Book excerpt: Nuada gave the most important performance of his life, yet the audience barely reacted at all. Nuada continued to strum away on his instruments five strings, feeling their every vibration jolt through his body, the tension and resolution of the notes calming his mind. They were all wrong. The notes he played were all wrong, ever so slightly misplaced within the melody's rhythm, just a touch out of tune, and that's not even considering the clearly wrong notes that he played. The many people of high status in attendance understood this keenly, yet held back their disdain.