This is not the next attempt to speculate how Moiraine will be rescued. It is an attempt to understand more about the rules of entering the Ghenjei Tower in general.

TsR Chapter 28: Tower of Ghenjei:

***"All children do. At least, they do in the Two Rivers. But they give it up when they get old enough to realize there's no way to win."

"Except to break the rules," she said. " 'Courage to strengthen, fire to blind, music to daze, iron to bind.' "

"That's a line from the game. I don't understand. What does it have to do with this tower?"

"Those are the ways to win against the snakes and the foxes. The game is a remembrance of old dealings. It does not matter so long as you stay away from the Aelfinn and the Eelfinn. They are not evil the way the Shadow is evil, yet they are so different from humankind they might as well be. They are not to be trusted, archer. Stay clear of the Tower of Ghenjei. Avoid the World of Dreams, if you can. Dark things walk."***

First I'd want to make it clear, that entering Ghenjei will be NOT like entering the redstone ter'angreal. There would be no *finns waiting for you at the entrance and asking you about the forbidden things and guiding you to a place to get answers or wishes. Why not? Because there is a children game snake-and-foxes and it's rules are not like the experience at the redstone door ter'angreals. In the game the snakes and foxes are hunting the players and if the *finns catch the player, the player loses. The player's goal seems to be to go through the area WITHOUT meeting any *finns. The books are very explicit, that the game cannot be won without cheating. To lose the game meant to be ctched by a *finn, so the cheating is instrumental to avoid the meeting with these creatures.

This means that a human can take the most obvious iron and musical instruments in Ghenjei and to bear a burning torch - until the *finns don't catch him, everything is well. And if he doesn't bring anything of the above, *finns will catch him and he will lose and become a fancy garment for some eelfinn. Fire, music, iron and courage are means to cheat, but there are no visible reasons to hide them as it is usual for "cheating".

And the situation becomes much more complicite if we take into account that *Finns are creatures who can see past and future as if it is present. "Cheating" would have a ... different meaning when you are playing against such creatures. It will be not like in normal play, when you can hide your intentions and take hiden forbidden means in the decisive moment - the opponents would know from before that you will use your hidden trick. It will be very hard to lie to the finns what you will do in the next moment against them. Cheating and breaking the rules must mean something else. "To blind", "to dazzle", "to bind" - al that seems to imply violent means to damage finns ability to operate freely with your time. This free operation with the timing of your thread seem to be part of the "rules" of Finnland, and to break these rules means rather to cause a little natural disaster (no matter if predictable by finns or not) in this realm.

Something like that we do see when Rand uses his fiery swords against the Aelfinns in Tear. They wanted to get him, but he threatened them with the sword, and they closed their eyes and keeped in distance. And this gave Rand a good opportunity to walk aout with dignity and without any harm. He used explicite fire and it was undoubtedly a cheat. It made no problems for him to get his answers. He cheated and was not punished for it even if the aelfinns were there and completely aware of the cheating. What Rand did to them was to limit their freedom to move and catch him. It is obvious why they regard it as cheating - it hurts them, it puts limits on them, it makes them helpless, they would definitely not agree with it. But they can also not do anyhting against it.

I can easily imagine how using fire or music or iron can be called "cheating" because it (blinding, dazzling, binding) apparently affects the finns in an unpleasant way and the game becomes not fair. It is some rude kind of elimination of the opponents. But why is courage considered to be "cheating" in Finnland? How could having courage be a cheating? Apparently the rules of Finnland do not accept "courage". What kind of rules could that be?

What is a "courage"? It comes into the play when the circumstances are against the person's will, but the person challenges them. When the circumstances are forcing the person to act in manner the person wants not, but the courageous person will not surrender to the circumstances and will nevertheless try his/her way to react. Circumstances.... what is the fate if not a generalized function of all the circumstancial trends for the future. When it is said, that it's your fate to do so, it means that circumstances will force you to do so. So courage is some kind of challenging one's fate.

Fate... both aelfinns and eelfinns are tightly connected to fate. Aelfinns can read the fate of persons, eelfinns can rewrite it in some extent. Both take the fate (=thread) of the person with the past and future as something whole before their eyes. This fate is the total description of everything this person has done in Finnland and that he will do else. The task of the finns in the snakes-and-foxes game is to catch the player. So if a finn sees the player, the finn will know the next steps of the player. If the finn knows your next steps, they will know well how to catch you later. You have no chance. Unless yo blind or dazzle or bind them, so they cannot use their advantage. Or unless you use your courage.



*Finns learn your next steps from your fate. And your fate is not you but your circumstances. If you are courageous you can eventually challenge the circumstances and maybe change the fate. Simple luck or ignorance or stubbornness or stupidity or madness will not help here, because they are based on inner circumstances, so they are also part of yout fate. But courage is a trait of will, not of the pure thread, and it can face the circumstances. With some courage you can change in some extent your fate. So *finns read from your fate that you will do so and so, but you do it in another way. They go and wait you in point A, but you go to point B instead and escape them. Would the *finns think that this is cheating? Of course!

And... "courage" is not so simple thing, if you have to do with creatures who can read your future. How could such creature understand the concept of "courage"? What will mean "risk" for them - they know exactly what will happen - where is the place of risk there? From a finn's point of view you are either doing the sure right thing and are wise, or you are doing a lost thing and you are ignorant; you are either oing to sure victory and there is no matter if you are courageous or not, or you are going to sure defeat, and here it is also no matter if you are courageous or not. For finns "courage" must be absurd.

So both courage and cheating are absurd things in Finnland. Well, absurd things sometimes really happen. When absurd things happen they disturb the normal flow of events, and that means an anomaly, it means stupid, insane events. Finns would most likely apprehend the courage, fire, music and iron in this manner - as crazy chaotic events. Most likely Finns usually cannot recognize the forbidden things unless they will be not used. So the aelfinn in Tear doesn't recognize the plenty of iron Mat wears (or maybe the aelfinn just sees that Mat will not use any iron during his time in Aelfinnland - Mat hasn't used any iron actually). Courage will be not understandable by finns, so it can fit in this category, and possibly can be used as tool.

Maybe that is the reason *finns do not ask visitors whether they bring courage in the door ter'angreal. They can just not understand what courage is. Or they could just not ask it because it is pointless - the visitor will be either courageous or not and there is nothing to change about it and nothing to negotiate. In all cases courage is a kind of a natural disaster for the *finns exactly like fire, music and iron are. The rhyme mentions four things that can make you win against the Finns and all they are considered to be breaking the rules. Courage could be mentioned in some different sense having rather rhetorical, but not informative function. But that would mean that the rhyme has too complicite structure. The composition of the rhyme is such that it leaves the impression of listing four things of equal importance and of the same category.