Dune by Frank Herbert Read Free Book Online Page A

and sink. They all wear those great flowing robes. And they stink to heaven in any closed space. It’s from those suits they wear—call them ‘stillsuits’—that reclaim the body’s own water.”
    Paul swallowed, suddenly aware of the moisture in his mouth, remembering a dream of thirst. That people could want so for water they had to recycle their body moisture struck him with a feeling of desolation. “Water’s precious there,” he said.
    Hawat nodded, thinking: Perhaps I’m doing it, getting across to him the importance of this planet as an enemy. It’s madness to go in there without that caution in our minds.
    Paul looked up at the skylight, aware that it had begun to rain. He saw the spreading wetness on the gray meta-glass. “Water,” he said.
    â€œYou’ll learn a great concern for water,” Hawat said. “As the Duke’s son you’ll never want for it, but you’ll see the pressures of thirst all around you.”
    Paul wet his lips with his tongue, thinking back to the day a week ago and the ordeal with the Reverend Mother. She, too, had said something about water starvation.
    â€œYou’ll learn about the funeral plains,” she’d said, “about the wilderness that is empty, the wasteland where nothing lives except the spice and the sandworms. You’ll stain your eyepits to reduce the sun glare. Shelter will mean a hollow out of the wind and hidden from view. You’ll ride upon your own two feet without ‘thopter or groundcar or mount.”
    And Paul had been caught more by her tone—singsong and wavering—than by her words.
    â€œWhen you live upon Arrakis,” she had said, “khala, the land is empty. The moons will be your friends, the sun your enemy.”
    Paul had sensed his mother come up beside him away from her post guarding the door. She had looked at the Reverend Mother and asked: “Do you see no hope, Your Reverence?”
    â€œNot for the father.” And the old woman had waved Jessica to silence, looked down at Paul. “Grave this on your memory, lad: A world is supported by four things. . . .” She held up four big-knuckled fingers. “. . . the learning of the wise, the justice of the great, the prayers of the righteous and the valor of the brave. But all of these are as nothing. . . .” She closed her fingers into a fist. “. . . without a ruler who knows the art of ruling. Make that the science of your tradition!”
    A week had passed since that day with the Reverend Mother. Her words were only now beginning to come into full register. Now, sitting in the training room with Thufir Hawat, Paul felt a sharp pang of fear. He looked across at the Mentat’s puzzled frown.
    â€œWhere were you woolgathering that time?” Hawat asked.
    â€œDid you meet the Reverend Mother?”
    â€œThat Truthsayer witch from the Imperium?” Hawat’s eyes quickened with interest. “I met her.”
    â€œShe. . . .” Paul hesitated, found that he couldn’t tell Hawat about the ordeal. The inhibitions went deep.
    â€œYes? What did she?”
    Paul took two deep breaths. “She said a thing.” He closed his eyes, calling up the words, and when he spoke his voice unconsciously took on some of the old woman’s tone: “ ‘You, Paul Atreides, descendant of kings, son of a Duke, you must learn to rule. It’s something none of your ancestors learned.’ ” Paul opened his eyes, said: “That made me angry and I said my father rules an entire planet. And she said, ‘He’s losing it.’ And I said my father was getting a richer planet. And she said. ‘He’ll lose that one, too.’ And I wanted to run and warn my father, but she said he’d already been warned—by you, by Mother, by many people.”
    â€œTrue enough,” Hawat muttered.
    â€œThen why’re we going?” Paul