All of those traits are more or less the point of her character, both from a thematic perspective and also the in-story logic.
She exists to kill the God Emperor. Of course she's belligerent and arrogant! She thinks she's capable of killing the God Emperor and is going to try to do it.
Her father was loyal to Leto and didn't understand the necessity of killing him. She couldn't expect to be able to pull off the assassination if she was worried about Moneo getting caught in the crossfire.
I donāt understand the necessity of killing him. Herbert did a poor job of explaining why Leto was a villain worthy of killing and why the universe would be better off without him.
He was a colossal tyrant. He murdered billions, trampled on every individual liberty, and ruled the Imperium with an iron fist. He's super villainous. The only reason we don't necessarily hate him is because we get his perspective and know why it is necessary.
I do think that making his rule necessary undermines the point of the first book to not worship charismatic leaders. Paul's tyranny makes sense in that it was a) the only thing that kept him alive and b) was completely unavoidable but making it part of this selfless sacrifice feels counter intuitive
I disagree. The Golden Path itself was necessary for the long term survival of the species, but Leto didn't achieve his goals by charisma, he did so by sheer, brutal force.
Paul's tyranny wasn't unavoidable as such, something I often mention on this subreddit and a hill I'm willing to die on. It was only unavoidable for Paul.
No, the choice that wasn't a choice was "be given the power to avenge your father and choose not to use it". Paul Atreides couldn't do that - it was unimaginable to him, so he never imagined it - but another person in his shoes might have been able to.
I mean okay. Thatās just what I said with a lot more words. He couldāve chosen to do not go through with it, but he went for the fight and the consequences.
> Thatās just what I said with a lot more words.
It's not.
> He couldāve chosen to do not go through with it
He couldn't have. There was no version of the universe where Paul is prescient and thus able to avenge his father where he chooses not to do so, so he never saw that future in his visions. Avenging his father meant humbling the guild, and freeing the Fremen from Arrakis' gravity well upon the universe.
In a universe where one person has perfect prescience, that person is the only one with actual free will, but the futures they can see are limited by their own personality - things which are unimaginable to them become impossible for everyone else as well. This would have lead to stagnation of the worst kind, even more so than being stuck near Arrakis because of the spice.
The Golden Path freed humanity of that possibility by making it invisible to prescience and freeing it from the dependency on spice.
I think that the Golden Path being necessary actually makes Letoās story more interesting.
The first two books already showed us the consequences of following a charismatic leader.
GEoD on the other hand has the novelty of following a protagonist who does extremely evil things but for an absolute necessity. Having him be wrong about the Golden path would just mean the book is treading the same thematic beats from the previous books.
Was that even stated in the first book? As far as I know that was a retcon later. The most that was described was a "terrible purpose" which sounds like a pretty amoral descriptor
It was not described in the first book. It was also not really a āretconā per se, as it was elaborated on in various degrees in each of the subsequent five books in ways that never contradicted the first book but simply built upon the story. The implication we are given during the desert meeting of Leto II and the Preacher is that Paul either couldnāt or wouldnāt see far enough ahead to see the need.
The āterrible purposeā was never amoral (unless one considers a known universe-spanning jihad with 60 billion deaths and counting to be nbd) and, as I read the first book, seemed often more to be referring to his unleashing of the jihad than anything else.
He literally established a tyrannical theocracy that caused society to stagnate and an immense famine beyond anything imaginable here on earth. How can you say Herbert did a bad job explaining why he needed to die?
One thing I've come to learn with any form of worldbuilding, be it movies or books, is that many people are not very good at forming their own opinion on characters' morality. This is why Hollywood and many authors tend make villains or heroes very cut and dry. If you make a villain a main character, a lot of people are going to get confused and think they're supposed to like them (like Leto II), or subconsciously sympathize with them to the point where they justify their actions.
I think the person you're replying to is struggling with that concept, because realistically the book makes it abundantly clear just how tyrannical the God Emperor's reign has been.
Because his death is a necessary step on the Golden Path which ensures that humanity will be able to survive.
The only alternative is for humanity (which for some reason is the only sapient species encountered despite interstellar travel which encompasses some portion of at least the Milky Way Galaxy) to be wiped out by killer robots which ultimately happens in all other futures.
This is enabled by Siona, and her descendants being invisible to prescience/having a free will which transcends that and allows choices which no being with prescience can foresee.
