Shen Yuan captures this softening, too, or tries to; tries to get the angle of his mouth right; a hovering thing, like the smile is just above the lips rather than actually curving them. Like the feeling of another person's skin a hair's breadth from yours, the knowledge that at any moment there could be touch, at any moment the expression on Laertes' face could break through to full joy at the thought of his husband.

"I've promised to take him flying again," he says, hoping to convince the smile to land, "on my sword. I told him we could practice beheading those on the ground, in case we ever face another horde of the dead."