Children of Dune

Back on the planet Salusa Secundis, Farad’n meets with The Preacher, who has been brought to the planet to interpret his dreams. Farad’n is nearing 18 years old. While pressured to seek the throne, he is disinterested in politics and more interested in his family’s attempt to raise giant sandworms from smuggled sandtrout. House Corrino is eager to break Arrakis’s monopoly on spice; they have been conducting experiments to see if they can raise sandworms to survive on their planet. Their powerful Sardaukar armies are only matched by the Fremen’s prowess.

In a deal struck between The Preacher and Princess Wensicia, Farad’n tells The Preacher about his dream in exchange for the services of Duncan Idaho. Farad’n describes his visions of water rising, snakes turning into sandworms, and atoms in his head. The Preacher interprets the dream and refuses to tell Farad’n its meaning. Farad’n is at first incensed by The Preacher’s audacity but comes to respect the mysterious man’s advice. The Preacher tells Farad’n he has the potential to be a great man but is surrounded by those who only seek political power.

Leto’s burgeoning prescient visions give him knowledge of future attacks. He warns Jessica that Alia plans to abduct her and place the blame on House Corrino. He instructs her to allow the kidnapping to happen. Jessica is disbelieving at first, but Leto reminds her that behind his child’s body is a mind that is millions of years old. He explains that Princess Wensicia knows of the Bene Gesserit’s desire to mate the twins and plans to expose that information to discredit House Atreides. Jessica denies the accusation, but Leto reminds her that unless she follows their biding, the Bene Gesserit will threaten to expose her blood relation to Baron Harkonnen. Realizing that Leto is correct, Jessica relents.

Leto chastises Jessica for judging and abandoning her daughter and tells her to pity Alia. He vows to abstain from the spice, knowing that the full power of prescience is a curse that deprives life of surprises. Leto explains that the only way he and Ghanima can avoid Abomination is by allying with their ancestral voices and coexisting with the past. He makes an obscure reference to making a choice his father couldn’t and speaks about collapsing time and living thousands of years. Jessica is puzzled by his statements, and Leto reiterates that she must allow herself to be abducted and will find herself teaching an interesting student.

The Preacher returns to Arrakis from Salusa Secundis and mounts the steps of Alia’s temple to make four declarations. He warns Alia that she has compromised herself for the empty promise of power. To Stilgar, he cautions against his strict code of ethics that may lead him to exile. He advises Irulan to run, and he tells Duncan Idaho that his wife, Alia, has been unfaithful. Alia is shocked by The Preacher’s awareness of her secret dealings. She is convinced The Preacher is her brother Paul, which makes her hesitant against publicly arresting him and upsetting his followers. She plans to have him spied upon to discover his weaknesses and discredit him.

Leto meets with Stilgar at The Attendant, a rocky outcropping a distance from Sietch Tabr where Leto and Ghanima often convene in secret. Leto confesses that he does not know how to follow in his father’s place and has had three visions of the future. The first requires him to kill Jessica, the second to marry and procreate with Ghanima, and the third to dispel the myth of his father as a god. Leto reassures Stilgar that he will follow the third course, believing as his father did that the deification of Paul Atreides has only led to corruption, a galactic holy war, and the dangerous transformation of the planet’s ecosystem. Leto warns Stilgar not to trust Alia. He points out how the stillsuits are no longer made with quality, prompting Stilgar to think about his contradicting role in altering the planet and his deeply held beliefs in Fremen traditions. Leto tells him that good leadership does not mean repeating the past or upholding old laws, but in recognizing newness and change. Leto foretells his own death at The Attendant and points to a gap in the rocks where his blood will be found. He instructs Stilgar to flee from Sietch Tabr and protect Ghanima’s life when the time comes. He ends the meeting with a passing comment on how beautiful the young women look at this time of year.

Stilgar begins to question his steadfast beliefs in traditions and the insularity of upholding unchanging values of the past. He realizes that Alia and the Imperium have relied on a similar logic to maintain absolute authority by suppressing change and denying individual willpower. Stilgar interprets Leto’s comment on the beauty of Fremen youths as a sign that a new generation with new ideas may improve upon the old.

