It's funny - the thoughts you think about when life gets so grave that your mind just needs to escape. For Venus, it was Cedric. Who would look after him? He was just a plant. A sad looking plant at that, but...

Her head jerked up towards the high, tiny, barred window above her as she heard the raucous crowd jeering. They must have brought him out. He must be there. So close.

Her heart clenched and she swallowed, her eyes stinging. What could she do? What... could she do?

Her eyes fell down to the dark, dank stone floor on which she knelt. And hugging her arms against the piercing coldness, she gazed into nothing. Her mind spiralling into a daze fused with sorrow, and edged with an empty defeat that seemed to echo through the halls of her soul. And oh, such weariness.

She just wanted to lay her head down on the cold floor and close her eyes. To never wake up. Maybe then the nightmare would end.

Someone began announcing something, raising a deep, callous voice that was barely heard over the roaring crowd.

She would not listen.

No.

She would not listen to him being taken up to the gallows.

And yet her senses could not help but swim out to him, gliding and swooping through the souls between he and her.

And there he was. The one soul she never thought she'd encounter. The one soul who would have her heart well beyond his last breath and far into eternity.

Venus sucked in a sob with a sharp breath and shut her eyes tight. She had lost count of the hours she'd tried to figure out how it would not come to this. But all roads led here. All roads.

And as she heard the swish of the cold blade slam down, her whole body jerked, just as though someone had ripped her heart from her very soul.

And as a single tear fell down her cheek, she curled in on herself, arms around her chest, cocooning herself on that cold stone floor.

But not much longer now. For tomorrow, she would meet the same fate as he. And their hearts will finally find each other again.

Until tomorrow.

Yes. Stay the course, Venus. Until tomorrow.