“Horble?”

“Look, for the last time, I don’t speak your stupid language.”

Chucky was at his wits’ end. After walking around Rhuiden for half an hour being bored, he’d gotten sick of looking at the Aiel trophy collection, and had stepped into the redstone doorway for some answers. Or for some wish-granting, preferably. But these fox-people didn’t seem to have an interpreter like the snake guys had.

“Schlorble.”

“Yes.”

Chucky sighed. The fox-guys on the pedestals leaned forward and looked at the air above his head, and made weird gaspy noises under their breaths.

“Look, just don’t tell me about the Daughter of the Nine Moons.”

“Jorble.”

“Because I don’t want to know.”

“Norble.”

“So don’t tell me.”

“Orble.”

Chucky sighed again, and wandered in a little circle around the shadowy interview room. The fox-guys looked down on him from their pillars. One of them scratched his ear with his foot, examined his toenails carefully, and then nibbled them. This deteriorated into a protracted bout of gonad-licking.

“Look, would it help if I just told you what my wishes are?” Chucky held up his ruined pipes, and ticked things off on his fingers. “I want you to fix the holes in my bagpipes. I want to be back in Rhuidean without being hanged,” he nodded in satisfaction. That last bit had been his own idea, because he knew Mat had been killed – or almost killed – by these guys because he’d asked for the wrong things in the wrong way. He made a final point on his fingers. “And I want to be able to understand what the Ghul you idiots are saying. Think you can manage that? Remember: not hanged. Not.”

The fox-people exchanged a look.

“Done,” the selected spokesfox said. The others grinned widely, tongues hanging out in nasty doggy laughs. Darkness gathered around Chucky, and he felt something smothering him.

“Or suffoca-“