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There are some sounds that one only needs to encounter once to remember forever; a blade unsheathed in wrath; the thrumming of a shield activated; the muted sandwalk of Fremen approaching; and here, at the break of dawn, the spice heady in the air with an orange glow, Gurney hears something that he never thought he would hear again – the footsteps of Paul Atreides.
The Preacher isn’t alone. There is the softer footfall of a child at his side, leading him to Gurney, and then retreating quickly, allowing them some privacy.
“We don’t have long”, Paul says, his voice softer now than it was during their first conversation. The words are sharp with a finality that Gurney should have seen coming, but lord; he did not. How could he expect a goodbye now that they have only just found each other? How could he listen to Leto ordering him to keep Paul safe no matter what, arguing that Gurney is his sanctuary; how could he hear these things and expect their journey to end just as it has begun?
Gurney sucks in a steadying breath, as if he has any hope of stilling the roiling chaos in his chest – the way it threatens to overwhelm him; nausea; the vertigo; the tears at the corners of his eyes – and then he turns to Paul, a harsh tension in his shoulders as he does so, because he must hold himself back not to reach for him immediately.
Paul is not a stranger – he never will be – but it is how he wants to be perceived. After everything they have been through, Gurney could at least do his best to grant him this wish.
Still. The sun’s burning rays spread over the dunes like spilled wine, unknowing, unbothered in what its light will bring. With it, the wind rises, the nightly breeze whipped into a frenzy, and at the heart of this world stands a man shaped by the desert. Old before his time, not despite the spice, but because of it. Long hair rustled by the wind; the stubble of a greying beard; all of it framing a sharp jawline, soft lips, the scars where his eyes once were. His skin is darkened by the sun, wrinkles carved into it by grief, pain – by the nature of Arrakis itself.
The Preacher does not look like the Paul Gurney remembers. He does not carry his head high, his shoulders back, and there’s no knowing smile to be found at the corner of his mouth.
And yet, he speaks with that same sharp wit, his voice layered with rhetoric and heartbreak – because beneath it all, beneath every role that Paul has played through the years, there are some things that are not an act. Some things that remain true, nestled at his very core, and these things can never be taken from him. Not for as long as he lives.
Gurney remembers the young man who left Caladan long, long ago; the deep, clever green of his eyes. He remembers the man he reunited with after the fall of House Atreides; eyes blue-in-blue with spice. Now, before him, Paul stands unseeing, and Gurney wishes he had words to express just how much this meeting means to him.
His love is light through a prism. He can name the green, the blue, the colors of the rainbow; but he cannot find words for the light itself. He has loved Paul beyond reason, beyond hope. He has mourned him twice, already, and he cannot fathom the pain of mourning him a third, the grief already building in his chest in the face of the inevitable.
“What will you do?” His voice barely carries, a rough broken thing, but Paul takes to it like he has spoken calmly, tenderly; he sways forward, incrementally so, but it’s enough that Gurney takes a few steps towards him – just to ensure that he is within reach, should Paul wish to touch him.
“Leto is heading for Arrakeen. I will go with him.” Paul speaks with a forced steadiness, moving his head as he does so, searching, an undercurrent of anxiety to it – perhaps worried that he can’t know for certain that he’s facing Gurney as he speaks. “I will give one last sermon, and I will meet my end on the steps of the temple.”
Gurney bites hard at the inside of his bottom lip, struggling not to protest - not to give word to the shock; the rage; the grief.
He knows full well that there is nothing he could say. Many years have passed since he could order Paul to do anything, and even then, it was mostly out of courtesy that his orders were obeyed at all.
“Let me go with you.”
“Gurney…” and Paul says it so tenderly, not exactly smiling, but something soft at the corner of his mouth now, and Gurney never thought Paul would speak to him like this again. He thought this intimacy forever lost to the sands.
“Let me stay by your side.”
Paul shakes his head, holding his breath for a drawn-out moment – long enough that Gurney starts to worry on his behalf – and it clearly takes everything in his power not to give in.
“I cannot.”
Gurney isn’t sure that he has ever begged. Not since the pits. Not for years and years and years. If there was ever a living soul who could bring him to his knees, who could make him beg, it is Paul, and Gurney wishes to beg now, because Paul is alive.
Paul is real and he is breathing and he is standing right in front of Gurney, and Gurney would give him everything. Everything. If Paul just allowed him to stay by his side, Gurney would follow him anywhere – even the temple steps.
“Please, I would…”
“I need you to live.” Paul says it with the finality from before, like this is a choice that, ultimately, is not hard for him to make. “If you stay away from the city, you will.”
