Navigators of Dune

“I know.” Harmona nodded sadly. “House Bach can provide the funding you need, and I’ll make the arrangements to send you to Corrin.” She sighed. “I just hope and pray you will come back to me.”

* * *

BEFORE LEAVING SALUSA, Vor had liquidated another secret account to purchase a small spaceworthy ship, an antique from the Jihad era. He felt right at home in the vessel, and it reminded him of his beloved old craft, the Dream Voyager, enough that he mentally christened this one the New Voyager. The name was strictly for his own amusement, not marked on the hull or anywhere else; he kept the ship inconspicuous and managed to fly away with it unregistered, thanks to a large bribe. It was money well spent.

Despite its age, the craft was well maintained, and he was familiar with its inner workings. The New Voyager did not have Holtzman engines, but used a familiar workhorse FTL drive. If he’d been in a particular hurry, he could have bought passage aboard a larger EsconTran foldspace carrier. But the delay served his purposes. He had told his operatives to wait for two weeks before spreading the rumor in the Imperial Court that he’d gone to Corrin. By that time he would have arrived, and his preparations would be complete.

Pain echoed in his heart as he arrived at Corrin again. In his long lifetime he had lived so many years on so many worlds, experiencing loves and families and losses, but Corrin—the heart of the former Synchronized Empire—was where he had spent much of his youth, as a human with special privileges granted by his thinking-machine masters. Much later, Vorian Atreides had led the human forces back to destroy the place. Corrin was also where Abulurd Harkonnen had betrayed the Army of Humanity during the crucial moments at the Bridge of Hrethgir. That disgrace, that cowardice, had been the spark of the Atreides-Harkonnen feud.

Yes, it was fitting for him to be here now … and to lure the Harkonnens here.

After inoculating himself against residual radiation from the old atomic attack, he landed the New Voyager in a cleared area not far from the largest settlement. He donned protective filmgoggles against the harsh light of the red sun, and emerged into what had once been the glorious machine capital. He carried a satchel filled with clothing and small weapons that he might need to use in a pinch. If Valya or Tula came after him here, he needed to be ready.

Omnius’s prime city had been flattened in the nuclear blasts, but many twisted towers of exotic materials remained as silent sentinels over a dead empire. Strange, stunted flora struggled to grow on the destroyed landscape, achieving no more than feeble footholds. It would be centuries before this planet would thrive again, if ever. His skin tingled as he remembered his youth in this place, before he went away and fought in the Jihad, before the holocaust here. This stark, haunted landscape still had an aftertaste of humanity’s suffering.…

It was an unsettling homecoming. Everything he remembered here had been blasted into rubble more than eight decades ago—destroyed by his ships in the Army of Humanity. Even so, he had a strange, powerful feeling of belonging under the red giant sun. It would be fitting for the blood feud to end here.

If he could end it.

As Vor explored, heading toward the large settlement he had noticed in the ruins, he perspired under the harsh sunlight, but gradually grew acclimatized.

Scavengers now lived in the rubble in a makeshift settlement, and he introduced himself to a hard-bitten woman called Korla, the self-anointed Queen of Trash, the planetary leader. She had a dirty face, a tangle of black hair, and a stained, patched-together radiation suit that looked more suitable for a burn pile than for daily use. An unusual, silvery flowmetal cape curled around her shoulders, as if the garment were alive.

Several thousand ragged, worn-looking refugees scraped out a living on Corrin. The wreckage of the once-great machine cities contained riches and oddities for those who were willing to risk the effort to find them. Many were working the piles now, using tools to drill and dig.

Vor gave his real name, because he wanted to be sure the Harkonnens could follow the clues. It was clear, though, that neither Korla nor any of the other scavengers believed he was truly the legendary hero of the Jihad. The Corrin scavengers didn’t much care about a newcomer living there, though, so long as he posed no threat.

The real threat would be coming directly after him.

The husky-voiced leader led Vor up a rough, sloping pile of black slag. From the top of the mound, they saw scavengers mining scraps of flowmetal, using cutting tools and pulsing electronic devices. A pasty flow of the strange metallic substance oozed out of a cut the crew had made; Vor remembered the flowmetal used by the most sophisticated thinking machines long ago, but he had never seen these wild, unruly remnants.