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Chapter Text

  Sarah woke up with a groaned gasp and half-elicited scream that got caught in her parched throat before she jolted herself into a sitting position. Her face was dripping with sweat, and her breath was ragged and intermittent.

  Her mouth hung open while she tried desperately to fill her lungs with enough air to regain her bearings, and her eyes darted wildly across the sheets of her bed in the darkness.

  Where was she?

  She swivelled her head and reached for the lamp on her nightstand, hastily flicking it on.

  The light, bathing her room into a soft yellow glow, had her relax quickly, and she took one deep inhale, followed by an even deeper exhale of great relief.

  “Just another dream”, she mumbled and wiped the sweat-stained strands of hairs out of her damp and flustered face. “I need some water.”

  As if on autopilot, she instinctively reached for her fully filled glass on the nightstand.

  She kept it there for a reason.

  Gulping down several large sips while wiping a few escaping drops off her chin, she returned it to the nightstand and let herself fall back onto her mattress and pillow with a loudly expelled groan.

  “God, when will it stop. I can’t take this much longer.”

  For the past thirteen years, she had been tormented by the same dream, night after night after night.

  She was in the ballroom and tried to find someone; no, not someone; she tried to find him.

  She was only allowed fleeting glances of his presence before he escaped her field of vision again, no matter how hard she hurried after him. He always disappeared amongst the mass of masqueraded and laughing dancers.

  The search through the dense crowd of swaying bodies, arms reaching for her, and grotesquely masked men stepping into her way, trying to get her to dance with them, had her exhausted and frustrated.

  The dream always ended in the same manner: the shattering sound of crystals followed by a horrible scream, and the unbearable sensation of extreme loss and sadness that had her cry out in agony.

  It was his scream she heard night after night after night for the past thirteen years.

  It nearly had driven her into madness, and she had consumed her entire adolescence and young adulthood going from therapist to therapist, trying out different medications that never helped.

  Regardless of what she took or what calming meditation and yoga exercises she tried, the dreams remained a constant in her life and consumed all of her waking hours.

  It made it hard to have a workable relationship with any man, and she soon had given up on ever finding her one true love with whom she could settle down and start a family.

  Her night terrors and resulting isolation from friends and society in general, as they did not comprehend her mental anguish, had her turn into a recluse.

  She left for college, moved away from her estranged family, travelled nearly half the globe in a futile pursuit of salvation, and finally settled in a small, mid-western American town, where no one knew her, to try and get her life in order.

  And now, here she was at twenty-eight, a nightly mess of tears, sweat, and slobber, pining over the one she could not find, ever.

  A dream that made her chase but never capture.

  A yearning that increased with each night but was never stilled nor rewarded.

  She flung back her sheets and stumbled into her bathroom, giving herself an intense stare in the mirror.

  The dark rings under her eyes and sunken in cheeks were a testament to the consistent nocturnal torment she endured.

  She exhaled a sigh at seeing her pitiful countenance and opened the medicine cabinet to reach for one of those latest anxiety pills she had been prescribed by her doctor a few weeks ago.

  They were her bête noire, and yet she was incapable of discarding them.

  She dutifully swallowed one with a cupped handful of water straight from the faucet and splashed her face to cool her hot clammy skin and rid it of the sweat that still clung to her eyebrows and nose.

  “You are the bane of all my suffering. Why are you doing this to me?” she asked the mirror with accusatively squinted eyes focused sternly onto the rigid glassy surface, halfway expecting it to ripple and show her what was so clear in her dreams.

  The mirror, however, remained a stark reflection of her questioning eyes and dripping wet face that had her appear as if she had been crying.

  She dabbed the water remnants from her visage with her hand towel and exhaled another deep sigh.

  She would not find her answer in this mirror nor any other mirror.

  Wiping her hair back with both hands, she turned away from the framed reflective surface and slumped back into her bedroom. A quick cursory glance at her nightstand clock told her it was just after midnight.

  An unusual time for her to have those dreams.

  They always occurred at precisely three in the morning. Why was she up so early?

  She briefly furled her brows, but then shrugged her shoulders and climbed back into her bed, although she did not feel tired.

  Her mind was racing, as was always the case, and all she could do was for the pill to do its trick and lull her back to sleep.

  Laying on her back and staring once more into the dark void of her room, she waited with desirous impatience for a dreamless sleep to overtake her.

  “Sarah.”

  The voice, spoken like a whisper on the wind, had her snap her head and listen intently.

  Was she hearing things now?

  Had she gone completely mad?

  She could have sworn she had heard a distant female voice calling her name.

  It was still, and the only sound came from the small fan that whirled on her vanity to provide a cooling breeze on this hot, stifling August night.

  “You really need to quit taken these pills. I think they make you see and hear things”, her reasoning mind admonished her for once again resorting to the drugs that rarely if ever worked and most likely came with hallucinogenic side-effect.

  “Sarah”, the ghostly melodious voice called out again.

  This time, she had heard it very distinctly, and she shot up into a sitting position, hastily flipping on the light on her nightstand with trembling fingers.

  Her eyes dithered frantically across her room but could not detect a visible presence.

  “You must come with us now and save him.”

  There it was again.

  It was faint, like a whisper on the wind, but unmistakable and perceptible, nevertheless.

  Her head snapped to her right and then to the left.

  Nothing.

  Her room was as completely devoid of human or otherwise company as ever, and she was the only one present.

  “Come now and save him before it is too late”, another female voice chimed in, equally, hauntingly beautiful and frightening at the same time.

  Rotating her head to her other side now from where this voice had emanated, she tried to make out anything that might move around, but there was nothing.

  “I must be going crazy.”

  He eyes dithered with onsetting panic, and her heartrate increased and caused her breath to be ragged and shaky.

  She could feel the sweat extruding from every pore of her body, and the palms of her hands becoming moist from her perspiration.

  At this rate, she would require a shower before going back to sleep.

  “Before it’s too late for you and him”, came the third, hushed on a whisper, female voice, as if finishing the statement of the other two.

  “STOP IT. STOP IT”, she finally cried out over and over and held her hands against her ears, convinced she was suffering from delusions on top of her nightmares.

  The scrunched her eyes to a close and grimaced her face with her palms pressing as hard against her ear-shells as possible.

  “You are not here; I’m only dreaming this. You are not here. I am not hearing voices”, she now mumbled to herself on repeat like a broken record while her body continuously rocked slightly back and forth.

  “Oh, but we are. Look at us”, came the first voice now, directly from the foot of her bed.

  Sarah shook her head and intensified the squeeze of her closed eyes, trying hard to control her breathing to keep from outright panicking.

  The new pill must have had some delusionary side effect that only now made its presence known. She would have to go and talk to her doctor tomorrow.

  “It’s only the pill, side-effects from the pill. That’s it. There are no voices. There’s nobody here.”

  She persistently repeated her mumbled words and kept up her rocking, trying her best to ignore the otherworldly presence, which seemed to intensify by the second.

  “LOOK AT US”, boomed the voice, forcing Sarah’s eyes to snap open under their own volition from the ferocity of its sound.

  Her terrified body froze in place, and her nonplussed stare rested on three ephemeral figures that had materialized between the foot of her bed and the window.

  Lowering her hands from her ears, she scooted herself slowly onto her knees, ready to pounce out of their reach at a moment’s notice should she feel threatened.

  “Now I’m seeing things too”, she mumbled with incredulity and shook her head as if to rid herself of the visions. “You are not real.”

  “Oh, but we are very real, Child, albeit we have a problem being solid in your world. All we can show you are our spectres.“

  She sucked in her breath, unable to utter another word.

  After swallowing down the lump in her throat that prevented her to speak, she perused intently over the three hovering diaphanous figures.

  They looked like middle-aged women in their fifties with lengthy, wavy hair of blonde, wearing long white gowns, nearly indistinguishable from each other.

  A warm smile graced each one’s lips, and their freakishly glowing bluish eyes held no ire or ill will towards her.

  “We have not come to harm you, Child”, the closest one declared with a soft smile and lightly stepped forward, as if she were floating on air, to be immediately followed by the other two.

  “We are the three Fates. I am Clotho, the Spinner of your destiny. I weave the path of life for you.”

  “I am Lachesis, the Allotter, dispensing your destiny”, the middle spectre declared.

  “And I am Atropos, the Inflexible, and you do not want me to act on your destiny, but I will if you won’t come and help him”, the third warned and bore a stark gaze into Sarah’s bamboozled eyes while her hand gestures mimicked the cutting of the thread she held in her hand.

  “What?” Sarah stammered and shook her head. “I got to be hallucinating.”

  “You are not hallucinating, Child, and the sooner you realize this, the sooner we can get going on saving him, and you, from a terrible fate”, Clotho emphasized.

  “Get going? Going to where? And saving him? Who is him? And why do I require saving? Saving from what fate?”

  Sarah became more bewildered by the second and kept her thin sheet pressed tightly against her body.

  She was fully aware that her pretend shield would not protect her against these ghostly visitors, but it comforted her with its instilled false sense of security and made her feel slightly less vulnerable.

  “Show her, we are wasting our time here”, Lachesis hissed with clear impatience, and Atropos stepped forward, reaching her hand out towards Sarah.

  Immediately, Sarah scooted back against the back of her headboard and kicked her legs at the advancing apparitions. 

  She was not persuaded of anything and still felt she was suffering from medication induced hallucinations. She definitely would have a talk with her doctor tomorrow.

  This could not be real, or could it?

  After all, her Labyrinth run had been real. Or had all of this been a dream too?

  She all the sudden questioned her entire last thirteen years.

  “Get away from me”, she yelled out with renewed oncoming panic.

  Tossing back her sheet to escape from the bed altogether, she was being grabbed by the eldritch hands on her shoulder, and before she could react, her entire world started spinning in ever-increasing circles.

  She felt herself freefalling into a void of nothingness and elicited a terrified scream that escaped her throat unheard.

  Her stomach began to revolt against the revolving of her surroundings, and she was afraid she would heave up her dinner from a few hours earlier.

  Just as she felt herself succumbing to the queasiness, the spinning stopped, and she felt solid ground beneath her feet.

  She charily peeked out from behind her mess of hair that had fallen over her face and charily glanced around with wild eyes.

  A loud gasp caught in her throat as her mouth dropped open, and her eyes opened wide.

  She was standing in the middle of the dance floor of the fancy ballroom from her dreams.

  She could hear the music and the raucous colloquies and laughter from the merry revellers.

  She could smell the intoxicating perfume that wafted like a seductive invite through the air and feel the sensation of several solid bodies bumping into her own as she was jostled around by swaying couples.

  They only tossed her lecherous and interested gazes from behind their grotesque, goblinesque masks as they floated by.

  Only now did she notice, her nightgown had been replaced by the same sugar spun, ostentatious white silk gown she had worn as a fifteen-year-old girl during her Labyrinth run.  

  Before she could ask what this was all about, she was rudely hustled about by another couple, and the three Fates speedily whisked her to the side-lines of the rumbunctious dance floor like a troupe of bodyguards.

  “I always tell you to make sure of your destination”, Clotho hissed at Atropos with a scowl and readjusted her togalike cape that had been knocked out of alignment on the dance floor.

  “How many more times do I have to tell you to concentrate”, she added with a sneer of discontent.

  “How was I to know they would be in the middle of a fast dance”, Atropos justified her miscalculations with a likewise sneer.

  “Because you always do this”, Clotho snapped back and threw her an irked gaze. “You never listen and always screw it up.”

  “Do not.”

  “Do too.”

  “Not.”

  “Too.”

  “Not”

  “ENOUGH”, bellowed Lachesis, tired of the same old bickering of her siblings. “We have more prominent issues here than your mishap in navigating. Zip it, Atropos”, she directed her pique at her sister, who was in the process of remonstrating once more.

  Sarah had followed the intense squabble with stunned silence while her perplexed eyes had dithered back and forth between Clotho and Atropos.

