Another labor spasm hit. The contractions grew more painful, tighter, stronger.

It took all of Jessica’s Bene Gesserit training to control her body, to focus her muscles and guide the baby through the birth canal. She didn’t care about Mohiam’s disappointment now, or how this unexpected boy-child would throw the Sisterhood’s centuries-long breeding program into chaos. She could think only of the process of giving birth.

At the side of Jessica’s bed, Lady Anirul Corrino sat in a suspensor chair. Her face was gray and drawn, as if she were using all her mental abilities to maintain her focus and hold the gossamer strands of her sanity. In one hand, she gripped the surgical lasknife again. Ready. Watching, like a predator.

Jessica surrounded herself in a meditative cocoon. She held her secret tight for just a few moments more. The baby would come soon. A son, not a daughter.

Both Reverend Mother Mohiam and Lady Margot Fenring had remained during the hours of her labor, and now they stood attentively just behind Anirul, ready to lunge if she threatened violence. Even though she was the Kwisatz Mother, they would not allow her to harm Jessica’s baby.

Out of the corner of her eye, between deep breaths, Jessica noticed a flicker of Mohiam’s hand, a special signal meant for her. Tell Anirul you want me to cut the umbilical cord. Let me be the one to hold the lasknife.

Jessica pretended a quick spasm to give herself time to consider this. For years, Proctor Superior Mohiam had been her instructor on Wallach IX. Mohiam had indoctrinated her young student in the Sisterhood, had given Jessica explicit orders to conceive a daughter by Leto Atreides. She remembered Mohiam holding the gom jabbar at her neck, the poisoned needle ready for a swift and deadly prick. The penalty for failure.

She would have killed me then, if I had not met the Sisterhood’s esoteric standard of humanity. She could just as easily kill me now.

But was that in itself a human thing for Mohiam to do? The Bene Gesserit zealously prohibited the emotion of love— but wasn’t it human to feel love and compassion? In the present situation, would Mohiam be any less dangerous than Anirul?

No, it is more likely they will kill my baby.

It seemed to Jessica that love was something a machine could not experience, and humans had defeated thinking machines in the Butlerian Jihad, millennia ago. But if humans were the victors, why did this remnant of nonhumanity— the savagery of the gom jabbar— thrive in one of the Great Schools? Savagery was as much a part of the human psyche as love. One could not exist without the other.

Must I trust her? The alternative is too terrifying. Is there any other way?

Between pushes, Jessica lifted her sweaty head from her pillow and said in a soft voice, “Lady Anirul, I would like… Margot Fenring to cut the baby’s umbilical cord.” Mohiam recoiled in surprise. “Would you hand the lasknife to her, please?” Jessica pretended not to notice her old mentor’s agitation and displeasure. “It is my choice.”

Anirul appeared distracted, as if she had been listening to the internal voices, still trying to understand them. She looked down at the surgical tool clutched in her hands. “Yes, of course.” Glancing over her shoulder, she handed the potential weapon to Lady Fenring. The anguish in Anirul’s face subsided for a moment. “How far along?” She leaned close to the birthing bed.

Jessica attempted to adjust her body chemistry to quell a sharp bolt of pain, but it had no effect. “The baby is coming.”

Instead of looking at the observers in the room, she detached herself and studied several tame honeybees that moved between the floating planter globes over her head. The insects crawled inside the enclosures and pollinated the flowers. Focus.… Focus….

After several moments, the spasm subsided. When her vision cleared, she saw to her surprise that Mohiam now held the surgical lasknife after all. She felt a moment of terror for her baby. The weapon itself was irrelevant, though. They are Bene Gesserit. They need no cutting instrument to kill a helpless child.

The labor pains came closer together. Fingers touched her, slid inside her vagina. The plump Medical Sister nodded. “She is fully dilated.” And, with a touch of Voice: “Push.”

Reflexively, Jessica responded, but the effort only intensified the pain. She cried out. Her muscles clenched. Concerned voices moved into the background, and she had trouble comprehending their words.

“Keep pushing!” Now it was the second Medical Sister.

Something inside fought against Jessica, as if the baby himself was taking control, refusing to come out. How could this be possible? Didn’t it defy the natural way of things?

“Stop! Now, relax.”

She couldn’t identify the source of the command, but obeyed. The pain became excruciating, and she suppressed a scream, using every skill Mohiam had taught her. Her body responded with biological programming as deep as her DNA.

“The baby is strangling on its cord!”

No, please, no. Jessica kept her eyes closed, focused inward, trying to guide her precious child to safety. Leto must have his son. But she couldn’t envision the right muscles, couldn’t feel any changes. She perceived only darkness and an intense, overwhelming gloom.

She felt the soft hand of a Medical Sister reach inside her, poking and probing to untangle the baby. She tried to control her body, to work her muscles, to direct her mind down into each cell. Again Jessica had the peculiar sensation that the tiny child was resisting, that he didn’t want to be born.

At least not here, not in the presence of these dangerous women.

Jessica felt small and weak. The love she had wanted to share with her Duke and their son seemed so insignificant in comparison with the boundless universe and all it encompassed. The Kwisatz Haderach. Would he be able to see everything even before his own birth?

Is my child the One?

“Push again. Push!”

Jessica did so, and this time felt a change, a smooth flow. She clenched her entire body, straining as long as she could, and then pushed again, and again. The pain subsided, but she reminded herself of the peril all around her.

The baby came out. She felt him go, sensed hands reaching out, taking him away… and then all of her strength faded for a moment. Must recover quickly. Need to protect him. After three deep breaths, Jessica struggled to sit. She felt weak, deeply fatigued, sore everywhere.

The women gathered at the foot of her birthing bed said nothing, hardly moved. A hush had fallen over the sunlit room, as if she had given birth to a monstrous deformity.

“My baby,” Jessica said, cutting the ominous silence. “Where is my baby?”

“How can this be?” Anirul’s voice was high-pitched, on the ragged edge of hysteria. She let out a keening cry. “No!”

“What have you done?” Mohiam said. “Jessica— what have you done?” The Reverend Mother did not show the anger Jessica had feared so greatly; instead her expression showed defeat and utter disappointment.

Again, Jessica struggled to get a glimpse of her child, and this time she saw wet black hair, a small forehead and wide-open, intelligent eyes. She thought of her beloved Duke Leto. My baby must live.

“Now I understand the disturbance in Other Memory.” Anirul’s face became a mask of unbridled rage as she glared at Jessica. “They knew, but Lobia couldn’t tell me in time. I am the Kwisatz Mother! Thousands of Sisters have worked on our program for millennia. Why did you do this to our future?”

“Don’t kill him! Punish me for what I did, if you must— but not Leto’s son!” Tears streamed down her cheeks.

Mohiam placed the baby in Jessica’s arms, as if ridding herself of an unpleasant burden.

“Take your damned son,” she said, in the coldest of tones, “and pray that the Sisterhood survives what you have done.”