"What do you mean you lost him?"

Mehrdad had arrived at the gates of Kyros with the dawn, red and gold banner flying behind him in the stiff autumn breeze as the sun rose, bathing them in light. Lit from behind, he and his men had developed a glowing, golden silhouette; it was all very impressive, and a small crowd had gathered on the walls and ground to watch them pass. Some of them had even broken out into cheers, calling for the Lion even when it was obvious the man himself was elsewhere.

He had timed it exactly right because that's what Mehrdad always did: he got it right.

It wasn't that the entire Pride--the men who had come back, that is--was planning to enter Kyros. There wasn't an inn large enough to hold them all. No, the point had been to send a clear message that the Lion's Pride was alive and well, ready to roar, and the men at the gates hadn't even stopped them--hadn't demanded a bribe either, knowing better than to try it with Aristos the Bull.

He'd even come wearing that stupid bull-horned helm. It was tacky and showy but Farhad had said to make an impression and so that's what Mehrdad had done: he'd come in full regalia with that fancy banner raised and fluttering, and he'd gone and made a show of it, exactly like Farhad would have done.

It wasn't really Mehrdad's style, but Farhad had asked it of him; Mehrdad hadn't had it in him to refuse a man so recently back from the dead, particularly since that man was his brother--his only living kin.

Well, the only living kin that counted.

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House Helios didn't count.

But now, after all that, they had lost him?

Lost him?

The Lion?

Lukios the Lion?

Mehrdad's brother?

Again?

To his credit, Epitus didn't flinch. Grown men cowered before the might of Aristos the Bull, but Epilektoi Epitus was not one of them.

But he did go a little bit pale, because Aristos the Bull was...Aristos the Bull.

"I'm sayin' I ain't got no clue where Lucky's gone. He ain't here no more."

"And you can't say we lost him," Askles chimed in. "He's a grown man. What do you mean we lost him?"

Mehrdad slowly turned his head to stare into Askles' eye. The man didn't flinch either, but his shoulders wobbled before he stiffened his back.

"You're telling me," Mehrdad said, very slowly, as if speaking to simpletons--because he was--"you don't know where he went even though he hired you for this job and told you to assemble here--right here--and none of you even bothered go looking for him? You decided to sit here drinking until he got back?"

Mehrdad wasn't prone to rages. No, lack of control was a sign of weakness, not strength, and he channeled his anger as needed--it was a tool, nothing more.

But this--this was beginning to irritate him.

Dumb and Dumber didn't seem to understand the implications of a newly adopted Helios getting attacked on the road, surviving, returning, then disappearing again right after announcing his return. Did they not realize what this looked like?

Were they not concerned?

Dumber shifted, his face a lesson in discomfort, and Mehrdad pounced.

"Out with it."

Epitus wriggled like a worm on a hook, but Mehrdad's stare could wear down a cliff wall. His voice ground out like gravel against a millstone.

"Epitus."

The red-head shuffled his feet then rubbed his hand over his nose. "Well, he had a fight with the missus," he said, and Mehrdad almost dropped his wine.

...The missus?