Alia asks Duncan to abduct Jessica and make it appear as an act by House Corrino. Duncan can no longer look her in the eyes and agrees to the kidnapping but has plans of his own. Duncan’s ghola reincarnation has been trained as a mentat, a type of human with the analytical capabilities of a computer. Suspicious that Alia would risk the life of her mother, something antithetical to the Atreides code of honor, he uses his mentat abilities of computation and deduces that Alia has been possessed. Testing Alia, he offers to have Jessica murdered instead. Alia makes an excuse that she fears for her own safety and believes Jessica will ally with House Corrino and report her to the Bene Gesserit. Duncan agrees to the abduction and tells Alia he will not let her know of their location. Alia mentions receiving and needing to examine a gift from Farad’n, a set of cloaks for the twins.

Stilgar quadruples the level of security around the twins at Sietch Tabr. Jessica is disturbed by an encounter she had with Leto earlier in the day, and Ghanima surmises that it was due to his ability to recall the most private memories between his mother and father. Ghanima tells Jessica that despite their youthful appearance, the twins are privy to all the sensual experiences of their ancestors, including the intimacies between Jessica and Duke Leto I. She tells her grandmother not to be disturbed by how different the twins are to other people and explains that Leto desired to know what his father was like through the eyes of others.

Alia is irate over the news that the Fremen have petitioned to have Lady Jessica reinstated into the Regency Council. Some of the other Houses have been stockpiling spice, and Duncan speculates that their rivals may attempt to raise sandworms off planet and break the Atreideses’ monopoly on spice. Alia is convinced she may be the target of an assassination, but Duncan knows that the twins are the ones in real danger. Using his mentat calculations, he concludes that the assassins will use animals to kill the twins and orders an embargo on any animal imports. Irulan confirms that the cloaks gifted by Farad’n were cleared as safe and have been given to the twins. Recognizing that Alia is possessed, Duncan is tempted to kill her, but refrains, wishing for her to die as a martyr rather than a demonized villain. He is also concerned that The Preacher has summoned him using a signal that only Paul Atreides knew. He wants to confide in Lady Jessica about his vivid visions of the twins’ murder but is unsure if he can trust her. He fears that she is indeed an agent of the Bene Gesserit’s plan to depose Alia and control the twins.

At the palace’s Great Hall, Alia invites Jessica to join her in the morning audience with Muad’Dib’s followers. Javid presses Jessica to make a public statement denouncing The Preacher’s heresies, but Jessica refuses and considers The Preacher’s challenges to authority as a “healthy sign” (224). She views the thick barriers and heavily guarded surroundings with distaste and believes Paul would be equally disappointed in what Arrakis has become. Alia emerges from the anteroom with an entourage of priestess guards to lead them into the Great Hall. Both mother and daughter exchange steely glances in a private acknowledgement of their rivalry. Jessica is determined to thwart Alia’s efforts to destroy her and reminds herself to follow up on a message she received from Duncan that warned her of danger.

Jessica and Alia sit upon parallel thrones to hear supplicants plea their cases. A troubadour seeking passage to work for Farad’n’s court performs an insulting song defiling the Atreides name; he calls Alia “Coan-Teen,” meaning “the female death-spirit who walks without feet” (232). Instead of punishing him, Jessica admires his boldness and rewards him with passage to Salusa Secundis. When an old Fremen Naib comes forward to speak about the desert, his claims alarm Alia’s priests, and they attempt to stop him. Jessica detects Alia’s hands forming the signal for “Now” and instinctively lurches to her side, knocking the throne down just in time to dodge shots from a maula pistol.

Jessica openly declares that Alia has attempted to take her life and calls her an Abomination. She permits the Naib to continue his entreaty, and he declares that the sandworms have disappeared from the desert. Alia interrupts him, proclaiming that such stories are superstition and that there is still enough desert remaining on the planet for spice production. Jessica declares that her loyalties lie with the Fremen and not the Bene Gesserits as rumors have assumed and accuses Alia of orchestrating a shortage in spice. Alia, no longer able to hide her possession by Baron Harkonnen, declares in his voice that she plans to control the entire market by driving up the price of the increasingly rare commodity. With the aid of several Fremen known as Fedaykin who had served in her son’s armies, Jessica escapes the Great Hall.