[ It's true and not especially funny, but it is a little funny, so Bastien smiles a correspondingly small smile. ]

Exactement. And can you imagine if we had hired some professional Orlesian negotiator and presented them with—ourselves? I think you have a better idea what to do with a pack of outcasts and scoundrels than they would, even if other things are new to you.

But I do suspect that you do too much alone.