Alfred had survived other things than this, that was true; whether they were stranger or not, he wasn't sure. More exotic, certainly, because they'd taken place halfway around the world — but everything he'd faced on the Sycorax expedition had been, to some extent, a known entity. He'd been shipwrecked, but he was not the first person in history to have been shipwrecked, or to have survived it, and he hadn't been alone. He'd survived each day wandering in the wilderness, but in the end they had all just been days; they were, for the most part, not extraordinary. Succumbing to illness, or dehydration, or an injury — all of these were things that one could think through and get the shape of, and understand, and maybe take actions to prevent. This, on the other hand, was unpredictable, ancient magic. Wasn't it quite a bit stranger than anything he'd faced in South America?

But the sentiment was nice, he supposed, so he wasn't going to argue with it. Besides, he didn't want to die, and was hardly inclined to act as though it was imminent, if he could help it. He was trying to frame some sort of response to that affect when Evander surprised him by making, of all things, a self-deprecating joke. Despite everything else, Alfred couldn't help but smile just a bit at that. "Well, you'll only be embarrassing yourself if you do," he pointed out in an equally light tone. "Since I won't be around to mind."