d not involve speculation about the 'long knife ' of the title One might suspect Goya posed a threat to House Knn itself, but his appetite was neither for conquest nor governmental power As a twisted mentat, Sohdar can be contrasted with the more normal Barkale-zon-Rale, the ' Compassionate Brain' from Har This scion of a Great House, after a hedonistic youth, was discovered to have mentat capability, and he began training Once graduated, he combined his natural compassion and his mentat training toward improving living standards on several planets within the Har system What is noteworthy here is that mentat training capitalized upon and benefited from Barkale's natural characteristics It was the standard practice of the legitimate Mentat schools to select admirable individuals as students Tleilaxu mentals, born from axo-lotl tanks, woe a separate breed, displaying artificially produced characteristics That these traits Were often odious speaks as much against the Tleilaxu as against the Great Houses who were Bene Tlcilax supporters Gharant the Player, produced for House Keys in its private cheops war with House Borgoi, demonstrated the encouragement of the Great Houses These two houses decided upon a cheops tournament to settle their disputes House Revs observed that no rules bound behavior during play, and they sent a requisition to the Tieilaxu Gharant the Player was created as a supreme cheops master He stood four meters tall, had long, dangling arms and a drooping, expressive face Given to mumbling, shrieking, guttural explosions as well as sudden, incoherent movements of his arms and legs, he constantly unnerved his opponents The total effect drove some of them to hysteria-especially when after a brilliant move, Gharant would salivate and sing to himself Outside of cheops tournaments Gharant had no life Once House Borgoi resigned in defeat, Gharant fell into despair and soon became catatonic, a state of little matter to House Keys, which had no further use for him One of the most subtle Tleilaxu mentals was Hamle the Paralyzer (4815-4897), ordered by the Emperor Mikael II after his restoration from cryogenic suspension Hamle served as a roving Imperial ambassador without-portfoho, passing himself off as a confidant of Mikael through whom unoffi cial communications could be sent Charming handsome, magnanimous, and eloquent, Hamle became popular with the Great Houses, whose leaders eventually took him into their conli-dence and sought his counsel m endeavors relating to House Cornno By his advice Hamle proceeded to hamstring them So great was his computational ability, but so in volvcd and convoluted his arguments, that he provided his victims no valuable advice whatsoever Points were met with counter points of such complexities and intricacies that those who listened were rendered comatose by Hamle s "pale cast of tiiought " But such was Hamle s decisive presence that he was given no blame at all for this paralysis The Bene Tleilax never lacked customers, and there were numerous twisted mentals Multifesl Hydros, the menial-politician who possessed seven different personalities, Piter de Vnes, House Harkonncn's effeminate psychopathic killer, Luao Twine* the mentat-hermaphrodile whose courtesan palace disguised a notorious web of intrigue.