  She was certain now that this was just an updated version of her regular dreams.

  Nothing this insane could be real.

  The pill must have worked and put her back to sleep. She was just dreaming again.

  “It’s not a dream, Sarah, at least not yours”, Lachesis informed her as if she had read Sarah’s thoughts. “It is King Jareth’s dream, or should I say, his nightmare.”

  “What?” Sarah gasped with utter confoundment and shook her head as if to rid herself of the entire situation. “Are you trying to tell me I am in his dream? You are all crazy. I’m having one weird dream tonight.”

  “She has spoken the truth. You are in His Majesty’s nightmare”, Clotho underscored Lachesis's claim.

  “What?” Sarah repeated her muttered response, with the rest of her argument stuck in her throat, as she swung her head around at the feeling in the back of her neck that she was being stared at.

  She immediately froze, and her breath failed her.

  There he was, looking as gorgeous and alluring as ever.

  His immaculate beatific face shimmered with golden flecks on his cheeks in the dancing light of the crystal chains.

  His blue and white markings seemed more intense than she could remember in any dream, and his mismatched bewitching eyes held her gaze with such an intensity that it had her nearly melt under his stare.

  Her heart ceased its beating, and the lump in her throat was too large to swallow and momentarily had her suck in her breath.

  She could feel the oncoming tingling of butterfly wings inside her stomach, and she felt a weakness invading her knees.

  “It is his dream. He has been stuck in this ballroom for the past thirteen years, ever since you had bested him and condemned him to his fate”, Atropos whispered into her ear.

  “What? I have condemned him? I have done no such thing”, Sarah now argued back as her head spun back towards Atropos for making such an unwarranted accusation.

  “Oh, but you did, Child”, Lachesis added with a warm tone in her voice that held a certain sadness.

  At the wave of her hand, all action in the ballroom froze, and the sounds were suspended in mid-air, never to arrive at their destinations.

  Sarah involuntarily quirked her brows at this, impressed over the magic trick. So, the Fates, too, could manipulate time, even in dreams.

  Her eyes travelled back to the Goblin King, equally frozen and unmoving. How enchanting and captivating he was with his ethereal beauty.

  The voice of Clotho tore her eyes back to the Fates as all three floated around the king, lovingly caressing his still countenance with their bare hands, tossing him empathetic gazes.

  “You see, Sarah, when you left and declared that he had no power over you, you unwittingly imprisoned his soul to the last place he felt happy and alive. Alas, here into this ballroom.”

  “His real body lays suspended in a deep, comalike sleep in his chambers”, Clotho picked up from where Lachesis had stopped, “slowly withering away from the passing of time. His kingdom is in a state of flux, for as the power of the king wanes, so does the existence of the Labyrinth itself.”

  “How can this be?” Sarah gasped with disbelief. “I never meant to bring this upon him. All I wanted was to take Toby back home with me.”

  “What we mean to do and what often happens are two different things, Sarah”, Atropos responded with an accusative gaze. “Words here have meaning. You rejected him, and not only that, but you also took away his powers, and with it his soul.”

  “He had no choice but to escape to this ballroom. It keeps his soul alive, for the time being, but his body will die and vanish like the sands on the wind”, Clotho concluded, and all three Fates stared at her in silence, their stark gazes holding all the divulged assertions within them.

  Sarah stumbled back in shock and shook her head.  She frantically pivoted to take in the entire scene of the ballroom, not knowing what to do.

  She could absolutely not fathom that she had unleashed a curse on this world with her carelessly spoken words and condemned the king, her beloved villain, whom she dreamt about every night for the past thirteen years, to such a gruesome fate.

  “No, no, I didn’t know”, she cried out in a panic-struck voice and spun around to look back at Jareth, who stood frozen, his intense gaze still prevalent in his unmoving eyes.

  Eyes that held so much yearning and pain within, betraying his lecherous smirk that lay in wait around the corners of his enticing lips.

  “It is his scream you hear in your dreams”, Atropos hissed into her ear from behind, and Sarah shivered involuntarily. “He cries out for you in his real form as he lays dying in his bed. Every night, he calls your name. Have you not noticed what the scream says?”

  Sarah’s face fell as the realization sank in.

  Yes, Atropos was correct.

  The scream had been a cry of her own name in his agonized voice, she only had refused to acknowledge it over the years.

  “I didn’t mean to....”

  “Oh, she didn’t mean to”, Clotho now chimed in with mockery in her voice and, likewise, stepped close to her to hiss into her ear, a snickering Atropos by her side.

  “You said a lot of things you didn’t mean back then, like wishing your brother away but then accusing the king of stealing him. Calling his Labyrinth ‘a piece of pie’.....”

“Cake”, Atropos interjected and earned herself a deathly glare from Clotho over the interruption.

  “What?”

  “She said cake, it’s a piece of cake, not pie.” Atropos set her straight but quickly cowered and shut up under the trenchant gaze of her sister.

   “Calling it a piece of cake” she corrected herself. “But then calling him a cheat for taking away three hours in retaliation for the insult. Yes, you said a lot of things you didn’t mean to, didn’t you?”

  “Enough of that”, Lachesis interfered and stopped both Clotho and Atropos from continuing their superfluous cruel taunts of Sarah, who was near tears over the accusations, which were all true the more she thought about it.

  “I want to help”, she begged with a couple of rueful tears now streaming down her cheeks. “I’ll take back my words. He can have his powers back; I don’t want them. I never wanted them.”

  “Oh, it’s not that easy, Child. You can’t just take back words and reason that will undo all the damage caused”, Atropos sneered but was immediately waved back by Lachesis.   

  “Sarah”, Lachesis now addressed the snivelling woman, whose eyes were filled with remorse and deep regret over her impetuous actions. “There is still hope, and that’s why we have brought you here. Do you realize that in thirteen days is the thirteenth anniversary of your run?”

  “It is?” Sarah breathed and twitched her brows, trying feverishly to remember the date. “It is”, she confirmed after her contemplations. “What does it mean?”

  “It means you have thirteen days to save King Jareth and his kingdom, and yourself”, Clotho piped in, completely disregarding Lachesis reprimanding glare over her intrusion.

  “Thirteen days? How? Tell me; what must I do?”

  “You must remain in his dream and convince him that this is but a dream and for him to break the crystal wall, just like you did when you had been trapped.”

  “Say what? I have to stay here until he believes me?” Sarah verified Lachesis’s instructions.

  A nod from all three Fates greeted her puzzled eyes.

  “You keep saying to save myself; what do you mean by that?” she added quickly with oncoming presentiment and took a step back, tossing a fleeting glance back at Jareth, who still stood frozen in time.

  A pitiful smile curled itself around the lips of all three Fates, and Sarah started to experience increasing sensations of imminent doom deep within her stomach.

  “If you fail, your soul will be trapped here as well, while your mortal body will wither and die.”

  “Wait, what? Where is my mortal body? I thought.... Are you saying I am....”

  She glanced down at herself to see if she started to be diaphanous or spectral, but to her reassurance, she remained solid.

  Her disquieted eyes rested back on the three Fates before her.

  “Your mortal body is still laying on your bed, Child”, Lachesis answered her question, and Sarah gasped in horror.

  “But.... so, this is just....”

  “Your soul, Child”, Atropos grinned and held up a string that represented Sarah’s destiny and life. “I hold your mortal life in my hands. Don’t make me snip it.”

  “That is quite enough from you, Atropos”, Lachesis scolded her sister over the superfluous threat and motioned her to step back.

  “She needs to know the truth”, the Inflexible retorted with a low growl, but receded obediently into the background.

  “And she will”, Lachesis assuaged her sister with another wave. “But we also don’t want to frighten the poor thing more than necessary.”

  “Wait, I can’t stay here for thirteen days. Even if I’ll be successful, my mortal body won’t be able to sustain itself without food and water for that long.”

  A commiserated twitched smile in the corners of Lachesis’ lips, and a pair of eyes filled with pity and anguish, had Sarah hold her breath as her heartrate increased, and she felt herself becoming lightheaded and unable to form clear thoughts.

  Her eyes flicked over to Atropos, who gleaned at her with a chuffed grin and hungry eyes, as if she was already assessing her for the next gourmet dinner she was about to throw.

  Clotho expelled a sorrowful sigh and cast her despondent eyes towards the floor.

  “I’m not coming back, am I?” Sarah asked more as a statement than a true question.

  “That is completely up to you, Child”, Lachesis replied in a motherly tone and stepped forward to gently touch Sarah’s cheek with the back of her hand.

  To Sarah’s own surprise, she did not flinch from the featherlight contact, and the touch felt comforting and soothing, stilling her most dreadful cogitations.

  She even briefly closed her eyes and lightly leaned into the caress.

  “Every thirteen hours here, you will be released from the dream for enough time to sustain nourishment”, Lachesis assured her and smiled gently down on her, as if she were a mother speaking to a child, trying to erase doubts and fears and instead instil confidence.

  “We are not cruel, and we won’t let you wither away while you are trying to save this world. Should you, however, have failed by the thirteenth day, you will remain trapped here for perpetuity along with King Jareth. Your souls will be trapped in a continual ballroom dance while your bodies will vanish like the frolicking dust flecks in the beam of the fading light as the sun goes down for the night, taking all of their existence with it.”

  Gone were the brief feelings of assurance, and Sarah’s face became distorted upon hearing Lachesis’ casted verdict of her fate.

  She fell to her knees and sat back onto her heels, weeping unabashedly into her hands in which she buried her face.

  Her body trembled from the mournful waves of sobs coursing through her being in predictable intervals.

  “Now, now, come on, Child. Are you giving up so easily? Are you already considering yourself vanquished before you have even begun? Are you that insecure in your abilities to woo the king and persuade him to break his own crystal dream walls?”

  Clotho’s soft-spoken words of encouragement slowly penetrated Sarah’s consciousness, and she lifted her gaze to look into the eyes of the three Fates, who now stood around her in a semicircle, smiling warmly down at her.

  Even Atropos held compassion and ruth within her gaze.

  “Stand up, Child, and wipe away those tears.”

  Lachesis proffered Sarah her hand, and after a hesitating moment, she accepted and lifted herself off her knees, wiping off her dress and dabbing away the tears with a handkerchief Clotho handed her.

  “Thank you”, she murmured gratefully and handed the handkerchief back to Clotho, who motioned for her to keep it.

  “So, what’s going to happen now?” she inquired with still lightly swollen and reddish eyes.

  With the wave of Lachesis’ hand, her eyes were once again clear of the tears, and her cheeks were rosy and fresh.

  “Now? Now you start persuading the king to break out of his dream to save you both.”

  With these words, the three Fates nodded and dissolved before her eyes while the music blared loudly through the ballroom, and the goblinesque masked revellers once more laughed and twirled across the parquet.

  Sarah hesitantly pivoted around and locked gaze with a mesmerized Goblin King as he walked up to her with a coy smile around his glistening lips, holding out his hand in an invite to dance with him.

Chapter Text

  Sarah gazed with ensorcelled eyes into his two mismatched ones. How they drew her in.

  She could not escape his powerful and all-consuming magnetism and appeal. Not that she even tried when she reached out her own hand, as if it were detached from the rest of her body and had a mind of its own.

  It wanted to feel his touch, the strength of his grip, and the softness of his gloves, which held the promise of a warm, gentle hand beneath its fabric.

  He took hold of her hand and pulled her ever so gently against his body, maintaining a respectable distance, nevertheless.

  His other arm speedily and meticulously snaked around her small waist. Sarah briefly hitched her breath upon the contact, which evoked vivid sensations from her dreams.

  Her mouth dropped open involuntarily, and she almost hated herself for looking so besotted and drooling over his appearance, like a love-struck, callow ingénue, meeting her secret crush for the first time.

