Dune Wiki
Register
Advertisement
Dune Wiki
Ordune This article or section refers to elements from Original Dune
There are separate pages for this subject as it appears in the other canons such as Scytale in Expanded Dune and Scytale in the Dune Encyclopedia

Scytale [d. 10210 AG] was a Face Dancer of the Bene Tleilax, and later the youngest Masheikh and the last Tleilaxu Master, who played a prominent role in major historical events that spanned more than five thousand years.

Biography[]

Face Dancer[]

Scytale was originally born as a Tleilaxu Face Dancer during the last decades of the Corrino Empire.

At the end of Muad’Dib’s Jihad, the Tleilaxu directly participated through Scytale in the plot to destroy the royal family with the gift to Paul-Muad'DIb Atreides of Hayt, the ghola of Duncan Idaho, secretly hoping to use Hayt to finally figure out how to restore a ghola's memories rather than using him to kill Paul.

Scytale was first sent to Wallach IX as the Tleilaxu representative in the conspiracy, and then to the Imperial capital of Arrakis, where he killed Farok, his blind son and their neighbor's daughter Lichna, who he impersonated, coming to the Emperor Muad’Dib as her to arrange his own collection of the secret Tleilaxu Master Bijaz, who was instrumental in reawakening Hayt’s memories as Duncan by getting him to attempt and fail to kill Paul.

When Chani Kynes died; giving birth to the twins Leto Atreides II and Ghanima Atreides, Scytale, seeing how Duncan had been successfully reawakened, revealed to Paul that this had been the plan all along, unleashing his ultimatum: he would kill the newborn children, or Paul could make a deal with the Tleilaxu by giving them Chani’s flesh with which they would make and reawaken a ghola. Scytale was, however, killed by Paul with the help of his newborn son.

Rebirth and promotion[]

The Tleilaxu, who had now learned how to renew the flesh and reawaken the memories of a ghola, had now achieved a kind of immortality through gholas, although they condensed this new power into a single government whose potency was confined lest it be demanded everywhere. Scytale, as the one who had made this new eternal life possible, was the first to be brought back to life, reawakened and promoted to a Tleilaxu Master.

Masheikh[]

By the time of the return Honored Matres to the Old Empire, Scytale had become the youngest and most junior member of the nine Masheikhs who made up the Tleilaxu ruling Council. He armed the faithful on the order of the Mahai, Twylyth Waff, as the Bene Tleilax set out to conquer humanity and convert it to their Great Belief.

Shortly before the Mahai Waff died in the Battle of Rakis and the Honored Matres destroyed Tleilax and all of the planets of the Bene Tleilax, practically ending Tleilaxu civilisation, Scytale left Bandalong and sought sanctuary on the planet Junction and sought sanctuary with the Spacing Guild or CHOAM, but was taken aboard a Bene Gesserit spy ship and brought to Chapterhouse.

Last Tleilaxu Master[]

On Chapterhouse, Scytale was imprisoned aboard a huge planet-bound no-ship. He informed the Sisters of how to grow a ghola in an axolotl tank but not how to use a tank to make the spice melange. He remained imprisoned on Chapterhouse for a decade.

However, when Reverend Mother Sheeana, the Sisterhood's Miles Teg ghola, and a Duncan Idaho ghola escaped on the ship he became a willing passenger in their flight into uncharted space. Within his body lay a vial containing genetic samples of numerous individuals, including the Tleilaxu Masters, making it possible for him to recreate his culture, as well as many of the Atreides line and their servants.

Images[]


Appearances[]

Behind the scenes[]

It is likely that Scytale's name alludes to both the cryptographic baton used by the ancient Greeks and Romans, also called a scytale, and the venomous pit viper Agkistrodon found in North America.

Adaptations[]

In the 2003 miniseries Frank Herbert's Children of Dune, Scytale is portrayed by Martin McDougall. In the unfinished David Lynch Dune sequel script, the Baron's doctor played in Dune by Leonardo Cimino was to be revealed to have been Scytale.[1]

References[]

Advertisement