I hated this room with the dark paneled walls and the painted portraits of all the Council leaders staring down at me. Looming and judging and calling me weak and pathetic with their silent observation. Just paintings, nothing more. But infused, for some reason, with the kind of disapproval that rankled.

Even Nanna's at the far end. She'd never looked so pinched and untrusting in real life.

I did my best to ignore them, to stare instead at my hands in my lap and keep ...