  His riveted eyes held her in a spell and never left hers as their feet began the slow one two three step sequence of the waltz rhythm.

  As much as Sarah wanted to object to the dance, she couldn’t. Her desirous body betrayed her, and her feet automatically followed his lead.

  Within a few opening beats, the waltz changed to a foxtrot and with the fluidity and smoothness of an expert dancer, he swooped her effortlessly into a four quarter, never losing a beat in the process.

  They flowed, as if on a wispy cloud, across the parquet while their eyes never wavered from each other.

  She could feel the strength of his muscles underneath his glittery blue frock, and for the first time as a woman, she experienced a resurging desire that had been held captive deep inside her recesses for far too long.

  She was still trying to make sense of her sudden resurfaced yearnings, which had somewhat blind-sided her over their unexpected intensity, when he began to sing the most beautiful song she had ever heard.

  It felt new to her, although she had heard it a million times by now in her nightly dreams and knew each word and note by heart.

  His rich baritone voice, containing within a touch of vibrato, created pleasurable shivers to ripple through her entire body, and the words spoke to her, as if they had been written for her alone.

  And perchance they had.

  She found herself falling deeper and deeper into a transcendental state.

  No, this was no mere dream; this was so much more; so much more intense and graphic. 

  It was a crystal dream reality.

  She dared to barely breath and tried to clear her mind but found herself unable of formulating one coherent thought.

  With the mere touch of his hands, and the enchantment of his voice, he had stolen them from her, wiped them from her consciousness.

  How did she get here?

  And why?

  What was the purpose of her being here?

  “To dance with your dream king”, her entranced mind whispered to her.

  No, this was not it; there had to be another reason.

  Deep inside, she felt she had been sent on some sort of mission, but she could not for the life of her remember what this mission possibly could entail. 

  Did she even care?

  The only thing that remained crystal clear in her mind was him, his mesmerizing eyes, and his incredible allure that threatened to consume her very being with its ferocity and ferity.

  “There’s such a sad love, deep in your heart....”

  Why did she feel like he was quite accurate with this line.

  Was there a love within her heart?

  Why was it sad?

  Unrequited, perchance?

  She couldn’t remember.

  All she knew was that she felt every word, every note, as if it spoke to her most inner desires and fears, begging for her to release them of their bondage.  

  The other dancers, twirling zealously around them with their grotesque masks and lecherous glares, were barely registered, as he alone held all of her unwavering attention with his serenade of love.

  “I’ll be there for you.... as the world falls down....”

  Whose world was falling down?

  Hers?

  His?

  Did it matter?

  He vowed he would be there for her if it did, and she allowed herself to fall into the believe of his sung promises. Promises of a togetherness, of a deep, pure love, and of eternal mornings of gold and valentine evenings.

  Increasingly, the other roysterers now encroached on their dancing space, and Sarah was torn from his enchanting gaze and bespelling voice by their ever-annoying presence.

  Her eyes, for the first time since they had begun to dance, left his, and her head briefly turned away, glancing at the revellers around them.

  She wanted them to go away and leave them alone as her head began to swivel worriedly from side to side with ever-increasing consternations.

  She could see the change in his eyes as they started to hold a worry and unease inside them for not giving him her undivided attention.

  He had finished singing, but the music kept going as they kept twirling faster and faster in place, as if being stuck on an out of control spinning carousel.

  Her head began to whirl, and her feet could barely keep up with the ever-increasing tempo of his circles.

  He smiled down at her.

  Powerful and captivating.

  His eyes intensifying their gaze as the ballroom became nothing but a blur in her vision.

  He remained the only clear image, yet she could not disregard the washed-out presence of the others around them, and her eyes began to wander, focusing increasingly on the other couples, as if an invisible force compelled her to divert her gaze from him.

  Something was wrong; she could feel it inside of her.

  This was not supposed to happen.

  She glanced back into his face and could see his lips twitching, trying to produce a genuine smile that was prevented from forming by the troublesome look in his eyes.

  He was fighting an inner war with himself.

  The alternating flickering between disconcertment and contentment was clearly displayed as his smile began to falter under the heavy weight of his surfacing consternations. 

  The grotesque partygoers increasingly crowded around them, and she pulled closer into him to avoid their reaching hands, as they tried to grab for her and pull her from him.

  “Jareth, I have to save him from this dream. This is his dream, not mine”, her mind finally recognized the situation and yelled at her with all its might.

  “You must remain in his dream and convince him that this is but a dream and for him to break the crystal wall, just like you did when you had been trapped.”

  “If you fail, your soul will be trapped here as well, while your mortal body will die.”

  The Fate’s words of warning resonated inside her head, and she gasped, trying to still her breathing that threatened to become ragged and out of control with her oncoming panic as she gradually remembered her mission.

  Finally, it had all come back into focus.

  Before she could ponder over a course of action to persuade him, she found herself being torn from his embrace by countless hands and swept up in the mass of the rumbunctious crowd.  

  Like an indomitable and unyielding tidal wave, the profusion of bodies carried her further and further from Jareth, who had stopped his dancing and stood motionless on the now deserted dance floor.

  His eyes were filled with utter disconsolation and bewilderment, and his forlorn mien on his crestfallen countenance spoke of his broken heart and torn soul.

  He haphazardly reached out with one arm, as if attempting to call her back to him.

  Sarah made every endeavour to fight the surge that had completely engulfed her. The cackling and screeching laughter gave her chills as they threatened to suffocate her with their tightly pressed together bodies.

  Was this how he had originally seen her disappear? Into a sea of jeering, mask-clad monsters?

  If she had hoped the partygoers were figments of his imagination and would easily be fought against, she found they consisted of solid, impenetrable figures, unwilling to yield to her resistance.

  She felt the heat escaping from their sweaty, heated physiques and took in the nauseating smells of wine, perspiration, and something else she could not decipher but found quite repulsive, as she crinkled her nose with abhorrent disgust.

  “Gag, that stench. They smell like....”

  “.... the Bog”, she answered herself.

  The surging, unrelenting wave finally had pushed her all the way against the wall of the crystal, and she stared at her own reflection, distorted by the curvature and slight elastic movement of the glass.

  The Goblin King stood in the far back of the crowd and looked at her with heavy-hearted and glum eyes.

  The mass of revellers had stopped its forward progress and held its position, staring her down in silence, as if to contemplate over what to do with her next.

  Only the hideous smirks were visible on their partially hidden faces, and she could clearly see some sharp, gnashing teeth glinting behind the disguises.

  She sucked in her breath over their now demonic, goblinesque appearances.  The former beauty and allure of the dancers had been replaced by the true reflection of their nightmarish personae.

  “Nothing can happen unless I break the crystal”, she told herself and firmly stood her ground.

  The masked pair, sitting at a table next to her, only gave her derisive glances and stood up to hurriedly vacate the premises.

  It seemed everyone expected her to break the crystal, and they steadily moved forward in one coalesced, slow rolling wave, as if they were challenging her over it.

  “Why don’t you break that glass, pretty mortal? It’ll bring an end to all your worries”, the woman hissed serpentlike into her ears as she passed her by.

  Her words underscored Sarah’s suspicion.

  They wanted her to shatter the wall.

  But why?

  Sarah squinted her indecisive eyes and stood with her back against the glass barrier.

  There was no way forward through the densely packed collection of gradually encroaching revellers, who now began to hiss and jeer, chanting for her to break the wall, daring her.

  “Break it, break it, break it.”

  Their voices increased in fervour and crescendo, making the glassy surface behind her ripple from the soundwaves bouncing off it.

  This was not how it had happened last time.

  They had not been adamant for her to leave. Just the opposite, as they had been utterly surprised and then panicked by her breaking the glass.

  So, what had caused the change in their attitude?

  Why were they so adamant for her to break the wall and escape the crystal?

  “It’s Jareth’s torn mind”, Sarah whispered to herself with incredulity, realizing that every single reveller presented a part of the tormented state of his subconsciousness.

  “He expects me to shatter the glass and leave. He’s making me leave, and yet he doesn’t want me to. It’s as if he’s fighting himself.”

  She was still in her own deep self-discussion when a chair was being pressed strongly into her hand.

  Her gaze travelled to a tall, slender male, grinning sardonically at her, and exposing sharp canines.

  “Break it. It’ll bring an end to your worries and nightmares. You shall have no more trouble afterwards. Go and destroy the wall.”

  His comment was emphasized by the increasing chorus of “break it” from the crowd, which continued to push steadily forward, shrinking her available area by the glass.

  Her space was running thin, her time was running out, and Sarah began to panic.

  If she stood there much longer, she would be crushed by the surging mass of tightly pressed bodies, and it didn’t appear they were greatly concerned about her physical wellbeing.

  It was her or the wall.

  Without thinking, and guided by a sudden overwhelming fear, she lifted the chair over her head with a throaty scream and violently crashed it into the glass barrier.

  For a moment, complete quietude overtook the mayhem, and all she could feel around her was a strong wind and millions of trenchant glass fragments, swooshing around her as if stirred up by a tempest.

  She instinctively placed her arms over her head and ducked down, hoping she would not be cut up by the flying shards and pulled out into the void.

  Her eyes looked for something sturdy to grab onto that would keep her inside the bubble, but there was nothing.

  “JAAAARETH” she yelled as she felt a harsh pull on her body and floated away with the rest of the revellers while watching a crestfallen Jareth disappear into the back of the crowd and vanish from sight.

  With an expelled gasp and scream of his name on her lips, Sarah opened her eyes and found herself sitting in bed, her back pressed tightly against the headboard, and the sheets clutched tightly in her fists close to her chest.

  It was the same position she had held before the Fates had taken her.

  She slowed her rapid breathing and anxiously surveyed her room. It was still dark, but the first beams of the rising sun told her that dawn was not far away.

  Tossing a quick glance at her clock showed that it was nearly six o’clock. Exhaling a deep sigh of relief, she tossed back the sheets and stumbled into her attached bathroom.

  “It was just another dream, but this one was so odd and different. It has to be the new pills. I’m definitely going to call the doctor this morning.”

  With this decision of her mind, she nodded and took care of her ablutions. 

  A quick, cool shower would do her good and get her blood flowing. Standing under the streaming showerhead, she casted her gaze towards her feet.

  They felt a touch sore for some unexplained reason.

  A subdued scream escaped her throat, and she quickly turned off the water and kept lifting her feet off the shower floor as if it were covered by a swarm of cockroaches, her eyes flummoxed, and her mouth gawping.

   The floor around her feet was covered in scintillating golden glitter; glitter just like in her dream of the ballroom.

  She finally ceased in her startled tap-dance, cautiously crouched down, and observed with nonplussed eyes the water as it slowly flowed into the drain and left behind streaks of the shimmering flakes.

  She charily ran the tip of her index finger over the shimmering golden substance and held it up to her dubiously narrowed eyes.

  “This can’t be”, she murmured and ran her other fingers across the small trail of glitter.

  Rubbing her fingertips together, the glitter sparkled and flashed. Taken by complete surprise over the unexpected reaction, she lost her balance and fell backward, landing on her butt with her back against the stall wall.

  “Ouch, that hurt.”

  She sat with wet dripping hair and cocked legs on the soaked shower stall floor and stared perplexed at the sparkling glitter on her fingertips. It tickled and created a sensation similar to an electric current.

  It frightened her, and she hastily dipped them into the small puddle of water remaining close to the drain to wash the remnants off her skin.

  “It can’t be; it just can’t be”, she kept repeating herself and charily stood up to grab a towel to wrap around her now chilled body.

  Not wasting any time, she quickly stepped out, dried herself off, and put on a fresh pair of underwear, a tank top, and a pair of shorts. 

  All the while, her heart hammered in her chest with suffocating anxiety over the presence of the glitter that apparently had covered her hair before she shampooed it.

  She made a hasty retreat out of the bathroom, as if it were inhabited by demons, expertly wrapping her towel around her hair on the go.

