Inspired by Perplexity Computer: Model Council mode for Mixture of Agents

Adds a 'council' synthesis style to MoA (per preset via synthesis_style,
one-shot via the new /council command on CLI + gateway). Reference models
answer independently; the aggregator chairs the deliberation and produces
a user-facing report of consensus, per-model disagreements (with the
differing assumptions behind them), unique contributions, and a
recommendation with an explicit confidence level.

Inspired by Perplexity's Model Council rollout to Perplexity Computer
(changelog 08/04/26): pick a board of 2-8 models, run them independently,
synthesize where they agree/disagree and what each uniquely surfaces.

cli.py

@@ -10678,6 +10678,31 @@ class HermesCLI(CLIAgentSetupMixin, CLICommandsMixin, CLIBillingMixin):
             self._pending_moa_disable_after_turn = True
             self._pending_agent_seed = payload
             _cprint(f"  MoA one-shot queued with preset {preset}; previous model will be restored after this turn.")
+        elif canonical == "council":
+            # /council <question> — one-shot Model Council (inspired by
+            # Perplexity Computer's Model Council, Aug 2026): the default MoA
+            # preset's reference models answer the question independently, the
+            # preset's aggregator chairs the deliberation, and the council
+            # report (consensus / disagreements / unique contributions /
+            # recommendation with confidence) is handed to the current session
+            # model to present. The session model is never switched.
+            from hermes_cli.moa_config import build_moa_turn_prompt
+
+            parts = cmd_original.split(None, 1)
+            payload = parts[1].strip() if len(parts) > 1 else ""
+            if not payload:
+                _cprint("  Usage: /council <question>  (runs the default MoA preset's models as an independent council and reports consensus vs disagreement)")
+                return True
+            try:
+                moa_cfg = self.config.get("moa") if isinstance(self.config, dict) else {}
+                encoded = build_moa_turn_prompt(
+                    payload, moa_cfg, synthesis_style="council"
+                )
+            except Exception as exc:
+                _cprint(f"  Council setup failed: {exc}")
+                return True
+            self._pending_input.put(encoded)
+            _cprint("  ⚖ Council convened — reference models are deliberating.")
         elif canonical == "subgoal":
             self._handle_subgoal_command(cmd_original)
         elif canonical == "skin":