On Rossak, Reverend Mother Raquella watches the Sisters gathering for the evening meal while feeling an unexplained tension. Her inner memory-lives are disturbed, but she cannot identify a specific threat. She reflects on Vorian Atreides’s recent reappearance, her restrained family feelings toward him, and her obligation to keep the Sisterhood’s work above personal concerns.

Raquella also considers Anna Corrino’s arrival as an acolyte. Because Anna is the Emperor’s sister, Raquella regards Anna’s protection as a political necessity, even though Anna seems angry, spoiled, and uninterested in training. Raquella has assigned Valya Harkonnen to watch Anna, hoping the responsibility will focus Valya’s intelligence and ambition while curbing Valya’s reckless fixation on House Harkonnen grievances.

Karee Marques, the oldest remaining Sorceress, joins Raquella on the cliff-side platform after sensing the same oppressive urgency. Karee explains that while collecting jungle samples, she involuntarily slipped into Mentat analysis but could make no clear projection. She and the other Sister Mentats have concluded that the Sisterhood faces a coming schism that could set Sister against Sister.

Karee identifies the likely fault line as the broader human conflict over forbidden technology, especially rumors that the Sisterhood’s breeding records are maintained by computers. Raquella defends the breeding program as essential to strengthening humanity, but Karee warns that deciding which traits are desirable risks dangerous social engineering. Raquella concludes that the other Sister Mentats must be brought into the secret, though Karee cautions that even one Butlerian sympathizer could endanger everything.

Elsewhere in the cliff-side tunnels, Dorotea shares a private meal with her friend Ingrid and describes her time at the Imperial Court. Ingrid reveals that factions are already forming among the Sisters over technology: some reject all thinking-machine remnants, while others argue for retaining limited computer use. When Ingrid mentions rumors that computers support the breeding records on Rossak, Dorotea is shocked and declares that if such machines exist, they must find and destroy them before outsiders do.