Hunters of Dune - Brian Herbert [6]
And the no-ship had found itself somewhere else entirely. But he had remained vigilant, not allowing himself to breathe a sigh of relief. In this incomprehensible universe, what might be next?
Now he studied external images transmitted from sensors extended beyond the no-field. The view outside had not changed: twisted veils of nebula gas, inside-out streamers that would never condense into stars. Was this a young universe, not yet finished coalescing, or a universe so unspeakably ancient that all suns had burned out and been reduced to molecular ash?
The group of misfit refugees desperately wanted to get back to normal . . . or at the very least to somewhere else. Over such a long time, their fear and anxiety had faded first to confusion, then to restlessness and malaise. They wanted more than simply being lost and unharmed. Either they looked to Duncan Idaho with hope, or they blamed him for their plight.
The ship contained a hodgepodge of humanity’s factions (or did Sheeana and her Bene Gesserit Sisters view them all as mere “specimens?”). The assortment included a sprinkling of orthodox Bene Gesserits—acolytes, proctors, Reverend Mothers, even male workers—along with Duncan himself and the young Miles Teg ghola. Also aboard were a Rabbi and his group of Jews who had been rescued from an attempted Honored Matre pogrom on Gammu; one surviving Tleilaxu Master; and four animalistic Futars—monstrous human-feline hybrids created out in the Scattering and enslaved by the whores. In addition, the great hold was home to seven small sandworms.
Truly, we are a strange mixture. A ship of fools.
A year after escaping from Chapterhouse and becoming mired in this distorted and incomprehensible universe, Sheeana and her Bene Gesserit followers had joined Duncan in a christening ceremony. In light of the no-ship’s endless wanderings, the name Ithaca seemed appropriate.
Ithaca, a small island in ancient Greece, had been the home of Odysseus, who had spent ten years wandering after the end of the Trojan War, trying to find his way back home. Similarly, Duncan and his companions needed a place to call home, a safe haven. These people were on their own great odyssey, and without so much as a map or a star chart, Duncan was as lost as age-old Odysseus.
No one realized how much Duncan longed to go back to Chapterhouse. Heartstrings linked him to Murbella, his love, his slave, and his master. Breaking free of her had been the single most difficult and painful endeavor he could remember in his multiple lifetimes. He doubted he would ever entirely recover from her. Murbella . . .
Yet Duncan Idaho had always placed duty above personal feelings. Regardless of the heartache, he assumed responsibility for keeping the no-ship and its passengers safe, even in a skewed universe.
At odd times, stray combinations of odors reminded him of Murbella’s distinctive scent. Organic esters that drifted through the no-ship’s processed air would strike his olfactory receptors, triggering memories from their eleven years together. Murbella’s perspiration, her dark amber hair, the particular taste of her lips, and the seawater scent of their “sexual collisions.” Their passionate, codependent encounters had been both intimate and violent for years, with neither of them strong enough to break free.
I must not confuse mutual addiction with love. The pain was at least as sharp and unendurable as the debilitating agony of drug withdrawal. Hour by hour as the no-ship flew through the void, Duncan drew farther from her.
He leaned back and opened his unique senses, reaching out, always wary that someone might find the no-ship. The danger in letting himself do this passive sentry duty was that he occasionally descended into muddled woolgathering about Murbella. To get around the problem, Duncan compartmentalized his Mentat mind. If a portion of it drifted, another portion was always alert, always on the lookout for danger.
In their years together, he and Murbella