Dune_ House Atreides - Brian Herbert [158]
“However, you should also conceal an assortment of other niceties: needles, stun-fields, poison tips. While your enemy can see the obvious weapons”—Hawat took a long training sword and slashed it in the air—“you can use them as a decoy to attack with something even deadlier.”
Leto stood up straight, brushing dirt and debris from himself. “But, sir, it’s not sporting to use hidden weapons. Doesn’t that go against the strictures of—”
Hawat snapped his fingers like a gunshot in front of Leto’s face. “Don’t talk to me about pretty points of assassination.” The Mentat’s rough skin turned more ruddy, as if he barely kept his anger in check. “Is your intention to show off for the ladies, or to eliminate your opponent? This is not a game.”
The grizzled man focused on Rhombur, staring so intently that the young man backed up half a step. “Word has it there’s an Imperial bounty on your head, Prince, if you ever leave the sanctuary of Caladan. You are the exiled son of House Vernius. Your life is not that of a commoner. You never know when the death blow will fall, so you must be prepared at all times. Court intrigues and politics have their own rules, but oft’times the rules are not known to all players.”
Rhombur swallowed hard.
Turning to Leto, Hawat said, “Lad, your life is in danger, too, as heir to House Atreides. All Great Houses must constantly be on the alert against assassination.”
Leto straightened, fixing his gaze on the instructor. “I understand, Thufir, and I want to learn.” He looked over at Rhombur. “We want to learn.”
Hawat’s red-stained lips smiled. “That’s a start,” he said. “There may be clumsy clods working for other families in the Landsraad—but you, my boys, must become shining examples. Not only will you learn shield-and-knife fighting and the subtle arts of killing, you must also learn the weaponry of politics and government. You must know how to defend yourselves through culture and rhetoric, as well as with physical blows.” The warrior Mentat squared his shoulders and stood firm. “From me you will learn all these things.”
He switched on his body-shield. Behind the shimmering field he held a dagger in one hand, a long sword in the other.
Instinctively, Leto switched on his own shield belt, and the flickering Holtzman field glimmered in front of him. Rhombur fumbled to do the same just as the Mentat feigned an attack, pulling back at the last possible second before drawing blood.
Hawat tossed the weapons from hand to hand—left, right, and left again—proving he could use either for a killing strike. “Watch carefully. Your lives may someday depend on it.”
Any path that narrows future possibilities may become a lethal trap. Humans do not thread their way through a maze; they scan a vast horizon filled with unique opportunities.
—The Spacing Guild Handbook
Junction was an austere world of limited geographic variations, unadorned scenery, and strict weather control to remove troublesome inconveniences. A serviceable place, it had been chosen as Spacing Guild headquarters because of its strategic location rather than its landscapes.
Here, candidates learned to become Navigators.
Second-growth forests covered millions of hectares, but they were stunted box trees and dwarf oaks. Certain Old Terran vegetables grew in abundance, cultivated by the locals—potatoes, peppers, eggplants, tomatoes, and a variety of herbs—but the produce tended to become alkaloid, edible only after careful processing.
After his mind-opening examination, stunned by the new vistas opened to him through the melange surge, D’murr Pilru had been brought here without a chance to say his goodbyes to his twin brother or his parents. At first he had been upset, but the requirements of Guild training rapidly filled him with so many wonders that he’d disregarded everything else. He found he could now focus his thoughts much better . . . and forget much more easily.
The buildings of Junction—huge bulging shapes with rounded and angular extrusions—were of standard Guild design, much like the Embassy on Ix: practical in the