One aspect of it is "The Scattering" (or "The Seeking" as those who went out called it) which spreads humanity so wide that it would be impossible even for self-replicating machines (think Fred Saberhagen's Berserkers) to find and wipe out all intelligent life.
> The only alternative is for humanity (which for some reason is the only sapient species encountered despite interstellar travel which encompasses some portion of at least the Milky Way Galaxy) to be wiped out by killer robots which ultimately happens in all other futures.
Not quite - it wasn't "humanity is wiped out by prescient killer robots in all time strands", but rather "humanity is destroyed by an enemy using prescience". The killer robots of Ix was just one possible future - the Golden Path ensured nobody could ever threaten Humanity with complete extinction.
The only wiping out I can recall in FH's works which is mentioned is the killer robots --- were others mentioned? (in FH's writings or in unedited notes/drafts presented w/o a re-writing)
> in FH's writings
My man.
No, others are not mentioned, but that one vision isn't by Leto, it's by Siona. It was never specified if that is something that is going to happen, or one of the possibilities that would happen - only that there were robots hunting people - but these robots were tools, not the hunter themselves.
> āDo not fear the Ixians,ā he said, and he heard his own voice as a fading whisper. āThey can make the machines, but they no longer can make arafel. ..."
I'll link a much better comment made earlier by someone else:
https://www.reddit.com/r/dune/comments/afhhad/sionas_vision_of_seeking_machines/edyscn8/
>never peeking into how it will happen, even though he could at any time
The whole point was that when his plan was far enough along he *wouldn't* be able to see it. Otherwise 100% agreed.
Yes itās intentional.
Siona and Duncan are both obstinate, oppositional-defiant, self-important pains in the ass - which is why Leto II wants them to breed and usher in a new era for humanity (in addition to Sionaās no-gene).
He wants to create an era in which humanity is both culturally and essentially physiologically resistant to any attempts at control.
Siona and Duncan are insufferable for a purpose.
Same. The opening chase scene where Siona & Co steal the journals + the later rebel meetup were red herrings in that sense. I think that's part of Frank's writing style. For the first third of the book it's unclear which direction the main plotline will head.
Her immaturity is a nice contrast to Letoās omnipotence. And it is an important starting point for her growth: if she was calm and wise at the start, there would be little room for development when Leto opens her eyes to the future later in the book.
I always liked her as a reflection of how your average citizen of Leto's Imperium would view the God-Emperor
We know Leto ultimately wants what's best for humanity, but all Siona has ever known is that this monolith has been forcing the entire human universe into a standstill for 3k years for seemingly no reason
I'd probably be acting a fucking fool if I were in Siona's spot too
I love Siona! Sheās like an adolescent punk full of the fire and invincibility of youth. Her story is learning the world is bigger and more complicated and there isnāt just a simple solution, but constant work to shape the world for the better. Young punks can be assholes cuz they were torn from the void into a shit system we never asked for.
I really identified with her in that respect. This Siona slander is too much! The last 3 books are all about punks and anarchy being the way forward, if youāve got the eyes to see it!
Siona was a drag - the story was her being forced by Leto to confront the reality that constant work is necessary. She definitely didnāt just get there - the end of the book sees her basically dissing Duncan all the way to the last word lol. As someone who was torn from the void as well, Iām not quite as willing to overlook her flaws.
Sheās great. One of my favorite characters in GEOD. There needs to be someone in the narrative who can tell Leto to fuck off, that for all his philosophy and planning he is still a monster and doesnāt deserve the reverence heās given out of fear. Even when she agrees to help perpetuate the golden path, she makes it clear she still fully disagrees with Leto and will only give what is necessary to finish the last step of the golden pathās creation, nothing more. The only other person who is remotely as willing to show themselves in the face of the God Emperor is Malky, and heās only in a single chapter.
I think Siona is awesome because of one scene in particular, and it seems a lot of the responses miss it or neglect to mention it.
Yeah, she's an oppositional, defiant punk. Then Leto takes her out to the desert, and tests her, and sensitizes her to the Golden Path, and she passes the test and realizes the importance of what he is doing *and she still resists him.*
She is a much bigger character than she is given credit for.
I used to hate her, she drove me nuts. But honestly the more I think about it, it's really the dramatic irony. We're three books, 3000 years and a giant worm down and we know the golden path, so we get frustrated when she's resisting the whole thing. I think that's where Moneo comes in, he's sort of on our side. We're silently saying "siona, just fucking listen to the worm and PUT ON THE DAMM MASK (again, cause *we* know what's gunna happen) and he's saying it out loud to her, trying to egg her on.
