Hunters of Dune - Brian Herbert [186]
“At one time, I might have tried to reeducate you. Now I see that the effort would be wasted.”
Hellica wanted this conflict. Apparently, she had no illusions about surviving, knowing about the bloody battles occurring all across Bandalong. Her intent must have been to maximize casualties, nothing more. More explosions rang throughout the city.
Staring hard at the beautiful woman, Murbella imagined Hellica dead, slumped at the base of the dais holding her throne. The vision was so clear it seemed like a gift of prescience. A classic Swordmaster technique.
At the edges of her vision, Murbella noticed flickering shadows, bodies moving stealthily around the throne room. Dozens of Honored Matre guards closed in, a surprise ambush. But it would never be enough. Her own Valkyries had been waiting for this trap, the desperate last stand. More than prepared to fight, they turned their superior numbers against them and plunged into the fray. Overhead, Bashar Aztin’s clustered attack ships roared across the sky, making the whole Palace shake.
Murbella bounded up the steps to the dais as Hellica vaulted over one of the armrests. The two grappled like asteroids colliding, but Murbella used her balance to throw her weight with a Swordmaster reorienting technique, and drove Hellica to the floor.
Rolling on the stone tiles in a flurry of deadly blows and blocks, Murbella and the pretender queen tore at each other. The Mother Commander clawed a long gouge down Hellica’s cheek, then the other woman smashed her forehead into Murbella’s, stunning her just long enough to tear herself free.
Springing to their feet, the opponents faced off, and the Matre Superior demonstrated unorthodox fighting techniques, subtly advanced from anything Murbella remembered in her own Honored Matre training. So, Hellica had learned, or changed.
In response, Murbella altered her timing, sought the opportunity to strike, but the other woman moved with an unexpected flash, more swiftly than Murbella could dodge. A hard, stinging blow bruised her left thigh, but the Mother Commander did not go down. She blocked her nerve receptors, numbed the pain in her leg, and then threw herself back into the fight.
An Honored Matre fought with violent impulsiveness, sheer strength and speed; Murbella possessed those traits herself, combined with the finesse of the long-forgotten Swordmaster art as well as the best Bene Gesserit skills. Once Murbella reset her mind and her approach, the Matre Superior had no chance.
Envisioning an unexpected response of her own, Murbella planned a sequence of moves and countermoves a few seconds into the future. The nonpattern in Hellica’s fighting style was really a pattern when viewed from a larger perspective. Murbella didn’t need a sword—needed no weapon at all, in fact—just herself.
Despite the Matre Superior’s flurry of movement, the parries, punches, and kicks, Murbella saw a straight line of vulnerability—and acted. The instant she envisioned it, her path of attack became no more than an afterthought. The action was over, and successful, as soon as she undertook it.
With the force of a pile driver, her right foot found its way under Hellica’s rib cage and smashed straight into the heart. Hellica’s eyes opened wide, and she mouthed a curse without getting the words out. She spilled onto the floor at the base of the dais, exactly as Murbella had foreseen her, moments before.
Panting, the Mother Commander turned away and assessed the handful of still-living Honored Matre guards locked in combat with the Valkyries. Many discarded bodies in bright leotards already lay strewn across the tiles, along with far fewer Sisters. “Hold! I am your Matre Superior now!”
“We do not follow witches,” one woman snapped indignantly, smearing blood from her mouth and ready to keep fighting. “We are not fools.”
With her peripheral vision, Murbella noticed the dead Matre Superior beginning to change. The Mother Commander turned back to her victim and caught the impossible shifting.