Paul can withstand the scrutiny of the great Pthumerian. When she strikes the earth to shaking, he remembers the old man of the desert, the angel of the beach, the conqueror wyrm of the ocean come to claim him. He is before the vast, consuming eye of the universe, and he looks back into it from the threshold of a shadowed place.
But she speaks of Kaworu's contrition, and his heart clamors. She turns her gazeless sight to Midoriya's protests, and Paul goes tensely coiled next to the turbulent storm of Midoriya's rippling power inside the encircling anchor of his arm.
(If she touches him, either of them, Paul will fall back across that threshold. He will ignite in retribution, he will make himself a scourge. Black, cold knowledge lays a stilling hand on the back of his neck.)
But she pivots back to Paul, and the future clarifies. He called her. He knew what she might ask, what she almost surely would ask, the sacrifice not complete until she does. He swallows a citric acid scald in the back of his throat, something hot and vital loose in the dark hollow of his skull. Blood trickles from his nose, unfelt, as his palm still pulses in rhythm.
"I confess," he says, tongue heavy, "I confess to sacrilege against my Patron, Mariana, and her domain. To abuse of my power, to domination of others' will, to theft of their freedom. I confess to profaning of the blood," and he hitches in Midoriya's hold with a stuttering inhale. It is slippery as cool grey stone from a faraway sea, a hundred times as heavy.
"I confess to murder, twice over." He won't look away from her, however hard her regard falls across him, as long as it stays with him. "I confess to being a traitor to my House, an oathbreaker. Faithless."
They may as well be two kinds of killing. Jamis, the pirate. The heart of House Atreides. His heart. They jumble together in his thoughts, a roil of guilt and shame and intangible, impossible loss.
His father would have wept to see what Paul did.
"I am at your mercy," Paul says, in a stranger's soft, accepting voice, "I ask for The Reckoning."
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But she speaks of Kaworu's contrition, and his heart clamors. She turns her gazeless sight to Midoriya's protests, and Paul goes tensely coiled next to the turbulent storm of Midoriya's rippling power inside the encircling anchor of his arm.
(If she touches him, either of them, Paul will fall back across that threshold. He will ignite in retribution, he will make himself a scourge. Black, cold knowledge lays a stilling hand on the back of his neck.)
But she pivots back to Paul, and the future clarifies. He called her. He knew what she might ask, what she almost surely would ask, the sacrifice not complete until she does. He swallows a citric acid scald in the back of his throat, something hot and vital loose in the dark hollow of his skull. Blood trickles from his nose, unfelt, as his palm still pulses in rhythm.
"I confess," he says, tongue heavy, "I confess to sacrilege against my Patron, Mariana, and her domain. To abuse of my power, to domination of others' will, to theft of their freedom. I confess to profaning of the blood," and he hitches in Midoriya's hold with a stuttering inhale. It is slippery as cool grey stone from a faraway sea, a hundred times as heavy.
"I confess to murder, twice over." He won't look away from her, however hard her regard falls across him, as long as it stays with him. "I confess to being a traitor to my House, an oathbreaker. Faithless."
They may as well be two kinds of killing. Jamis, the pirate. The heart of House Atreides. His heart. They jumble together in his thoughts, a roil of guilt and shame and intangible, impossible loss.
His father would have wept to see what Paul did.
"I am at your mercy," Paul says, in a stranger's soft, accepting voice, "I ask for The Reckoning."