a/n:
hey all!! this was requested by my friend on tumblr so here's what happened to lucy gray and sejanus :) (and our main two, ofc)
Lucy Gray stumbled up to the cabin, hours after she was certain you and Coriolanus had left. Her heart had finally stopped pounding, and the bullet wound that only just grazed her back was still burning. Trying to stop the bleeding was hard when she was all alone.
She takes deep breaths, sighing in relief as she opens the cabin door in the dark of the night. She was free, or so she hoped. She peeked in, gasping as she saw your figure asleep on the makeshift bed, Coriolanus's scarf gripped in your hands held up just in front of your face as the moonlight seeped in through the open door. She couldn't believe she had considered you a friend.
You looked so peaceful as you slept. Harmless, even. But she knew better. She closed the door quietly, begging the universe to keep you asleep long enough for her to get away. Where you were, Coriolanus Snow was never far behind. Lucy Gray quietly stalked off into the woods past the cabin, leaving any hope of returning to the lake or the cabin behind. She would go North, just like the original plan.
After hours of walking in the dark, the day would break- finally. Finally, she could breathe again. The sun was still rising when the smell of smoke reached her, making her furrow her brow as she looked around. Up ahead, between the trees, there was a fire sizzling out, coals still burning just enough to illuminate the area around it. She hears a twig snap a ways to her left and quickly jumps behind a tree to hide, heart racing and forcing her blood to start to seeping from her back again. She could feel it.
"Lucy Gray?" The use of her name makes her tense up, and she doesn't dare peak out of her hiding spot. "Lucy Gray, is that you?"
She knows that voice, but it's not Coriolanus, and it's certainly not you, but the Capitol accent still has the hairs on the back of her neck raising.
"It's Sejanus, you don't have to hide. I'm not gonna hurt you." Her eyes shut tightly. That's exactly what you had said to her before you tried to kill her. She couldn't trust Capitol folk. Not anymore.
"Lucy Gray..." The footsteps get closer. "I thought you were dead. She tried to kill me, too."
Lucy Gray opens her eyes, holding her breath as she peeks around the side of the tree trunk. Sejanus is there, several feet away with his hands held out to show her he meant no harm. "I'm not going to hurt you." He says again.
Taking a shaky breath she nods, stepping out from her hiding place but keeping her distance. "She tried to kill you?" She asks him. "You weren't there when we arrived... I thought you didn't make it."
"I was there. Just went to scout out what our path should be." He explains. "I heard it all. What he did to you..."
Lucy Gray shakes her head, looking down at her feet. "I thought I could trust 'em."
"I did too." He replies quietly. "They were my best friends. My only friends. They tricked us both, huh?" He laughs dryly, shaking his head.
"Apparently." Lucy Gray mumbles.
"Come. Sit. You must be exhausted." He nods for her to follow him back to his little camp where he had the fire going.
"I just want to know why." Sejanus mumbles after close to an hour of silence, both of them sat quietly by the now dying fire.
Lucy Gray stays silent, just nodding as she stares into the orange coals. "I should have seen it sooner. She was just so... odd. So back and forth. I should have known when she flipped a switch and turned into a whole new person when she showed up at the hob."
"You wouldn't believe the things I've seen that girl do." Sejanus agrees, tossing a stick onto the rubble of the fire. "She's crazy. I always thought that was a good thing, she stood up for herself, she wouldn't go down without a fight to get anything she wanted. She'd scream and throw things like no one's business when someone said something she didn't like. Lucy Gray, you have no idea."
"But you were friends with her. Why?"
"Why were you?" He asks, turning to her and raising an eyebrow.
Lucy Gray opens her mouth to answer, but she can't bring herself to say what she wants to.
"I get it." He admits. "She's good when she wants to be. I've seen both sides of her. She's... Complicated, but at the end of the day, I'm not much different than her. She's braver. Much, much braver, though. I mean, I've seen her get violent before, but nothing like that. I could never hurt anyone."
"They deserve each other." Lucy Gray mutters, and Sejanus hums in quiet agreement.
Snow littered the grounds of the presidential palace on the day Sejanus Plinth and Lucy Gray returned to the Capitol.
The whole building had a chill that stung Sejanus down to his core as he was lead through the large halls, the building more lifeless than it had ever been. Quiet. Haunting.
When he thought back on his life in the Capitol, a full lifetime ago, he did imagine at the time that you and Coriolanus would occupy the space; filling it with life and tones of red and laughter and love, despite everything the Capitol leaders had done. He had hope back then that you would have done better.
