Chapter 22

Jessica waits in the Keep’s anteroom, uneasy with the grandiosity celebrating Paul’s victory and questioning why Alia invited her to share the audience before formal reinstatement. Conscious of her aging and training, she contrasts subtle changes in herself with the disturbing lack of change in Alia. She senses Alia watching and prolonging tension.

Recalling the Bene Gesserit delegation that urged her to counter the souring Muad’Dib religion, Jessica reviews their logic and her own training’s caution about mentat limits and proofs. The moist, lax air of the Keep and Arrakeen’s fortress-like hardness reinforce her sense that Alia’s rule has decayed.

Javid approaches and presses Jessica to denounce the Preacher as a blasphemer. Jessica lectures on mentat fallibility, calls the Preacher a healthy sign, and flatly refuses to denounce him, even when Javid insists on church demands. Her public dismissal of Javid unsettles the room and exposes shifting loyalties; she notes his lover’s undertone when he speaks of Alia, confirming rumors of their intimacy.

Watching the courtiers’ calculated postures, Jessica sees fear of Alia radiating around her and recognizes her own disruptive presence. She hears a priest boast that diplomacy is speaking otherwise than one thinks and laments how far the court has strayed from Atreides standards. She grows sympathetic to the Preacher’s reported condemnations.

Alia arrives with priestess bodyguards, projecting power and locking eyes with Jessica; both recognize the confrontation is joined. Jessica judges Alia’s confidence as madness and recalls Duncan Idaho’s cryptic, urgent message about danger and a plot. She resolves to see Idaho at Tabr immediately after the audience.