It was Alys Carroll, one of his stern female trainees, a Butlerian recruit he had been forced to accept in order to stay in Manford’s good graces. “You received a summons, Headmaster. You need to depart immediately.”

Alys had an abrasive personality; worse, she did not realize it, or perhaps didn’t care. “A summons from the Emperor?” Gilbertus unsealed the security systems, then used his old-fashioned key to unlock and open the door.

Alys stood before him. “Leader Torondo orders that you come to his headquarters.” She said Manford’s name as if he were as important as the Emperor. And Gilbertus realized that, to her, the Butlerian leader might even be on a higher level than that.

With a forced, polite smile, the Headmaster said, “I shall depart as soon as possible.”

“Immediately,” she repeated.

In the past year, Josef Venport had transformed his headquarters planet into a veritable fortress. The conflict with the Butlerians was an undeclared war, but a war nevertheless. He saw it as a struggle for the future of humanity — and he was the person to be in charge of it.

A time of crisis demanded a great leader, such as Serena Butler, who had launched her Jihad against thinking machines, or Faykan Butler, who led the final victory on Corrin, or even Jules Corrino, who quelled the CET riots after the release of the incendiary Orange Catholic Bible.

Emperor Salvador, though, was not such a person. As the Half-Manford tried to plunge human society back into barbarism, and Josef fought to preserve civilization, the Emperor was caught like a melon in a vise, doing nothing and easily crushed.

Josef had to pay lip service to the throne, so that he did not provoke any outright Imperial resistance while he gathered his own allies. Much of Salvador’s fleet was carried aboard VenHold haulers, but Josef could not count on those soldiers to defend his interests if the Emperor refused to take sides.

In times like these, he wished Prince Roderick were the leader instead of Salvador. But for an accident of birth …

Since Kolhar served as the headquarters of Venport Holdings and the creation ground for mutant Navigators, Josef could not allow the planet to be vulnerable. He had to protect himself, and he certainly had the means to do so.

In the centuries-long war against the thinking machines, many human worlds had been protected by planetary shields originally created by Norma Cenva. Now, Josef also used those types of shields to protect his groundside industrial bases and construction docks in orbit — to protect them against the Butlerians. Dedicated VenHold warships, many of which were salvaged from old robotic vessels, patrolled space around Kolhar. His defenses would strike without hesitation if any barbarians tested Venport defenses. Josef had installed ground weaponry and deployed a picket line of patrol ships as well as a network of surveillance sensors throughout the system.

The planet should be secure, but when it came to the antitech fanatics, nothing was certain.

At the Thonaris shipyards, Josef had let his guard down and underestimated the Half-Manford’s violence and savage stupidity, and he had nearly lost everything. He would never make that mistake again. Josef knew that Kolhar would be a primary target if the barbarians ever organized themselves. Oh, he could disintegrate hordes of the savages, but more would keep coming. He had explicitly told his employees and allies that he would not be disappointed if someone just assassinated Manford Torondo. Without their charismatic demagogue to lead them, the chattering monkeys would disperse and find some other idiotic superstition to believe in.

From Kolhar’s high admin-tower, the Directeur surveyed his bustling shipyards, landing fields, and assorted industries. The way to achieve victory was through civilization and efficiency. “You never lose when you bet on human nature,” he had once told Cioba. “Take advantage of greed and the universal desire for easy living. That’s the deep flaw in the Butlerian thesis: The Half-Manford expects people to choose deprivation and suffering over their own comfort and well-being? It can never last.”

Though he knew he was right, Josef was sorely disappointed that the rest of the Imperium was taking so long to reach the same conclusion. Many planets had taken the Butlerian pledge, so Venport Holdings cut them off. When they grew desperate, Josef offered them a perfectly reasonable solution — admit that they preferred civilized society over primitive squalor, and he would reopen galactic commerce with them. As simple as that. He had slipped his own ships to outlying towns on Lampadas, taking a cold satisfaction in tempting those people right under the nose of the Butlerian leader.

But he underestimated human stubbornness. They were taking much too long to break under the pressure.

The communication system transmitted a message into his office. “The spice hauler just arrived from Arrakis, Directeur. With your permission, we will open the planetary shields to allow for passage.”

“Permission granted. Direct the ship to Landing Zone Twelve. I’ll take a groundcar and meet Draigo myself.” He tidied his desk and retrieved a jacket before heading out into the chill air.

Draigo Roget would be bringing a full assessment of the Combined Mercantiles spice-harvesting operations. Draigo was the most talented graduate of the Mentat School and an invaluable employee of Venport Holdings.

As soon as Josef had learned of the school, he’d seen the potential of the so-called human computers. Not only did Mentats possess tremendous analytical and predictive abilities, they could calculate with the speed of thinking machines, while retaining more of their humanity than the mutated Navigators did. Therefore, he wanted to use Mentats to enhance his own business interests.

With this in mind, Josef had selected a young man named Draigo Roget and planted him in the Mentat School on Lampadas, giving him a false past. His plan was to have Draigo learn Mentat techniques so he could return to Kolhar and teach other candidates. Josef needed as many as he could get.

Guiding the groundcar himself, Josef drove across the busy landing zone, weaving his way among cargo containers and refueling trucks. He could smell the hot metal, fumes, and stressed polymers. The Directeur was not a man who sat in his office and let others handle the work (although he might have preferred that, if he could be confident everyone would perform up to his standards). But he had few people he could truly count on. His wife, Cioba, was one of them; Draigo Roget was another.

As he parked outside Landing Zone 12, he watched the spice hauler descend through the gray sky, noting its design. VenHold spacecraft came from many ship architects and manufacturers. He had gathered every salvageable robot ship he could find; he had purchased (or stolen) ships from defunct or weak transportation companies; and he was in the process of constructing as many new spacefolders as his industries could produce. His aim was to drive all rivals out of business, just as he had done with spice poachers on Arrakis.

In order to remain in the Emperor’s good graces, VenHold foldspace haulers transported battleships from the Imperial Armed Forces. The Imperial military had their own Holtzman engines that could fold space, but VenHold ships were much more reliable, and Josef charged very little for the service.

There were other space transportation carriers throughout the Imperium, but the rival vessels used archaic navigation technology, hurtling through foldspace with the blind hope that they would not encounter a navigational hazard. Josef had a monopoly on prescient Navigators, and as a specialized backup and closely guarded secret, many VenHold ships also used navigation computers.