Gilbertus donned his Headmaster robe and applied aging makeup to maintain appearances. “I am going to observe from the battlements. Stay safe here, and hidden.”
“I’ll be observing.” With his network of secret spy-eyes, Erasmus would see more than anyone else in the institution.
Preparing the defenses, the Mentat students had walled themselves into the compound, closed and secured the gates, drawn up the connector bridges, and checked all of the electronic systems, both aboveground and underwater. Thanks to their survival exercises, the trainees knew labyrinthine safe paths through the swamp, where any misstep would cause disaster. They were brave, wise, and imaginative—but not combat trained.
When Gilbertus stepped onto the decks that overlooked the surrounding marshlands, he saw that Manford had brought hundreds of armed followers. They came crowded on vehicles, rolling along the rugged road that became even more challenging when it reached the waterlogged ground. Most appeared to be mere footsoldiers, but he also spotted a number of elite Swordmaster fighters, including Anari Idaho.
The Butlerians thronged across the uncertain terrain. Some were piled aboard amphibious vehicles that could be used as attack boats on the marsh-lake side of the scho+hre m2Iol, while other vehicles would approach the high walls around the entrance. Perhaps Manford Torondo would be cautious, perhaps he would be brash and confident. He often exhibited chaotic behavior.
As they stopped at the main gates, Swordmaster Anari Idaho placed Manford into his saddle on her shoulders and stepped forward, carrying him to the barrier. The legless leader shouted up to the closed gate, “Headmaster Albans! I understand you wish to have a philosophical discussion with me.”
From his high observation deck, Gilbertus looked down at his opponent. “You brought a great many people for a philosophical debate. Are they all trained in rhetoric?”
“They provide moral support.”
Gilbertus knew this was simply a dance of words and would accomplish nothing. Nevertheless, he played it out, gleaning small details, assessing the mood of the Butlerians, studying their behavior. “I’ve known you for years, Leader Torondo. You have enough intelligence to hold your own in a discussion. I will invite you and your Swordmaster inside so we can debate. These other spectators are not invited.”
Anari turned her head and said something quickly to Manford, but he rested a reassuring hand on the side of her face, tenderly stroking her close-cropped hair. He shouted back up to the wall, “Why aren’t my followers welcome in your school? If you won’t let them accompany me, then I suggest you come down here. Open the gates and talk with me, face-to-face.”
“If I come out alone, do you absolutely guarantee my safety?”
“God will guarantee your safety.”
“I prefer a more direct commitment from you,” Gilbertus said. “I’m not one who can demand guarantees from God.”
“We could destroy your school at any time,” Manford taunted, “just as we ransacked Baridge and burned down the old Suk School on Salusa Secundus. But the Emperor’s sister is with you, and Anna Corrino must be kept safe—in our custody.”
“She will be safe so long as your followers don’t ransack the school,” Gilbertus said. “And if you refuse to guarantee my safety when I come to speak with you, then you will have a long wait.”
Gilbertus knew that if he opened the secure gates, the Butlerians would surge forward, not caring how many students they sacrificed to get to him. He decided a siege was preferable to an invasion, or his personal surrender.
Realizing they were at an impasse, Manford withdrew, without any parting comment.
* * *
THE BUTLERIANS HAD brought a supply train with them and worked like drones to set up camp, laying down tarpaulins in the soft swamplands, erecting simple shelters, preparing food from cook wagons. They were ready to be here for days, weeks, months.
On the second night, Anari Idaho circled though the swamp with three of her fellow Swordmasters, scouting the imposing school. She had been trained as a Swordmaster on Ginaz, and had learned to fight in difficult environments, but even the rugged Ginaz islands were not such a festering set of dangers as this soggy, uncertain ground.
Alys Carroll and other faithful Mentat trainees had warned about the hazards and predators around the school, but Anari disregarded the worries of mere contemplators. She and her companions scouted for vulnerabilities in the darkn boosted by the power of Other Memory she carriV Mentatess, looking for ways to break into the defiant Mentat School, all the while ready with their swords to fight any swamp predators that challenged them. Her group slipped around the tangled trees, weaving their way into the sangrove morass that was closest to the school. Wearing headbands with dim lights, they splashed through the shallow water, which rarely rose above their shins.
