincidence that Elrood was dead, a victim of chaumurky, within another year.
The question of the Count's involvement in that chaumurky has never been satisfactorily solved. Rumors abounded following Shaddam IV's ascent to the Golden Lion Throne, and a few brash souls were daring enough to set them down in writing (albeit anonymously, as with the author of Pirate History of Corrino). But not even the most persistent whisperers cared to face Fenring — by this time a proven fighter with a score of successful duels behind him — with anything so crude as a bald accusation.
What is certain, however, is that the Count's fortune was assured from the very beginning of Shaddam's reign. To the already considerable sources of income Fenring had inherited with his title, the emperor added enough estates, shares in CHOAM, and the like, to make his friend as wealthy as many of the heads of Houses Major.
It was not completely charitable. Shaddam expected in return — and received — the loyal service of a man capable of handling delicate matters without unnecessarily involving his master. So adept was the Count at smoothing out what he referred to as "inconveniences" (problems with the Landsraad, for example, or with Houses going renegade) that he quickly became best known as the "Emperor's errand boy." To the dismay of some who considered the title an insult, Fenring found it an amusing recognition of his talents.
The Count was married, in 10173, to Lady Margot, a recent graduate from the Bene Gesserit school on Wallach IX. Shortly after this, he was assigned as Imperial Agent to Arrakis, where his chief duties consisted of spying on the Harkonnens and maintaining the flow of melange, the geriatric spice, to Shaddam IV's stockpile.
Such work left Fenring with much time on his hands, a large portion of which was spent with his lady. She trained him in many of the Bene Gesserit ways of observation, control, and philosophy; and, when he was prepared to accept it, she revealed that her assigned duty to the Sisterhood was that of a breeder, preserving bloodlines for the B.G. program that might otherwise be lost.
Reverend Mother Partherin had not been mistaken in her estimate of the Count's usefulness. Fenring, already as thoroughly influenced by the Bene Gesserit doctrines as many of the Sisterhood's recognized members, adapted himself to the roles of benign cuckold with an ease that might have astonished someone knowing him only in his public capacity.
During the couple's tenure on Arrakis, Lady Margot bore three daughters: Cynthe, Yana, and Lianne. Each of the three was sent to the Wallach IX school at age five — the minimum age of admission — but no records yet translated give any details concerning their progress there or the identity of their father(s).
Such information as is available comes from Lady Margot's book Arrakis and After, a volume printed by the Bene Gesserit; but the lady touches only briefly on the subject of her children, with the father(s) of these first three being mentioned not at all.
Count Fenring returned to Court following the
handing over of the Arrakis fief to House Atreides, Lady Margot joining him after a brief visit to Wallach IX. Knowing of the treachery planned against the incoming house, the couple reacted in their individual ways: the Count, by laying the groundwork for the massive system of bribes and coercion which would eventually serve to keep the emperor freed of the Landsraad's suspicions; his wife, by leaving a warning message for Lady Jessica, a fellow Bene Gesserit, concerning dangers to the lives of her son and Duke.
Of the two efforts, Fenring's was by far the more successful. Though it cost him over a billion solaris in spice bribes in addition to an undisclosed amount spent on slave women, royal honors, and tokens of rank, the Count managed to keep his master's name clear of any connection with the Harkonnen (and Sardaukar) slaughter of the Atreides on Arrakis. Lady Margot's warnings conveyed too little information about the threat to Duke Leto to be effective, and came too late to help Paul Atreides, although the boy escaped the hunter-seeker that threatened him on his own.
In early 10192, Count and Lady Fenring were sent as official observers to Harko, on the Harkonnen's homeworld, Giedi Prime, to witness the birthday celebrations for Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, the na-Baron. It was during this visit that Fenring confronted Baron Harkonnen with a number of lies and half-truths the Baron had sent to the emperor, and advised him in no uncertain terms concerning the dangers of his proceeding with any further deceptions.
The implications were crystal clear: Having already moved, however, surreptitiously, against one Great House, the Count's master would not fear to attack again at need.
