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

the involuntary urge to leap away.
"Good," she said. "You pass the first test. Now, here's the way of the rest of it: If you
withdraw your hand from the box you die. This is the only rule. Keep your hand in the box and
live. Withdraw it and die."
Paul took a deep breath to still his trembling. "If I call out there'll be servants on you in
seconds and you'll die."
"Servants will not pass your mother who stands guard outside that door. Depend on it. Your
mother survived this test. Now it's your turn. Be honored. We seldom administer this to men-
children."
Curiosity reduced Paul's fear to a manageable level. He heard truth in the old woman's voice,
no denying it. If his mother stood guard out there . . . if this were truly a test . . . And
whatever it was, he knew himself caught in it, trapped by that hand at his neck: the gom jabbar.
He recalled the response from the Litany against Fear as his mother had taught him out of the Bene
Gesserit rite.
"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total
obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it
has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be
nothing. Only I will remain."
He felt calmness return, said: "Get on with it, old woman."
"Old woman!" she snapped. "You've courage, and that can't be denied. Well, we shall see,
sirra." She bent close, lowered her voice almost to a whisper. "You will feel pain in this hand
within the box. Pain. But! Withdraw the hand and I'll touch your neck with my gom jabbar -- the
death so swift it's like the fall of the headsman's axe. Withdraw your hand and the gom jabbar
takes you. Understand?"
"What's in the box?"
"Pain."
He felt increased tingling in his hand, pressed his lips tightly together. How could this be a
test? he wondered. The tingling became an itch.
The old woman said; "You've heard of animals chewing off a leg to escape a trap? There's an
animal kind of trick. A human would remain in the trap, endure the pain, feigning death that he
might kill the trapper and remove a threat to his kind."
The itch became the faintest burning. "Why are you doing this?" he demanded.
"To determine if you're human. Be silent."
Paul clenched his left hand into a fist as the burning sensation increased in the other hand.
It mounted slowly: heat upon heat upon heat . . . upon heat. He felt the fingernails of his free
hand biting the palm. He tried to flex the fingers of the burning hand, but couldn't move them.
"It burns," he whispered.
"Silence!"
Pain throbbed up his arm. Sweat stood out on his forehead. Every fiber cried out to withdraw
the hand from that burning pit . . . but . . . the gom jabbar. Without turning his head, he tried
to move his eyes to see that terrible needle poised beside his neck. He sensed that he was
breathing in gasps, tried to slow his breaths and couldn't.
Pain!
His world emptied of everything except that hand immersed in agony, the ancient face inches
away staring at him.
His lips were so dry he had difficulty separating them.
The burning! The burning!
He thought he could feel skin curling black on that agonized hand, the flesh crisping and
dropping away until only charred bones remained.