Sapphire Bones

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"Corvo I'm on your side here, just hear me out," Tyler rubbed at the stubble on his chin and rested his shoulder blades on the tall window pane. "Mia's my sister. She's been updating me on the case and trial since she was assigned. Try and keep up, will you?"

"Don't test my patience."

Tyler held out his hands in defeat for a moment and nodded before the bulge in his throat bobbed up and down. "Mia has a bit of information on L but it's not much, and not great," he waited for my approval to continue and I gave it with a quick tick of my jaw. He let out a quick sigh, heavy and full.

"Well, don't look at me like that," I hissed, fists tightening into snug balls that turned white from the pressure. "Don't come in here and throw something like this around like it doesn't matter to me."

"She's alive – I mean barely alive but she's alive," he half-shrugged as if L's well-being didn't affect everyone in the Lycan community. "They have her in maximum security, on her own floor. She's the only prisoner on the floor."

"Why are they keeping her down there?" I seethed, the saliva between my teeth multiplying as potential scenarios flashed in my brain. They couldn't keep her down there – she didn't deserve that. She couldn't deserve that. I bit my bottom lip with elongated canines until a bit of the thin skin split under the pressure of teeth. Blood seeped down underneath my tongue, an explosion of metallic and tang in my mouth made me wince back into the wall. I keeled over at the waist for a moment, my hands pressed onto my knees while my head continued with the projection of images in front of my vision. I sucked the drops of blood into my throat and swallowed, eyes shut momentarily against the taste, and stood back up straight to face Tyler again.

"The majority of the council still believes she's guilty. They're not willing to turn their minds over."

"Have they seen her? L is incapable of anything like that."

"She killed your father."

"She defended herself. If not he would've killed her, and I would've ended up killing him," I said, my words jumbled in between the taste buds on my tongue. I spat them out the best I could but regretted them as soon as I remembered my audience.

"And yet here we are; you used her so you didn't have to kill him yourself?" Tyler implied, his thick, mangled brows raised high on his forehead at his accusation. The implication sent Zane flying into the forefront of my conscious but I held him back with a thin leash ready to snap at the seams.

"How dare you-," I started but Tyler held a hand up to silence me. I willingly obliged, but I could hardly fight the urge to put a fist into his cheekbone. My hands clenched until the blood in them ran cold.

"I'm not fighting on this topic, Corvo. I'm here to help," Tyler made no other move except a quick tick in his jaw. I kept my glare bared on him, his actions, the way his Adam's apple bobbed up and down inside his throat. My nostrils flared a bit, Zane biting through the barrier I threw between us but I kept him at the back of my head with what strength I had left to spare.

"You said your sister works for the council. Is she a mercenary?" I butted in before Tyler could open his mouth, and he nodded once.

"Yes," he started. "Peter was removed from L's case because of the incident over the summer, and Mia took his job. From what she's told me, and it's not much, but what she's mentioned... L's future is bleak Corvo. She's weak, she's ill, she can't see. They have her on a strict diet to keep her from getting too strong."

I bit back a growl and twisted my neck, muscles flexed just below the flesh. My fists tightened and I held myself flush on the dark beige wall to keep from tearing the office apart. Tyler cocked a brow and waited for my attention to return on him.