The evening they were brothers

Mara insists that her sons come to dinner while they are close enough to make excuses implausible. Ciro visits under the pretext of inspecting the repaired sluice roads. Xeno, allowed a supervised journey to a nearby shrine after weeks of lobbying, briefly slips his official party with the help of an old household servant. The visit is risky, but it is not an action sequence. Its value lies in letting the brothers occupy an ordinary room together.

Ciro cannot remove a damaged buckle from his gauntlet. Pyrrhus fixes it while making fun of ceremonial equipment. Xeno admits he does not know how to peel a root vegetable properly and then becomes unexpectedly competitive about learning. Mara tells a harmless story about Pyrrhus as a child. He is embarrassed until he sees how intently his brothers listen to an account of childhood without tutors or guards.

The tenderness does not eliminate resentment. Ciro asks why Pyrrhus never came looking for them after learning the truth. Pyrrhus says he had not known whether they would see a brother or a claimant. Xeno says he is tired of everyone deciding what might frighten him. Mara refuses to let the argument become a contest over who suffered most. Each was denied something different, and none owes the others gratitude for his particular deprivation.

Before leaving, they agree to write without intermediaries. Xeno gives Pyrrhus a cheap sketch of the capital as seen from his window, the only map he can draw from memory. The player later recognizes that view during his escape. This evening should remain one of the game's emotional anchors: a glimpse of the life that their titles make difficult, and a reason their later disagreements hurt.