  A cursory glance at her pillow told her that it, too, contained glitter residue, along with the sheets.

  She tried to control her breathing through her nose, taking slow intakes of breaths to keep from panicking, but it became harder and harder by the second.

  A noise emanating from her kitchen tore her out of her contemplation over what to do about the glitter flakes in her bed.

  Her head snapped so suddenly, she lost her self-created turban. She didn’t care and let the towel fall unopposed to the floor, furling her brows in the process.

  Was someone in her house?

  There it was again, clearly a noise coming from her kitchen, as if someone was moving metal pots around and handling her porcelain dinnerware.

  And were those voices?

  Voices, as in.... more than one?

  She took hold of the baseball bat, she always kept next to her bed, and tremulously stalked out the door and down the hallway towards her kitchen.

  With each step she took, the noises became more pronounced and discernible, and her knees turned weaker and shakier.

  Someone or something was indisputably in her house.

  Her heart was about to jump out of her chest from beating so hard, and she was afraid its loud thumping could be heard all the way to the kitchen and announce her approach.

  “There’s more than one”, she deduced, biting her bottom lip and gripped her bat just a tad tighter. “Oh, god, what if it is goblins, or worse, those creepy dancers?”

  She shuddered at the thought and tightened her grip on her bat, holding it up, as if she was ready to go to bat.

  Like a panther on the prowl, she sneaked stealthily towards the doorway of the kitchen. Her bare feet made it possible to keep her footsteps soundless.

  Pressing her back flat against the wall, she took a deep inhale, held her breath, and charily stuck her head around the corner.

  “Why are you hiding for?” a voice emanated from behind her, and Sarah spun around, reactively whacking the bat with full force at whoever had uttered those words.

  Judging by the dull cracking sound of the wood, it definitely had made contact with the intended target.

  An immediate howl of pain, followed by the ear-splitting clattering of dropped cookware in the kitchen, and accompanied by the running of feet, let her know her presence had been noticed.

  She immediately raised her bat over her head, ready to swing again if necessary.

  “Have you lost your bloody mortal mind?” growled the voice that now came from beneath her knees as she looked down with flummoxed eyes at the middle-aged woman, wallowing around on her hardwood floor.

  She immediately took a couple of hasty steps sideways to distance herself from the presumed intruder.

  “Sarah”, another voice hollered from the direction of the kitchen, two heads sticking out from the doorway and trying to figure out what the commotion was all about.

  “What are you doing on the floor, Clotho?” Lachesis wondered with puzzled eyes, while Atropos burst into uncontrolled laughter at the sight.

  “She hit me”, Clotho wailed and stood herself up, rubbing the impressive knob on top of her forehead that had already sprouted and took on the appearance of a short horn.

  “One more whack on the other side, and you’ll look like Puck”, Atropos chortled and held her stomach to suppress her hilarity.

  Clotho failed to see the humour of the situation and tossed her sister a loathing glare.

  “Sarah, why did you assault Clotho?” Lachesis scolded her with the shake of her head and bore her eyes into a very bamboozled Sarah, who was still holding on firmly to her ready-to-swing bat.

  What on Earth had gotten into this mortal to act in such a violent and brutish manner?

  She had taken her for a more balanced and calmer human. Apparently, she had grossly misjudged her tendencies for unprovoked violence.

  “You really exist?” Sarah flabbergasted and dropped her bat while she leaned herself against the wall, feeling an incredible weakness invading her tremulous legs.

  “I thought you were nothing but a bad dream”, she whispered, and her eyes dithered with disbelief between the three Fates before her, trying to make sense of it all.

  “There she goes again, mumbling about some bloody dream”, Clotho grumbled and tossed her an affronted glare.

  “I thought we had made it clear last night; we are not a dream and instructed you on what you need to do to save the king and yourself.”

  Lachesis stood in front of her with an accusative mien on her face and hooded eyes.

  Atropos, smelling blood, had stopped her snickering, and stood next to her sister, her eyes gleaning with a certain hunger while she held the string in her hand that represented Sarah’s life.

  “Will you quit it with the intimidations?” Lachesis hissed at her sister and slapped the string out of her hand. “It’s not even her life thread but a braided string from her kitchen, you imbecile.”

  She rolled her eyes over Inflexible’s antics and conjured an icepack over Clotho’s forehead.

  “Keep pressure on it”, she snarled and marched back into the kitchen. “And you”, she pointed at Sarah, “follow me.”

  Not wanting to aggravate the Fates any further than she already had, she trotted dutifully behind Lachesis and sat herself on a chair by the table after being curtly gestured to do so.

  Clotho and Atropos flanked her, one tossing her a grimace in pain, the other a taunting sneer, clearly waiting for the next opportunity to pounce at her again.

  “I thought you guys couldn’t materialize in this world”, Sarah mentioned, carefully.

  She frugally eyeballed the three otherworldly figures in her kitchen, who appeared as concrete as any normal human being; and Clotho’s protruding welt was the proof of their solidity and vulnerability.

  “Yes, and no. We only can take on rigid human forms during the one hour of sunrise and sunset. Guess what time it is now?”

  Sarah stretched her neck and peeked out her kitchen window, not that she needed affirmation.

  The sun had just risen above the horizon and a beautiful reddish sky was visible above the top of the trees in her garden. Today would be another beautiful summer day.

  “We don’t have much time before we have to return to our realm. What happened last night? I see nothing has been accomplished.”

  Lachesis stood now before her with her fisted hands dug into her sides and an intense mien on her austere face.

  “Well, I rightly don’t even know”, Sarah stammered, still too perplexed over everything that had been happening so far.

  “We do”, Clotho mouthed and was immediately elbowed by Atropos.

  “What?” she growled and tossed Inflexible a furrowed-brow sneer.

  “Shut up, Spinner, and let Allotter talk to her.”

  “Allotter? Spinner? Inflex....?”

  “Never mind, Child”, Lachesis cut a once again bamboozled Sarah off and held up her hand to still her questioning.

  It was clear, the Fate was not in the mood for rehashing their introduction or other idle chitchat, and Sarah quickly shut her mouth and pressed her lips together.

“Those are our other names we go by”, Lachesis continued. “Now let’s talk about last night. Why are you here, believing all of this was nothing more than another dream? I thought we had made ourselves quite clear when we took you to Jareth’s crystal dream reality.”

  “So, it is all real?” Sarah asked astounded, and Clotho couldn’t help but to roll her eyes in overexaggerated fashion.

  “Mortals are so incredibly dense”, she sighed. “And violent. I ought to reweave your entire life”, she added on and underscored her misery with an overemphasized dramatic sigh.

  “I’m sorry about that”, Sarah quickly apologized over the hit with her baseball bat. “I thought you were an intruder.”

  “And there she goes thinking again”, Atropos riposted with an amplified roll of her eyes, happily joining in on the disparaging of this mortal. “Don’t you know by now that doesn’t work for you?”

  “Shut your mushes, both of you, and let her explain about last night”, Lachesis hissed at her sisters and emphasized her displeasure over their behaviour with a sneer that bared her teeth.

  Atropos and Clotho both flinched and leaned back on their chairs at seeing the Allotter’s sharp canine teeth, and the flash of fire in her eyes.

  They had pushed it as far as they could. They would be wise to not agitate her any further.

  “Well?” she now addressed a wide-eyed Sarah. “I’m all ears.”

  Sarah opened and shut her mouth a couple of times before she found the courage to speak up.

  “I don’t know what happened. We were dancing just like the first time, and he sang to me, and..... he was so charming and....”

  “You let him enchant you, you fool”, Atropos hissed but was immediately shut up with a smack upside her head by Lachesis.

  “Continue, Child”, the Allotter encouraged Sarah to keep telling her story.

  “Well, he sang to me, and then the other dancers were encroaching on us and coming closer, and the enchantment, whatever I was placed under by the song, broke, and.... they pushed me away from him and against the glass wall.”

  Sarah took a quick inhale and continued uninterrupted.

  “One was telling me to break the glass, and before I knew, the glass barrier was broken, and we floated out, and he remained there with a sad face. When I came to, I was back in my bed, so I figured it was just another dream.”

  Sarah shut her mouth after she had finished her hastily rambled account and waited on a reaction from the three Fates, who stared at her with stupendous countenances.  

  “Oh, Child, you let him bespell you again”, Lachesis lamented and wrung her hands.

  “Looked right into his eye like some besotted damsel”, Clotho sighed with a headshake.

  “Told you, she’s a fool”, Atropos spat and folded her arms in front of her chest to underscore her disdain.

  “I’m sorry, guys, but he, I, his eyes are just too mesmerizing”, Sarah stammered her apology with downcast eyes.

  “I can’t help it”, she added weakly with a sniffle. “His eyes just have that effect on me.”

  “Child”, Lachesis addressed her again in her motherly voice and gesticulated for Clotho and Atropos to drop their follies.

  It truly wasn’t helpful and only unravelled a confused Sarah even more. They needed her focused and alert, not doubting and hesitant.

  “When you return, you must avoid gazing into his eyes any longer than a couple of seconds, or he will enchant you again. You must get him to talk; engage him in idle colloquy. He has to realize he is stuck in his own dream hell and needs to break the glass barrier to free himself. Drive that point home. Until you are successful, you will be forced to return over and over, creating your own hell.... and demise.”

  Lachesis extended a compassionate smile at Sarah, who sat nervously chewing on her bottom lip. She felt like a scolded schoolgirl, who was being admonished by her teacher for being tardy.

  “I’ll do better next time. I promise”, she whispered her reply with a cursory glance flicked at the Allotter.

  “Good”, Lachesis nodded. “Our time here is limited, and so is yours. I suggest you eat something quickly, for you will be returning soon.”

  She noticed the solid forms of the three Fates starting to fade as the beams of the sun began to infiltrate her kitchen window and casted their lights across the room and onto the table.

  “Hurry, Sarah”, Clotho wailed.

  “You must save us all”, Atropos added, and the ghostly apparitions disappeared like mist on a wind.

  Sarah hesitantly stood up and gazed around. They had gone, vanished completely from sight.

  Shaking herself out of her stupor and allowing the voiced warnings to penetrate her consciousness, she quickly marched over to her refrigerator to retrieve her milk.

  A cursory glance at her stove had her stop in her tracks, as only now did she spot a plate with perfectly cooked bacon, scrambled eggs, and buttered toast, sitting on the counter beside it.

  “Wow, they are truly handy to have around. They made me breakfast.”

  “We told you; we needed you to hurry up. Time is of the essence”, came the ghostly voice that had her flinch temporarily.

  “I am hurrying”, she grumbled into the empty room while she hurriedly stuffed the food into her mouth and washed it down with the tall glass of milk, they also had poured for her.

  Sarah had barely finished the last piece of bacon and emptied the glass, setting it in the sink to rinse, when her surroundings once again started to whirl and distort.

  She quickly closed her eyes, not wanting to experience the turmoil in her stomach again, as she had last night.

  After all, she had just consumed a rather large breakfast and did not look forward to seeing its content splattered all over the void or the ballroom even.

  It would not make for a gallant entry.

  As the wind picked up, and she was spun around like a dreidel, her world disappeared, and she found herself wearing the same dress and shoes with her hair and make-up fully styled and done.

  This time, she found herself on the side-lines of the ballroom, observing the dancers, swaying to the same familiar tune.

  Within a short, few moments, her eyes beheld him as he stood on the other side of the dance floor.

  He had yet to notice her.

  “Well, here it goes. Let’s go feet”, she muttered upon spotting the Goblin King, and attempted to make her way across the parquet to confront him once more.

  This time, she would not gaze into those bewitching eyes.

Chapter Text

   Before Sarah made her way across the dance floor, she hastily snatched a glass of champagne from the server’s tray, who had taken up position next to her by a large pillar.

  Not usually a drinker, she definitely felt the need to still her shaking nerves with a few sips of the sparkling alcoholic beverage.

