I shook my head. “He didn’t tell me to lie. He was distracted, I think. He tried to pull a big gambit to turn the tides and he’s operating blind. Literally, I don’t think he can see.”

I still had the traitorous, general thoughts and impressions from the compulsion. I was familiar with having thoughts that weren’t mine in my head. The mind was supposed to be sacrosanct, the thoughts it contained purely sourced from oneself and for oneself. Valefor had violated the former, like Amy had violated the latter.

On a level, I was just happy I hadn’t killed him. I knew there was an argument for why I should have, had I had the opportunity. I also knew it would have been a betrayal of myself and the me I wanted to be.

For all these reasons and more, mind control was another one of the parts of the game. Too many people found it viscerally horrifying, myself included, and the way things could break down if mind control saw common use was too big of a problem. The natural reaction from society, or from our sub-society, was to fight back.

Valefor obviously didn’t care.

He didn’t give me the impression of someone at home in a big thing like the one we’d been in, especially after the fighting had started, and he’d still been pretty damn scary.

“We could go,” I said. “We caught them off guard once or twice there, and we got some lumps in. It’s not quite breaking the back of the Fallen, but we could pull away, regroup with others, and plan for the perimeter and Looksee’s trap.”

“I want to do more,” Sveta said. “I was useless back there.”

“I can’t back down from this,” Tristan–Capricorn said. “I think if we run into him again, if I’m alert, I might know what to do.”

“If you’re sure,” I said.

He nodded.

I looked down at Introspection Chris. “How about you? You good to retreat to the background? Gallop in if you see the need and feel up to it?”

He lurched to his feet, curled and uncurled like he was stretching, and then loped away, swaying a bit to compensate for the missing forelimb. He bucked a bit, claw reaching up, and then the iffy camouflage kicked in.

“Okay,” I said. “I have a lot of questions.”

“His whole thing is he doesn’t like answering them,” Capricorn said.

“He’s doing his part,” Sveta said. “That was brave.”

“It was insane,” Capricorn said. “No offense intended to present company, brothers, or self.”

“Fine line between bravery and insanity,” I said.

I looked across the clearing to Beast of Burden’s group. Damsel wasn’t pacing anymore.

Capricorn approached and stood next to me, his armored shoulder touching the spikes at mine. Sveta stood at my other side, looking in that direction.