Sapphire Bones

Sanctuary

Updated: March, 28, 2019

Corvo

I blinked from the madness I caused and shuffled away from the wreckage around the room. Furniture, including the large black leather couch from the middle of the living space, was smashed, shards littered the floor in random heaps. Carpet was torn up from arbitrary areas across the apartment, and chairs lay on their sides, legs missing in action. Not a single piece of furniture remained where it was when I first arrived. Dust clouds mingled with my midsection, their wispy pieces stretching out like plant vines blowing in a summer breeze. The apartment was a warzone created and finished by me.

I knew the Council pulled tricks out of their sleeves but I honestly didn't think they'd get enough votes to overturn a law in place for hundreds of years. It kept children from being prosecuted as adults. Yet, after the mercenary system was put into place the law seemed obsolete. Those children were held until their twenty-fifth birthday, upon which they were put up against a room full of Council members to confess to whatever crimes they committed as children. No forgiveness, no afterthought as to whythey were being held. And just like the children before her, L was to become another victim in their underground scheme to keep the Lycan community in line. Crimes were never truly solved. Only buried under children murderers and secret plots to take down the government. To a regular Lycan, the idea passed off as a joke but to the Council it was their main defense.

Footsteps came from outside in the hall, and Emerald's aroma wafted into the room, mixing with the kicked up dust from underneath furniture.

Jax came back through the doorway with the car keys in hand. They jingled like church bells as he walked. I shooed him away but he continued into the room without taking heed of my direction. He had a worried glare in his eyes but kept his distance. As soon as he saw the damage, however, Jax's face turned from worry to confusion.

"What the fuck happened in here?" Jax asked, jaw dropped as he surveyed the room. He saw the damage done from my outburst of anger, but Jax's facial expression refused to change from the rock hard grimace he kept. I shook my head in response and collapsed onto one of the last remaining seats in one piece. The legs teetered under my weight. I grabbed ahold of the arms to keep the seat steady but the unease only worsened the longer I sat.

"They overturned the law," I responded, my voice breathless while I tried to work out the new problem at hand. My muscles tensed at the thought again. With the overturning of the law nobody knew when the Council would decide to send her to her death. I needed to be there even if I was the last thing she saw. I needed her to know I supported her.

"Wha-,"

"The twenty-five law," I hissed, and turned my head up to look at my Beta. He stood in front of me, hands tucked into the pockets of his jacket. His leg crossed the other as he stood. Golden blonde hair fell on the sides of his face, the hair brushed out leaving a heavy wave. "The Council trashed it," I said.

"H-how do you know this?" Jax rushed through his words and ran a hand through his hair. He paced nearly in place until I answered. His eyes glistened with moisture, but not heavy enough to cause spillage. Jax found L when she first stumbled onto Emerald land, and she latched onto him first, refusing to let him leave unless necessary. When her disappearance reached him, it brought back a version of him I hadn't seen since Anna died.

"After I sent you down they offered me two different exchanges. I said no. After, the woman told me they got rid of the law." I said with a heavy sigh. The palms of my hands were warm against my temples but I couldn't stop the vicious pounding inside my skull. It felt like cracks were breaking through the bone holding my brain in place, and if I didn't hold my hands to the sides of my head the entire skull would fall apart.