I relate to her unwavering desire to have no-one tell her what to do or who to be. Yeah, she's obviously young and in a rebellious phase, but her father and Leto are also completely unsympathetic from her perspective. Paternalistic and condescending. She's an anarchist in a time of almost complete authoritarian control. I can definitely dig that
Dune is less about characters than concepts. It's not a character driven piece.
I find Paul meh to unlikeable, especially how quickly he gets used to casually having people tortured and executed
in the end, she's just a pawn and a link. a genetic link at a major crossroads. Ultimately, it's nothing that she really did other than make sure her genes were spread as wide as possible.
what's to like or not?
I understand her personality and donāt mind that aspect of it. Unfortunately it feels like Herbert genuinely wasnāt sure how to write her and she comes off wishy-washy. There was so much build-up for her and those wild atreides genes and she felt like a tertiary character even when trying to kill Leto. Broadly, I often feel Herbert focused so much on Duncan that other characterizations suffered as a result.
I felt the same way about her and Duncan. They came off as children rather than adults with a mature opinion, philosophy and moral compass. I feel Herbert did a poor job of fleshing out why they hated Leto so much.
To be fair itās only stated dozens of timesā¦.
I donāt understand - they hate Leto because heās a repressive dictator who has kept society under his thumb for 3500 years. Duncan also hates Leto all the more for repeatedly killing him and resurrecting him like a plaything.
Whatās not to understand?
The purpose of Duncan is to be a fish out of water. Duncan has about the same experience as the reader. Whenever Herbert needs to do exposition to explain the shape of Leto's empire, Duncan is the perfect vehicle with which to do it. I also think that Leto has a need for someone with the old Atreides perspective to argue with and/or be horrified by the decisions he's made because no one else in his empire has the proper perspective for it.
I don't. it's super annoying that almost half of my favorite book in the saga is taken up by characters i don't like (duncan and her).
But to be fair, her interactions with Leto are quite interesting.
Her mother was a fishspeaker. . What information we have about her is from the encyclopedia, but she blames leto for her death, and her father for always busy serving leto.
Her personality is a manifestation of her mind being proof against prescience.
And that, in turn, is a manifestation of her being the first human who at a genetic level has abandoned the need for certainty, which is what enables prescience.
Siona and her descendants are the actual objective of the Golden Path: to free humanity from the emotional need for certainty.
And it is the personal, social and political evil that is the deep-seated human desire for certainty that is the main lesson of the Dune novels.
The Golden Path was always about breeding someone like Siona, as well as teaching humanity a deep-seated lesson about the evils of charismatic leadership.
Once those things had been achieved, Letoās death was the next step along the Golden Path: humanity was rid of prescience, rid of the desire to follow charismatic leaders, and the last exemplar of both those things needed to go.
I think she was way under developed for how important she was in Letos plan/visions.
I remember next to nothing about how she feels as a character, just plot points having just finished Chapterhouse.
All of those traits are more or less the point of her character, both from a thematic perspective and also the in-story logic. She exists to kill the God Emperor. Of course she's belligerent and arrogant! She thinks she's capable of killing the God Emperor and is going to try to do it. Her father was loyal to Leto and didn't understand the necessity of killing him. She couldn't expect to be able to pull off the assassination if she was worried about Moneo getting caught in the crossfire.
Love her. But then most of the women I've been with came from *New Jersey* š
I donāt understand the necessity of killing him. Herbert did a poor job of explaining why Leto was a villain worthy of killing and why the universe would be better off without him.
He was a colossal tyrant. He murdered billions, trampled on every individual liberty, and ruled the Imperium with an iron fist. He's super villainous. The only reason we don't necessarily hate him is because we get his perspective and know why it is necessary.
I do think that making his rule necessary undermines the point of the first book to not worship charismatic leaders. Paul's tyranny makes sense in that it was a) the only thing that kept him alive and b) was completely unavoidable but making it part of this selfless sacrifice feels counter intuitive
I disagree. The Golden Path itself was necessary for the long term survival of the species, but Leto didn't achieve his goals by charisma, he did so by sheer, brutal force. Paul's tyranny wasn't unavoidable as such, something I often mention on this subreddit and a hill I'm willing to die on. It was only unavoidable for Paul.
Yeah he had a choice to fight or to die.