The guards open the doors to what appears to be a bedroom, large with endless opulent decor and a patio overlooking the back of the property.
He doesn't say anything when he enters and the doors are shut promptly behind him. He turns, seeing the guards had entered now. Likely, in an effort to protect him.
"Leave us, please." He prompts them quietly, voice rough from nothing more than the decades that had passed. The guards look confused, but obey anyways. Sejanus had been on the receiving end of your anger before, and he was one of few who lived to tell the tale. You wouldn't hurt him.
You were sitting at the window, looking out at the snow falling over your garden. You turn your head when you hear his voice, eyes already wide. You stand up slowly, holding the arm rest of the chair as you stare at him in shock. "Sejanus?" You ask, but it comes out more as a comment.
"Y/N." He smiles. Smiles. You could be sick.
You're not sure if this is a fault in your medication- if you had been distributed too many by Thirteens doctors and you were losing your mind, or if Sejanus Plinth was truly standing in front of you right now. You let out the slightest laugh from shock, eyes welling up with tears.
"It's good to see you." He says, taking steps toward you, hands held behind his back. He was older, like you, but you didn't have a doubt in your mind that it was him.
He had survived. All this time.
"Oh my..." You shake your head in disbelief as he opens his arms to you. After all this time- after what you did, something so long forgotten from your memory, he was greeting you with a hug.
You hug him back, once again unsure whether or not this was real. Perhaps this was the afterlife, and you had been executed by something so boring as an untraceable overdose. You certainly hoped not.
"Sejanus..." You cry, patting his arms as you pull away and looking him up and down.
"I'm sorry." He mumbles, almost inaudible to you even from right there.
"Sorry?" You reply, that same dry laugh falling from your lips. "You have nothing to be sorry for. I... You're alive. I'm proud."
"I'm sorry it had to end like this." He clarifies and you look down, then cast your gaze out the window.
"Yes, well... we have never been well liked." You admit.
"You were by me."
"But not anymore?"
He doesn't respond, motioning for you to sit down as he pulls over his own chair to sit across from you. You both sit down, and you continue to stare out the window.
"We had a good life. He gave me everything I have ever wanted." You sigh. "I apologize... for what we did that day. I have felt a great deal of... guilt, over it. I hope you know."
He nods, keeping his pleasant shock to himself. You were sorry. He didn't expect so much from you after what he had seen and heard of your actions over the years. "Why did you let us go?" He asked, and you look over at him again, your face falling into one of confusion.
"Us?"
"Me and Lucy Gray."
"Lucy Gray..." You mumble. "That's a name I haven't heard in years." You shake your head, hurt building up inside you. It doesn't settle well. "Not since Coryo told me that he had buried her."
This wasn't true, of course, you had brought her up a small handful of times since, but that was when you were under the assumption that she was under the brush in the woods of District Twelve by the cabin at the lake.
Sejanus's eyebrows raise. "I... No. She escaped. She is alive, too." He says, trying to gauge your reaction, but you keep much of your emotions to yourself. All that gave you away was the tear that fell down your cheek as you stared down at the greenhouse.
"I see."
"You are scheduled for execution tomorrow afternoon." He states. "Coryo will be the following day. Coin wants him to be hurt by your passing, there will be a big celebration and they want him to be a witness."
"A celebration." You chuckle, wiping your tear away. "I wouldn't want it any other way."
"Wouldn't you prefer to go together?"
The way you hesitate is what he knows is his ticket in. "That would be preferable." You say after a moment. "But we will be together soon, regardless."
"I have spoken to some people from Thirteen, and they are willing to let you go." He tells you, and you shake your head before you even think about it.
"No. I will not be happy without him."
"I think that's a hasty assessment." When you don't respond, your pride refusing to let you admit anything different, he continues. "Is that true? Or are you just so used to being with him that you can't imagine being happy without him?"
"He is my whole world, Sejanus." You answer honestly. You hadn't known anything different since you were eighteen years old.
"Y/N, one of the things I remember the most about you is that you won't let anyone get in the way of what you want. You've always been a true independent." He reminds you.
You're silent for a moment, reeling over the realization of what Coriolanus had truly done. To him, it was likely a harmless lie to keep you calm. To be able to leave you out there at the lake for days without fear, and it worked. But it could have cost you your life, if Lucy Gray was more vicious than she was.
"Lucy Gray saw you, in the cabin." Sejanus tells you, almost tracking your thought process. "That he had left you out there alone. She said you had never looked more peaceful than when you were sleeping."