“Then, does that mean”, and Gurney is stumbling over the words, stumbling to suggest something he has no right suggesting. “Should you stay - with me - would that…?”
Paul bites at his lip, and he looks nothing like himself, and he looks only like himself; a simple gesture carried through the decades, this essence of him, and god, how Gurney loves him. He loves him.
What he wouldn’t do to close the distance between them and hold him to his chest. To feel his heartbeat and offer even an inkling of the tenderness that he deserves.
“I have to go”, Paul says, finally, voice all gravel now, rough with tears that will not fall. “He’s my son.”
Gurney nods, wordlessly, feeling foolish for doing so, but he’s trying to remember how to breathe. Trying to center himself even a little, so that he can offer Paul some kind of support that would be worth a damn. “I may not have sired children, but I know why you have to do this. Trust me. I know."
“You raised a boy once.” Paul says it quietly, with a wry expression bordering on a smile, and then he stumbles forward, the final step needed to bring the two of them together; for his hands to grasp Gurney’s shoulders in an attempt to steady himself.
Paul lets out a huff as they crash together, as if he could bristle just from the misstep, and something about that quick anger, the failure of masking it at all, has Gurney feel like his heart could burst out of his chest. It leaves him breathless, so overwhelmed at how real it all is; Paul in his arms; Paul, wearing his heart on his sleeve, after all this time.
Gurney cannot help the chuckle that escapes him – cannot help how it comes out broken on a sob – and Paul is still holding on to him, and maybe he is selfish, but he considers it enough of an invite to touch him in return. To raise a trembling hand to Paul’s face, and cradle his cheek, and feel that warm skin beneath the palm of his hand.
God, he knows that Paul has no way of knowing how Gurney’s looking at him in this moment, but Gurney hopes beyond hope that he remembers; that he thinks back to all their years together; that he remembers the sparring room on Caladan and their reunion in the dunes. He prays that Paul remembers the warmth that Gurney holds only for him.
“And how did I do, raising that boy?”
Paul allows himself to smile, then; a smile that spreads slowly, brilliantly, like the rising sun, and for a moment so brief that it’s barely there at all, he leans into Gurney’s touch. Nuzzles into his palm, breathing him in, looking like he wishes nothing more than to linger, but not allowing himself to.
In the very next instant, Paul straightens up, just enough that Gurney’s hand falls from his face to his throat, then shoulder. Paul’s hands, however, are still on Gurney’s chest, fingers digging into the material of his stillsuit.
“You did just fine, old man”, Paul says, voice soft, like he lingers in the touch in his mind still; even after he has put some distance between them. “The odds were stacked against you.”
And is such a condemnation of all that Paul is, years of regret and self-hatred nestled in words that are almost flippant.
“I know you do not wish to hear it”, Gurney starts, because this is not a time for keeping his thoughts to himself, “but I am proud of you.”
Paul does not ask what he has done to earn Gurney’s pride. He does not protest, nor does he seem to accept the praise. The wind continues to rise, the cool of night whisked away like it was never here at all, and they stand here, at the center of what could grow into a desert storm should they stay long enough, but time is running out.
Time has been running out for a while now.
“I abandoned the path, and my son had to take my place. The universe asks so much of him – too much – and he will give it everything.” Paul falters, his voice unable to carry the weight of his sorrow. “The least I could do is follow him on this path.”
And what can Gurney say to that? How could he possibly argue, when he knows that it would only cause the both of them more pain?
“There are so many things I wish for…” and Gurney trails off, voice breaking, because there is nothing left to say – no words to convey what he holds in his heart – and yet, he tries. God, he tries, and he fails, but it's better than nothing. “You deserved so much better.”
Paul’s lips are pressed together tightly, like he’s trying to keep in a sob, or perhaps, like he doesn’t wish to disagree with Gurney at a moment like this. The silence spreads, and it builds, and for a brief, brief moment, it’s beautiful; for a moment it’s like countless silences they’ve shared; it’s like sinking into the Caladan sea, carried by the soothing waves.
“Would you lead me to him?”
Gurney wipes at his eyes with the back of his hand – salt and water and dust – and lets out a shivery breath that in no way steadies him. “Aye.”
He trails a hand down Paul’s arm, just to ensure that he is aware of where Gurney is, what he is intending, but it is Paul who hooks his arm with Gurney’s. Who presses up against his side, close enough that Gurney can feel the scent of earth; vetiver; petrichor; this preacher of the desert, still carrying his old home within his skin.
Together, they turn toward the sun, walking into a new day, and Gurney cannot see beyond this moment – cannot possibly imagine what his life will be like, come evening – but for now, however briefly, he is allowed at Paul’s side.
One last time.