"Frank Herbert - Dune 1 - Dune (2)" - читать интересную книгу автора (Herbert Brian & Frank)

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Dune
Frank Herbert



Copyright 1965

Book 1
DUNE

===========================

A beginning is the time for taking the most delicate care that the balances are correct. This
every sister of the Bene Gesserit knows. To begin your study of the life of Muad'Dib, then, take
care that you first place him in his time: born in the 57th year of the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam
IV. And take the most special care that you locate Muad'Dib in his place: the planet Arrakis. Do
not be deceived by the fact that he was born on Caladan and lived his first fifteen years there.
Arrakis, the planet known as Dune, is forever his place.
-from "Manual of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan

In the week before their departure to Arrakis, when all the final scurrying about had reached
a nearly unbearable frenzy, an old crone came to visit the mother of the boy, Paul.
It was a warm night at Castle Caladan, and the ancient pile of stone that had served the
Atreides family as home for twenty-six generations bore that cooled-sweat feeling it acquired
before a change in the weather.
The old woman was let in by the side door down the vaulted passage by Paul's room and she was
allowed a moment to peer in at him where he lay in his bed.
By the half-light of a suspensor lamp, dimmed and hanging near the floor, the awakened boy
could see a bulky female shape at his door, standing one step ahead of his mother. The old woman
was a witch shadow -- hair like matted spiderwebs, hooded 'round darkness of features, eyes like
glittering jewels.
"Is he not small for his age, Jessica?" the old woman asked. Her voice wheezed and twanged
like an untuned baliset.
Paul's mother answered in her soft contralto: "The Atreides are known to start late getting
their growth, Your Reverence."
"So I've heard, so I've heard," wheezed the old woman. "Yet he's already fifteen."
"Yes, Your Reverence."
"He's awake and listening to us," said the old woman. "Sly little rascal." She chuckled. "But
royalty has need of slyness. And if he's really the Kwisatz Haderach . . . well . . ."
Within the shadows of his bed, Paul held his eyes open to mere slits. Two bird-bright ovals --
the eyes of the old woman -- seemed to expand and glow as they stared into his.
"Sleep well, you sly little rascal," said the old woman. "Tomorrow you'll need all your
faculties to meet my gom jabbar."
And she was gone, pushing his mother out, closing the door with a solid thump.
Paul lay awake wondering: What's a gom jabbar?
In all the upset during this time of change, the old woman was the strangest thing he had
seen.
Your Reverence.