Sandworms of Dune - Brian Herbert [63]
Waff buried his arms up to his shoulders in the organs, feeling around, identifying specific structures by their shapes and textures. Guild assistants used wide scoops to shovel offal onto the dock. Witches and Phibians watched in fascination, but Waff paid little attention to them.
Ignoring the obviously confused and impotent Sisters, he laser-cut deeper into the worm, sliced along its length and rummaged through the stinking debris, until finally a large bluish-purple lump of soft liverlike material spilled out. Waff stepped back for a breath, then leaned closer, poking and prodding with his fingers. He made a cut with the lasknife at its lowest setting.
A rich oily-cinnamon odor boiled out, so thick it could be seen as fumes. Waff reeled dizzily. The intensity of the melange nearly bowled him over. “Spice! The creature is saturated with melange! Extremely concentrated spice.”
The Sisters looked at each other and came closer with curious expressions. “Spice? The seaworms produce spice?” The Guildsmen stood close to Waff and his dripping prize, blocking the Bene Gesserits.
“The seaworms destroyed our soostone beds!” another woman shouted.
Waff stared them down. “These creatures may have destroyed one economy on Buzzell, but they created an even more important one.” His assistants picked up the large, melange-saturated organ and carried it back to the nearest hornet ship. Waff would have to test the substance thoroughly, but he already felt confident in what he would find.
Up in the orbiting Heighliner, Edrik the Navigator would be pleased.
Dripping with slime and seawater, Waff hurried back to the ship.
Some see spice as a blessing, others as a curse. To everyone, however, it is a necessity.
—PLANETOLOGIST PARDOT KYNES,
Original Arrakis Notebooks
After her long and exhausting journey across the Old Empire, from the planets preparing for battle, to the Guild shipyards, to the soostone operations on Buzzell, Mother Commander Murbella returned to Chapterhouse with renewed determination. Since she had been gone for many months, her quarters in the Keep now looked like a stranger’s rooms. Harried acolytes and male workers scurried to unload her belongings from her ship.
After a polite knock on the door, an acolyte stepped in. The young woman had short brown hair and a furtive smile. “Mother Commander, Archives sent these updated charts. They were supposed to be waiting for you upon your arrival.” She held out thin maps with finely detailed lines, then drew back, startled, when she noticed the hulking combat robot, deactivated but still standing in the corner of the room like a war trophy.
“Thank you. Don’t mind the machine—it is as dead as they will all soon be.” Murbella took the reports from the girl’s hands. With a second glance, she realized the young woman was her own daughter Gianne, her last child with Duncan Idaho. Another daughter, Tanidia, also raised by the New Sisterhood, had been shipped off to work among the Missionaria.
Do Gianne or Tanidia even know who their parents are? Years ago she had made the choice to tell Janess of her parentage, and the young woman had thrown herself into the study and understanding of her famous father. But Murbella had let her other two daughters be raised among the Bene Gesserit in the more traditional way. She doubted they knew how special they were.
Gianne seemed hesitant, as if hoping the Mother Commander would ask her for something else. Though she knew the answer, on impulse Murbella asked, “How old are you, Gianne?”
The girl seemed startled that she knew her name. “Why, twenty-three, Mother Commander.”
“And you have not yet undergone the Agony.” It was not a question. Occasionally,