Hear the desert sigh Sing the city's lullaby [closed]

[worm-dancer.livejournal.com]

A quick message to the comms had summoned her wayward sister to her. Now Sheeana stood in the statuary, beneath columns both Doric and Ionian columns and a curved roof like that of a cathedral. The floor was marble and inexplicably maintained to a reflective sheen, showing the impromptu aba robe she'd tied together from some dusty old curtains in an alien office building, spare features still with no waterfat but with a quirked up smile and mischevious eyes that made her a valued seductress for the Sisterhood.

Outside, her worm paced in a nearby pen. She'd commanded it to stay there and asked Arha to leave hers with it. This process could agitate both of them.

It was time for them to Share.

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[worm-dancer.livejournal.com]

When their foreheads touched, other things touched too. There was a great gibbering as four thousand years stampeded into the other woman's head. Sheeana felt it as a shudder that shook her, like the Water of Life in the few moments before it began to hurt. Her body tensed and convulsed a half second, forcing them to cling to each other for balance. A fitting metaphor.

She was turned internally. Herself flowed into Arha and Arha flowed into her. Caught in the middle, she was spun and it took some time to catch her balance.

I am eight. I wear a much patched stillsuit and walk rythmlessly, looking for deposits of Spice on the sands. I am proud that I am big enough for this duty. The economy of our little pioneer village depends on this, looking for melange scraps left behind by the worms of our time: smaller than the ones of Muad'dib's time, but so much faster and more intelligent. That has been the routine of my life up to now, playing, searching, learning, avoiding the priests of the Divided God. We Fremen were much degraded by our millenia under the Tyrant. We are the second iteration and our knowledge is still clumsy, filtered through a kind of historical recreation.

Then the moisture barrier failed. I could only watch as that tripartite mouth opened and that horrible screeching roar issued. A spiral. It was a neat spiral that swallowed everything i'd known until then. Family. Friends. Home. No longer bothering with maintaining my rythmlessness, I ran to it and screamed for it to eat me too. Begged it. What was my worth if I could not be with them? I was livid.

Instead it sat in front of me like a loyal dog. Knowing nothing else to do, I clambered on that great leathery head and it took me where I wished.

That was when the priests of the Divided God came for me. Four years I spent as princess of those poor, silly sots. I learned that the reason Shaitan obeyed me was the revenants of Leto 2, the divided god. All was going well until...

There was an attempt on my life and it was women in black robes who saved me. They had knowing looks, eyes that penetrated through my hapless caregivers. They could do so many things. I was fascinated. They would not submit to my orders.

Chief among them was Darwi. Gentle Darwi, who deflected my brattiness like one deflects an attack in the Weirding Way. Darwi of the wisdom. She was the one who would teach me her heresy: Love. She whispered it to me as we left the only planet i'd ever known.