Bijaz

Bijaz was a member of the Bene Tleilax and a prescient dwarf, immune to the prescience of others, who spoke cryptically in riddles and rhymes. Having lived many previous ghola lives, he was made a hidden instrument in the conspiracy against the Emperor Paul Atreides, Muad'Dib, serving both as a living register of the plotters' names and as the means to control the ghola of Duncan Idaho known as Hayt.

The conspiracy#

Bijaz had lived many previous ghola lives. He was bought by Otheym during Muad'Dib's Jihad, who believed the Bene Tleilax had thrown him away, and in 10209 AG he was given to the Emperor Paul Atreides as a means of acquiring the names of the conspirators plotting against him. He was, in truth, a human distrans containing the names of every plotter. His hidden purpose, however, was to control the first ghola of Duncan Idaho, the mentat called Hayt.

When the dwarf was confined to the keep, Hayt was ordered to question him, but Bijaz's answers were at first as obscure as his usual manner of speaking. During the conversation he refused to call the ghola Hayt, insisting that he was Duncan Idaho, and using the secret whistling language of the Bene Tleilax he implanted in him the command to kill the Emperor when Paul was in the depths of grief. Duncan did, however, draw from him the full list of the conspirators.

Failure and death#

When the ghola confronted Paul after the death of Chani, the trauma restored his pre-ghola memories and he spared the Emperor. The Tleilaxu had prepared a contingency, intending to use Idaho as proof that gholas could regain their memories and to offer a ghola of Chani as a bargaining chip. The Face Dancer Scytale bargained with Paul on these terms but was killed by him. The plan had still not wholly failed, and Bijaz escaped his confinement to approach a worn-out Paul and Duncan with the same offer once more. Paul refused, and ordered Idaho to kill the dwarf to remove any further temptation.

Hayt and his makers#

Hayt first met Bijaz before regaining his original memories and took an instant dislike to him, mistrusting the dwarf and finding his provocative use of the name Duncan Idaho distressing. Yet the two shared a fundamental connection, for they had been grown in the same Tleilaxu axolotl tank, which led Bijaz to compare them to brothers. When Hayt asked what the dwarf intended to do with him, Bijaz said only that he would do him a simple kindness. After Duncan's memories returned and Paul ordered the dwarf's death, Idaho obeyed without hesitation, saying that he had been the one to do Bijaz the kindness. Some held that Bijaz was himself a Tleilaxu Master, owing to his mention of having lived multiple pasts, which would have placed him above the Face Dancer Scytale in the hierarchy of the Bene Tleilax.