But Anari had underestimated the treacherous terrain. She was so alert for swamp dragons and spotted cats that she paid little attention to the glimmer of silver that flickered through the water channels. The voracious fish swept around their legs—and then bit. Razorjaws!
Anari was in the rear of the group, and she sprang up onto the curved sangrove roots, her lower legs already badly sliced. Blood dripped down her calves into the water and drove the predatory swimmers into a frenzy. The razorjaws were attacking the other cursing Swordmasters, ripping their hamstrings, leaping up to attach themselves to exposed skin. When one of the Swordmasters fell into the water, the boiling froth turned red in the collective light of the headlamps.
Anari tried to work her way forward, still balanced on the knobby roots, but her leg wounds were too serious. She grabbed the hand of a companion who flailed for help, but by the time she hauled him out, half of his body had been stripped of skin, and he died.
Anari tore part of her garment into makeshift bandages for her bleeding legs, and tediously picked her way back, never leaving the woven obstacle course of sangrove roots. Along the way, as the shadows increased, she watched the silver flickers of razorjaws in the shallow water below, following her drops of blood. The ravenous fish trailed her, hoping she would slip back into the shallow channel. But she made it to solid ground.
She reached Manford’s camp feeling the weight of her failure, but determined to try again. “We won’t be defeated by fish,” she said, as a battlefield medic cleaned her wounds and stitched the largest slashes, then wrapped her legs. She asked for no anesthetic, but simply endured. She was the only survivor of the scout party.
Seated on a chair inside the medical tent, Manford observed Anari, showing great concern for her. “I want you to be more careful. I can’t lose my most loyal warrior … and best friend.”
As a human being, I was born on the brink of personal destruction, and I have spent my life dancing along the edge of that cliff.
—MOTHER SUPERIOR RAQUELLA BERTO-ANIRUL
Despite her increasing infirmity, Raquella felt a burst of energy, fueled by anger. Gripping a curl of message paper in her hand, she walked at a brisk pace through the plant- and statue-lined portico that had been set up in one of the new school buildings. Her shoes made sharp reports on the tiles, sounds that grew louder as she rounded a corner before coming to a wooden door.
She rapped sharply and stood staring at the door, as if willing it to move. Finally the door opened, and Reverend Mother Valya stood before her in a new black robe.
“I ordered you to attend the reception for Dorotea and her companions from Salusa Secundus.” Raquella waved the message paper under the younger woman’s nose. “Why did you decline?”
Valya had been on Wallach IX for less than a day since returning from Ginaz, but she arrived before Sister Arlett, who was bringing Dorotea from the Imperial Court. Now the transfer ship from Salusa Secundus was about to land at the spaceport, and Raquella didn’t have the time for squabbles or stubbornness. This had to end now!
Valya’s dark eyes hardened. “How can I welcome Dorotea when she is responsible for the murder of so many Sisters? She teaches a
heretical group of women that pander to the Emperor and swoon whenever Manford Torondo mutters a command. To invite Dorotea back here, even to suggest that she is still one of us—”
Raquella did not try to quell her emotions. “I am the Mother Superior, and this is my school. I made it clear to everyone—Acolytes, Sisters, and Reverend Mothers alike—that I want the two factions to reconcile before I die. Valya, you must set aside your feelings for the sake of the Sisterhood … for my sake.”
Valya squirmed, obviously fighting her dislike. “I will never trust a turncoat, Mother Superior. On Rossak, you asked me to pretend to be Dorotea’s friend so I could spy on her—I have seen her heart, her unbridled ambition.”
Raquella’s voice was sharp, like a weapon. “As I have seen yours.”
