The look that crosses Martel's face - mostly in the eyes, and the lines there that he doesn't have any more and never will again - is very faint, but all the same the best description of it is 'affectionately pitying'. He doesn't argue the point, knowing full damn well that some lessons can only be taught by your own mistakes. (He wouldn't have listened. He didn't listen.)

It passes.

"You should see the scar," he says, dryly - and actually he'd be perfectly willing to show him, but it's not a little bit weird to casually get half-naked with new friends. (Unless it's for the purposes of a back massage, and anyway, they ended up married. Henry is no Candice, which is probably something you never thought you'd have to read.) "The nexus is...interesting that way, though. I wouldn't be here at all if not for it, and as it is I am...not the same as I was. It's what I've devoted the most substantial of my research to, this past year. That and the torches."