Lady Margot had reasons of her own — or, more accurately, of the Bene Gesserit's — for traveling to Giedi Prime. In Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, the Sisterhood had spotted genetic traits they coveted for their program. As the boy was known to consort only with his uncle, the Baron, and those slave women the old man permitted him, any child of his would have to be secured for the Sisterhood by a careful intermixing of seduction and guile. Lady Margot, who had not only proven herself several times over in those particular arts, but was able to appear on the scene without suspicions being roused, was the most obvious choice as carrier for that child.
Count Fenring both knew of and assisted in his wife's plans. On the night of their arrival, and on a sufficient number of occasions thereafter for his lady to be certain of her pregnancy and her control over the boy, the Count engaged Baron Harkonnen in a series of arguments that left in the old man's mind no room for wonder concerning the activities of his heir. During the days of Fenring's visit, the Baron was kept in a constant state of confusion concerning his status with the emperor, his rights involving appointment of Feyd-Rautha as his heir, and other topics the Count was certain would keep tight hold of his attention.
It was several days after the departure of his less-than-welcome guests that the Baron thought to ask Feyd-Rautha how he had passed the time; and since the boy had been hypnoconditioned to forget what had taken place between himself and Lady Margot, he could give his uncle no information.
Count Fenring's next — and last — function as servant to the emperor was to accompany his master during the final battles on Arrakis, culminating in Shaddam IV's abdication (10196). It was on this occasion, according to Lady Margot's memoirs and those of Shaddam's daughter, the Princess Irulan, that the Count willfully disobeyed his emperor for the first time by refusing to kill a man for him.
The man involved was Duke Paul Muad'Dib Atreides. He had fought and won a duel to the death with Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen, thereby crushing Shaddam's hopes of escaping Paul's demands for Irulan's hand and ascension to the throne. The emperor's last chance of escape lay in Fenring's calling out the already exhausted Atreides and eliminating this last "inconvenience."
The Count knew what was expected of him and studied, with the Bene Gesserit techniques of observation, the young man he was being asked to murder. Unfortunately for his master, Fenring recognized in this upstart Duke all of the traits and abilities that he himself possessed; the combination that had, so long ago, led Reverend Mother Partherin to hope that she had found the Sisterhood's Kwisatz Haderach. He recognized, too, that the younger man lacked the flaw that had killed the old woman's hope.
And the Count saw one thing more that stayed his hand and led him to betray his emperor after so many years of keeping faith. As he had recognized Paul Muad'Dib for what he was, so had the other recognized him, and understood all the ways in which that single flaw had shaped and twisted his life.
That understanding was a gift no one else had ever given him. The Count could not bring himself to kill its giver.
Nor could he, despite his anger, strike back at his emperor when Shaddam, enraged at his refusal, viciously cuffed him. Instead, he accepted the blow for the impotent gesture it was, counseled his former master through the painful details of setting up the Regency for Irulan, and took charge of preparing Shaddam's household on Salusa Secundus, the former prison planet to which the deposed emperor was exiled.
Once all of the proper arrangements had been made, Fenring returned briefly to the Court. There he made arrangements of his own: for transfer of his holdings, for the care of Lady Margot's youngest daughter, Elissa, until she reached the age of admission for the Wallach IX school, and for passage for himself and his wife to Salusa Secundus, where they joined Shaddam in his exile.
This companionship ended with Shaddam's death in 10202; the former emperor's health had declined steadily following his exile, and his early demise surprised no one, least of all the Count. Fenring remained on Salusa Secundus — by this time no longer a harsh prison planet, but a world altered to suit the new emperor's description of it as a "garden world, full of gentle things" — until he too died in 10225, having spent the later years of his life in further study of the Bene Gesserit techniques. (A favorite remark of his, which amused Lady Margot tremendously but often offended her visiting sisters, was that he was "more Bene Gesserit than human.")
Fenring's widow left Salusa Secundus in 10226 to serve as a teacher at the Wallach IX school. Pupils who studied under her often remarked on the number of her teachings for which she gave credit to her late husband.
Further references: ARRAKIS; HARKONNEN, FEYD-RAUTHA NA-BARON; SHADDAM IV; Lady Margot Fenring, Arrakis and After, Arrakis Studies 12 (Grumman: United Worlds); Princess Irulan Atreides-Corrino, Count Fenring: A Profile Lib. Conf. Temp. Ser. 243.