  She did a doubletake and raised her brows suspiciously upon looking at the only unmasked person in the room aside from Jareth and her.

  “You?” she hissed her whisper and stared with bewildered eyes at Clotho, who unabashedly grinned at her from behind her tray, holding several tall narrow glasses. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “Someone has to keep an eye on you”, she sibilated back with barely moving lips that had frozen into a permanent broad smile. “What better way to achieve this than to be a server.”

  “You look much younger. I almost didn’t recognize you”, Sarah mentioned with a frown cut across her visage, surreptitiously looking Clotho up and down.

  “We can look like anything we want to. Take any shape we want to. We only appeared to you as elderly women as so not to scare you too much. Figured a motherly type would be more.... gentle on your eyes and.... fragile mind.”

  “How considerate”, Sarah snarked and took another sip with oncoming ire over the Fate’s presence. “Just so you know, I don’t need a babysitter.”

  “Oh, really? In case you didn’t know, I was here last night as well and stood right behind you as you broke the crystal wall.”

  “Then why didn’t you stop me?” Sarah asked exasperated over that revelation.

  She had been given a scolding only minutes ago by all three Fates over her failure last night, and now she was being informed that one of them had been there the entire time?

  It riled her to no avail.

  “I am not allowed to interfere”, came the laconic and somewhat snippy answer from the disconcerting looking countenance of a suspended expression, as if time had come to a halt and had turned her into an unmoving mannequin.

  “Well, if you were there, then why did you ask me to rehash everything this morning? You already knew what had happened.”

  Sarah felt like splashing the champagne into the grinning visage of this infuriating Fate.

  “Because it was fun watching you fall all over yourself. Consider it payback for the unprovoked assault.”

  Sarah took a quick quaff and with an irritated glare and a low, nearly imperceptible growl placed the glass back on the tray.

  “I didn’t assault you on purpose. I thought you were an intruder”, she rejected the accusation, but Clotho had already disappeared into the dense crowd.

  Her momentary stupor was quickly erased by the familiar feeling of eyes boring into the back of her skull.

  His eyes.

  He had once again tracked her down, and she knew that he would be standing there with his intense look, approaching her to dance with him.

  She needed a plan to not fall into his enchantment this time. The unexpected run in with Clotho had completely ruined her plan of being the one to approach him this time.

  She inwardly cursed the Fate.

  “All right, Sarah, you can do this. Curtsy, lower your eyes, and address him properly”, Sarah told herself and took a deep inhale before she turned around.

  As predicted, Jareth stood no more than two metres from her, his intense eyes boring into hers, and his feet steadfastly stepping forward.

  Sarah let go of a slow, drawn-out breath and forced herself to divert her gaze that was already in danger of falling into his ensorcellment.

  “Your Majesty”, she whispered and fell into a deep curtsy with down-casted eyes.

  Instead of coming out of her deep obeisance, she held her pose, waiting on him to make his next move.

  She could see the tip of his black, shiny boots and parts of his grey leggings.

  He was now so close; she was eyelevel with a certain body part of his that had her nearly faint.

  She immediately lowered her gaze even more, away from the inviting and delectable morsel that had her innards in turmoil and her loins burning with a sudden wanton desire.

  Did this man have any part on his body that did not bespell her?

  She held up her arm and waited on him to accept her hand. It seemed as if time itself had decided to stop in its forward progression, and she felt her arm growing heavy and tired.

  Just as she was about to give up and come out of her curtsy on her own, due to her legs beginning to feel tottery from the semi-squat she had been holding, she felt his grip close around her fingers.

  Keeping her eyes casted down, she slowly stood up. He, likewise, performed a perfunctory bow and placed a chaste kiss against the back of her knuckles.

  “Sarah”, he drawled in his baritone voice that created another round of sensual shivers to course through her entire body. “I did not expect that.”

  “Expect what, Your Majesty?” she replied hastily and flicked him a cursory glance, making sure not to get caught in his alluring web of mismatched orbs.

  The expression on his face was one of surprise and intrigue. He tried to figure her out with his slightly tilted head and twitching brows.

  “For you to show such obeisance to me, considering.... Rise”, he ordered her instead of finishing his statement, and Sarah stood.

  “Considering what, Your Majesty?” she challenged him to finish saying what he had started and focused her gaze on his cravat.

  It was indisputably the safest place for her eyes.

  She more sensed the quirked smile around his lips than she could see it. The game had begun, and she needed to be on her toes in order to win. 

  “Considering your infuriating, obstreperous behaviour so far. I had not pitched you for someone to show me such reverence in a submissive pose. Maybe one of these insipid, dreadful airheads....”

  His eyes briefly left her to glance around the room and to make it clear whom he was speaking about.

  “.... but not you, my dear Sarah. You are too stubborn and thick-headed to lower yourself to authority”, he finished with such sensuality in his voice, she felt the chill racing down her spine and her innards beginning to melt from the once again stoked fire deep inside her.

  “I may be all what you just proclaimed, but I do know my etiquette when it comes to addressing a king. You are a king, are you not?”

  Her question held a hint of playfulness and taunt even, causing him to quirk one brow as he stepped even closer into her.

  “And here I thought you considered me nothing more than your fiend.”

  “A challenge, an antagonist perhaps, but a fiend, never”, she replied and briefly looked up at him.

  For a split second, they held each other’s gaze, and she could see the calculated smirk coiling itself around his updrawn lips.

  He was toying with her and most likely considered her already won. She needed to redirect the conversation away from the tense sensuality that had begun to cloud around them.

  “I’m thirsty, do you have something to drink around here?” she quickly diverted her eyes again and pretended to search for one of the servers.

  Her gaze fell briefly onto Clotho, who watched her intently from across the room and mouthed something to her she could not decipher.

  His low rumbling voice in reply had her redirect her attention back onto him.

  “Most certainly. I guess we could take in some quick libations before we take to the dance floor.”

  “So sure, I want to dance with you.... Your Majesty”, Sarah teased him with a quirked smile and was rewarded with a chesty laugh of mirth.

  It was the first time she heard him laugh, and it instilled a warm and soothing feeling inside of her, a feeling for which she was not prepared. She found his laugh rather charming and pleasant, and she yearned to hear more of the same.

  “You, my dear Sarah, keep surprising me at every turn. Even here, you challenge and defy me. But alas, this is your crystal dream, not mine, so, I’ll play along.”

  His answer had her knit her brows.

  He was under the assumption this was her dream. She was not sure whether this could play to her advantage or not, but she decided to go along with his postulation, at least for now.

  “All right, then let’s go somewhere where we can talk and have a.... take in some libations”, she quickly corrected herself to sound more sophisticated and be in line with the manner in which he spoke.

  “Are you old enough to consume alcohol yet?” he teased with an irresistible grin and the wiggle of his head.

  “I am older than you think”, she retorted self-assuredly and caused him to elicit an entertained chortle.

  “Now you claim to know what I am thinking?” he breathed into her ear as he leaned himself forward. “How presumptive of you.”

  Not one for being provoked without offering a comeback, she regained her posture and glared right at him, even at the risk of being consumed by his riveting gaze.

  “You are the one who insinuated I was not of age. If I appear too young of an age to you then it is your presumption, not mine.”

  “Touché, well done.”

  He dipped his head with an entertained smile and interlinked her arm into his, keeping hold of her hand with his gloved one as he guided her through the throng of people towards the server, which still happened to be Clotho.

  With nervous eyes, Sarah scrutinized the Fate and could only hope she would keep her mouth shut.

  Taking two glasses of champagne from the tray, Jareth handed her one and dismissed Clotho with the wave of his hand.

  His eyes did not linger on the Fate, as they returned with full strength onto her. A predatory smile lay in waiting around his thinly pressed lips that shimmered in a soft rosé, inviting her to capture them in a passionate kiss.

  Sarah had to tear herself from his face and focus on the glass, as the desire to press her lips against his nearly overwhelmed her.

  It would serve well to keep her eyes trained on it and still give the impression she looked at him.

  “Thank you”, she muttered while she accepted the champagne, only to be immediately corrected by a finger-wagging Jareth.

  “Sarah, you never thank a fae for anything, or the fae will be in debt to you for the gratitude. It is considered rude.”

  “Really?” she gasped and stared at him with her wide-open eyes for a brief moment before she quickly redirected them back onto her glass.

  He seemed genuinely concerned and didn’t appear to be toying with her.

  “How odd”, she added with a bewildered look.

  “Not really”, Jareth replied with a broad smirk and held up his glass as if in a toast. “Different worlds, different customs. Here is to your run. May the better of us be victorious.”

  Taken aback by the unexpected salute, she automatically reacted by complying and taking a sip of the champagne.

  It tasted exceptionally fruity and bubbly, very much like.... peaches. She should have expected this.

  A knowing smirk appeared on his scheming face as he tipped back his own glass. His eyes never left her face, and the hunger in them for her was quite apparent and clearly displayed.

  Another shiver ran down her spine.

  How was she going to resist him if he kept sending her such sensual signals with nothing more than a subtle glance, or the erotic rumbling of his voice.

  The mere aromatic scent of his entire being had her mind addled in ways, not even the strongest alcohol could accomplish.

  He truly was a dangerous weaving spider, whereas she was the hapless fly, caught in his web of seduction and immoral desires.

  If it weren’t for the dire situation, they both were in, she would gladly accept his challenge and find out how strong her willpower against his charm really was.

  Alas, she could not risk being caught in his desirous web. She needed to convince him to break out of his self-created imagery and return to his body before it wilted away forever, along with hers.

  To avoid looking straight at him, she kept her glass to her lips and kept taking miniscule sips.

  He cocked his head as if he was inspecting a rarity, a unique thing he was not sure of what it was but felt it was worth of being studied.

  “So, what other customs do you have that are different from ours?” she enquired to redirect their attention back onto their innocuous colloquy and hopefully be able to steer it to the ultimate task of getting him to wake up from his own illusion.

  “Why the sudden interest in my world? I thought you had a brother to save from the clutches of the evil Goblin King? That does not leave much time for a lesson in Underground fae customs.”

  His eyes flashed dangerously, and his voice had dropped an entire octave, giving it an even more seductive rumbling undertone.

  Sarah felt the waves of seduction flood her entire being, and it took all of her volition to fight the desire to succumb to his imbedded latent invite.

  “Oh, I fully plan on saving my brother, make no mistake about that, but I still would like to understand your world a bit better. Tell me.”

  “I never make mistakes”, he immediately retorted with an accompanying growl that once again had her innards in uproar.

  She quickly took another sip, this time a much larger one, and swallowed hard. At this rate, she would be in his arms within the next fifteen seconds.

  “Just play along, Your Majesty”, she replied quickly with a nervously flashed smile. “Humour me.”

  “Verily so”, he chuckled, satisfied he had such an effect on her. “For starters, one should never give a fae his or her real name.”

  Sarah raised her brows, knowing full well he knew her real name.

  “And why is that?” she asked innocently, batting her eyes at him before refocussing them on the remaining bubbly liquid inside her glass.

  “Knowing one’s real name gives the fae power over the person.”

  “Is that so?” she replied with her glass against her lips. “Is that why you never get Hoggle’s name right? You are trying to figure out what his real name is?”

  Jareth elicited an annoyed growl. He did not want to think about this ingrate, much less talk about him. Especially not now.

  “Oh, I know his real name. It was me, after all, who gave it to him. It is just fun, a game if you will, to get a rise out of him. The dwarf is so easily flustered, don’t you agree?”

  “Do you enjoy tormenting others?” she asked instead of giving him an answer.

  “Only when it suits my purpose”, he chuckled with entertainment over her question, which bordered on an accusation.

  “You know my name”, she stated dryly. “Does that mean you have power over me?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Then what is your purpose with me?” she kept up her interrogation of him that suddenly had taken on a dark direction.

