Marie Fenring

Marie Fenring was the daughter of the late na-Baron Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen and the Lady Margot Fenring. She had her mother's blond hair and features together with her father's pale blue eyes. Raised by Margot and her husband Count Hasimir Fenring as both an assassin and a Bene Gesserit, Marie was groomed from infancy to be the instrument by which the Fenrings would seize the Imperial throne from Paul Atreides.

Upbringing and time on Thalidei#

Because Margot Fenring was married to the sterile Count Hasimir Fenring, Marie was raised by him and her mother. The Fenrings trained their child as both an assassin and a Bene Gesserit. Though the Sisterhood had known of Marie from her birth, the Count and the Lady chose to raise her free of the order's direct tutelage, accepting only the sister Tonia Obregah-Xo as her nanny.

Holding their own designs to one day set Marie upon the Imperial throne in place of Paul Atreides, the Fenrings resolved that she should be exposed to a variety of cultures. Among the first groups she lived with were the Bene Tleilax, in their city of Thalidei. As the crisis of Muad'Dib's Jihad reached its height, the Tleilaxu took interest in Marie's abilities, viewing her as a possible fulcrum against Paul's growing authority.

During the year the Fenrings lived at Thalidei, Marie was introduced to Thallo, the unstable Kwisatz Haderach experiment the Tleilaxu were attempting to create. The prime ghola candidate became her friend and confidant, displaying his superior intellect in helping to manage the affairs of the Tleilaxu Masters. When Thallo went unstable, as the Tleilaxu Kwisatz creations were prone to do, and tried to poison all the inhabitants of Thalidei, Marie killed him with ease, earning the respect of the Tleilaxu leaders.

Mission on Arrakis#

In 10198 AG, at the age of six, the Fenrings judged Marie ready for her mission and had her accepted into Paul's court on Arrakis as a playmate for his young sister Alia Atreides. It was discovered that Marie possessed an enhanced resistance to poison when she and Alia played with scorpions. Otherwise the time the two girls shared was much as for any school-aged children, spent in games and learning.

Six months later, at a banquet attended by her visiting parents, the Fenrings executed their carefully planned attempt on Paul's life. Though security was high, Marie came within feet of murdering the Emperor before Alia killed her first, stabbing her deep with a blade and earning the name "Alia of the Knife". Moments later, Margot's revelation of her daughter's true paternity startled Paul enough that Hasimir was able to stab him mortally with the famed Emperor's Blade. The concubine Chani gave Paul the poisonous Water of Life, which he used to slow his metabolism and repair his body, surviving the wound. Rather than execute the Fenrings, Paul banished them to permanent exile on Salusa Secundus, there to contemplate having raised their only daughter as an instrument of death, alongside the deposed Shaddam Corrino IV whom they hated and distrusted.