Dune

There will be decisions I must make that love would prevent. Decisions for the Sisterhood and not for myself. That is where my fear is pointing.

Immediate necessities restored her. She sent her councillors away, promising pain and death if they failed to learn this new restraint.

Next, Reverend Mothers must be taught a new diplomacy: getting along with no one—not even with each other. It would grow easier in time. Honored Matres slipping into Bene Gesserit ways. One day, there would be no Honored Matres; only Reverend Mothers with improved reflexes and augmented knowledge of sexuality.

Murbella felt haunted by words she had heard but not accepted until this moment. “The things we will do for Bene Gesserit survival have no limits.”

Duncan will see this. I cannot keep it from him. The Mentat will not hold to a fixed idea of what I was before the Agony. He opens his mind as I open a door. He will examine his net. “What have I caught this time?”

Was this what happened to Lady Jessica? Other Memory carried Jessica threaded into the warp and woof of Sharings. Murbella unraveled a bit and paraded elder knowledge.

Heretic Lady Jessica? Malfeasance in office?

Jessica had plunged into love as Odrade had plunged into the sea and the resultant waves had all but engulfed the Sisterhood.

Murbella sensed this taking her where she did not want to go. Pain clutched her chest.

Duncan! Ohhhh, Duncan! She dropped her face into her hands. Dar, help me. What am I to do?

Never ask why you’re a Reverend Mother.

I must! The progression is clear in my memory and . . .

That’s a sequence. Thinking of it as cause and effect beguiles you away from totality.

Tao?

Simpler: You are here.

But Other Memory goes back and back and . . .

Imagine it’s pyramids—interlocked.

Those are just words!

Is your body still functioning?

I hurt, Dar. You don’t have a body anymore and it’s useless to . . .

We occupy different niches. The pains I felt are not your pains. My joys are not yours.

I don’t want your sympathy! Ohh, Dar! Why was I born?

Were you born to lose Duncan?

Dar, please!

So you were born and now you know that’s never enough. So you became an Honored Matre. What else could you do? Still not enough? Now you’re a Reverend Mother. You think that’s enough? It’s never enough as long as you’re alive.

You’re telling me I must always reach beyond myself.

Pah! You don’t make decisions on that basis. Didn’t you hear him? Don’t think; do it! Will you choose the easy way? Why should you feel sad because you’ve encountered the inevitable? If that’s all you can see, confine yourself to improving the breed!

Damn you! Why did you do this to me?

Do what?

Make me see myself and my former Sisters this way!

What way?

Damn you! You know what I mean!

Former Sisters, you say?

Oh, you are insidious.

All Reverend Mothers are insidious.

You never stop teaching!

Is that what I do?

How innocent I was! Asking you what you really do.