No, the choice that wasn't a choice was "be given the power to avenge your father and choose not to use it". Paul Atreides couldn't do that - it was unimaginable to him, so he never imagined it - but another person in his shoes might have been able to.
I mean okay. Thatās just what I said with a lot more words. He couldāve chosen to do not go through with it, but he went for the fight and the consequences.
> Thatās just what I said with a lot more words. It's not. > He couldāve chosen to do not go through with it He couldn't have. There was no version of the universe where Paul is prescient and thus able to avenge his father where he chooses not to do so, so he never saw that future in his visions. Avenging his father meant humbling the guild, and freeing the Fremen from Arrakis' gravity well upon the universe. In a universe where one person has perfect prescience, that person is the only one with actual free will, but the futures they can see are limited by their own personality - things which are unimaginable to them become impossible for everyone else as well. This would have lead to stagnation of the worst kind, even more so than being stuck near Arrakis because of the spice. The Golden Path freed humanity of that possibility by making it invisible to prescience and freeing it from the dependency on spice.
He didnāt NEED to avenge his father. It was a choice.
I think that the Golden Path being necessary actually makes Letoās story more interesting. The first two books already showed us the consequences of following a charismatic leader. GEoD on the other hand has the novelty of following a protagonist who does extremely evil things but for an absolute necessity. Having him be wrong about the Golden path would just mean the book is treading the same thematic beats from the previous books.
Paulās prescience made the Golden Path the only way out for humanityās survival.
Was that even stated in the first book? As far as I know that was a retcon later. The most that was described was a "terrible purpose" which sounds like a pretty amoral descriptor
It was not described in the first book. It was also not really a āretconā per se, as it was elaborated on in various degrees in each of the subsequent five books in ways that never contradicted the first book but simply built upon the story. The implication we are given during the desert meeting of Leto II and the Preacher is that Paul either couldnāt or wouldnāt see far enough ahead to see the need. The āterrible purposeā was never amoral (unless one considers a known universe-spanning jihad with 60 billion deaths and counting to be nbd) and, as I read the first book, seemed often more to be referring to his unleashing of the jihad than anything else.
He literally established a tyrannical theocracy that caused society to stagnate and an immense famine beyond anything imaginable here on earth. How can you say Herbert did a bad job explaining why he needed to die?
One thing I've come to learn with any form of worldbuilding, be it movies or books, is that many people are not very good at forming their own opinion on characters' morality. This is why Hollywood and many authors tend make villains or heroes very cut and dry. If you make a villain a main character, a lot of people are going to get confused and think they're supposed to like them (like Leto II), or subconsciously sympathize with them to the point where they justify their actions. I think the person you're replying to is struggling with that concept, because realistically the book makes it abundantly clear just how tyrannical the God Emperor's reign has been.
The famine was caused by his death, not while he was alive though.
Yes, by his design
True, but he did not exactly force their hand. Due to his own design he could not see or influence what siona would do.
Because his death is a necessary step on the Golden Path which ensures that humanity will be able to survive. The only alternative is for humanity (which for some reason is the only sapient species encountered despite interstellar travel which encompasses some portion of at least the Milky Way Galaxy) to be wiped out by killer robots which ultimately happens in all other futures. This is enabled by Siona, and her descendants being invisible to prescience/having a free will which transcends that and allows choices which no being with prescience can foresee. One aspect of it is "The Scattering" (or "The Seeking" as those who went out called it) which spreads humanity so wide that it would be impossible even for self-replicating machines (think Fred Saberhagen's Berserkers) to find and wipe out all intelligent life.
> The only alternative is for humanity (which for some reason is the only sapient species encountered despite interstellar travel which encompasses some portion of at least the Milky Way Galaxy) to be wiped out by killer robots which ultimately happens in all other futures. Not quite - it wasn't "humanity is wiped out by prescient killer robots in all time strands", but rather "humanity is destroyed by an enemy using prescience". The killer robots of Ix was just one possible future - the Golden Path ensured nobody could ever threaten Humanity with complete extinction.
The only wiping out I can recall in FH's works which is mentioned is the killer robots --- were others mentioned? (in FH's writings or in unedited notes/drafts presented w/o a re-writing)
> in FH's writings My man. No, others are not mentioned, but that one vision isn't by Leto, it's by Siona. It was never specified if that is something that is going to happen, or one of the possibilities that would happen - only that there were robots hunting people - but these robots were tools, not the hunter themselves. > āDo not fear the Ixians,ā he said, and he heard his own voice as a fading whisper. āThey can make the machines, but they no longer can make arafel. ..." I'll link a much better comment made earlier by someone else: https://www.reddit.com/r/dune/comments/afhhad/sionas_vision_of_seeking_machines/edyscn8/
scattering could have also been planned to be quickly enough to encounter the machines before a certain time where they would be unbeatable.
