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"Thank you for bringing my food," Odrade said.
Sheeana swallowed and a wide grin came over her features. "It's delicious."
Bellonda returned to eating. "It's all right." But she had heard the unspoken comment.
Tamalane ate steadily, shifting attention from Sheeana to Bellonda and then to Odrade. Tam appeared to agree with a proposed softening of emotional strictures. At least, she voiced no objections and older Sisters were most likely to object.
The love the Bene Gesserit tried to deny was everywhere, Odrade thought. In small things and big. How many ways there were to prepare delectable, life-sustaining foods, recipes that really were embodiments of loves old and new. This bouillabaisse so smoothly restorative on her tongue; its origins were planted deeply in love: the wife at home using that part of the day's catch her husband could not sell.
The very essence of the Bene Gesserit was concealed in loves. Why else minister to those unspoken needs humanity always carried? Why else work for the perfectibility of humankind?
Bowl empty, Bellonda put down her spoon and wiped up the dregs with the last of her bread. She swallowed, looking pensive. "Love weakens us," she said. No force in her voice.
An acolyte could have said it no differently. Right out of the Coda. Odrade concealed amusement and countered with another Coda stepping-stone. "Beware jargon. It usually hides ignorance and carries little knowledge."
Respectful wariness entered Bellonda's eyes.
Sheeana pushed herself back from the table and wiped her mouth with her napkin. Tamalane did the same. Her chairdog adjusted as she leaned back, eyes bright and amused.
Tam knows! The wily old witch is still wise in my ways. But Sheeana... what game is Sheeana playing? I would almost say she hopes to distract me, to keep my attention away from her. She is very good at it, learned it at my knee. Well... two can play that game. I press Bellonda, but watch my little Dune waif.
"What price respectability, Bell?" Odrade asked.
Bellonda accepted this thrust in silence. Hidden in Bene Gesserit jargon was a definition of respectability and they all knew it.
"Should we honor the memory of the Lady Jessica for her humanity?" Odrade asked. Sheeana is surprised!
"Jessica put the Sisterhood in jeopardy!" Bellonda accuses.
"To thine own Sisters be true," Tamalane murmured.
"Our antique definition of respectability helps keep us human," Odrade said. Hear me well, Sheeana.
Her voice little more than a whisper, Sheeana said, "If we lose that we lose it all."
Odrade suppressed a sigh. So that's it!
Sheeana met her gaze. "You are instructing us, of course."
"Twilight thoughts," Bellonda muttered. "Best we avoid them."
"Taraza called us 'Latter-day Bene Gesserit,' " Sheeana said.
Odrade's mood went self-accusatory.
The bane of our present existence. Sinister imaginings can destroy us.
How easy it was to conjure a future that looked at them from glazing orange eyes of berserk Honored Matres. Fears out of many pasts crouched within Odrade, breathless moments focused on fangs that went with such eyes.
Odrade forced her attention back to the immediate problem. "Who will accompany me to Junction?"
They knew Dortujla's harrowing experience and word of it had spread throughout Chapterhouse.
"Whoever goes with Mother Superior could well be fed to Futars. "
"Tam," Odrade said. "You and Dortujla." And that may be a death sentence. The next step is obvious. "Sheeana," Odrade said, "you will Share with Tam. Dortujla and I will Share with Bell. And I also will share with you before I go."
Bellonda was aghast. "Mother Superior! I am not suited to take your place."
Odrade held her attention on Sheeana. "That is not being suggested. I will merely make you the repository of my lives." Definite fear on Sheeana's face but she dared not refuse a direct order. Odrade nodded to Tamalane. "I will Share later. You and Sheeana will do it now."
Tamalane leaned toward Sheeana. The strictures of great age and imminent death made this a welcome thing for her but Sheeana involuntarily pulled away.
"Now!" Odrade said. Let Tam judge whatever it is you hide.
There was no escape. Sheeana bent her head to Tamalane's until they touched. The flash of the exchange was electric and the entire dining room felt it. Conversation stopped, every gaze turned toward the table by the window.
There were tears in Sheeana's eyes when she withdrew.
Tamalane smiled and made a gentle caressing motion with both hands along Sheeana's cheeks. "It's all right, dear. We all have these fears and sometimes do foolish things because of them. But I am pleased to call you Sister."
Tell us, Tam! Now!
Tamalane did not choose to do that. She faced Odrade and said, "We must cling to our humanity at any cost. Your lesson is well received and you have taught Sheeana well." "When Sheeana Shares with you, Dar," Bellonda began, "could you not reduce the influence she has on Idaho?"
"I will not weaken a possible Mother Superior," Odrade said. "Thank you, Tam. I think we will make our venture to Junction without excess baggage. Now! I want a report by tonight on Teg's progress. His leech has been too long away from him."
"Will he learn that he has two leeches now?" Sheeana asked. Such joy in her!
Odrade stood.
If Tam accepts her then I must. Tam would never betray our Sisterhood. And Sheeana--of us all, Sheeana most reveals the natural traits from our human roots. Still... I wish she had never created that statue she calls "The Void. "
Religion must be accepted as a source of energy. It can be directed for our purposes, but only within limits that experience reveals. Here is the secret meaning of Free Will.
--Missionaria Protectiva, Primary Teaching
A thick cloud cover had moved over Central this morning and Odrade's workroom took on a gray silence to which she felt herself responding with inner stillness, as though she dared not move because that disturbed dangerous forces.
Murbella's day of Agony, she thought. I must not think of omens.
Weather had issued a peremptory warning about clouds. They were an accidental displacement. Corrective measures were being taken but would require time. Meanwhile, expect high winds, and there could be precipitation.
Sheeana and Tamalane stood at the window looking at this poorly controlled weather. Their shoulders touched.
Odrade watched them from her chair behind the table. Those two had become like a single person since yesterday's Sharing, not an unexpected occurrence. Precedents were known, although not many of them. Exchanges, occurring in the presence of poisonous spicy essence or at an actual moment of death, did not often allow further living contact between participants. It was interesting to observe. The two backs were oddly alike in their rigidity.
The force of extremis that made Sharing possible dictated powerful changes in personality and Odrade knew this with an intimacy that compelled tolerance. Whatever it was Sheeana concealed, Tam also concealed. Something tied to Sheeana's basic humanity. And Tam could be trusted. Until another Sister Shared with one of them, Tam's judgment must be accepted. Not that watchdogs would cease probing and observing minutiae but they needed no new crisis just now.
"This is Murbella's day," Odrade said.
"The odds are long she won't survive," Bellonda said, hunched forward in her chairdog. "What happens to our precious plan then?"
Our plan!
"Extremis," Odrade said.
In that context, it was a word with several meanings. Bellonda interpreted it as a possibility of acquiring Murbella's persona-memories at the moment of her death. "Then we must not permit Idaho to observe!"
"My order stands," Odrade said. "It's Murbella's wish and I have given my word."
"Mistake ... mistake ..." Bellonda muttered.
Odrade knew the source of Bellonda's doubts. Visible to all of them: Somewhere in Murbella lay something extremely painful
