He didn’t say it with his usual bravado, and Collum realized he was actually embarrassed. Some part of him must really have wanted to join the Table, but he couldn’t quite let himself do it, he couldn’t give himself that gift, like a stray cat who came to the door to be fed but was too wild to go in the house where it was warm and dry. Some deep defensive instinct, either of self-preservation or self-destruction, made him slink away instead, back out into the cold.
