Dune_ House Atreides - Brian Herbert [199]
One evening a single sandrider came trudging in carrying his gear, looking for Umma Kynes. Breathless, the newly arrived traveler lowered his eyes, as if he didn’t want to meet the Planetologist’s gaze.
“At your command, our numbering has been completed,” he announced. “We have received word from all the sietches, and we now know how many Fremen there are.”
“Good,” Kynes said, smiling. “I need an approximate number so I can plan for our work.” Then he waited expectantly.
The young man looked up and stared at him directly with blue-in-blue eyes. “The sietches are counted in excess of five hundred.”
Kynes drew a quick breath. Far more than he had suspected!
“And the number of actual Fremen on Dune is approximately ten million. Would you like me to compile the exact numbers, Umma Kynes?”
Kynes staggered backward with a gasp. Incredible! The Imperial estimates and the Harkonnen reports had implied mere hundreds of thousands, a million at the very most.
“Ten million!” He hugged the astonished young Fremen messenger. So many willing workers. With such an army of laborers, we can indeed remake an entire planet!
The messenger beamed and stepped back, bowing at the honor the Planetologist had shown him.
“And there is more news, Umma Kynes,” the man said. “I’ve been instructed to tell you that your wife Frieth has given birth to a strong young son who is sure to be the pride of his sietch one day.”
Kynes gasped and didn’t know what to say. He was a father! He looked at Ommun and Stilgar and the members of his exploration team. The Fremen raised their hands and shouted congratulations to him. He had not let it penetrate through his consciousness until now, but he felt a flood of pride washing over his surprise.
Considering his personal blessing, Kynes looked at the palm trees, at the growing grasses and flowers, and then up at the narrow slice of blue sky framed by canyon walls. Frieth had given birth to a son!
“And now the Fremen number ten million and one,” he said.
Hatred is as dangerous an emotion as love. The capacity for either one is the capacity for its opposite.
—Cautionary Instructions for the Sisterhood,
Bene Gesserit Archives, Wallach IX
The two dim suns of the Kuentsing binary system shone through the murky skies of Bela Tegeuse. The blood-red nearer sun imparted a purplish cast to the afternoon sky, while the icy-white primary—too distant to add much heat or light—hovered like an illuminated hole in the twilit heavens. A scrubby-surfaced and unappealing planet, it was not on any of the main Guild transspace routes, and Heighliners didn’t often stop here.
In this dismal place, the Lady supervised her aboveground gardens and tried to remind herself that this was her temporary home. Even after the better part of a year, she felt herself a stranger here.
She stared into the cold gloom and across the agricultural fields at her hired local workers. Under a false name, she had used some of her remaining hoarded assets to buy a small estate, hoping to live here . . . and just survive until she could be reunited with the others. Since her desperate flight, she had not seen or heard from them, nor had she let her guard down for an instant. Elrood still lived, and the hunters were still out there.
Flat glowdisks spread full-spectrum light over the fields, pampering the rows of exotic vegetables and fruits that would be sold at a premium to wealthy functionaries.
Beyond the edges of the fields, the native vegetation of Bela Tegeuse was bristly and hardy, not welcoming at all. Kuentsing’s natural sunlight wasn’t bright enough to foster sufficient photosynthesis for the delicate plants in the Lady’s crops.
She felt the brisk cold against her face. Her sensitive skin, once caressed by an Emperor, was