A traditional English rain swelled on the horizon. There were no thunderous booms to resonate through flesh, no frantic hailing down of rain, no fury harbored in the great stone colored clouds. The intensity and looming of their presence, though, was inescapable.

Lacie's chest ached with a burning thirst for oxygen as she sprinted through masses of muscular guards and down case after case of steep steps. Her milky skin had flooded red as her thin shoes barely gripped the floor; she was pounding to the Sherriff's office with a purpose she had never imagined could ignite to this level. Each moment of resentment, jealousy, short-temperament, and disgust she had with her husband burned up in a chemical pile chugging through her veins. Lacie regretted wasting any time disliking him even as she smothered down the worst premonition in her gut; she rejected each of these ideas as her mind constructed wafer thin excuses and stalled any concept of a change in the status quo of her world. Reaching the tall wooden door she crossed her chest and clenched the small golden crucifix around her neck with her left hand.

Her fist beat into the door with a wild cry as she felt the lock deny access. It was intentionally jammed into the frame, locked up tight, sealing anyone but Guy outside. Lacie shrieked out with all of the muster her petite body could produce and banged repeatedly into the blockade. She yelled his name over and over, begging and pleading, wishing it was no more than him huffing in selfishness away from her. Her heart, though, knew much better.

"Guy! Jesus Christ, let me in, Guy!" Hot tears marred her face and Lacie looked every minute of her age. She alternated between desperate tugs at the handle and tragic slams into the lumber as she felt the cubby for the lock wearing down. The whole weight of her small body nudged the socket thin and, after nearly years of effort and cries, the door gave way and tumbled inside with the Lady Gisborne. A darkness filled the chamber, but not from lack of sunlight; in fact the drapes were pulled back and light was gracefully displaying everything. A presence weighed down the air like concrete that made Lacie want to vomit.

There was not a single item out of place in the room. Each detail seemed in order as not even dust could be detected over shelves, but the unmistakable whisper that something was wrong would not dissipate. Lacie tore through the room without a pause to wrap around behind the Sherriff's desk, wishing she didn't know that is where he would be. After so many screams and hollers at the door it would be easy to blame a hoarse throat for her lack of sound but, in reality, the sickening shock of her mind becoming disturbed had stolen even the capability of her legs supporting herself. Lacie collapsed to her hands and knees and scraped herself along the floor, through the blood, to Sir Guy of Gisborne.

Resting perfectly on his back, Guy did not move his head to see her. His eyes drifted to her as he took another deep swallow, piercing a shot of pain in his stomach where the dagger protruded from. The blade was driven deep and the hilt stood proud over him. Guy's breaths were choppy and shallow, sweat beading on his forehead, sorrow pooling in his eyes. Gisborne was seconds away from dying. His fingers crept over covered in a sheet of his own blood to gently wrap around his wife's hand. She quickly grabbed it and put it to her heart, gaping for any words or breath or reasoning. Her other hand touched his cheek and stroked his jaw as the pain clearly bathed him.

"Do not hate me." The Sherriff managed to squeeze out from his lungs as they pumped for more and more time.

"Guy… Guy, no, no, no, no."

"Please…"

"I could never hate you. I have always loved you and I always will, I need you Guy, please!"

"I cannot keep… going in this darkness of what I cannot forget," he choked out with an empty cough, "I cannot forgive myself…"

"Why would you do this to me?" Lacie whined out with her body folding in on itself.

"I can't, Lace, I can't… You will still have Locksley to raise Margaret. But we cannot have Sherriff taken from us… I can't have Drake taken from me… I can't let myself ruin your life anymore." Each word required more and more combat to form as he let out another cough; this one was wet with blood that traced down the corner of his mouth and trickled to his neck.

"Guy I don't… I can't! I can't! Let me get a doctor, you will be ok!" She watched as her tears dripped down onto his collar bone before a small smile came to him.

"Lacie it's done. I'm done –"

"Stop it!"

"- I will always love you, my sweet… little dove… please forgive me…"

"I will think of you until the day I die; Guy I cannot stop loving you."

"I was wrong," he muttered, both of them knowing he had never said this phrase before, "You are not naïve… you are… wonderful and… and strong. You will be okay."

"You made me that way." Lacie replied. She pressed her cheek to his own and buried her face into his ear, sobbing and crying her professions of love repeatedly. It wasn't until Lady Gisborne had caught her breath that she was quiet enough to notice she no longer heard him breathing. She sat back up and cradled his face in her hands, the flesh still warm from the life that had just escaped. Guy's lips were parted slightly and his eyes were empty; they were as transparent as a pane of glass and were completely unrecognizable to his own wife. That void, that shell of his stare, that would scar her for the rest of her life. Each night as Lacie shut her own eyes his were all she would think of. She heard herself screaming at the top of her lungs in an animalistic ache, squeezing her husband and covering herself in his blood as she refused to let their bodies part.

Guards poured into the room and quickly saw what had happened. Several of them grabbed at Gisborne's wife and tried to pull her away but she scratched and kicked and pounded with bony hands to beat them off. Profanities spouted from her but her mind was in no way connected to her body; all she was now was a body, just like her husband. Nothing survived inside any longer. Lacie's energy was eaten through in only a matter of minutes but she did not allow them to take her until Sherriff Gisborne's skin had fallen pale and began to feel cold. This chill was much more severe than ice and could not be matched by any other temperature on earth. It was then that Lacie the widow gave up and was dragged away, never to see her husband's face again.