The door opens without a knock, and Councillor Meredith Jackson—who was arguing with Lander just this morning, though it feels a lifetime ago—glides inside.
She circles the desk and settles in the spare chair set squarely opposite mine, as though the scene had been arranged in advance.
I find maintaining eye contact almost impossible; it feels so strange. I have spent several human lifetimes without a body, and now, suddenly, I must consider the expression on my face and how I hold another person’s gaze. I once read that too much eye contact is creepy, while too little makes you look shifty.
How can I strike the right balance when I am trying not to appear guilty? It seems impossible.
I lift my chin, and my hair itches at the back of my neck. It is still tucked into the jumper; I feel strange with it down. I do not think I have worn it loose since I was a little girl.
My thoughts scatter as the rest of my skin itches, my head hurts and every breath burns. I am not used to it—my heartbeat, blood pressure, all of it. Even the adrenaline surging through my system is disorientating.
There is so much happening in this body that I canscarcely think, let alone protect myself. I am going to slip. I can feel it.
I doubt I can keep this fragile balance much longer.
I usually have far more control, but I cannot stop my hands from trembling. I tuck them beneath my thighs to keep them still.
Already I am mixing things up in my mind. I must remember: Lander said he is merely a council operative, not a councillor, and Meredith has yet to introduce herself. I am not supposed to recognise her or know her name.
Channelling the persona of a wicked witch, Meredith regards me like something unpleasant stuck to her shoe.
Yet the bags beneath her eyes betray that she is exhausted, and I caused it.
She was one of the magic users who dropped to their knees. Thirteen members of a coven—fourteen, counting the Magic Hunter—were needed to bring me down, and still I escaped.
I won.
I won.
The anxiety I have been feeling melts away. I close my eyes and draw my first deep breath in hours and allow myself tofeel.
I am safe.
I can keep myself safe.
They have no power over me.
My magic will return, and I may never match my strength as the disembodied force of House, yet I will remain strong. I have always had to be strong. Mentally I am tougher than they imagine, and though this body is weaker, the mind directing it has not changed.
I have dealt with unimaginable horrors. This… This is nothing.
I keep my expression impassive, smiling inwardly. I have nothing to fear. If I stay alive a few more days, I can vanish.
I just need to hold it together.
I set my now steady hands on my lap. I do not twitch or fidget. I simply watch them back.
Meredith blinks, uncertain how to occupy the hush; most people are. Silence unsettles them, so they fill it with noise or movement. She breaks the silence first.
“So you’re the woman our team found in the woods,” she says.
They did not find me. Lander did.
He sits, unreadable, though his troubled eyes are doubtless an act. Lander Kane would kill anyone—man, woman or child—who threatened his beloved magical society.
I say nothing.
She lifts an eyebrow and peers down her nose at me. “Nothing to say?”