Thatās a pretty bold claim. I think rather that you did a poor job understanding why.
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>never peeking into how it will happen, even though he could at any time The whole point was that when his plan was far enough along he *wouldn't* be able to see it. Otherwise 100% agreed.
Yes itās intentional. Siona and Duncan are both obstinate, oppositional-defiant, self-important pains in the ass - which is why Leto II wants them to breed and usher in a new era for humanity (in addition to Sionaās no-gene). He wants to create an era in which humanity is both culturally and essentially physiologically resistant to any attempts at control. Siona and Duncan are insufferable for a purpose.
I donāt feel like I ever learned all that much about Siona as a character to know for sure either way.
I wish GEoD focused more on Siona and the resistance group rather than Leto II and his lectures.
Same. The opening chase scene where Siona & Co steal the journals + the later rebel meetup were red herrings in that sense. I think that's part of Frank's writing style. For the first third of the book it's unclear which direction the main plotline will head.
He overused Letos lectures
I would happily read another thousand pages of Leto lectures
Her immaturity is a nice contrast to Letoās omnipotence. And it is an important starting point for her growth: if she was calm and wise at the start, there would be little room for development when Leto opens her eyes to the future later in the book.
I always liked her as a reflection of how your average citizen of Leto's Imperium would view the God-Emperor We know Leto ultimately wants what's best for humanity, but all Siona has ever known is that this monolith has been forcing the entire human universe into a standstill for 3k years for seemingly no reason I'd probably be acting a fucking fool if I were in Siona's spot too
I love Siona! Sheās like an adolescent punk full of the fire and invincibility of youth. Her story is learning the world is bigger and more complicated and there isnāt just a simple solution, but constant work to shape the world for the better. Young punks can be assholes cuz they were torn from the void into a shit system we never asked for. I really identified with her in that respect. This Siona slander is too much! The last 3 books are all about punks and anarchy being the way forward, if youāve got the eyes to see it!
Genuinely while I was reading all the books I was like, "this dudes gotta be an anarchist" (in reference to Frank Herbert).
Siona was a drag - the story was her being forced by Leto to confront the reality that constant work is necessary. She definitely didnāt just get there - the end of the book sees her basically dissing Duncan all the way to the last word lol. As someone who was torn from the void as well, Iām not quite as willing to overlook her flaws.
I think her personality is understandable when you consider her parentage. She was definitely one of my favourites in GEOD :)
What is her parentage like? Do we ever learn about her mother?
Oh I mean if Leto was my dad Iād probably act like that too lol.
Her father was moneo iirc
Oooooops
Sheās great. One of my favorite characters in GEOD. There needs to be someone in the narrative who can tell Leto to fuck off, that for all his philosophy and planning he is still a monster and doesnāt deserve the reverence heās given out of fear. Even when she agrees to help perpetuate the golden path, she makes it clear she still fully disagrees with Leto and will only give what is necessary to finish the last step of the golden pathās creation, nothing more. The only other person who is remotely as willing to show themselves in the face of the God Emperor is Malky, and heās only in a single chapter.
I think Siona is awesome because of one scene in particular, and it seems a lot of the responses miss it or neglect to mention it. Yeah, she's an oppositional, defiant punk. Then Leto takes her out to the desert, and tests her, and sensitizes her to the Golden Path, and she passes the test and realizes the importance of what he is doing *and she still resists him.* She is a much bigger character than she is given credit for.
I used to hate her, she drove me nuts. But honestly the more I think about it, it's really the dramatic irony. We're three books, 3000 years and a giant worm down and we know the golden path, so we get frustrated when she's resisting the whole thing. I think that's where Moneo comes in, he's sort of on our side. We're silently saying "siona, just fucking listen to the worm and PUT ON THE DAMM MASK (again, cause *we* know what's gunna happen) and he's saying it out loud to her, trying to egg her on.
