Beast

Gryphon sat quietly and listened to his brother's words, and his anger slowly dissolved away into bewilderment, and a troubled expression settled over his features. He was silent for a long moment after Lykos had finished speaking, before he finally looked back up, green eyes meeting blue. It was interesting, he reflected distantly, that physically they each had more in common with their other two brothers than with each other, yet before all this they'd been so close. Maybe it was because his only stake in this was protecting his family, all of his family, but Gryphon suddenly realized that he could be the only one who could actually look at this with completely rational judgement.

"I think you and our mother have more in common than you think," he said thoughtfully, then held up a paw to forestall comment. "Now hear me out. All our lives, Mom taught us that loyalty was one of the most important things. But she chose to leave Imperium and was hurt that you didn't want to follow her. Why?" He stopped a moment, staring intently at his brother. "When we were in Imperium, you were the only one of us to actually spend time with the rest of the pack. Kharnage and I were sick a lot, and Dragon was always either with Mom or sneaking off to go outside pack lands, but you actually had a mentor, and you actually spent time living in the pack. You learned loyalty too, didn't you? But it wasn't what Mom wanted you to learn. See, Mom always taught us that you should be loyal to your family -" He grinned briefly. "Hell, maybe I think that too. I'm here, after all, instead of sitting quiet in Talis like a good boy - but Imperium always put the pack first. So I think when you stayed loyal to Imperium, Mom took it personal. Like you were abandoning her, even though you were just doing what she taught us, you were being loyal, just... she couldn't see that, I think."

He tilted his muzzle up to stare reflectively at the sky. "I think maybe she made you heir because she thought she had to... buy your love back. That if you had an important position, you'd care more about Ivalice than Imperium and by extension, would love her more than Imperium." He shrugged. "I don't think Mom understood that we did love her, and that was why we were so upset over Vereux. We wanted to protect her and she thought we were just trying to get in the way of her happiness. That we were being selfish when we were just being... loyal."

"And then you found out whatever it was you did about Vereux and told someone from Imperium, the pack that she'd been trying so hard to win your love from, and I think... she took you breaking one of her rules as a personal betrayal. That's the only reason I can think of for her to jump instantly to the conclusion that you're a traitor. She went through all that trouble to birth you and raise you and make a pack for you and make you an heir and then you went off and chose Imperium over her again." He squinted at Lykos. "You follow?"

"So, then Mercy decided to do what she did, and instead of doing what she always told us to do and calm down and think before we did something stupid because we were mad, went off and did something stupid because she was mad. She stood there bleeding because she thought that's what you did to her heart and she wanted you to see what you'd done and suffer for it, because when we're mad and hurt we want other people to be hurt."

He shrugged again, and looked pained. "I'm not saying she was right. Hell, I don't think she was. I mean sure maybe punish you for breaking a rule, even if it was a damn stupid rule, but I think she went too far and left it for way too long. The punishment way exceeded any infraction. And Dragon?" He scowled blackly. "Dragon was just being a dick keeping you as a prisoner. I mean what the hell was he thinking?"

Then he hesitated thoughtfully. Actually, maybe he did know what Dragon was thinking. Dragon was thinking the way he always thought. And if he was thinking that way... "I know you don't want to have anything to do with them, but you might need to. You know Dragon. He's hot headed, and he's stubborn. He's every bit as likely to take this personally like Mom did and chances are pretty good that he's not going to leave you alone until it comes down to one of you guys being maimed or dead, and dammit, Lykos, I don't want to be in the position to have to either come between two of the people I love, or lose one or both of them. So please, just come down to Auster with me and we'll talk to Dragon together. I'll make him understand, Lykos, and then he'll let you go and you won't have to see the family ever again if you don't want to. No one has to get hurt. Not again."

His expression went stormy again, though, as another thought came to him. "I think it's fair to warn you though. I don't agree with you that Mercy was acting in your best interests. I think she was acting in her best interests and trying to drive a wedge between you and us so you'd depend on her more. I think she caused this deliberately, and that her trespassing was trying to goad Mom into fighting her. Either way she'd win, wouldn't she? Either she won and hurt Mom and could say 'look at how weak your mother is' or she'd lose and get hurt and could say 'look at what your awful mother did to me' and either way you'd have to choose between her and Mom... only she betrayed you to Mom and told her you'd been spilling Vereux's stupid secrets so that Mom would be an idiot and you couldn't choose Mom." He took a deep breath, his whole figure settling into grim lines, eyes like polished green stone. "So like I said, it's only fair to warn you. I am going to be tracking Mercy down and having a chat with her, and I will not guarantee to you that there will not be blood if it comes to it."