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.Sweat glistened on hisbody.His lovely body.No!Desperation drove her off onto the floor.She was on her knees there and then,mostly by will power, she stood.Energy was returning but her legs trembled asshe staggered around the foot of the sleeping pad.I will do it myself without thinking.I must do it.Her body swayed from side to side.She tried to steady herself and aimed a blowat his neck.She knew this blow from long hours of practice.It would crushthe larynx.The victim would die of asphyxiation.Duncan dodged the blow easily, but he was slow.slow.Murbella almost fell beside him but the hands of the Great Honored Matre savedher."Kill him," Murbella gasped."He's the one we were warned about.He's theone!"Murbella felt hands on her neck, the fingers pressing fiercely at the nervebundles beneath the ears.The last thing Murbella heard before unconsciousness was the Great Honored Matresaying: "We will kill no one.This ghola goes to Rakis."The worst potential competition for any organism can come from its own kind.The species consumes necessities.Growth is limited by that necessity which ispresent in the least amount.The least favorable condition controls the rate ofgrowth.(Law of the Minimum)-From "Lessons of Arrakis"The building stood back from a wide avenue behind a screen of trees andcarefully tended flowering hedges.The hedges had been staggered in a mazepattern with man-high white posts to define the planted areas.No vehicleentering or leaving could do so at any speed above a slow crawl.Teg's militaryawareness took all of this in as the armored groundcar carried him up to thedoor.Field Marshal Muzzafar, the only other occupant in the rear of the car,recognized Teg's assessment and said:"We're protected from above by a beam enfilading system." A soldier incamouflage uniform with a long lasgun on a sling over one shoulder opened thedoor and snapped to attention as Muzzafar emerged.Teg followed.He recognized this place.It was one of the "safe" addressesBene Gesserit Security had provided for him.Obviously, the Sisterhood'sinformation was out of date.Recently out of date, though, because Muzzafargave no indication that Teg might know this place.As they crossed to the door, Teg noted that another protective system he hadseen on his first tour of Ysai remained intact.It was a barely noticeabledifference in the posts along the trees-and-hedges barriers.Those posts werescanlyzers operated from a room somewhere in the building.Their diamond-shapedconnectors "read" the area between them and the building.At the gentle push ofa button in the watchers' room, the scanlyzers would make small chunks of meatout of any living flesh crossing their fields.At the door, Muzzafar paused and looked at Teg."The Honored Matre you areabout to meet is the most powerful of all who have come here.She does nottolerate anything but complete obedience.""I take it that you are warning me.""I thought you would understand.Call her Honored Matre.Nothing else.In wego.I've taken the liberty of having a new uniform made for you."The room where Muzzafar ushered him was one Teg had not seen on his previousvisit.Small and crammed with ticking black-paneled boxes, it left little roomfor the two of them.A single yellow glowglobe at the ceiling illuminated theplace.Muzzafar crowded himself into a corner while Teg got out of the grimedand wrinkled singlesuit he had worn since the no-globe."Sorry I can't offer you a bath as well," Muzzafar said."But we must notdelay.She gets impatient."A different personality came over Teg with the uniform.It was a familiar blackgarment, even to the starbursts at the collar.So he was to appear before thisHonored Matre as the Sisterhood's Bashar.Interesting.He was once morecompletely the Bashar, not that this powerful sense of identity had ever lefthim.The uniform completed it and announced it, though.In this garment therewas no need to emphasize in any other way precisely who he was."That's better," Muzzafar said as he led Teg out into the entry hallway andthrough a door Teg remembered.Yes, this was where he had met the "safe"contacts [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]