Your blood runs cold and you slightly shake your head. He just confirmed your fears, and you think he knew that. She could have killed you, but she didn't. You were just as lucky to be alive as he was, and it was at the fault of your beloved husband.
"I never forgot what you did for me. You saved my life, then you could have killed me, and I count myself lucky everyday that I had made a friend in you." Sejanus says, reeling you in further. "And I just want to offer you that same freedom now. I know you deserve it."
You chew on the inside of your cheek, eyes still locked on the snow coated greenhouse outside. "I have some conditions."
After he leaves, you are escorted outside and down to the garden. You would spend what was meant to be your final night there, with your husband.
You wanted to hate him for lying to you, you really did, but you couldn't. If you were to hate him for anything he had done, that would have happened years ago.
"My execution is this afternoon." You say to Coryo, approaching him as he admires some of the roses.
He hums in response as you join his side, picking one of the delicate flowers and holding it out to you with a gloved hand. You smile as you accept it.
"We were happy, weren't we?" You say softly, smiling down at the rose in your hand.
"Indeed." He grins, looking at you now.
"We took a lot of risks, and that rewarded us."
He smiles. "I would say so."
It was the end and he knew it. There was no use in fighting anymore.
"Would you have done anything differently?" You ask him, taking a seat on the bench next to you.
"Maybe I would have let you step in to prevent that stunt those kids pulled last year." He comments, sitting next to you. "But when it comes to us... no. Not a thing."
You nod slightly, looking down. "Sejanus is alive." You tell him.
"Is he really?"
"Yes. I just spoke with him."
"What did he have to say?" Your husband asks.
In the very same way that he never told you about Lucy Gray, you never told him you let Sejanus go either. Were you really any better than him? "That he is sorry." You answer simply.
"Well, he got what he wanted." He replies. "He shouldn't apologize for that. We never have."
"I agree, but he was more sorry for us." You explain, reaching out to take his hand beside you. "That it had to end this way."
"I see."
"I only wish that our children would have had a better chance." You say softly. You gave them everything- they were spoiled rotten their whole lives and prepared to take your place, but they would never get that chance. They were to be executed just after you, if Coin got her way.
"We gave them everything we could. This is not our fault."
"No." You agree. "It isn't."
"What about Cecelia?" He asks quietly. Your granddaughter was extremely special to the both of you, to him especially. She looked just like you, and every time he looked at her it's all he could see.
"Sejanus agreed that she will be well cared for." You promise, squeezing his hand. "She'll be okay."
He nods slightly. "She looks more and more like you every day." He says, unable to help it. "I remember you, when we were her age."
You smile at the memories, nodding. "I miss those days."
"I hope you know how incredibly proud I am of you, darling." He admits, voice cracking as he looks at you. "I feel as if I didn't tell you enough."
"You showed me every day." You promise, patting your other hand over his. "You were the best person I could have had by my side all these years."
"I love you." He says, and you lean your head on his shoulder.
"I love you too." You didn't want to talk anymore- you felt so incredibly guilty for deciding to leave him. It was betrayal. Maybe that is what would kill you.
You only have a few minutes before the glass doors are cracked open, and you look up. You know it's time. Commander Paylor is standing there with some guards, and she just nods at you.
You stand carefully, squeezing your husbands hand again as he joins you and remembering something you had heard him echo to you dozens of times.
Never let them see you bleed.
So it would be a silent goodbye. You drop his hand, looking up into his blue eyes for the last time as you take a step back.
He smiles as you raise your hand to your forehead in a salute. You don't need to speak- he knows what you mean. You weren't sure you could if you wanted to.
'Coriolanus Snow, future President of Panem, I salute you.'
He smiles, refusing to let the heat in his head manifest into tears as he gives you a curt nod, a slight bow. Your show was over.
You can't bring yourself to look back as you are escorted, for the last time, from your beautiful garden.
The sound of fireworks and music comes from the home Coriolanus Snow had shared for so many years with the love of his life. The most perfect person he has ever known, and he knows that the sounds of national celebration are his indicator of your passing. So that was it. You commanded and filled the energy of every space you entered, so he wondered now, after you were gone, why the air didn't feel any lighter.
He stared at the bare trestles that in the spring had always held up your raspberry bushes. They were gone, waiting to sprout in the spring. He can hear you, still.
'Raspberries are perennials."
Only then, when it was dark and he was alone, completely alone for the first time in years, did he cry over the weight of your death. Again.
All that was left of him was that boy on the train, crying over a letter he knew you would never receive.
Yours,
Always yours, your Coryo.