The air in the high tower of Castle Caladan was thick with the scent of old parchment and the cold, metallic tang of a private shield generator. Paul stood before the Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam, his face a mask of sweating stone. The gom jabbar—the poison-tipped needle—hovered at his throat, held by the withered, steady hand of the Emperor's Truthsayer.
"A beast in a trap will gnaw off its own leg to escape," the old woman hissed, her eyes like black flint. "What will you do, son of a Duke?"
Paul's hand was inside the box, a void of agonizing, phantom fire. He felt his skin charring, his nerves screaming in a thousand different languages of pain. He didn't move. He didn't cry out. He held the old woman's gaze with a burgeoning, cold power that made even her reach out with her mind to steady herself.
But the silence of the ordeal was broken by the soft, rhythmic click-clack of small boots on stone.
The heavy door, which should have been barred by the Duke's finest guards, swung open with a gentle creak. Anastasiastepped into the room. At ten, she looked like a stray sunbeam in a tomb, her petite frame wrapped in a soft, sea-blue shawl.
Behind her, Jia moved like a blurring shadow, her hand already white-knuckled on the hilt of a hidden blade as she saw the needle at the young Lord's throat. Jia's eyes flared with a lethal, yandere-level intensity; she didn't care for the Bene Gesserit or the Emperor. To her, this old woman was merely a target that needed to be erased.
"Paul?" Anastasia's voice was a soft chime of concern. She didn't see the politics. She didn't see the test of the Kwisatz Haderach. She only saw her brother's shaking frame and the terrifyingly sharp needle.
"Stay back, 'Stasia!" Paul gasped, his voice cracking through the wall of pain.
The Soft CommandAnastasia didn't stay back. With the "naive" courage of a child who believes everyone is fundamentally good, she walked right up to the Reverend Mother. She didn't look at the poison. She looked at the old woman's face, her wide, curious eyes filled with a sudden, overwhelming kindness.
"You look very tired, Grandmother," Anastasia said softly. She reached out—a move so fast and innocent that even the Truthsayer didn't pull back—and gently touched the old woman's withered hand, the one holding the death-needle. "Your hand is shaking. You shouldn't be so angry at my brother. He's a very good boy."
The Influence hit the room like a physical pressure. The Reverend Mother's black eyes dilated. For the first time in eighty years, the Truthsayer's mental shields... flickered. She felt a sudden, irrational urge to drop the needle, to pull this petite girl into a protective embrace, and to beg her forgiveness.
The old woman pulled her hand away as if burned, the gom jabbar disappearing into her robes. She stared at Anastasia, her breathing ragged.
"What... what is this?" Mohiam whispered, her voice trembling. She looked at Lady Jessica, who stood trembling by the door. "Jessica! You told me of the boy. You said nothing of this."
"She is my heart," Jessica whispered, her own yandere devotion shining in her eyes as she rushed forward to scoop Anastasia up, shielding her from the old woman's gaze. "She is the Gem of the Atreides."
The Warning of the CroneThe Reverend Mother stood up, her black robes swirling. She looked at Paul, then at the girl tucked into Jessica's arms, and finally at Jia, who looked ready to leap across the room and tear the old woman's throat out.
"You go to Arrakis," Mohiam said, her voice regaining its iron. "You take a boy who might be a god, and a girl who makes gods want to kneel. The Harkonnens are the least of your worries, Duke's wife. The universe will not allow something this pure to exist without trying to devour it."
Anastasia, tucked safely against her mother, reached into her pocket and pulled out a small, dried Caladan lily. "For your journey, Grandmother," she chirped, holding it out with a kind smile. "I hope you feel better soon."
The Reverend Mother took the flower with a hand that still shook. She didn't say another word. she simply turned and fled the room, the most powerful woman in the Imperium chased away by the "naive" kindness of a ten-year-old girl.
Paul pulled his hand from the box, the skin unburned and whole, but his eyes were fixed on his sister. The obsession in his chest grew. If an old crone can see her power, he thought darkly, then the whole galaxy will soon be hunting her.
He looked at Jia. "Double the guard. From this moment on, no one enters her presence without my personal seal. Not even the Guild."
Jia bowed, her eyes burning with a dark, loyal fire. "On my life, My Lord. I will be the last thing anyone sees before they die for looking at her."