A hunt will always be successful, provided one is willing to redefine the goals as needed.

—VORIAN ATREIDES, private journals, Kepler period

Riding the great sandworm left Vorian awestruck. During the journey across the desert, Ishanti never let down her guard. Nevertheless, she took the adventure in stride, as if controlling such a creature was an everyday activity.

While the behemoth slid across the sand with the speed of a Coriolis storm, the woman seemed worried that Vor was unprepared for the deep desert. “Where is your face mask, your noseplugs? How much extra water do you carry? And food? You are not ready for this place.”

Still holding on to the ropes, Vor coughed from the stirred-up dust and cinnamon reek that wafted around the sandworm. “I was in a skimcraft, returning to the spice harvester. I didn’t expect to find my whole crew slaughtered—and I didn’t plan to be shot down.”

Her grimace showed what she thought of his explanation. “If one could foresee every accident, we would all be prepared. Only those who learn to accept the unpredictable will survive.”

“You were certainly unpredictable. I don’t know who you are any better than I know those two assassins.” He flashed her his best smile. “Frankly, I prefer your company to theirs.”

“Naib Sharnak will decide what to do with you.” She prodded the sandworm with one of her goads, and the beast raced onward.

By now, hunger tightened his stomach, and the dust and extreme dryness of the air had parched his throat. As if to teach him a lesson, Ishanti had not offered him any water, though occasionally he watched her sip from tubes at her collar.

In his life, Vor had never been really thirsty, like this. Though he’d spent the past month on Arrakis, his metabolism had not yet adjusted to the drastic changes. Even under tight rations with the spice-harvesting crew, he still retained plenty of water fat, but now his throat felt like hot ashes. His skin was dry, his eyes burned; he could sense the arid world stealing moisture from him, every drop of perspiration, every hint of vapor from an exhaled breath.

Though he might be parched and miserable, he knew Ishanti would not simply let him perish, since she had gone to the trouble of rescuing him. On the other hand, she was under no obligation to coddle him, nor did he ask her to. He attempted to drive his thoughts away from his thirst.

Hours later, when they neared a line of gray mountains, Ishanti explained in patient detail, as if to a child, how to dismount from the exhausted sandworm. Vor paid careful attention and, when the time came, tried to imitate her as she sprang down, bounded onto the soft sands, and then froze in place as the cranky beast slithered onward, thrashing its hot tail in annoyance. When it had moved far enough off, Ishanti gestured silently to Vor, and they danced away from the retreating creature; he and the woman went motionless again as the great worm paused, turned in their direction, and lumbered back toward the open expanse of desert. Ishanti let out a sigh of relief, then urged Vor to hurry to the cliffs. “You’re a fast learner. Good.”

Though he was filled with questions about what to do next, he sensed her impatience with his inquiries, so he just followed. She led him into the rocks with an easy confidence, as if she had come this way many times before. He studied the ground for any clue as to where she might be taking him and discovered that Ishanti was following marks: well-placed pebbles, small signs that looked almost natural. Only a few feet had trod these rocks to beat down a trail—or someone might have erased the footprints after each passage.

He remembered the abandoned camp that he and the spice crew had found in the rocks, and now he was intrigued, thinking he might finally get to meet the mysterious “Freemen” of Arrakis. They were the reason he had chosen this out-of-the-way planet in the first place.

Vor didn’t notice the cave until they were upon it. The opening was disguised by an elbow of rock that required a sharp left turn; another well-placed boulder blocked the entrance from view. Ishanti paused to open a moisture-sealed door, and they found themselves facing three desert-robed men with half-drawn knives. When Ishanti raised her hand and gave a sign, they let her pass, but the men stopped Vor from entering.

“I don’t vouch for him, yet,” Ishanti said. “He must still pass our tests.”

Vor studied them, saw their tough stance, their confident readiness for combat, noted the unusual milky-white blades of their daggers. He decided not to ask questions, not to beg for his life, or surrender—he just faced the desert people, letting them make their own judgments based on what they saw. The guards seemed to appreciate that.

“This man is the only survivor of a spice-harvesting crew,” Ishanti continued. “Let him pass. We need to speak to the Naib.” The three stepped aside but did not lower their guard.