Valya looked at the floor, then raised her gaze and seemed to summon her courage. “I left my Swordmaster instructor and came back at your urging, but what is all this talk of reconciliation? How can you forget our Sisters who were cut down by the Emperor’s troops?”
Raquella’s voice was quietly reassuring. “I’m not ignoring anything, but I must make compromises, for the future of the Sisterhood. When I am gone—and that will be soon, Valya—my work could be torn apart by a civil war, and I don’t want that to happen. All Sisters follow the same basic teachings and believe in our plan to improve the human race. It is best for us not to be divided simply because we disagree about the tools we use. It is essential for us not to be divided.”
“And who is to replace you?” Valya pressed. “Your message said you had chosen your successor.”
“I will tell you when I tell all of the Sisters. My choice will assure the best chance for the Sisterhood’s survival.”
“Is it to be Dorotea, then? The woman who abandoned us? Your own granddaughter?”
Raquella gripped Valya firmly by the arm and guided her out into the corridor. “My decision is forthcoming. And you will attend the reception.”
* * *
THE TWO WOMEN entered the austere reception hall, one of the first large structures built by VenHold workers. The school had expanded greatly in the initial year, but the women wasted no time or effort on unnecessary amenities or furnishings. The hall thronged with black-robed Sisters and a small number of white-robed Acolytes.
Just inside the doorway, Raquella said, “It would please me to see you and Dorotea spend time together. Make the initial effort. You used to be friends.”
“I pretended to be her friend.”
“Then pretend again. The Sisterhood is at stake.” The Mother Superior flowed away into the crowd of women, leaving Valya on her own.
Raquella eased herself into a seat and poured a glass of springwater from a pitcher. Going into a deep analysis, she felt her nerves crackle with misfires, her metabolism strain, her cellular chemistry struggle to continue functioning. Any normal woman would have died decades ago, but Raquella used her extraordinary bodily control to keep herself alive. She closed her eyes to dive deep into an inner trance where she worked within her own cells, monitoring the biological machinery.
Just a little longer … Maybe tonight she could surrender and be done with her work, with her life.
She returned to awareness when Sister Fielle spoke to her. Raquella realized that she had drifted off for longer than she expected. “Dorotea has arrived, Mother Superior.”
The young Sister Mentat extended her arm and helped the elderly woman to her feet. “Thank you.” Raquella resented her own increasing weakness, and she drew upon energy reserves to steady herself so that others would not see.+rch woman
Valya stood off to one side, surrounded by a group of Sisters. Raquella realized that they were the commando women who had gone to retrieve the hidden computers from Rossak; they were also the Sisters most dedicated to Valya’s personal combat training. Of course, she should have realized that Valya would gather her own allies at the school.…
When the main doors opened, Sister Arlett strode into the reception hall, introducing the guests she had brought from Salusa. Dorotea followed her, a lanky figure wearing a black robe that was of a different cut from traditional Sisterhood garb; hers even included a Corrino lion crest. She was accompanied by six other women who also served in the Emperor’s palace. Raquella remembered all of the prodigal Sisters, wished they had never left.
Dorotea and her entourage looked around the hall to assess the Mother Superior’s new headquarters. Raquella caught hints of … haughtiness? Superiority? Disappointment at these workmanlike buildings, which were far inferior to the ostentatious spectacle of the Imperial Palace?
The orthodox Sisters mingled with their Wallach IX counterparts, showing no reservations. It was either a sign of submissiveness, or perhaps arrogance, since they had the Emperor’s favor.
From across the large room, Dorotea’s eyes met her grandmother’s like weapons systems acquiring targets. The voices of Other Memory became a loud whisper in the back of Raquella’s mind, a gathering storm. The other woman regarded her as if they were equals … and perhaps that was how Dorotea felt.
The old woman used well-honed techniques to control her blood pressure, her metabolism, her pulse. She had to remain calm and fully alert, using her last energy reserves. Most of all, she had to be ready to do what she must, the martyrdom solution—it was a tremendous gamble, but Raquella knew it was the best move she had left to her.
