John smiles softly at her and opens his mouth to protest, but then thinks better of it. Honestly, he supposes he had better sit down and have a rest. He is injured, and it isn't as though helping the rest of the Wanderers dig each other out of the ground has helped matters. Even if in the end it was only gnomes. He hadn't known that at the time, now, had he?

"If you do insist," he says, inclining his head to her in submission. "I don't suppose that all that digging has done my arm much good at all."

In fact, it is throbbing something awful. But Lord John is a soldier and has been so long enough to develop certain bad habits.