OH...you thought I was actually going to let you READ my novel before it was finished??

GUESS AGAIN.
However, DO feel free to read these excerpts which I have carefully chosen on the advice of my cadre of spin doctors in order to make my novel sound more exciting than it is :-)
    Pulec blinked rapidly as the dust cleared and looked inside the chest. Nestled within some straw was a smallish red fox, with one of its back legs looking rather like it had stumbled into a white dye-pot. As the light streamed into the box, the fox squinted and stared up at Pulec. He stared hard at the fox, a puzzled look on his face. The fox gazed back at him with an almost identical expression. After a long silence, the fox spoke.
     "Well?" it asked. "Aren't you going to get me out of this box?"
     Pulec squinted at the fox, as if debating the relative merits of picking up a talking fox as opposed to quickly replacing the lid and pretending nothing had ever happened. In the end, his curiosity won out, and he reached into chest and lifted the fox out, gently setting it on the floor.
    "I have an idea," said the fox slowly. "Why don't you make up a nonsense word for my name. Then, whenever anybody asks you where you got the name, you can say it means something simple, like 'red', in some obscure language. That way I have something both unique and mysterious as my name. It is fitting, because I am unique and mysterious also."
     "You certainly are that," Pulec agreed. He paused as a thought came to him. "But I don't know any obscure languages."
     The fox sighed.
     "Well, that's the point. It's beneficial to you as well as to me, because it's NOT really an obscure language. You just pretend that it is. That way you also benefit from my name, by appearing even smarter than you are."
    "That's rather showy, isn't it?" Tav asked. "Onjans are not exactly known for their wealth." Pulec looked down at him in surprise.
     "That's true, but my purpose today is to persuade them that there are easier ways to acquire riches than by starting a war with Taros. When I introduce the trade treaty, the presence of the brooch will remind them that we have much to offer each other."
     "It might also remind them of how much YOU have, and how much less THEY have. They will probably question why you would want to trade with them at all," Tav pointed out.
     "For a fox, you seem remarkably astute about these matters," Pulec observed.
     "For a human, you seem remarkably knowledgeable about the characteristics of talking foxes," Tav retorted.
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