"My foresight has always been lacking." The counter is dour and immediate, self-flagellating as Joscelin so often is without someone to stop him. He isn't self-aware enough to feel the balance between his need to be checked, to be measured and the dark, penitent almost-pleasure he takes in his own tension and error - in a way familiar to, yet utterly unlike, that of any Mandrake or Valerian adept's understanding of pain, shame, and guilt.