Beatrice hugged her heavy wool coat tighter. The wind ripped through her body, she could feel it all the way through her bones. Its cold fingers raked her tights and ripped at her hair. Her pace quickened then slowed as she remembered that she was on a tightly run schedule.

Those lips that love's own hand did make

Breathed forth the sound that said "I hate,"

She recited the words effortlessly. Her footsteps kept in perfect beat with the well-rehearsed rhythm. "Pick something we'll both remember." He had whispered in her ear. "Pick something you'll never forget."

To me that languished for her sake.

But when she saw my woeful state,

He had smiled at her when she suggested this one, his lips brushing her neck. It was his favorite sonnet, she knew. He would write its stanzas everywhere. In random notebooks. In between shopping list items. In the corners of opera programs.

"Just get to theater on time, not a syllable before, not a syllable after." His warning echoed in her ears.

Straight in her heart did mercy come,

Chiding that tongue that ever sweet

Just a little farther… She thought, snapping herself out of her reverie. Her heels clicked on the uneven sidewalk, her breathed curled out in icy tendrils in front of her. She tried to distract herself from the task ahead, tried not to think of what she was getting herself into.

Was used in giving gentle doom,

And taught it thus anew to greet.

Focus, Beatrice. She thought. Almost there.

She reached her freezing hands into her pocket and found the small box given to her earlier that evening. Her fingers traced the carvings on the lid, found the latch.

"But why darts?" She had asked. "Isn't that a bit… unconventional?"

"When have we ever be conventional?" He had countered.

"I hate" she altered with an end

That followed it as gentle day

At first she had refused. This was the line, they had drawn it.

"It has to be done." Kit had said.

"We have no other choice." Lemony had said.

"I can do it." She had said.

Doth follow night, who, like a fiend,

From heaven to hell is flown away.

She saw the theatre, once her refuge it now held the unspeakable task ahead of her.

Get in. Get it done. Get out.

She took a deep breath and pushed open the ornate doors. A blast of warm air hit her in the face. Voices began crowding her ears but she was too focused on her target to understand what they were saying.

They're the enemy. She reminded herself. The world is quiet here.

"I hate" from hate away she threw.

And saved my life, saying "not you."