  “I like tormenting you. I like bending you to my will, to my desire”, he whispered into her ear with such an erotic drawl that she nearly buckled in her knees.

  “I will fight you”, she retorted with defiant eyes and this time held his intense gaze.

  “I’m counting on it”, he smiled broadly and showed off his sharp canine teeth that appeared human and yet otherworldly.

  Sarah shrugged back with a gasp and clutched her glass as if it was a lifesaver and could protect her from his lecherous advances. Advances, she was certain would be of a most gruesome yet also most pleasurable nature.

  “I know your name too”, she hastily countered back to bring a distance between them.

  “Do you now?” he smirked with oncoming amusement. “What makes you so sure it is my real name?”

  “Hoggle told me. It’s Jar....”

   “Enough of that silliness now”, he suddenly announced with dark flashing eyes and an underlying growl while he took her drink from her hand, setting it speedily on the tray of another passing servant, as if he had summoned her.

  “You came here to dance with me, not waste time with idle chitchat.”

  “But I thought we would talk a little first and get to know each other before we take to the dance floor”, Sarah remonstrated with oncoming anxiety.

  “You are unable to dance and carry on a conversation at the same time, Sarah?” he rejointed with a taunting sneer and pulled her onto the dance floor by her hand. “And here I thought you were capable of doing more than one thing at a time. Have I misjudged you?”

  The sudden change in his demeanour alarmed her greatly.

  Why was he in such a rush?

  Was it because she was about to say his name?

  He was a mercurial and unpredictable creature indeed, and she needed to redirect his attention away from the dance floor.

  “No, I am more than capable of doing two things at once”, she snapped back while she was being dragged out onto the parquet. “But where I come from, it is customary to know each other a bit more first.”

  She knew it was a blatant lie, but it was the best she could come up with at the moment.

  “Really, Sarah? I am long-lived beyond your imagination. Do you really think I am not familiar with the customs of your world? I know partners join for dances without having ever met, just as they do here. You and I are not that much different in that aspect.”

  He took hold of her waist and pulled her into his chest with such zeal, it was clear that he was not taking a no for an answer, and any resistance on her part would be futile.

  This time, he forewent the respectable distance, and he was much closer than the night before.

  He breathed deeply as he stared down at her with a fire that threatened to consume her.

  Sarah had no choice but to follow his lead when the music started up.

  She knew what was about to happen, and she worked her brain feverishly to come up with a solution, a diversion of any sort that would break her from the dance and escape her fate of having to break the glass barrier.

  “Keep him talking.... About what?.... Anything, just keep up the conversation.”

  Her internal monologue raged within her mind while the music hinted at the inevitable beginning of his song of love to her as he twirled her just like the previous night across the dance floor.

  And just like the night before, it felt heavenly, and she felt herself being consumed by his incredible allure all over again.

  He was too close, much too close, to keep her wits.

  With each step they took, her mind became more and more addled, and she felt the muzzy headedness descending upon her.

  “I thought you wished to carry on a conversation and learn more about me?” Jareth grinned at her unexpectedly, holding off on the start of his own singing while she stared at him with besotted, star-struck eyes and was incapable of muttering a single syllable.

  His slight taunt jostled her somewhat from the bespelling of his personae, and she shook herself over to regain her faculties.

  “Don’t let him trap you in his web. Keep a clear mind.”

  “I don’t know if I can.”

  “You must, or you are both lost. Now FOCUS.”

  Her intrapersonal debate managed to finally shake off the fog in her brain and redirect her eyes from his alluring orbs onto his shoulder. It was a much safer place.

  “I do”, she stammered her response and licked her lips with nervousness.

  “My presence is not affecting you from formulating sentences, now, is it, Sarah?” he teased some more and purred her name like a cat purring at the sight of a bowl of cream, it is about to consume.

  “You think too highly of yourself, Your Majesty”, she sniped and caused him to briefly push her away from him to force her to look back into his eyes.

  Her self-assured tone took him for a whirl.

  She was supposed to melt away under his sensuous touch, and his engrossing gaze that could incinerate the thickest of defensive walls.

  Why was she so defiant and assertive in her spoken words?

  Why was she constantly averting his eyes?

  Her unexpected mannerism unnerved him greatly, and he refastened his hold on her.

  She noticed that the song had changed. It was no longer the melody from the previous night, and he was not singing.

  Had she changed the events?

  Could it be that she was making progress and would be able to convince him to break free from his own dream prison?

  She could only hope, and the thought instilled a more self-assured confidence in her.

  “Tell me about you”, she quickly threw her question at him before things would regress back to the status quo.

  “Like what?”

  “Oh, why don’t you start with your childhood?” she smiled at him with a persuasive bat of the eye.

  He snorted, as if her request highly amused him.

  “My childhood, Sarah? I cannot even remember my childhood; it happened so exceedingly long ago.”

  “I am sure if you give it some thought you will remember some things”, she encouraged him with a fleeting smile.

  “And what would that accomplish?” he sneered, becoming irritated with her persistence over finding out about his upbringing.

  He needed to draw her back to the dance and his song, to the subject at hand, which was his seduction of her and making her stay in his world.

  This idle colloquy served absolutely no purpose.

  “It would allow me to see what kind of person you are. According to Sigmund Freud, a lot of a person’s true character is shaped during their early childhood”, she quoted pedantically.

  “Freud? You are resorting to Freud now. Really, Sarah?”

  She internally rolled her eyes over her own question and attempt to carry on a conversation. And as precited, he was equally not impressed.

  “Freud”, he snorted and almost lost his footing to keep in rhythm with the melody, a melody she was unfamiliar with for the first time.

   “The man was a quack if you ask me. And there is not much to tell of my childhood. It was long and boring.”

  “Why don’t you let me be the judge?” she encouraged him, and he curiously tilted his head at her.

  “You are very peculiar. Nobody has ever cared knowing about my childhood, nor has anyone intentionally enquired about it.”

  “Well, then maybe it’s high time someone does”, she retorted adamantly as he took her around in another whirl, pressing his body tightly against hers.

  His closeness unnerved her, and her heartrate increased with each beat of the music that seemed to go on and on in a never-ending three-quarter crescendo of a waltz.

  “I was rambunctious”, Jareth stated unexpectedly and smirked mischievously with glinting eyes, as if an old memory had reinvaded his mind, and he relished at the recollection.

  Sarah looked into his eyes, a latent smile around her lips, waiting to be released from its prison.

  “I had a tendency to defy my parents and authority. I often sneaked out of the castle late at night to meet the trouping fairies on top of the peach orchard hill and dance with them in the light of the full crystal moon.”

  Sarah’s mouth formed into a broad smile, and she lightly bit down on her bottom lip.

  He looked so boyishly playful and puckish at this moment; she couldn’t help but to feel a sense of deep attachment to him.

  Was this the real Goblin King, the real authentic Jareth, shining through this glamour of a seducer and witty gamer?

  Had she started to break through his defences?

  “Crystal moon? That sounds wonderful.”

  “It is”, he breathed with glossed-over eyes, as if lost in a distant memory that held him captive.

  As if on cue, he began to softly sing to her with the melody shifting fluidly back to his special song.

  “There’s such a sad love, deep in your eyes....”

  The enchantment once more took hold of both of them, and before Sarah realized what was happening, she was fully engulfed in his beautiful words and melody.

  He had done it again.

  He had ensnared her.

  The other dancers now began to notice them, whereas before, they had ignored them, as if they hadn’t existed. And maybe they hadn’t.

  Sarah began to nervously glance around.

  Was it her imagination or were the other revellers even more grotesque and aggressive than the previous night?

  Jareth seemed completely in his own world and watching him sing and dance felt like an unescapable re-run of an often-watched show she was unable to turn off.

  “Jareth”, she expelled his name from her lips before she was being ripped from his arms and forced away from the dance floor while the agitated mass crowded around her.

  She tried to reach for him, but he was already too far.

  “Let me go”, she grunted and began to fight the flood of revellers, pushing her into one specific direction, towards the glass wall.

  Jareth still stood glued to the same spot, his eyes expressing an untold sadness over her leaving.

  “JARETH, I know your name”, she called out to him, but her words were ripped from her lips and carried away before they reached his ears.

  Nevertheless, she could see him tilt his head, as if she had piqued his curiosity.

  He opened his mouth, trying to respond to her, but no words escaped him, at least none she could make out or decipher.

  His arms slowly came up and reached for her disappearing form, and she could clearly see the glint of tears for the first time.  

  This was different from the night before.

  Had her presence made an impact?

  Was he remembering something?

  She could only hope, as she was carried away by the wave of bodies that were in danger of suffocating her.

  Her only escape was to break the glass barrier. She turned and stared at her own reflection.

  Clotho appeared distorted in the image of the glass, a sad expression on her face as she slowly shook her head with frustration.

  For a moment, Sarah could only stare at the stoic face of the Fate through the reflection of the glass before her attention was drawn back to the moment at hand.

  The surging crowd was in danger of trampling her.

  Sarah closed her eyes and picked up the chair.

  With one more look at the glass, barely making out a lonely figure on the dance floor with his longing, tearstained eyes holding on to her, she lifted the chair over her head, and crashed it against the mirror, shattering it into thousands of pieces.

  The piercing shriek from hundreds of terrified throats was the last thing she heard.

  A lonely unrecognizable voice reached her ears, calling out to her, as if it were nothing more than a whisper on a breeze, drowned out by the rushing waters of an enormous waterfall.

  “Sarah, names have power.”

Chapter Text

  “Nooooo”, Sarah screamed in agony as she opened her eyes and found herself crumbled into a heap on the floor of her kitchen, wearing her top and shorts from whenever she had disappeared, as she had lost all sense of time.

  She had been so close to making progress.

  What had caused him to start singing again?

  And what was the correlation between the song and the masked revellers becoming so aggressive and bold?

  They had been ignored the entire time up to the point Jareth had begun serenading her.

  There had to be a connection.

  She placed her hand flat against her flushed forehead and tried to regain her bearing.

  It was dark inside her house and only the faint light from the streetlamp down the road provided a dim glow of her surroundings.

  Like a blind person, she stood herself up and padded carefully over to the wall where she knew she would find the light switch.

  Flipping it on, she found herself in urgent need of emptying her bladder. Her stomach growled as if she hadn’t eaten in days, and her hair were an utter mess while she tumbled into the hallway bathroom.

  The most urgent matter was immediately taken care of, and she had barely enough time to rid herself of her shorts while slumping down onto the toilet seat.

  A relieved, elongated sigh escaped her throat, and she closed her eyes in the comforting sensation of her disburdened bladder.

  Having made sure that she had sufficiently emptied herself, she quickly stood up and readjusted her shorts.

 Leaning over the washbasin, she inspected her face in the mirror and found the dark, swollen bags under her eyes and overall tired look abundantly disconcerting.

  “How long have I been out?” she wondered, and like the previous time, splashed her face with some cool water, quickly drying her skin with the hand towel that was drooping over a large brass ring next to the sink.

  She ran a brush through her tangled mess of hair she never had a chance to fix before she had been hurled back onto the carousel of dreams by the three Fates after her last shower.

  “Carousel of dreams. Fitting”, she mumbled to herself over the accurate thought and decided this would be a suitable time to go into her main bathroom to brush her teeth and change into some more suitable clothing.

  Satisfied that she at least looked somewhat representable and didn’t sport any dragon breath, she exited and made her way back into the kitchen. Her stomach now fulminated with loud angry growls over its neglect.

  Her eyes constantly scanned the emptiness of her house and her ears perked and strained to detect any noises of a presence.

  It appeared that the three Fates were not in attendance this time, and she let go of a relieved sigh.

  She was not so sure she was up to any more of their squabbling and taunting. Physically, she felt enervated and distraught, and her stomach kept eliciting gurgling and rumbling sounds.

  She needed to do something about her hunger pangs.

