Mistress Macura and Luci, having drugged Nynaeve and Elayne into a stupor, carry their limp bodies upstairs. Thom and Juilin come to the rescue. Macura confesses she has orders from the Amyrlin to bring Elayne back to the Tower by any means necessary. Nynaeve and Elayne dye their hair and assume new identities, leaving Macura and Luci dosed with their own medicine.
Elayne regains consciousness as Mistress Macura and Luci carry her upstairs. Luci is alarmed to see Elayne awake, but Macura dismisses her concerns and focuses on ham-handedly explaining everything to the reader:
MACURA: She cannot channel, or twitch a muscle, not with forkroot tea in her. Tee-hee!
Clearly this woman missed the day in Villain School where they learned about the hazards of oversharing. Oh well! Water under the bridge, right? Macura runs off to send a pigeon to the White Tower, leaving her incompetent underling behind to dose the prisoners. Uh– do we need to talk about incompetent underlings? Not to put too fine a point on it, but this is kind of like deputizing Piglet to make sure your captives don’t escape; Luci is such a nervous wreck that it’s a practical certainty that she’s going to find a way to fuck it up.
Sure enough, just when Elayne expects Luci to return with another dose of the awful tea, the door opens and Thom marches Luci into the room by the scruff of her neck. A few moments later, Juilin comes upstairs with Mistress Macura, who quickly explains that she was only following orders. Macura refuses to divulge who her contact in the White Tower is, so it’s time for some good-cop/bad-cop.
No doubt the inspiration for the Juilin scene.
NYNAEVE: Fine, I’ll let Juilin deal with you. He’s a Tairen thief-catcher, and he knows how to elicit a confession. Don’t you, Juilin?
JUILIN: Oh yes. I’ll need some rope to tie her, rags to gag her, some cooking oil and salt… she will talk.
NYNAEVE: The kitchen is downstairs, Juilin.
MACURA: I report to Narenwin Barda. I was told to watch for her!
Macura nods at Elayne and says the Amyrlin ordered her to be brought back to the Tower by any means. Elayne is suddenly confused. The Amyrlin wants her brought back to the Tower? It was the Amyrlin herself who sent Elayne and Nynaeve after the Black Ajah in the first place! Oh, this chapter really milks the fact that Elayne and Nynaeve still know nothing about the White Tower coup, doesn’t it? Enjoy it while you can, Mr. Jordan, because you’ve used up your Dramatic Irony Quota.
After the effects of the forkroot wear off, Luci and Macura receive a dose of their own medicine and are left to lie peacefully in their beds. Elayne asks Juilin what he was going to do with the cooking oil and salt, but he admits he doesn’t know. He recounts a time when he “broke a man” by asking for a basket of figs and mice — thus explaining the unusual title for this chapter. To avoid any more incidents like this, Nynaeve and Elayne dye their hair black and replace their wagon with a coach. They are no longer merchants, but rather a mysterious lady and her maid. I’m eager to see who is the lady and who is the maid. On the one hand, I don’t see Nynaeve being able to pull off acting like a lady, but I also don’t see her acting obsequious enough to be a maid.