In a cool, shadowy grotto lit by a single glowglobe, Ishanti introduced him to a grizzled, older man who wore his long gray-black hair in a thick braid; he had a high forehead, a calm expression, hard eyes. She gestured for Vor to sit on one of the patterned fiber rugs over the stone floor, and took a place close beside him. Vor remained respectfully silent as Ishanti summarized what had happened to the spice-harvesting crew at the hands of two seemingly indestructible hunters, and how she had helped Vorian escape.

The man, Naib Sharnak, regarded Vor coolly, like a doctor performing a dissection, then lifted his chin. “Two people massacred an entire spice-harvesting crew, shot down your aircraft, and made Ishanti nervous? And you say they were after you?”

“They said they were after me. I’ve never seen or heard of them before.”

One of the Naib’s people brought in an elaborate service of spice coffee that was so potent Vor could barely drink it, despite his thirst. They did not offer him water, though he craved it.

“I myself have many questions about the young man and woman who caused such damage,” Ishanti said, narrowing her deep-blue eyes. “I represent Combined Mercantiles here. If one of our competitors has discovered a secret weapon or dispatched mercenary assassins, then I must make my report. They were not normal people—perhaps not entirely human. They won’t be easy to kill.”

“Freemen are not easy to kill, either,” Naib Sharnak said.

Vor had been grappling with the same questions ever since his escape, squeezing and prodding the possibilities, but none of the answers made sense to him. The pair of attackers had called him by name. But he had lived a quiet life on Kepler for decades, and had come to Arrakis without fanfare. No one should have known he was here at all. Who could possibly be hunting him?

“If there is a threat to the desert, then there is a threat to us,” the Naib said. “I will send scouts to study the wreckage of the spice harvester—if anything remains. You will stay with us.”

“As your prisoner?”

Sharnak raised his eyebrows. “Are you foolish enough to attempt an escape?”

“Where would I go? In fact, I was actually hoping to encounter you. That’s why I came to Arrakis in the first place.”

*   *   *

TWO DAYS LATER, Naib Sharnak’s desert scouts returned, a pair of young men named Inulto and Sheur. While Vor sat with the Naib in a small sietch cavern, the two youths described in excited words what they had seen; the mission had obviously been an adventure for them. Ishanti came in to hear their report as well.

“We rode as fast as we could, Naib,” said Sheur. “An evening dust storm drove us to shelter early, but we were off again before the next sunrise.”

“And what did you find?”

“Nothing.” Inulto lowered his head. “A worm had been there. All the machinery, the aircraft, the dune rollers, the bodies—the evidence is gone. Nothing remains.”

“I know what I saw,” Vor said. “I’m sure the killers are still alive.”

Ishanti was anxious and angry. “I need to return to Arrakis City and report to headquarters. Directeur Venport will want to know.” She looked over at Vorian. “I presume you desire to return to civilization? We have a fast skimcraft. I can take you there directly.”

Vor surprised both by saying, “No, I’d rather stay here for a while. I am intrigued to speak with your people. Rumor has it you live very long lives, well over a century?”

“It’s the geriatric effects of melange,” Sharnak said. “That is how we live. You cannot steal any secret of immortality from us.”

Vor laughed. “Oh, I already have immortality, but I would be interested in talking to others about it.”

The Naib looked at his visitor’s features, probably noting the first hints of gray in his hair, and scoffed. “What would you know of immortality?”

“Only what I’ve learned during the two hundred and eighteen years of my life.”

Sharnak laughed even louder. “You harbor delusions! Offworlders believe ridiculous things, really ridiculous things.”

Vor gave him a contented smile. “I swear to you, I was born before the beginning of Serena Butler’s Jihad, well over two centuries ago.” He explained who he was, even though these isolated desert people knew little of the politics and history of the war against the thinking machines, a galaxy-spanning conflict that ended a century earlier. “I have fought in those epic battles, traveled much, and seen countless friends die, many of them heroically. I watched two of my wives bear me children. I raised families, and they, too, grew old … while I did not change. The cymeks gave me a life-extension treatment, and you have your melange with its enhancement properties, but we’ve both lived long lives—long, hard lives.”

The Naib seemed unsettled by his claims, but Vor stared at him until he looked away.

Ishanti reached out to touch the side of Vor’s face. “We don’t have soft skin like you do.” Then she caught herself and added with a snort, “Old men muse about such things. I am more worried about the business at hand, and whether those two assassins will attack other spice-harvesting operations.”

At the next sunrise, she flew off in her skimcraft.