FENRING, LADY [MINGUS] MARGOT
Acknowledged by many sources in the Bene Gesserit Library and elsewhere as the most accomplished of the Sisterhood's seductresses. Much of her sexual skill can be traced to her two-year sabbatical from Wallach IX at age fourteen to the School of Erotic Arts on Gamont. Even though her program of study was an abbreviated form of the regular course work, she graduated with a rank of Mistress VI, unheard of in such a short length of time. However, the Bene Gesserit breeding program had produced varied talents among its progeny, and Lady Fenring's talents were certainly as much genetic as learned. Her physical appearance greatly enhanced her skills: golden-haired, gray-green-eyed, and willowy, her physical attributes by themselves must have been the subject of much attention at the court of Shaddam IV. However, her husband's deadly abilities at court intrigue and hand-to-hand combat insured that she was never the subject of common gossip, and her hold over Count Fenring assured that she could pick her companions as her Bene Gesserit instructions and taste mandated.
The daughter of the union between Shiirlon Wiktor, a Bene Gesserit of hidden rank, and Baron Redmond Bagratoni, she was born in 10153 in the House of Voices on Wallach IX while her mother was in seclusion. With the exception of her sojourn on Gamont, she was trained from puberty by Gaius Helen Mohiam, the celebrated Reverend Mother. This special attention was befitting the woman whose genetic promise ordained at an early age that she would be married to Count Hasimir Fenring, thought before his puberty to be a possible Kwisatz Haderach. Margot was followed in her training by the future Jessica Atreides. It is not known whether the trainin
g of the two overlapped or if they ever met on Wallach IX, that the warning that Margot left for Jessica in the wet-planet conservatory in Arrakeen indicates affection and a familiarity win each other's movements.
Lady Margot left Wallach IX with the hidden rank of Mater Acrior as an emissary espion, and in 10173 she was married by arrangement to Count Hasimir Fenring. While the initial purpose of this union was to assist in the awakening of the Kwisatz Haderach, it quickly reconfirmed that the Count was a genetic eunuch. In fact, as early as 10147, the Reverend Mother Zoe Partherin, the emperor's Truthsayer, had reported such suspicions to the Bene Gesserit Chapter House. At this point a series of messages between Lady Margot and the Matres Felicissimae indicated a shift in objective. Initially Margot's fishing in various genetic pools had been a secondary role for her; it now became primary, and her significant charms and skills gave her almost full access to the genetic resources of the Court of Shaddam IV. It was essential that Count Fenring acquiesce in this endeavor and that full advantage be taken of his longtime friendship with Shaddam IV. Groundwork had already been partially provided for this control when the Bene Gesserit had insisted that Margot be offered as wife only to the Count when the arrangements began in 10172 for her sale.
Shortly after their marriage, Lady Margot was provided with an opportunity to subjugate the Count. He was made the royal envoy to Arrakis, where he supervised the activities of House Harkonnen and the royal planetologist, Pardot Kynes, and insured that the emperor's melange allotment was accurate. The boredom of the provincial court of the desert planet allowed Lady Margot to train the Count in Bene Gesserit techniques, philosophies, and propaganda. Fascinated by their uses in intrigue, he was an apt and willing pupil. At this time Margot revealed to the Count that she had been assigned a schedule of seductions, including that of the na-Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen. One school of thought contends that Hasimir Fenring was by then so programmed and so bewitched that he readily accepted his wife's "duties" and willingly gave his significant help. However, Lady Margot's secret communiques, now revealed for the first time by the opening of the Bene Gesserit Library, reveal two controls on the Count's behavior that he may or may not have known about. First, on their wedding night, Margot fed him a residual poison and administered the antidote thereafter in his food, thus foiling the poison snoopers. Second, during his Bene Gesserit training, Margot implanted a hypnotic suggestion, activated by the Voice, that would paralyze the Count from the neck down. Reports indicating any knowledge of these controls by the Count remain either untranslated or unavailable, and there is no mention of any of these activities in Lady Margot's Arrakis and After or Princess Irulan's Count Fenring: A Profile. Whatever the reasons for the Count's compliance, it was complete, and Lady Margot bore three daughters while they were on Arrakis: Cynthe, Yana and Lianne.
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