Dune: The Butlerian Jihad (73 page)

The Sorceress looked skeptically at her, then astonishment crossed her alabaster face. “It truly is you, Serena Butler! We thought you had died on Giedi Prime, along with Ort Wibsen and Pinquer Jibb. We checked the DNA on blood samples found in the wreckage of your blockade runner.” Zufa loomed before the young woman, studying her while ignoring the two men entirely.

Serena struggled valiantly to set aside her sadness. “Wibsen and Jibb did die fighting the cymeks. I was injured . . . and captured.”

At the deep expression of emotions, Vor spoke on her behalf. “She was held prisoner on Earth by a robot named Erasmus.”

The Sorceress’s electric expression swung to regard him. “And who are you?”

Vor knew he could not lie. “I am the son of the Titan Agamemnon.” The Militia soldiers stirred. The two Sorceresses reacted with alarm and then renewed intensity. “I used my influence to slip through the defenses of Earth-Omnius.”

Iblis Ginjo pushed forward, eyes bright and enthusiastic. “All of Earth is in revolt! Humans have broken free of their machine masters. Rebels slew Titans and neo-cymeks, smashed robots, destroyed entire facilities. But we need League help—”

Abruptly, Iblis’s words were cut off with a little squeak of his voice. Around his own throat, Vorian felt a tightness, like a garrote. The eyes of the Sorceresses blazed, as if probing deeply into the minds of these new arrivals. Suspicion saturated the air like thick humidity, an unwillingness to trust two turncoat humans and Serena Butler, who might have been brainwashed by Omnius.

The Sorceresses’ concentration was broken by a sudden commotion. Vor found he could breathe easily again. Viceroy Manion Butler, looking a decade older than when Serena had last seen him, pushed soldiers out of his way and charged forward like a wild Salusan bull. “Serena! Oh my sweet child! You are alive!”

Both Sorceresses stepped aside, seeing that nothing could stop the man from throwing his arms around his daughter. “My child, my child— I can’t believe it!” He held Serena, rocked her from side to side. Without wanting to, she found herself weeping against his chest. “Oh what have they done to you? What have they done?”

Serena found she could not answer him at all.

S
erena’s father hushed her and hurriedly escorted her away from the spaceport with a crowd of fawning and dutiful attendants. “The best place for you now is the City of Introspection, with your mother. You can rest and heal there, in peace.”

“I will never have peace again,” she said, struggling to control the tremor in her voice. “Where is Xavier? I need to—”

Looking troubled, Manion patted her on the shoulder. “I sent an executive order recalling him from an inspection patrol of perimeter defenses. He’s racing home now, and should be back early tomorrow.”

She swallowed hard. “I need to see him as soon as he returns. Inside the ship . . . ourson . . . there is so much—”

Manion nodded again, without seeming to hear that she had just referred to her “son.” “Don’t worry about it now. A lot has changed, but you’re home again, and safe. Nothing else matters. Your mother is waiting for you, and you can rest with her. Everything else can keep until tomorrow.”

Serena looked over to where Vorian Atreides and Iblis Ginjo were being ushered off by Militia officers. She felt she should accompany them and introduce the former Omnius servants to their new world. “Don’t be hard on them,” Serena said, remembering the harsh skepticism of the Sorceresses. “They’ve never really met free humans before. Both of them have important information.”

Manion Butler nodded. “They’re only being debriefed. The League can learn much from what they have to say.”

“I can help, too,” Serena said. “I saw so many terrible things in my captivity on Earth. Maybe tonight I can come back and—”

The Viceroy shushed her. “Everything in its time, Serena. I’m sure you’ll grow weary enough of our questions, but you don’t have to save the world today.” He chuckled. “Same old Serena.”

By high-speed groundcar it took an hour for them to reach the contemplative hillside retreat on the outskirts of Zimia. As thirsty as she was for the sights of her home world, everything seemed a blur to Serena, and she noticed few details.

