Idaho wet his lips with his tongue and stared at Leto with obvious puzzlement. “But the moral training of… I mean, the legal… the prisons to…”

“What good are laws and prisons when the breaking of a law is not a sin?”

Idaho cocked his head slightly to the right. “Are you trying to tell me that your damned religion is…”

“Punishment of sins can be quite extravagant.”

Idaho hooked a thumb over his shoulder toward the world outside the door. “All this talk about death penalties… that flogging and…”

“I try to dispense with casual laws and prisons wherever possible.”

“You have to have some prisons!”

“Do I? Prisons are needed only to provide the illusion that courts and police are effective. They’re a kind of job insurance.”

Idaho turned slightly and thrust a pointing finger toward the door through which he had entered the small room. “You’ve got whole planets that are nothing but prisons!”

“I guess you could think of anywhere as a prison if that’s the way your illusions go.”

“Illusions!” Idaho dropped his hand to his side and stood dumbfounded.

“Yes. You talk of prisons and police and legalities, the perfect illusions behind which a prosperous power structure can operate while observing, quite accurately, that it is above its own laws.”

“And you think crimes can be dealt with by…”

“Not crimes, Duncan, sins.”

“So you think your religion can…”

“Have you noted the primary sins?”

“What?”

“Attempting to corrupt a member of my government, and corruption by a member of my government.”

“And what is this corruption?”

“Essentially, it’s the failure to observe and worship the holiness of the God Leto.”

“You?”

“Me.”

“But you told me right at the beginning that…”

“You think I don’t believe in my own godhead? Be careful, Duncan.”

Idaho’s voice came with angry flatness. ”You told me that one of my jobs was to help keep your secret, that you…”

“You don’t know my secret.”

“That you’re a tyrant? That’s no…”

“Gods have more power than tyrants, Duncan.”

“I don’t like what I’m hearing.”

“When has an Atreides ever asked you to like your job?”

“You ask me to command your Fish Speakers who are judge, jury and executioner and…” Idaho broke off.

“And what?”

Idaho remained silent.

Leto stared across the chill distance between them, so short a space yet so far.

It’s like playing a fish on a line, Leto thought. You must calculate the breaking point of every element in the contest.

The problem with Idaho was that bringing him to the net always hastened his end. And it was happening too rapidly this time. Leto felt sadness.

“I won’t worship you,” Idaho said.

“The Fish Speakers recognize that you have a special dispensation,” Leto said.

“Like Moneo and Siona?”

“Much different.”

“So rebels are a special case.”

Leto grinned. “All of my most trusted administrators were rebels at one time.”

“I wasn’t a…”

“You were a brilliant rebel! You helped the Atreides wrest an empire from a reigning monarch.”