They said nothing to each other.

It was Nero who first spoke.

“They should have bitched to their fires and got drunk in their taverns and picked fights with each other.”

“Mm,” Mars hummed in agreement.

“He has never engaged, not once,” Nero said.

Mars turned his gaze from staring unseeing down an alleyway formed by tents to Nero.

“Not with this realm, not with his father, not with his brother, not in any battle he was forced to wage,” Nero went on.

Mars held his eyes.

“In my knowing of him, I’ve seen him engage with four things. His wife, his daughter, his lieutenants, and Elena,” Nero stated.

Mars said nothing.

“They should have bitched…to their fires…and got drunk…in their taverns,” Nero said through his teeth. “For Cassius Laird unleashed about something he gives a shite about, they will curse for eternity their decision to force his hand this day.”

Mars continued to say nothing, for he knew this to be true.

“Before,” Nero carried on, “he was fighting for what was right, but mostly he was fighting because Ellie believed in it, and he’d shift the stars for her. But now…”

Mars nodded.

Nero continued to release it.

“Otho was his brother. Tone was his brother. And she was a pain in his arse, but he loved Jazz. But that is not what makes Cassius. For Cassius, it is not about what he wants or needs or feels. Thus, it is not that her loss hurt him. It is that her loss hurt Mac. It hurt Elena. And they will know how he feels about that.”

“You’ve lost today as well, Nero,” Mars noted cautiously.

“They’re going to know how I feel about it, too,” Nero bit, turned and strode away.

Mars watched him go even after he disappeared from sight.

Not long later, Cassius came out of the tent, but Mac did not.

“I am uncertain, mio amico, it is good you leave him in there with Tone,” Mars noted.

“He asked to stay. He will not be at Tone’s burial. He wants to take Jazz soon. He will wait for the brothers who shroud so I can go about my business and talk to Ellie. And then he will seek Hera and prepare to transport Jasmine and Rose.”

Mars nodded and fell in step with Cassius as his friend began to move down the line of tents.

He’d forgotten about their shrouding ritual. How only some, who had been trained in the proper procedure of soaking the dressings in herbal liniments, before cleansing and wrapping their dead in them as soon as possible after death, could prepare a body for burial.

It was a process of caring that Mars always found surprising, considering Airen was not known as a caring land.

He felt, if there was care, it should be shown while the one you cared about was breathing.