Road to Dune Read Free Page B

you? Or to the Grand Emperor?” Esmar Tuek sat beside him in the lead vehicle as the motorcade moved with stately haste toward the landed ship. “How often does Emperor Wuda take notice of our little Catalan?” Since they were in private, Jesse allowed the old veteran to use familiar speech with him.
    The question was a fair one, and Jesse hoped it would be answered soon enough. Banners fluttering, the groundcars approached the gaudy Imperial ship. The vessel’s ramp was already extended, but no one had emerged, as if waiting for an official reception.
    Jesse stepped out of the lead car. In the breeze, his dark hair whipped about like loose strands of sea kelp. He straightened his formal jacket and waited while the honor guard scrambled into position.
    No doubt, the impromptu procession would only foster the impression of Catalan being a rude backwater world. On other worlds, noblemen drilled their soldiers in relentless parades and exhibitions. In stark contrast, though Jesse’s volunteers would fight fiercely to defend their homes, they had little interest in twirling batons or marching in lockstep.
    On the Imperial spacecraft’s ramp, Counselor Ulla Bauers stepped out. His nose twitched as he sniffed the oceanmist air, and his forehead wrinkled. The Grand Emperor’s representative—a prissy and ferretlike man with a demeanor of foppish incompetence—wore a voluminous high-collared robe and dandy ornamentation that made his head seem too small.
    Jesse knew not to underestimate this man, however. The Counselor’s overemphasis on fashion and trappings might be a mere disguise; Bauers was rumored to be a swift and highly effective assassin. The fact that he had come here did not bode well.
    With a flick of his fingers to one eyebrow, the traditional sign of allegiance to the Emperor, Jesse said, “Counselor Bauers, I welcome you to my humble Catalan. Won’t you come and join us?”
    The Imperial advisor descended halfway down the ramp with a smooth gait, as if his feet were on wheels. Bauers’s piercing eyes swept the docks, the fishing boats, the weather-hardened shacks, the warehouses, and shops that ringed the harbor. He soaked up droplets of information like a dry sponge. “Hmmahh, yes … humble indeed, Nobleman Linkam.”
    The local guardsmen stiffened. Hearing an impolite grumble and a sharp, whispered rebuke from General Tuek, Jesse merely smiled. “We will gladly provide you with our most comfortable rooms, Counselor, and an invitation to this evening’s banquet. My concubine is as skilled at managing our household kitchens as she is at organizing my business affairs.”
    “I have my own chef aboard this diplomatic craft.” Bauers removed an ornately inlaid metal cylinder from one of his billowing sleeves and extended the messagestat like a scepter toward Jesse. “As for this evening, you would be better advised to spend your time packing. I return to Renaissance in the morning, and the Grand Emperor wishes you to accompany me. All the details are contained in this dispatch.”
    Feeling an icy dread, Jesse accepted the cylinder. Bowing slightly, he forced himself to say, “Thank you, Counselor. I will study it carefully.”
    “Be here at dawn, Nobleman.” Turning with a swirl of his robes, Bauers marched back up the ramp. The dignitary had not even set foot on Catalan, as if afraid it might soil his shoes.

    A COLD RAIN stretched into the darkest hours of the night, while clouds masked the canvas of stars. Standing on an open balcony above the sea, Jesse watched raindrops sizzling against the electrostatic weather screen around him. Each sparkle was like a variable star, forming transient constellations just above his head.
    For most of an hour, he had been brooding. He picked up the messagestat from where it rested on the balcony rail. When he pulled on each end of the cylinder, mirrors and lenses popped up, and words spooled out in Grand Emperor Wuda’s voice: “His Imperial Majesty requests