Dune_ House Atreides - Brian Herbert [119]
“Ah, forests! Green and lush as far as the eye can see, covering hills and swales and broad valleys. In ancient times, sand encroached on plants and destroyed them, but it will be the reverse on the new Dune: The wind will carry seeds across the planet, and more trees and other plants will grow, like children.”
The assassin stood still, astonished at being so casually dismissed. Remove yourself. The import of what he had been charged to do transfixed him. If he killed this man, Fremen legends would call Uliet the Destroyer of Dreams.
“First, though, we must install windtraps in the rocks,” Kynes continued, breathless. “They’re simple systems, easy to construct, and will grasp moisture, funneling it to where we can use it. Eventually, we’ll have vast underground catchbasins for all the water, a step toward bringing water back to the surface. Yes, I said back. Once water ran freely on Dune. I have seen signs of it.”
In dismay Uliet stared at the poisoned knife, unable to believe that this man had no fear of him whatsoever. Remove yourself. Kynes had faced his death and walked right past it. Guided by God.
Uliet stood there now, knife in hand, the unprotected shoulders of the Imperial servant taunting him. He could easily drive a killing blow into the man’s spine.
But the assassin could not move.
He saw the Planetologist’s confidence, as if he were protected by some holy guardian. The vision this great man brought for the future of Dune had already captivated these people. And the Fremen, with their harsh lives and generations of enemies who had forced them from planet to planet, needed a dream.
Perhaps someone had finally been sent to guide them, a prophet. Uliet’s soul would be damned forever if he dared to kill the long-awaited messenger sent by God!
But he had accepted a mission from his sietch leader, and knew that the crysknife could never be put away without shedding blood. In this case, the dilemma could not be resolved by a minor cut either, for the blade was poisoned; the merest scratch would kill.
Those facts could not be reconciled with each other. Uliet’s hands trembled on the hilt of the curved knife.
Without noticing that everyone had fallen silent around him, Kynes rambled on about windtrap placement, but his audience, knowing what must happen, watched their esteemed warrior.
Then Uliet’s mouth watered. He tried not to think of it, but—as if in a dream—he seemed to taste the sweet, sticky juice of portyguls, fresh fruit that one could simply pluck from a tree and eat . . . a mouthful of lush pulp washed down with pure water from an open pond. Water for everyone.
Uliet took a step back, and another, holding the knife up in a ceremonial gesture. He took a third step away, as Kynes spoke of wheat- and rye-covered plains and gentle rain showers in the spring.
The assassin turned, dizzy, thinking of the two words the messenger had said to him, “Remove yourself.”
He turned away and stared down at the knife he held in front of him. Then, Uliet swayed, stopped, then swayed forward again, deliberately—and fell on his knife. His knees did not bend, nor did he flinch or try to avoid his fate as he let himself fall facefirst onto the floor, onto the tip of the blade. The poisoned crysknife plunged below his sternum and up into his heart. Sprawled on the stone floor, his body trembled. Within moments Uliet was dead. There was very little blood.
The sietch audience cried out at the omen they had just witnessed and backed away. Now, as the Fremen gazed at Kynes with religious awe, his words finally stuttered to a halt. He turned and saw the sacrifice this Fremen had just made for him, the bloodletting.
“What’s going on here?” Kynes demanded. “Who was that man?”
The watermen rushed forward to remove Uliet’s body. With a rustle of robes, a shrouding of blankets and towels and cloths, they whisked away the fallen assassin, taking him to the deathstills for processing.
The other Fremen now stared at Kynes with