As Dorotea came forward with gliding steps, the Sisters gave her a wide berth. More and more Sisters congregated around Valya, facing Dorotea and her smaller entourage. Raquella wondered how many seeds Valya had already planted among the Wallach IX followers, how much of a personal power base she’d been building. Dorotea and Valya exchanged glances, but neither showed any emotion.
Now the Mother Superior gripped Dorotea’s hands warmly. “Welcome back, Dorotea. The Salusan Sisters are still our Sisters, though we have traveled different paths. Those paths are converging again.”
Reverend Mother Dorotea held the old woman’s hands formally, then squeezed tighter, but just for a moment. Was she trying to communicate some sort of message? “It is good to see you, Grandmother. We are both far from Rossak.”
“In distance perhaps, but we are not necessarily so separate. At least, it doesn’t have to be that way.”
Raquella was aware of all the women listening in on the conversation, not saying anything. Many of the Wallach Sisters shot questioning glances at Valya. The Mother Superior needed to seal this matter of opposing loyalties.
Raquella hoped that Fielle’s risky solution would succeed.
The Mother Superior had to stage a dramatic, emotional event that would likely result in her death. She had spent years demanding that her students learn to rein in their emotions, but now the future depended on both Valya and Dorotea caring about her.
* * *
any form of advanced technology-re the DURING THE TENSE reception, the Wallach Sisters treated Dorotea and her companions as if they were made of cold glass.
The Mother Superior seated herself at the head of a long dining table and instructed Valya to sit on her right, Dorotea on her left. The two younger women kept themselves in separate pools of moody reticence, speaking only when spoken to, constantly on the alert for their rival’s every move, gesture, and word.
Through a high window in the hall, Raquella could see the fading outlines of nearby hills as darkness set in. She turned to Valya and Dorotea. “Back on Rossak, you two were comrades and learned from each other. You both endured the Agony, though you took separate paths to pass through to the other side.”
The two younger women seemed ready to interject, but Raquella held up a hand to silence them. “I know your disagreements, I know your beliefs—but I hope that both of you will understand that the Sisterhood is more important. The things we have in common are more fundamental than our differences. We know from history—written in documents and told to us by our ancestors within—that since the beginning of civilization countless soc
ieties have warred over nuances, while forgetting the commonality of their basic beliefs. We must not let that happen to ourselves.”
“Others have tried and failed,” Valya said sourly. “The Commission of Ecumenical Translators sought to find common ground among feuding religions and produced the Orange Catholic Bible. That didn’t turn out well at all.”
Dorotea snorted, agreeing with Valya. “We could ask the members of the CET, but most of them were murdered. The only ones left are in deep exile.”
Mother Superior Raquella gave them each a stern glance. “The final success or failure of the Orange Catholic Bible remains to be seen. In the Sisterhood, we must take the long view—thousands of years, hundreds and hundreds of generations, not just a few decades.”
She paused for breath. “I am ancient and should have died long ago. Now I must anticipate what will happen to the Sisterhood when I am gone—my legacy.” She nodded toward Fielle. “Our Sister Mentats have run extensive projections, and I know what must be done.… I also know the dire consequences if I fail. When I die, it is up to you, and to all of my Sisters.”
“We can never forget that Dorotea betrayed us,” Valya said.
“I was not the betrayer. Your use of computers was a betrayal of the Imperium, and of humanity itself!”
“An unproven charge,” Valya said, “which you made with no thought of the consequences. Because of you—”
Raquella cut them off. “Enough!” It seemed hopeless, but she had to proceed with her plan. She had to force a rapprochement, and her final alternative would require her remaining energy. If she failed, she would be dead. “I grow weary of this. I grow weary of life.”
With all the dignity and energy she could muster, she strode out of the hall.
* * *
RAQUELLA WAS ON the edge of despair about the crumbling future, and every one of the Sisters needed to understand why she felt that way. The Sisterhood no longer matched her +go. pvision; perhaps it was appropriate for it to end with her, if the factions could not work together.
Mentats of Dune Page 31