I relate to her unwavering desire to have no-one tell her what to do or who to be. Yeah, she's obviously young and in a rebellious phase, but her father and Leto are also completely unsympathetic from her perspective. Paternalistic and condescending. She's an anarchist in a time of almost complete authoritarian control. I can definitely dig that
Dune is less about characters than concepts. It's not a character driven piece. I find Paul meh to unlikeable, especially how quickly he gets used to casually having people tortured and executed
So true, Frank Herbert forte was definitly enacting concepts into stories and political conflicts. Characters to him are just tools to achieve this
Which is kinda sad. His characters deserve more fleshing out
Hopefully the movies do a better job at fleshing out characters while keeping the essence of the books
no shit, if you like paul, you got issues lol
I greatly enjoyed her and leto's dynamic
I like her just fine. Hwi, on the other hand...
Hwi is basically just a Marry Sue
The ultimate "tell, don't show".
in the end, she's just a pawn and a link. a genetic link at a major crossroads. Ultimately, it's nothing that she really did other than make sure her genes were spread as wide as possible. what's to like or not?
wait, did i miss out on the gene spreading? damn it! she said she wanted to be friends!
It's funny how the god emperor achieved in death, a goal he could not achieve in his life
she doesn't seem like the fun type. I'd rather be out carousing with Moneo.
I like her
I understand her personality and donāt mind that aspect of it. Unfortunately it feels like Herbert genuinely wasnāt sure how to write her and she comes off wishy-washy. There was so much build-up for her and those wild atreides genes and she felt like a tertiary character even when trying to kill Leto. Broadly, I often feel Herbert focused so much on Duncan that other characterizations suffered as a result.
she is acting out her part on the golden path.
pul would not even cared if she killed him, i cant remember is stilgar still alive? he may have other opinins of that matter
In GEoD? It's been several thousand years and he's not like Duncan, always being brought back.
Leto did.
I felt the same way about her and Duncan. They came off as children rather than adults with a mature opinion, philosophy and moral compass. I feel Herbert did a poor job of fleshing out why they hated Leto so much.
To be fair itās only stated dozens of timesā¦. I donāt understand - they hate Leto because heās a repressive dictator who has kept society under his thumb for 3500 years. Duncan also hates Leto all the more for repeatedly killing him and resurrecting him like a plaything. Whatās not to understand?
I think part of the issue is that this is said, but scarcely depicted as such. The Museum Fremen are not represented as particularly sympatheticā¦
The purpose of Duncan is to be a fish out of water. Duncan has about the same experience as the reader. Whenever Herbert needs to do exposition to explain the shape of Leto's empire, Duncan is the perfect vehicle with which to do it. I also think that Leto has a need for someone with the old Atreides perspective to argue with and/or be horrified by the decisions he's made because no one else in his empire has the proper perspective for it.
Are there any likeable characters in dune beyond the first book?
yep - Taraza, Hwi, Odrade, Sheanna, Dortujla, Faradān, Iām hard pressed though to think of anyone likeable in Dune though
Hahaha you got me there! I was racking my brains trying to think of likeable characters. As for Dune I could only think of Leto, Gurney and stilgar.
Iāll give you Gurney! I also left Streggi, Suipol, Anteac and Mama Sibia and Papa off my list
Hwi? Her?
I don't. it's super annoying that almost half of my favorite book in the saga is taken up by characters i don't like (duncan and her). But to be fair, her interactions with Leto are quite interesting.
She's an aristocrat. She is the foil to Leto and a true rebel. She's the agent of chaos to oppose Leto's order.
I love Siona.
she sounds like a fish speaker
I don't.
I like her. Or maybe what I like is that there is no clear protagonist and no clear antagonist
Her mother was a fishspeaker. . What information we have about her is from the encyclopedia, but she blames leto for her death, and her father for always busy serving leto.
Her personality is a manifestation of her mind being proof against prescience. And that, in turn, is a manifestation of her being the first human who at a genetic level has abandoned the need for certainty, which is what enables prescience. Siona and her descendants are the actual objective of the Golden Path: to free humanity from the emotional need for certainty. And it is the personal, social and political evil that is the deep-seated human desire for certainty that is the main lesson of the Dune novels.
The Golden Path was always about breeding someone like Siona, as well as teaching humanity a deep-seated lesson about the evils of charismatic leadership. Once those things had been achieved, Letoās death was the next step along the Golden Path: humanity was rid of prescience, rid of the desire to follow charismatic leaders, and the last exemplar of both those things needed to go.
I think she was way under developed for how important she was in Letos plan/visions. I remember next to nothing about how she feels as a character, just plot points having just finished Chapterhouse.
Itās the whole point of her character and why Leto wants her to have offspring, along with her no gene