Livia Butler, in her plain abbess robes, greeted them at the high gates of the quiet complex. With a moist-eyed nod to her husband, she accepted Serena into the City of Introspection and led the way across a grassy area to a warm and well-furnished room of muted colors and cushioned chairs. There she cradled Serena against her breast as if their daughter were a child again. Livia’s large eyes filled with tears.

Now that Serena was with her parents, safe and warm and loved, the oppressive weights of weariness and fear lifted from her, and she felt more able to do what still needed to be done. In a weak and shaky voice, Serena quickly told them about her sweet little Manion, and how Erasmus had killed him . . . sparking the revolt that swept across Earth.

“Please, I need to see Xavier.” Her face lit up. “And Octa? Where is my sister?”

Livia shot a hard glance at her husband, and words caught in her throat until she said, at last, “Soon enough, dear child. For now, you must rest and gather your strength. You’re home now. You have all the time in the world.”

Serena wanted to protest, but sleep swept her away.

BY THE TIME Xavier raced back from his Armada patrol on the fringes of the Salusan system, the news had already reached him in a dozen comsystem messages of joy and grief, each one a hammer blow of pain. The clashing happiness, confusion, and despair made him want to explode.

Because he traveled solo in his kindjal, Xavier had time to think about what he had learned. When his ship arrived late at Zimia Spaceport, he felt incredibly alone. He disembarked onto a landing field illuminated with spotlights. It was past midnight.

How could Serena be alive? He had seen the wreckage of her blockade runner in the gray seas of Giedi Prime. The bloodstains matched her DNA. Even in his wildest, most foolish dreams, Xavier had never considered that she might still be alive.
Alive!
Or that she was pregnant with his child.

And now Serena had escaped. She had come home. But his son—
their
son— had been murdered by the monstrous machines.

When Xavier stepped away from his cooling kindjal, he could barely smell the ozone and oxidation chemicals on its hull from his fast descent through the Holtzman scrambler shields. Ahead he saw a single man waiting on the landing field, seemingly forlorn, his features washed out under the spaceport lights, but Xavier recognized Manion Butler, Viceroy of the League of Nobles.

“I’m so glad you . . . you could—” Manion Butler was unable to finish his sentence. Instead, he stepped forward and embraced his son-in-law, the young military officer who had married not his daughter Serena, but Octa.

“Serena is resting at the City of Introspection,” Manion said. “She . . . she doesn’t know about you and Octa. It is a delicate situation, from every angle.” All life seemed to have drained out of the Viceroy. He was obviously excited to have his daughter back, but broken to know what had happened to her, how the machines had hurt her . . . how they had killed her baby.

“Serena would want the truth,” said Xavier. “But she will have all of it she can tolerate soon enough. I’ll see her tomorrow. Let her sleep well for this evening.”

Supporting each other, the two men walked away from the kindjal. The Viceroy led Xavier to where larger banks of white lights and a work crew continued their inspection even at such a late hour. The silver-and-black vessel was of a configuration Xavier had seen only once before— an update ship such as the one he had encountered at Giedi Prime, when the traitorous human pilot had eluded Xavier’s attempts to capture him.

“Serena found allies among the humans on Earth,” Manion said. “Two trustees, men raised by the machines. She convinced them to flee with her.”

Xavier frowned. “Are you certain they are not spies?”

Manion shrugged. “Serena trusts them.”

“Then I suppose that is good enough.”

They entered the
Dream Voyager
, and Xavier felt a cold heaviness in his chest. He knew where Manion was taking him. Aboard the update ship, he noticed the odd configurations, the smooth curves, the clean metallic lines that denoted efficiency and also carried an unconscious sleek beauty.

“We’ve not moved the boy,” said Manion. “I told them to wait for you.”

“I don’t know if I should thank you for that.” When the Viceroy opened a sealed storage compartment and a wispy breath of cold steam crawled like feathers into the air, Xavier overcame his reluctance and leaned forward.

