Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [120]
Duncan knew she was right. In his original lifetime, when he’d escaped from the Harkonnens and gone to Caladan, Thufir Hawat had already been a weathered battle veteran. Duncan remembered his first real conversation with Hawat. He’d been a stable boy at Castle Caladan, working with the Salusan bulls that Old Duke Paulus loved to fight in grand spectacles. Someone had drugged the bulls into a frenzy, and young Duncan had tried to raise the alarm, but no one believed him. After Paulus was gored to death, Hawat himself had led the investigation, hauling young Duncan before a board of inquiry, since evidence indicated that he was a Harkonnen spy . . . .
And now this Thufir was a Face Dancer! Duncan still had trouble wrapping his mind around the undeniable reality.
“Then all of the ghola babies could be Face Dancers,” Duncan said. “I suggest you summon Scytale. He’s now our prime suspect.”
“Or,” Teg said in a brittle voice, “he may be our best resource. As Garimi already stated, who would know the Face Dancers better?”
When the Tleilaxu Master was brought into the copper-walled chamber, Duncan and Teg took seats at the other side of the table, part of the growing inquisition to root out the Face Dancer infiltration. Scytale appeared frightened and unsettled. The Tleilaxu ghola was fifteen years old, but he did not look like a boy. His elfin features, sharp teeth, and gray skin made him seem alien and suspicious, but Duncan realized that was only a knee-jerk response based on primitive superstitions and previous experiences.
After Scytale sat down, Elyen leaned forward. She looked the sternest of them all. “What have you done, Tleilaxu? What is your plan? How have you tried to betray us?” She used an edge of Voice, enough to make Scytale jerk.
“I did nothing.”
“You and your genetic predecessor knew what you were growing in the axlotl tanks. We tested the cells before allowing you to create them, but you deceived us somehow with Thufir Hawat.” They showed him images of the dead Face Dancer. Duncan could see that the Tleilaxu’s surprise was genuine.
“Are all of the ghola children similarly tainted?” Sheeana demanded.
“None of them are,” Scytale insisted. “Unless they were replaced sometime after being decanted from the tanks.”
Elyen narrowed her gaze. “He’s telling the truth. I see none of the indicators.” Sheeana and Garimi silently consulted each other and nodded simultaneously. Then Sheeana said, “Unless he is himself a Face Dancer.”
“Scytale isn’t likely to be a Face Dancer substitute simply because so few of us trust him anyway,” Duncan pointed out. “A Face Dancer would choose to be someone who could more easily move among us.”
“Someone like Thufir Hawat,” Teg said.
Young Scytale looked greatly disturbed. “Those new Face Dancers were brought back from the Scattering. The Lost Tleilaxu claimed to have modified them in ways we didn’t understand. Much to my dismay, I have now learned that even I can’t detect one of them. Believe me, I never suspected Hawat.”
“Then how did a Face Dancer get aboard, if not grown from the Face Dancer cells in your nullentropy capsule?” Sheeana asked.
“The Face Dancer could already have been posing as one of us when we left Chapterhouse,” Duncan mused. “How carefully did you check all of the original hundred and fifty who rushed aboard during the escape?”
Teg shook his head. “But why wait more than two decades to strike? It makes no sense.”
“A sleeper agent, perhaps,” Sheeana suggested. “Or, could the Face Dancer have been someone else for a long time, and only recently replaced Thufir?”
“Yes, look for a scapegoat to persecute,” Scytale said bitterly, slumping in the overlarge interrogation chair. “Preferably a Tleilaxu.”
Sheeana had fire in her eyes. “As a precaution, we have sealed all of the ghola children in separate rooms, where they can cause no damage if another of them is a Face Dancer. I’ve already directed our Suk doctors to take blood samples. They won’t escape.”
Duncan