Free Road to Dune by Frank Herbert, Brian Herbert, Kevin J. Anderson Page B

odds I’ll make it to my next birthday?”
    “All the more reason you shouldn’t risk Barri! I’ve seen the mortality statistics of the workers. Those men would be safer in a penal colony. How can you take our boy into the middle of that?”
    Jesse took a deep breath. When Dorothy set her mind on something, it was like trying to pry open the jaws of a gazehound from its quarry. “I do it because I am the head of House Linkam, and he is my son. He goes where I say he goes.” The iron tone of his voice cut off further protests, though he could tell she still had a lot more to say.
    “As you command, My Lord.” She would stew about it, running the discussion over and over in her head. Unwilling to accept his decision, and refusing to concede, she would be like ice to him—probably for days. “Stay here in the tower as long as you like. I will not wait up for you.”
    After Dorothy left, Jesse felt the great loneliness again. He feared that the next few days before the expedition departed would be even less pleasant than the storms of the deepest desert.

    COOLLY BUT DUTIFULLY supportive, Dorothy went to the secondary spaceport to bid her son farewell. Though she did her best to conceal her feelings, she could tell that the other members in the party sensed the wall between herself and Jesse.
    While the men boarded the transport ship for the forward research base, Jesse stood on the ramp with a hand on Barri’s shoulder. The grinning boy was clearly excited to be going on a grand desert adventure with his father. His blue-green eyes were alight above the face mask, and a tight hood held down his unruly brown hair.
    Dorothy gave Jesse a chaste kiss, then embraced their son, holding him a moment too long. “Be safe,” she said. Stepping back from the ramp, she lowered the gaze of her myrtle-brown eyes. Though General Tuek had already completed his inspection, she had quietly double-checked their preparations and provisions, satisfying herself that the team had reduced risks to the extent possible.
    “We’ll be as safe as Duneworld allows us to be,” Jesse said with a faint conciliatory note in his voice. Then he and Barri entered the craft and sealed the hatch.
    Dorothy did not stay to watch the vessel lift off and disappear toward the sand-smeared desert horizon.
    8

The spice is a lens through which one can see the entire universe.
—A SAYING OF THE FREEDMEN

    F ollowed by two water-supply ships, Jesse’s transport approached the forward research base near Duneworld’s equator.
    “Is that it?” Barri asked for the fourth time, as he looked past the pilot, through a front window. He’d mistaken practically every outcropping of rock for their destination, but when the base finally came into view, its appearance was unmistakable.
    “That’s it,” Jesse said, putting a hand on the boy’s shoulder.
    The cheddar-colored wedge structure thrust up from the sand, surrounded by a low fortress wall of natural rock. Mottled tan domes circled the main building, everything aerodynamically curved so that storms could skim over the tops without causing damage. V-shaped rows of plantings fronted the settlement area like the ripples from a ship’s prow forging through a sandy ocean.
    Because the research outpost pursued Imperial-sponsored projects, most of the water burden was covered by a stipend from the Grand Emperor’s private budget; even so, Jesse knew what an exorbitant cost this oasis drained from the planetary treasury.
    William English worked his way back along the line of seats to sit beside Jesse. Outside, the bronze-orange sun settled toward the horizon. “We’re lucky we weren’t an hour later, or we’d have a bumpy ride. The rapid temperature change at sunset plays havoc with the weather.”
    “Will we see a storm?” Barri asked.
    “Not tonight, boy,” English said with a smile, tapping his scarred cheek. “I’d be able to feel one coming. I learned my lesson the hard way—so I can teach you not