  One look around her kitchen told her she was not up for cooking anything and opening her freezer in the hopes of finding either leftovers or a store-bought precooked dinner turned out to be a futile endeavour.

  “I guess ordering a pizza it is”, she sighed and looked for her home phone after going over the menu, which hung dead centre on her refrigerator door.

  Finding her phone receiver abandoned on the kitchen table, she quickly dialled the number from memory and placed her order.

  Forty-five minutes, they had told her.

  Forty-five minutes of agony while her stomach did loops and flips and increased its remonstration with each minute going by.

  “Whatever happened to thirty minutes or its free?” she grumbled disgruntled under her breath while she poured herself some orange juice to appease her gut with some simple sugars and the taste of fruits.

  “That’s for Dominos Pizza, which they don’t have here”, her mind retorted back to her quietly stated protest.

  “What happens if the Fates send me back before my pizza arrives?” she suddenly thought and sucked in her breath.

  “If that happens, I guess you’ll just have to deal with that somehow.  I’m sure they let you consume some food before sending you back. They did last time.”

  Appeased over the last reassuring thought, she shrugged her shoulders and hastily gulped down several large swallows.

  It seemed to have done the trick, as the angry rumblings lessened to a manageable degree.

  It would hold her over for now.

  Waiting on her pizza order to arrive, she decided to flip on her television to pass the time, even though she was in no mood to watch anything.

  She couldn’t care less about the news, and she didn’t feel like laughing at a sitcom that made no sense to her. Her mind was much too preoccupied, and she felt as if on pins and needles.

  She had her own news to work on.

  Falling into deep contemplations, the sounds from the television faded into the background while her mind replayed her last encounter with Jareth in great detail.

  What was it that she was overlooking?

  She still could clearly see his disheartened countenance as she faded from his view. It almost broke her heart seeing the tremendous pain in his dull eyes.

  What had he mouthed to her?

  He was calling something out to her, and she narrowed her eyes, concentrating on his words before the void had taken over.

  “Use my name”, she muttered pensively. “He said to use his name. Use it for what?”

  “Names have power. Weren’t you listening when he told you that?” came the snide answer from the eldritch form that had materialized next to her on the sofa, and Sarah about fell to the floor.

  Her natural reaction was to immediately grab the remote control and toss it at the spectre beside her with an accompanying scream.

  It went straight through the apparition and landed with a loud clanking noise on her hardwood floor, spinning across the slick wood and coming to a rest beneath her stereo, the back covering to the battery compartment separating and resting beside it.

  While Clotho emitted a screeching skirl over the unexpected thrown object hurling her way, the other two Fates appeared before Sarah, who at this point doubled over and clutched her chest to still her beating heart.

  “Stop doing this unless you want me to die of a heart attack before I have a chance to free Jar.... the Goblin King”, she growled with vexation and tossed each of them a reprimanding look.

  “She attacked me again. This time you all saw it clearly. She is a vicious, aggressive mortal, who should be incarcerated for her unprovoked violent attacks”, wailed an overly dramatic Clotho and tossed her an accusatory stare.

  “Quit sneaking up on me then”, Sarah fulminated back. “And it wasn’t unprovoked, it was reactive. You startled me, and when I become startled, I throw things. Besides, it went right through you.”

  “Oh, like that makes it better and justifies your intemperate actions?” Clotho screeched appalled. “So, it only counts if you actually physically hurt me?”

  “You are such a melodramatic drama queen”, Sarah grumbled under her breath, and Atropos and Lachesis emitted haunting cackles of sheer entertainment.

  Clotho, on the other hand, was not amused and huffed her discontent over the mortal’s unbecoming behaviour.

  How dare her to disrespect a deity like her and assault her with such primitive weapons.

  “I am so much more than a queen. I am a goddess, a drama goddess”, she protested with a shrill voice, causing her two sisters to laugh even more over the fact the insult had gone completely over her head, or should they say  ‘through her head’.

  “And what the hell are you two laughing about?”

  She snarled at her two sisters with an angry growl, not understanding what they found so amusing about this situation.

  “You didn’t even get her aspersion”, Atropos chortled and bent her transparent form nearly in half from her uncontrolled tittering. “Talk about daft.”

  “What do you mean by that?” Clotho huffed and tossed both her siblings a quizzical gaze.

  Atropos only guffawed louder at her reply and pointed her finger at her as if she were the biggest joke in town.

“What did she mean by that?” she now addressed Lachesis, who had composed herself the best she could and floated to the sofa to sit next to Sarah’s other side.

  “Oh, let’s just say she wasn’t calling you a queen out of reverence and admiration.”

  Her wry answer was well noted by Clotho, whose gaze now turned darker at the insinuation that Sarah’s remark had been a jest, an intentional taunt, not a term of respect.

  So, not only had this mortal physically attacked her, but she had followed up the uncalled-for attack with an insult on top of it.

  “Are you trying to sell me for stupid?” she now addressed Sarah, who couldn’t help but to roll her eyes over the theatrical show by Clotho and let go fo a loud groan.

  Why did Spinner remind her so much of the antics of a certain king, whom she was in the process of rescuing, and the constant appearances of the three Fates were more counterproductive than helpful.

  It was downright unnerving.

  “You are doing a pretty good job at that all by yourself”, Sarah snarled back, tired of the presence of the Fates, whom she blamed for all of her misery at the moment, and that included her ever-increasing growling stomach.

  Hunger made her snippy, aggressive, and peckish. Clotho would do good not to test her patience at the moment, at least not until she had a minimum of one pizza slice in her.

  Goddess or not, she was ready for the battle if Clotho wanted one. Her fear over the Fates had long evaporated with the last beam of the sunlight.

  Before Clotho could come back with her own riposte, the doorbell rang, and Sarah shot out of her seat, greatly relieved over the interruption of their quarrel.

  “Pizza! If you’ll excuse me, my dinner has arrived, and I am starving, all thanks to you guys.”

  She turned and jogged to her front door, grabbing her purse in the process while the three Fates remained in the living room.

  Atropos had stopped in her snickering and had plopped her translucent form languidly into a chair, still grinning tauntingly over the jest.

  Clotho sat with a dour disposition and crossed arms on the sofa, pondering over the apparent insult by Sarah while she scooted her bottom lip out like a pouting child.

  “You know, mortals these days just don’t have the same respect as they used to. Back in the old days, they would cower before us, as if we were the mighty gods of Olympus themselves. Now? Look at them. Having some weird round food delivered in a paper box by some pimple-faced ingénue boy. No hunting, no self-preparation. They have become insolent, indecorous weaklings.”

  “I hear you, Sister”, Atropos chimed in with her apparent agreement, using any opportunity to pile onto the mortal girl. “It is  appalling, rude, and offensive. Maybe you should teach her some manners?”

  She tossed Clotho an encouraging look, hoping she could get her to play a nice trick of mischief on the mortal woman.

  “Nobody is teaching anyone any manners”, Lachesis interjected herself into the conversation, knowing exactly where this was heading. “We need to stay focused on this mission. Remember, if the king goes down, so does his entire realm. Is that what you want?”

  Atropos and Clotho returned her stark gaze with rueful glances of their own and shook their heads. Even they knew better. It would throw the equilibrium of the entire universe out of alignment.

  “No”, they both murmured their answers in subdued unison, slightly ashamed over having been lectured.

  “Of course, we don’t want her to fail, but can’t we still just a little teach her some....”

 “By all the gods up in Olympus, I swear that I will send back the first one who will keep up this antagonizing behaviour against Sarah. DO. NOT. TEST. ME”, Lachesis hissed her threat, cutting off Atropos with a death glare over her continuing suggestion.

  She had all she could take of her infuriating and incorrigible sisters. They needed to shape up and take this grave and salient situation with the seriousness it required.

  Clotho was about to voice her retort, but the return of Sarah put a temporary stop to their quarrel, and each instantly retained a mien of fake joyful bliss on their countenances.

  “Wanna share some of that?” Atropos piped up before she sucked her head back into her shoulder and tossed Lachesis a  contrite grin.

  “You don’t look like you guys could eat any of that”, Sarah replied with shrugged shoulders and sat herself down onto the chair by her coffee table and opened the box with a blissfully expelled sigh and closed eyes to wholeheartedly take in the escaping aroma from her fully loaded, medium pizza.

  “We don’t need any sustenance. In that you are right, Child”, Lachesis smoothed over any waves Atropos tried to create again. “Why don’t you make sure to get all the nourishment you need. Time is....”

  “.... of the essence. I know, I know”, Sarah cut her off with a full mouth as she chewed her first bite. “I’m going as fast as I can here. I don’t think ten minutes will make a damn difference.”

  “Oh, but they do”, Clotho chimed in under the stern gaze of Lachesis, and she quickly sucked in her head. “Time flows differently between the Underground, the void, and your world”, she added in a much more respectable tone.

  “How so?” Sarah asked with a mouthful and gulped down some soda to wash it down quickly.

  “Well, Child, time in the void is at a constant flux. It is a realm of instability as you probably have noticed, where things can repeat themselves over and over”, Lachesis offered her own explanation to avoid any and all sarcasm and teasing from her sisters.

  “Time in the Underground flows completely different by itself as well and is controlled by the Labyrinth in correlation with the king, who thanks to.... who is now incapacitated, throwing time out of alignment”, Atropos injected herself and quickly changed her words at catching the sneer from the Allotter.

  Her sister truly was not up for any more pranks and teasing.

  “And the time in your world, of course, has its own rhythm, undisturbed and flowing across the universe in its long established velocity”, Lachesis finished up the explanation with a soft smile.

   “Huh, I never thought time could be so different from realm to realm, but I guess it would make sense”, Sarah acknowledged with a pensive tilt of her head before she resumed her consumption of her nearly gone pizza.

  She did not feel like spending a lot of time perusing over the deeper philosophy of time movement, as it gave her a headache, and all she really wanted was to consume her food in peace and quietude without having to think deep thoughts.

  For several moments, nobody spoke, and Sarah relished in the silence for but a minute before it became awkward.

  The quiet stares of the Fates unnerved her and definitely put a damper on her enjoyment of her pizza.

  “All right, what is it you are wanting to tell me but aren’t?” she finally asked and wiped her lips with a paper napkin. “I know there is something you are dying to say. I can see it in your eyes. Spit it out already because this silence is making me nervous.”

  The three Fates exchanged fleeting glances with each other as whether to decide who should go first in informing Sarah over whatever it was that weighed on them.

  Lachesis nodded inconspicuously to Clotho. They needed to get back to the main conversation they had come for and had started before their petulant squabble. Hopefully, Clotho would be a tad more civil this time.

  “What was it the king mouthed to you before you returned here?” Clotho finally broke the silence and asked her with raised eyebrows, and an ‘I know you know this’ look on her face.

  “Um, something about.... using his name?” Sarah replied with questioning eyes and lightly shrugged her shoulders. “Does it mean anything?”

  “Does it mean anything?” Atropos chimed in with indignance and an expelled huff through pursed lips while rolling her eyes. “Is this mortal for real? Everything means something for us.”

  “I understand that. What I meant to say was, is it vital to my task?”

  Sarah tossed Atropos a perturbed look and wrinkled her nose. Every word she expelled was being measured by the three Fates.

  She really needed to formulate her questions better to avoid the constant mockery.

  “Well, why didn’t you say then what you meant to say?” Clotho added to the chance of taunting her along with Atropos.

  “Stop it”, came the warning growl from an already vexed Lachesis again, and she pushed Clotho off the couch and sat herself next to Sarah, who tossed her a grateful gaze.

  She much rather had Lachesis situated next to her than Clotho. Lachesis so far had always been kind to her, while Clotho and especially Atropos, used any chance they could to belittle her or become downright mean.

