The old prophet lifted the body of the disobedient prophet from Judah on one of the donkeys (presumably the one he had loaned him) to carry him back to Bethel. He mourned over him and buried him. The mourning is recorded in a short phrase, Alas, my brother,
but we do not need to believe that this is a full record of the expression of his grief. If it were that brief an expression of mourning, why bother to mention it at all? Moreover, the direction he gives in the following verses concerning direction for his own burial beside the other prophet’s grave leads us to believe that the grief was genuine.
29 And the prophet took up the body of the man of God and laid it on the donkey and brought it back to the city to mourn and to bury him.