Leto remembered this as he lay alone in his small reception room shortly before noon when Moneo arrived. Moneo had seen the Reverend Mother Anteac onto a Guild lighter, had conferred with the Fish Speaker Command about the previous night’s violence, had made a quick flight to the Citadel and back to make sure Siona was under a secure watch and that she had not been implicated in the Embassy attack. He had returned to Onn just after the betrothal announcement, having had no previous warning.
Moneo was furious. Leto had never seen him this angry. He stormed into the room and stopped only two meters from Leto’s face.
“Now the Tleilaxu lies will be believed!” he said.
Leto responded in a reasoned tone. “How persistent it is, this demand that our gods be perfect. The Greeks were much more reasonable about such things.”
“Where is she?” Moneo demanded. “Where is this . . .”
“Hwi is resting. It was a difficult night and a long morning. I want her well rested when we return to the Citadel this evening.”
“How did she work this?” Moneo demanded.
“Really, Moneo! Have you lost all sense of caution?”
“I am concerned about you! Have you any idea what they’re saying in the City?”
“I’m fully aware of the stories.”
“What
“You know, Moneo, I think that only the old pantheists had the right idea about deities: mortal foibles in immortal guise.”
Moneo raised both arms to the heavens. “I saw the looks on their faces!” He lowered his arms. “It’ll be all over the Empire within two weeks.”
“Surely it’ll take longer than that.”
“If your enemies needed one thing to bring them all together . . .”
“The defiling of the god is an ancient human tradition, Moneo. Why should I be an exception?”
Moneo tried to speak, found he could not utter a word. He stamped down along the edge of the pit which held Leto’s cart, stamped back and resumed his former position glaring into Leto’s face.
“If I am to help you, I need an explanation,” Moneo said. “Why are you doing this?”
“Emotions.”
Moneo’s mouth formed the word without speaking it.
“They have come over me just when I thought them gone forever,” Leto said. “How sweet these last few sips of humanity are.”
“With Hwi? But you surely cannot . . .”
“Memories of emotions are never enough, Moneo.”
“Are you telling me that you are indulging yourself in a . . .”
“Indulgence? Certainly not! But the tripod upon which Eternity swings is composed of flesh and thought and emotion. I felt that I had been reduced to flesh and thought.”
“She has worked some kind of witchery,” Moneo accused.
“Of course she has. And how grateful I am for it. If we deny the need for thought, Moneo, as some do, we lose the powers of reflection; we cannot define what our senses report. If we deny the flesh, we unwheel the vehicle which bears us. But if we deny emotion, we lose all touch with our internal universe. It was emotions which I missed the most.”
“I insist, Lord, that you . . .”
“You are making me angry, Moneo. That
Leto saw Moneo’s frustrated fury cool, quenched like a hot iron plunged into icy water. There was still some steam in him, though.
“I care not for myself, Lord. My concern is mostly for you, and you know this.”
Leto spoke softly. “It is your
Moneo inhaled a deep, trembling breath. He had never before seen the God Emperor in this mood, reflecting this
“That which makes life sweet for the living,” Leto said, “that which makes life warm and filled with beauty, that is what I would preserve even though it were denied to me.”
“Then this Hwi Noree . . .”
“She makes me recall the Butlerian Jihad in a poignant way. She is the antithesis of all that’s mechanical and non-human. How odd it is, Moneo, that the Ixians, of all people, should produce this one person who so perfectly embodies those qualities which I hold most dear.”
“I do not understand your reference to the Butlerian Jihad, Lord. Machines that think have no place in . . .”
“The target of the Jihad was a machine-attitude as much as the machines,” Leto said. “Humans had set those machines to usurp our sense of beauty, our necessary selfdom out of which we make living judgments. Naturally, the machines were destroyed.”
“Lord, I still resent the fact that you welcome this . . .”
“Moneo! Hwi reassures me merely by her presence. For the first time in centuries, I am not lonely unless she is away from my side. If I had no other proof of the emotion, this would serve.”
Moneo fell silent, obviously touched by Leto’s evocation of loneliness. Surely, Moneo could understand the absence of the intimate sharing in love. His expression betrayed as much.
For the first time in a long while, Leto noted how much Moneo had aged.
It made Leto deeply aware of how much he cared for Moneo.