The child’s body was wrapped in a tough, dark covering, a sealed preservation shroud that hid specific details, leaving only a small, painfully sad shape of what had once been a vibrant little boy. Xavier touched the cold wrapping. His fingertips were gentle, as if he didn’t want to disturb his son’s slumber.

Behind him, Manion was breathing hard. “Serena said . . . she said she named the boy after me.” Then his words choked off, and Xavier reached in to lift out the wrapped package, all that remained of the child he had never met, had never even known about until it was too late. The boy seemed unbelievably, absurdly light.

Xavier found he had nothing to say, but as he carried his son out into the night air of Salusa Secundus, taking little Manion home for the first and only time, he wept openly.

V
orian Atreides sat at a large, polished table in a debriefing room, ready to face a crowd of gathered political leaders, all of whom had questions and suspicions. He hoped he had answers for them.

Iblis Ginjo would be interviewed separately. The League had already dispatched its fastest scout ship to Earth to verify the stories and assess the current status of the revolt.

Looking around the capital city had absolutely astounded Vor. The buildings of Zimia had none of the outrageous grandeur of Earth, and the streets seemed . . . disorganized. But the
people
he saw, the colors, the clothes, the expressions on their faces— he felt as if he had awakened from a dream. Vor steeled himself and resolved to cooperate so he could help the free humans in every way possible. If they would allow him.

For an interrogation session such as this, Agamemnon would have used pain stimulators and exotic torture devices. Undoubtedly, the League saw this as a remarkable opportunity to obtain inside information on Omnius. Sitting around the table and standing against the walls, representatives regarded him with curiosity, some with hatred or at least resentment.

Always before, Vor had been proud of his lineage, deluded by the perceived glories of Agamemnon and the Titans. Free humans, though, had a different view of history. A more accurate view, he hoped.

Uncomfortable before so many agitated people, Vor felt adrift, missing Serena, hoping she was all right. Had she reunited with Xavier Harkonnen yet? Would she ever want to see Vor again?

Before the buzz of conversation could dwindle in the debriefing room, Vor spoke, starting slowly and selecting his words with the utmost care. “I make no excuses for my behavior. My cooperation with the machines has certainly caused harm and pain to people in the League of Nobles.” He looked around the room, met each curious eye. “Yes, I worked as a trustee on an update ship, delivering copies of Omnius to the Synchronized Worlds. I was raised by the thinking machines, taught their version of history. I even revered my father, General Agamemnon. I thought he was a great cymek.”

He heard mutters around the room. “Serena Butler, though, opened my eyes. She challenged me to question what I had been taught, and finally I saw that I had been deceived.” He wrestled with what he was about to offer. It seemed the final betrayal of his past.

Let it be so
.

He took a deep breath, continued. “It is my fervent hope that I can use my knowledge and skill— as well as my detailed information about the workings of the thinking machines— to assist my fellow human beings, who are currently in revolt against Omnius on Earth.”

A growing mutter passed among the listeners around the table as the representatives began to realize the implications of his words. “I distrust any man who would betray his father,” one of the representatives said, a tall man with a pockmarked face. “How will we know he is not giving us distorted intelligence?”

Vor frowned at the accusation. Surprisingly, the coldly beautiful Zufa Cenva of Rossak said from one side, “No, he speaks the truth.” Her dark eyes penetrated him, and he had difficulty looking into them for more than a moment. “If he dares to lie here, I will know.”

One of the debriefers looked at his notes. “And now, Vorian Atreides, we have many questions for you.”

W
hen Serena awoke with the first pale light of dawn, she found herself alone in a soft bed surrounded by soothing sounds, colors, and smells. Many times after Fredo’s death, she had visited her mother in the City of Introspection and enjoyed the contemplative atmosphere. But after a short time she had always grown impatient with meditation and pondering, preferring to do something more active.

She dressed quickly as the morning light grew outside. Xavier might be back on Salusa by now. The brief sleep had done her good, but she felt a leaden weight in her chest that she knew would never lift until she found Xavier and told him the terrible news about their son. Despite her bruised heart and soul, she had never backed down from her responsibilities.