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"There can be deliberation and judgment even in anarchy," she said.
"You're a hypocrite, Bell!"
She drew back as though he had struck her, a purely involuntary movement that shocked her by the forced reaction. Voice? No ... something reaching deeper. She was suddenly terrified of this man.
"I find it marvelous that a Mentat and a Reverend Mother could be such a hypocrite," he said.
Teg tugged at Idaho's arm. "Are you fighting?"
Idaho brushed the hand away. "Yes, we're fighting."
Bellonda could not tear her gaze from Idaho's. She wanted to turn and flee. What was he doing? This had gone completely awry!
"Hypocrites and criminals among you?" he asked.
Once more, Bellonda remembered the comeyes. He was playing not only her but the watchers as well! And doing it with exquisite care. She was suddenly filled with admiration for his performance but this did not allay her fear.
"I ask why your Sisters tolerate you?" His lips moved with such delicate precision! "Are you a necessary evil? A source of valuable data and, occasionally, good advice?"
She found her voice. "How dare you?" Guttural and containing all of her vaunted viciousness.
"It could be that you strengthen your Sisters." Voice flat, not changing tone in the slightest. "Weak links create places others must reinforce and that would strengthen those others."
Bellonda realized she was barely keeping her hold on Mentat mode. Could any of this be true? Was it possible Mother Superior saw her that way?
"You came with criminal disobedience in mind," he said. "All in the name of necessity! A little drama for the comeyes, proving you had no other choice."
She found his words restoring Mentat abilities. Did he do that knowingly? She was fascinated by the need to study his manner as well as his words. Did he really read her that well? The record of this encounter might be far more valuable than her little playlet. And the outcome no different!
"You think Mother Superior's wishes are law?" she asked.
"Do you really think me unobservant?" Waving a hand at Teg, who started to interrupt. "Bell! Be only a Mentat."
"I hear you." And so do many others!
"I'm deep into your problem."
"We've given you no problem!"
"But you have. You have, Bell. You're misers the way you parcel out the pieces but I see it."
Bellonda abruptly remembered Odrade saying: "I don't need a Mentat! I need an inventor."
"You ... need ... me," Idaho said. "Your problem is still in its shell but the meat's there and must be extracted."
"Why would we possibly need you?"
"You need my imagination, my inventiveness, things that kept me alive in the face of Leto's wrath."
"You've said he killed you so many times you lost count." Eat your own words, Mentat!
He gave her an exquisitely controlled smile, so precise that neither she nor the comeyes could mistake its intent. "But how can you trust me, Bell?"
He condemns himself!
"Without something new you're doomed," he said. "Only a matter of time and you all know it. Perhaps not this generation. Perhaps not even the next one. But inevitably."
Teg pulled sharply at Idaho's sleeve. "The Bashar could help, couldn't he?"
So the boy really listened. Idaho patted Teg's arm. "The Bashar's not enough." Then to Bellonda: "Underdogs together. Must we growl over the same bone?"
"You've said that before." And doubtless will say it again.
"Still Mentat?" he asked. "Then discard drama! Get the romantic haze off our problem."
Dar's the romantic! Not me!
"What's romantic," he asked, "about little pockets of Scattered Bene Gesserit waiting to be slaughtered?"
"You think none will escape?"
"You're seeding the universe with enemies," he said. "You're feeding Honored Matres!"
She was fully (and only) Mentat then, required to match this ghola ability for ability. Drama? Romance? The body got in the way of Mentat performance. Mentats must use the body, not let it interfere.
"No Reverend Mother you've Scattered has ever returned or sent a message," he said. "You try to reassure yourselves by saying only the Scattered ones know where they go. How can you ignore the message they send in this other fact? Why has not one tried to communicate with Chapterhouse?"
He's chiding all of us, damn him! And he's right.
"Have I stated our problem in its most elemental form?"
Mentat questioning!
"Simplest question, simplest projection," she agreed.
"Amplified sexual ecstasy: Bene Gesserit imprint? Are Honored Matres trapping your people out there?"
"Murbella?" A one-word challenge. Assess this woman you say you love! Does she know things we should know?
"They're conditioned against raising their own enjoyment to addictive levels but they are vulnerable."
"She denies there are Bene Gesserit sources in Honored Matre history."
"As she was conditioned to do."
"A lust for power instead?"
"At last, you have asked a proper question." And when she did not reply, he said: "Mater Felicissima." Addressing her by the ancient term for Bene Gesserit Council members.
She knew why he did it and felt the word produce the wanted effect. She was firmly balanced now. Mentat Reverend Mother encompassed by the mohalata of her own Spice Agony--that union of benign Other Memory protecting her from domination by malignant ancestors.
How did he know to do that? Every observer behind the comeyes would be asking that question. Of course! The Tyrant trained him thus, time and time again. What do we have here? What is this talent Mother Superior dares employ? Dangerous, yes, but far more valuable than I suspected. By the gods of our own creation! Is he the tool to free us?
How calm he was. He knew he had caught her.
"In one of my lives, Bell, I visited your Bene Gesserit house on Wallach IX and there talked to one of your ancestors, Tersius Helen Anteac. Let her guide you, Bell. She knows."
Bellonda felt familiar prodding in her mind. How could he know Anteac was my ancestor?
"I went to Wallach IX at the Tyrant's command," he said. "Oh, yes! I often thought of him as Tyrant. My orders were to suppress the Mentat school you thought you had hidden there."
Anteac-simulflow intruded: "I show you now the event of which he speaks. "
"Consider," he said. "I, a Mentat, forced to suppress a school that trained people the way I was trained. I knew why he ordered it, of course, and so do you."
Simulflow poured it through her awareness: Order of Mentats, founded by Gilbertus Albans; temporary sanctuary with Bene Tleilax who hoped to incorporate them into Tleilaxu hegemony; spread into uncounted "seed schools"; suppressed by Leto II because they formed a nucleus of independent opposition; spread into the Scattering after the Famine.
"He kept a few of the finest teachers on Dune, but the question Anteac forces you to confront now does not go there. Where have your Sisters gone, Bell?"
"We have no way of knowing yet, do we?" She looked at his console with new awareness. It was wrong to block such a mind. If they were to use him, they must use him fully.
"By the way, Bell," as she stood to leave. "Honored Matres could be a relatively small group."
Small? Didn't he know how the Sisterhood was being overwhelmed by terrifying numbers on planet after planet?
"All numbers are relative. Is there something in the universe truly immovable? Our Old Empire could be a last retreat f
or them, Bell. A place to hide and try to regroup."
"You suggested that before ... to Dar."
Not Mother Superior. Not Odrade. Dar. He smiled. "And perhaps we could help with Scytale."
"We?"
"Murbella to gather information, I to assess it."
He did not like the smile this produced.
"Precisely what are you suggesting?"
"Let our imaginations roam and fashion our experiments accordingly. Of what use would even a no-planet be if someone could penetrate the shielding?"
She glanced at the boy. Idaho knew their suspicion that the Bashar had seen the no-ships? Naturally! A Mentat of his abilities ... bits and pieces assembled into a masterful projection.
