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The flowers arrived a week after her run through the Labyrinth.
The bouquet was on the kitchen table when she got home from school. They were a lovely riot of color and she smiled as she looked for a card, though she wondered when they were delivered. As far as she knew, Louise and Toby weren’t due back until the weekend, and her dad wouldn’t be home until after 7.
Sarah couldn’t find a card, but when she lifted the bouquet to smell them she knew exactly who they were from.
Just fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave.
The flowers fell from her suddenly boneless fingers and disappeared in a shower of crystalline sparks.
Sarah shook her head in denial. No. No. She had won. He had no power over her. He was supposed to leave her alone!
“You foolish girl. Did you really think you would be rid of me so easily?”
She whirled around at his voice in her ear, but there was no one there.
“Come now, Sarah. Are you going to deny me the chance to press my suit?”
“You’re damn right I am!” She was proud that her voice only wavered a little bit. “I beat your labyrinth. I got my brother back. You hold no power over me.” If she said it enough it would be true, right?
“That you did, precious thing. But that doesn’t mean we’re over. It means we are no longer limited to only the Underground.”
Sarah sank to the floor and shook her head. “What do you want from me?”
Jareth materialized in front of her and she really wanted to smack the smirk off his face. He looked down at her and said in mock surprise, “Why, Sarah, I want you.”
She shook her head again. “In what way? Do you want to turn me into a goblin? Make me your servant? What? What do you want me for? Why me?”
He squatted down and lifted her chin with his index finger, making her meet his mismatched eyes. “I thought I made myself clear before. I want you to be my queen.”
She snorted and jerked her face away from his hand. “I am fifteen years old. I can’t be anyone’s queen!”
Jareth just tsked and smiled at her condescendingly. “Oh, Sarah. How very little you know of the way the world works. I have so much to teach you. What better time to start than now?”
She scrambled back on her hands to get away from him, trying to get enough traction to get up. “I don’t want that! I don’t want anything to do with you! You want me to fear you? Believe me, I do. But I will never love you, Goblin King. No matter what tricks or games you play, that will not change.”
Sarah knew she said the wrong thing the moment the words left her mouth. Jareth’s eyes darkened and his ethereal features twisted into something almost demonic before they resettled into his customary smirk. She tried again to get up, to get away, but he moved too quickly. He caught her by her upper arms and pulled her close.
There was a spark of something sinister in his eyes and she could feel the blood draining from her face. Jareth leaned in, his lips ghosting across her cheek, and he whispered in her ear, “Challenge accepted.”
Her familiar kitchen dissolved around them and she found herself back in the Underground.
Sarah thought she knew what fear was. She thought she knew what Jareth was capable of.
She had no idea, none at all- but she was about to learn, whether she wanted to or not.
-30-