Bag over one shoulder, the neck of his nine-string baliset clutched in the other hand, an ugly lump of a man stands before you. His hands are long-fingered with big thumbs, full of tiny moevements that draw such delicate music from the baliset. His glass-splinter eyes gleam of savage understanding and his wispy blond hair trails across barren spots on his head. His wide mouth is twisted into a pleasant sneer, and the scar of the inkvine whip slashed across his jawline seems to move with a life of its own. His whole air is of casual, shoulder-set capability.
Music is life, and song the fruit of the orchard.
Allow me to offer you a piece to savor. The beginning is a very delicate time. Know then that it is the year 10,191. The Known Universe is ruled by the Padishah Emperor, Shaddam IV, my father. In this time the most precious substance in the universe is the spice, melange.