Dune_ House Atreides - Brian Herbert [181]
Colorful banners hung in the humid air, along with Atreides hawk pennants over the royal box. In this case, however, the leader of House Atreides was not in his prime seat; he was out in the arena, as performer rather than spectator.
All around them, the Plaza de Toros was filled with the humming, chattering sounds of thousands of spectators. People waved and cheered. A local band played balisets, bone flutes, and brassy wind instruments—energetic music that heightened the mood of excitement.
Leto looked around the guarded stands, listening to the music and the happy noises of the crowd. He wondered what could be taking his mother so long. Soon, people would notice her absence.
Finally, with a flurry of female attendants, the Lady Helena arrived, moving through the throng. She walked smoothly, head held high, though her face carried shadows. The ladies-in-waiting left her at the doorway to the ducal box and returned to their assigned seats in the lower level.
Without speaking a word to her son or even looking at his guests, Helena settled herself in the tall carved chair beside the empty post where the Duke sat on those occasions when he watched the matadors. She had gone to the chapel an hour beforehand to commune with her God. Traditionally, the matador was supposed to spend time in religious contemplation before his fight, but Duke Paulus was more concerned with testing his equipment and exercising.
“I had to pray for your father to be saved from his stupidity,” she murmured, looking at Leto. “I had to pray for all of us. Someone has to.”
Smiling tentatively at his mother, Leto said, “I’m sure he appreciates it.”
She shook her head, sighed, and looked down into the arena as a loud fanfare of trumpets played, sounds that blasted and overlapped in resonating echoes from speakers encircling the Plaza de Toros.
Stableboys jogged around the ring in unaccustomed finery, waving bright flags and pennants as they rushed across the packed sand. Moments later, in a grand entrance that he performed so exquisitely, Duke Paulus Atreides rode out, sitting high on a groomed white stallion. Green plumes rose from the animal’s headdress, while ribbons trailed from the horse’s mane to flow back around the rider’s arms and hands.
Today, the Duke wore a dashing black-and-magenta costume with sequins, a brilliant emerald sash, and a matador’s traditional hat, marked with tiny Atreides crests to indicate the number of bulls he had killed. Ballooning sleeves and pantaloons concealed the apparatus of his protective body-shield. A brilliant purple cape draped over his shoulders.
Leto scanned the figures below, trying to pick out the face of the stableboy Duncan Idaho, who had so boldly positioned himself working for the Duke. He should have been part of the paseo, but Leto didn’t see him.
The white stallion snorted and cantered around in a circle as Paulus raised his gloved hand to greet his subjects. Then he stopped in front of the ducal box and bowed deeply to his wife, who sat rigid in her chair. As expected, she waved a blood-red flower and blew him a kiss. The people shouted and cheered as they imagined fairy tales of romance between their Duke and his Lady.
Rhombur hunched forward on his plush but uncomfortable seat, smiling at Leto. “I’ve never seen anything like this. I, uh, can’t wait.”
Inside the stables, behind force-field bars, the chosen Salusan bull issued a muffled bellow and charged against the wall. Wood splintered. The reinforced iron supports screeched.
Duncan scrambled backward, terrified. The creature’s multifaceted eyes burned a coppery red, as if embers inside the orbs had glowed to life. The bull seemed angry and evil, a child’s nightmare come true.
For the paseo, the boy wore special white-and-green merhsilks the Duke had given all the stableboys for the day’s performance. Duncan had never before worn or even touched such fancy clothes, and it made him uncomfortable to bring them into the dirty stables. But he had a greater