"Predator, Lord?"
"The predator improves the stock."
"How can this be, Lord? You do not hate us."
"You disappoint me, Moneo. The predator does not hate its prey."
"Predators kill, Lord."
"I kill, but I do not hate. Prey assuages hunger. Prey is good."
Moneo peered up at Leto's face in its gray cowl.
Have I missed the approach of the Worm? Moneo wondered.
Fearfully, Moneo looked for the signs. There were no tremors in the giant body, no glazing of the eyes, no twisting of the useless flippers.
"For what do you hunger, Lord?" Moneo ventured.
"For a humankind which can make truly long-term decisions. Do you know the key to that ability, Moneo?"
"You have said it many times, Lord. It is the ability to change your mind."
"Change, yes. And do you know what I mean by longterm?"
"For you, it must be measured in millennia, Lord."
"Moneo, even my thousands of years are but a puny blip against Infinity."
"But your perspective must be different from mine, Lord." "In the view of Infinity, any defined long-term is shortterm."
"Then are there no rules at all, Lord?" Moneo's voice conveyed a faint hint of hysteria.
Leto smiled to ease the man's tensions. "Perhaps one. Short-term decisions tend to fail in the long-term."
Moneo shook his head in frustration. "But, Lord, your perspective is..."
"Time runs out for any finite observer. There are no closed systems. Even I only stretch the finite matrix."
Moneo jerked his attention from Leto's face and peered into the distances of the mausoleum corridors. I will be here someday. The Golden Path may continue, but I will end. That was not important, of course. Only the Golden Path which he could sense in unbroken continuity, only that mattered. He returned his attention to Leto, but not to the all-blue eyes. Was there truly a predator lurking in that gross body?
"You do not understand the function of a predator," Leto said.
The words shocked Moneo because they smacked of mind-reading. He lifted his gaze to Leto's eyes.
"You know intellectually that even I will suffer a kind of death someday," Leto said. "But you do not believe it."
"How can I believe what I will never see?"
Moneo had never felt more lonely and fearful. What was the God Emperor doing? I came down here to discuss the problems of the peregrination... and to find out about his intentions toward Siona. Does he toy with me?
"Let us talk about Siona," Leto said.
Mind-reading again!
"When will you test her, Lord?" The question had been waiting in the front of his awareness all this time, but now that he had spoken it, Moneo feared it.
"Soon."
"Forgive me, Lord, but surely you know how much I fear for the well being of my only child."
"Others have survived the test, Moneo. You did."
Moneo gulped, remembering how he had been sensitized to the Golden Path.
"My mother prepared me. Siona has no mother."
"She has the Fish Speakers. She has you."
"Accidents happen, Lord."
Tears sprang into Moneo's eyes.
Leto looked away from him, thinking: He is torn by his loyalty to me and his love of Siona. How poignant it is, this concern for an offspring. Can he not see that all of humankind is my only child?
Returning his attention to Moneo, Leto said, "You are right to observe that accidents happen even in my universe. Does this teach you nothing?"
"Lord, just this once couldn't you..."
"Moneo! Surely you do not ask me to delegate authority to a weak administrator."
Moneo recoiled one step. "No, Lord. Of course not."
"Then trust Siona's strength."
Moneo squared his shoulders. "I will do what I must."
"Siona must be awakened to her duties as an Atreides."
"Yes, of course, Lord."
"Is that not our commitment, Moneo?"
"I do not deny it, Lord. When will you introduce her to the new Duncan?"
"The test comes first."
Moneo looked down at the cold floor of the crypt.
He stares at the floor so often, Leto thought. What can he possibly see there? Is it the millennial tracks of my cart? Ahhh, no-it is into the depths that he peers, into the realm of treasure and mystery which he expects to enter soon.
Once more, Moneo lifted his gaze to Leto's face. "I hope she will like the Duncan's company, Lord."
"Be assured of it. The Tleilaxu have brought him to me in the undistorted image."
"That is reassuring, Lord."
"No doubt you have noted that his genotype is remarkably attractive to females."
"That has been my observation, Lord."
"There's something about those gently observant eyes, those strong features and that black-goat hair which positively melts the female psyche."
"As you say, Lord."
"You know he's with the Fish Speakers right now?"
"I was informed, Lord."
Leto smiled. Of course Moneo was informed. "They will bring him to me soon for his first view of the God Emperor."
"I have inspected the viewing room personally, Lord. Everything is in readiness."
"Sometimes I think you wish to weaken me, Moneo. Leave some of these details for me."
Moneo tried to conceal a constriction of fear. He bowed and backed away. "Yes, Lord, but there are some things which I must do."
Turning, he hurried away. It was not until he was ascending in the lift that Moneo realized he had left without being dismissed.