Running With Wolves

Seventeen stitches. Seventeen hooks of a needle were what it had taken to close the wound. Seventeen stitches in eight minutes was what it had taken to close the wound that had taken six minutes of arguing.Yet it had been thirty minutes since Sage had spoken to Lukas, thirty minutes since she’d asked to be left alone and he’d complied.

Grandfather stared at Lukas from across the table where he’d offered him a cup of tea. Conan and Knoll had been sent home and while Rune had fallen into a fitful sleep within the safe room, Mia had chosen to stay in the room as well, far from Jasmine who had left the four-walled space and joined Grandfather for tea.

There was tension in her muscles, anger in the flare of her nose, and severe annoyance in her eyes but she sipped the lemon tea quietly.

“Lukas,” Grandfather began again. “What happened to those men?”

Jasmine watched him over the rim of her orange ceramic coffee mug, curiosity flickering in her eyes. She’d be lying if she hadn’t been hoping he’d slaughtered them like pigs. She didn’t know if she’d ever stop looking over her shoulder if he hadn’t.

Lukas stared down at his own mug, having not touched it since the cup had been placed before him on the table.
He was silent, lost in his own thoughts. Images of Sage, fierce and strong, laughing and happy, then crumbled and broken, bruised and bleeding, he couldn’t comprehend that these to drastically deferent memories of people were the same.

“I killed them.” He murmured indifferently. The least he could do, he thought, was make sure the monsters that would haunt the girls nightmares didn’t exist any longer. His eyes didn’t meet Grandfather’s but Jasmine’s. Her dark eyes met his head on and he could see the tension in her back slacken—she was relieved.

Grandfather said nothing for a moment. He showed neither signs of approval nor disapproval before he nodded in simple understanding.

“All of them?”

Grandfather’s eyes turned on Jasmine but she didn’t waver under the gaze, she wanted to, no, needed to know. Lukas sighed and shook his head with pursed lips.

“One got away.” And like magic the stiffness had returned to Jasmine’s muscles.

A heavy silence filled with unspoken words settled like a blanket over the trio. Was murder under any circumstance something to be praised? What did it mean if one had gotten away? Would he come back to finish what his companions had failed to?

“What were you all doing in those woods anyway?” There was a frustrated tone to Lukas’s voice and Jasmine’s eyes flickered from Grandfather to Lukas.

“Those woods…they’re no man’s land.” Grandfather added. “No place for young women.”

Jasmine scowled at the accusation that she wasn’t as capable as any man to defend herself in those woods.

“Jaz?” Her eyes flickered back to Lukas who was looking at her expectantly.

“I, uh,” she averted her eyes trying to recall what they had all been there for. It seemed like weeks ago that Sage had called her telling her to meet her in Falcon Ridge as soon as possible; half remembered conversations drifted across her mind in a misty haze. “It was about her sister,” yes, the words sounded right on her tongue.

“Cheyenne?” his eyes closed automatically and he shook his head. Lukas thought he should have known as much. When Sage thought of her family she wore blinders and thought nothing of anything aside from that—like the dangers that lurk in Falcon Ridge.

They’d been foolish kids with an adrenaline rush when they ventured into that forest a lifetime ago but it had also been safer when they were kids and Blackwood was whole. Now it was no man’s land, outlawed, stories about that place were endless.

Jasmine nodded solemnly. “She said she found something that might have something to do with Cheyenne’s disappearance. I didn’t see what it was…” she trailed off, a frown on her lips. “we got side tracked.”

“Side tracked?”

“Rune was supposed to come alone.” She commented though her lips pulled down in a frown revealing she wasn’t happy with what had happened. “she brought Mia,” Her face darkened and Lukas raised an eyebrow. “She’s Were,” Jasmine hissed, a low burn still hot with fury and distrust. “she deceived Sage and Conan, walked right into Blackwood without anyone realizing that she’s a god damn Were.”

“Jasmine,” Grandfather’s voice was calm but there was a chiding edge to it. “I’ve talked to Miakoda, she poses no threat to us.”

To that Jasmine said nothing but it didn’t lessen the scowl on her face any. She thought of all the things she wished to say to Grandfather but all of them were too disrespectfully for her to even contemplate uttering.

Silence fell amongst the three and Jasmine’s thoughts drifted to the mistrust she bore toward Mia while Lukas thought only of Sage, and Grandfather worried for all of them.

Eventually Grandfather rose tiredly to his feet, dark circles were present under his eyes that had not been there upon his arrival.

“I’ll be going now I think,” he announced with a small nod.

Lukas stormy grey eyes met Grandfather’s and a silent conversation passed between the two. Jasmine said nothing, though her perceptive oaken orbs flickered between the two.

She wanted to know why he’d leave them when they needed him most but sometimes Grandfather didn’t follow basic knowledge. Grandfather was always two steps head but sometimes he was even two. Grandfather did nothing without reason and that included leaving abruptly.

“I’ll walk you out,” Lukas offered simply and then two left the room; Jasmine didn’t try to follow them.

Jasmine collapsed into a kitchen chair, her lips seemed to be pressed into a permanent, displeased frown. She was obviously unhappy with what had happened to them all in the woods, she was clearly displeased with everyone’s open acceptance of a stranger who had lied to them all, and she still was not the least bit cheerful that, seemingly against her will, she looked to Sage as <s>an</S> her Alpha.

Jasmine didn’t like the way change seemed to stirring in the air, it set her nerves off and left her uneasy. She thought to herself then that if things were going to change, somehow standing beside Sage didn’t make it seem so scary. Safe within the confines of Lukas’s house stopped the feeling that everything was threatening her, and with Rune beside her she had a friend—something she wasn’t used to.

Change was in the air and whether it was good or bad, Jasmine hadn’t yet decided. What she did know though was that she was not alone in this. None of them were, they'd die for each other and that was one fact Jasmine was absolutely sure of.