  “Child”, Lachesis started out in her typical motherly voice and radiated a soft smile in Sarah’s direction. “As the king had told you, names have power in our world, and we don’t use them lightly. You know his name, and he is aware of this. Somehow, deep inside his mind, he knows he is trapped in this nightmare of his. He was giving you a hint, a secret weapon so to speak.”

  Sarah sat with dithering eyes, concentrating her gaze onto the floor while her mind raced wildly with an onslaught of cogitations over the situation.

  “Okay,” she finally replied and looked back at Lachesis with a renewed clarity in her eyes. “I have to use his name to jolt him out of his prison.”

  “Hah, she finally got it”, Atropos exclaimed with a sarcastic laugh, but was immediately shut down by Lachesis’ upheld hand.

  “So, what do I do next?” Sarah wondered, and Lachesis smiled once again at her as if she were a toddler, who was so close to being able to tie her own shoes after extensive coaching.

  She found it a bit unsettling and furrowed her brows.

  The last thing she wanted was to be looked on as an ignorant child, but maybe to the Fates she was. After all, they had been in existence for thousands of years.

  Who was she in comparison to them?

  A mere nascent infant.

  “You will address him by his name and force him to pay attention to your words. Nothing will get his attention better than his name coming from your lips. Trust me on that”, Lachesis replied and patted her hand.

  Even though her form was insubstantial and diaphanous, Sarah could feel the contact as a warm, calming sensation on her skin, and she slowly bobbed her head up and down.

  “It’s really that simple?”

  “It is if you do it right. His mind will fight you on this”, Clotho now inserted herself into the conversation, but didn’t try to reclaim her seat from Lachesis.

  “He is known to be very stubborn”, Atropos added her wisdom.

  “You can say that again”, Sarah mouthed her acknowledgement.

  “Say what again? That he is stubborn?” Atropos wondered bewildered and with a hint of annoyance. “Why are you making me repeat myself? Have you not listened to a word I’ve been saying?”

  “It’s just another mortal saying, acknowledging your correctness of that statement, Dear”, Lachesis came to Sarah’s assistance. “She has heard you loud and clear.”

  “Mortals with their idioms and platitudes. No wonder they are still so.... primitive”, Atropos huffed back with feigned indignance, but a chuffed smile lay in wait around her slightly curled lips, satisfied the young woman was finally agreeing with her.

  “Tah, tah, don’t start that again”, Lachesis winked at her sister, knowing she only faked her affront this time.

  Sarah hadn’t followed any of the exchange, and by her far away, absent gaze, it was quite obvious she was once again in deep contemplations. She had long forgotten about the rest of her pizza or her coke.  

  “Sarah? Are you still with us?” Lachesis jolted her out of her cavernous musings, and Sarah tossed her an abashed smile.

  “Yeah, I’m still with you. I was just thinking....”

  She flicked a wary glance at Clotho and Atropos to see if she could expect any taunts in return, but neither seemed willing to engage in further mockery for the moment.

  “You said ‘if I do it right, it’ll be easy”, Sarah picked up from where Clotho had stopped. “How do I know if I am doing it wrong or right?”

  Her questioning gaze was now trained onto Clotho, who had found a comfortable chair in the meantime and had seated herself next to Atropos.

  Her demeanour spoke of a certain hubris and flair of importance while she locked eyes with the mortal woman.

  “Well, you will know by his reaction. His eyes will lose the intense licentious desire for you and become.... puzzled and most likely worrisome”, Clotho snorted as if the statement was particularly amusing.

  Of course, Atropos had to join in with her merriment, and Sarah rolled her eyes in return.

  For eternal beings, having witnessed tens of thousands of years, they could behave rather childish and petulant themselves at times.

  And they called her unrefined and immature. How hypocritic of them, but she wisely held her tongue.

  “Okay, makes sense”, was her only reply, which drew the curious attention of Clotho, who had fully expected for Sarah to retaliate with an insolent response.

  “It does?” she stammered flabbergasted and thrown of her game for a moment.

  “Of course”, Sarah hastily continued with a quirked smile directed at Clotho, taking full advantage of her astonishment.

  “He will be worried that I’ll use his name against him, as a weapon so to speak, and that could be dangerous for him. For a monarch, it is of the utmost importance to be safe, first of all. Any licentious thoughts, as you like to call them, will be overridden by his need for protection against his own person and the crown.”

  Clotho along with Atropos sat with gawping mouths and ogling eyes, unable to retort in any fashion.

  “By the mighty Zeus, Danu, Odin, and all the other gods, I think she finally got it”, Atropos finally breathed her response with near reverence in her whispered voice.  

  Lachesis sat with a smug look of victory plastered across her chuffed visage.

  She was proud of Sarah.

  The mortal woman could not have given a better answer to shut up her annoying sisters, who did not believe in the intelligence of mortals.

  “Well, she told you, didn’t she?” she couldn’t resist adding and chuckled with inner mirth.

  Sarah, herself, quirked her brows victoriously at the flummoxed Fates in front of her. Finally, she had managed to get the better of them and, at least for a few precious moments, had shut them down.

  “Well, I say”, Clotho agreed and impressed dipped her head to Sarah, her lips forced into an admitting smile.

  “So, how will you use this newfound knowledge to your advantage?” Atropos enquired, having regained her composure.

  “I’ll address him with Jareth instead of His Majesty. This should set him back enough to where I can direct the conversation into any direction I want.”

  A smug smirk surrounded her thinly pressed lips, and she trained her attention back on her pizza that seemed to beg her from across the table.

  She leaned forward and took hold of the last large slice and took a big bite, her confidence sparkling in her eyes.

  “So sure of that?” Atropos kept challenging, not liking this new, self-assured mortal, sitting with an overly confident grin, and acting as if all of this would already be a given victory.

  “It’s a piece of cake”, Sarah tittered and took another big bite. “Now let me finish my pizza. I know it’s nearly time to go back”, she protested with a full mouth and did her best to ignore the presence of the Fates.

  Only a disgruntled scoff from Atropos was heard before silence once more fell over the living room.

  Sarah hurried in finishing her last slice, knowing quite well, time was running out for her.

  A sudden thought flared up in her mind and had her momentarily halt in her eating while an uneasy feeling settled deep in her stomach.

  “You said earlier time flows differently between the void and my world. How much time has passed since I returned to the ballroom, the second time around?”

  Her eyes were full of uncertainty and her voice slightly shaky from the fear of the answer. The moment she had woken up she could sense that she had been gone more than a mere few hours.

  “Nearly three days”, Lachesis informed her nonchalantly.

  Sarah dropped the remaining slice of her pizza onto the box and stared with a dropped jaw and wide-open eyes at the three Fates.

  Atropos and Clotho confirmed Lachesis’ statement with the bob of their heads, a wicked smile of epicaricay curled around the Inflexible’s lips.

  “Three days?” she gasped.

  She suddenly found it hard to breath at the realization she had been laying on her kitchen floor for nearly three days.

  How could she not have made a mess and soiled herself?

  “We kept you clean”, Lachesis answered, as if she had read her mind. “There was no need to have you lay in your own filth. It would be counterproductive to your quest.”

  “Thanks?” Sarah mumbled her reply and absentmindedly wiped the grease and pizza residue off her fingers with the last clean napkin available. “That means, I have....”

  “You have nine mortal world days left to accomplish your task”, Lachesis finished for her.

  Sarah elicited a groan and cupped her face into her palms, rubbing them forcefully across her cheeks and forehead with splayed fingers.

  “I’ve been at this for four days already? It seemed like it was only a few hours the most.”

  “We already told you twice now; time perception is skewed in the Underground. It flows differently, it is perceived differently. It truly does not exist at all and is only what you expect it to be. You expected hours, and so it was. In your world, however, time keeps flowing as usual. It is not affected by your perception”, Clotho informed her with a pedantic flair in her expressions and an annoyed gaze in her eyes.

  “If this was four days, how am I going to have enough time to convince him that it’s all but a fantasy on his part?”

  She felt like dying at the moment and again buried her face into her palm with a deep groan of aggravation, ready to pull out her mussed and sticky hair.

  She needed to compose herself, and she did her best thinking while standing under a spray of warm soothing water.

  “I’m going to take a shower”, she finally declared and stood up. “And I don’t care what you think about me having to hurry up”, she cut off an attempt by Clotho to deny her this treat. “Let me get cleaned up at the very least before I return for who knows how long.”

  “Remember, every minute you waste here on your personal care, is another possible day closer to death for the king and his kingdom”, Clotho shouted after her while Sarah stomped into her bedroom and slammed the door shut.

  “Five minutes; we give you five mortal minutes, and not a second more”, Atropos added militantly, but Sarah didn’t hear any of it, as she already drowned herself under the energetic rush of water from her showerhead.

Chapter Text

  Sarah felt the pull of the translocation on her body when her surroundings once again started to spin in ever-increasing circles as if she were on a rotating carousel.

  “Not yet”, she called out with a whiny voice. “I’m in the middle of washing my hair for crying out loud.”

  Her protestations and pleads went unanswered, and she felt the shower stall fading from sight before total blackness overtook her once more.

  Her hand instinctively reached up to the handle before she lost consciousness and turned off the water with her last thought about racking up an enormous water bill if she was gone again for days or possibly flooding her entire house.

  Was it her imagination or did the translocation this time not affect her as badly as the previous two?

  Maybe she was becoming used to the transport. She still gagged slightly and felt disoriented when the spinning concluded, and her locality came into clear view.

  As expected, she was back in the ostentatious ballroom, dressed in this gaudy, sugar pun dress she began to despise with every fibre of her being. She was once again surrounded by dancing couples, who leered at her from behind their grotesque masks.

  Already having expected this repeating scene, she rolled her eyes and steadfastly shoved the encroaching pairs out of her way. She was done with this silliness.

  A groan escaped her throat upon confronting an exceptionally stubborn masked male dancer, who insisted on blocking her way and mock her with his grotesque crowing.

  It was exasperating and caused shivers of repulsion to travel down her spine. It took all of her self-control not to slug him in his ugly visage.

  “Out of my way”, she grumbled assertively and pushed right past him without missing a step, drawing a staggered reaction from him.

  “Come back and dance with me, you delectable morsel”, he hissed after her, followed by a loud jeering cackle.

  She completely ignored him and continued to work her way through the dense throng, searching for Jareth, whom she expected had most likely already spotted her and was currently playing his cat and mouse game with her.

  Every time she thought she had caught a glimpse of him, he vanished into the rabble, and she inwardly cursed this vexatious fae.

  The pompous wide skirt of her dress made it hard to move around unimpeded and added to her already frustrated state.

  “I wish I’d wear something less obnoxious”, she growled under her breath without realizing she had actually expelled the words from her slightly parted lips.

  “Sarah, nooo”, her mind yelled at her upon realizing her mistake, and she sucked in her breath before she stopped to look down at herself.

  Her puffed up, imperious dress had vanished and had been replaced by a soft silken gown of the same colour and sparkle but a much softer and streamlined skirt and a tight bodice that showed quite a bit more cleavage.

  It definitely was more appropriate for her age, and she raised an eyebrow over the change.

  Where before the dress appeared as a horrible recreation of a Walt Disney princess movie, this one exuded sophistication, elegance, allure, and screamed seduction with its low décolleté. 

  She expelled a sigh of relief, finding she had not been left standing naked or in her underwear, but instead had vastly improved her image.

  “This is actually a lot better”, she gummed and bobbed her head with approval before her eyes narrowed and her brows knitted. “Since this wish worked, I wonder if I can....”

  She only perused over her thought for a minute moment, disregarding the small warning voice in the back of her mind, before she muttered her desire.

  “I wish I were successful in my attempt to free the Goblin King from his mental prison.... right now.”

  She glanced around, hoping to find herself back in her house with the news that Jareth was well and back in his body with time having adjusted itself across the realms, but found that nothing of the sort had happened.

  “Damn it. I guess it was worth a try”, she grumbled with disappointment and perused over the swaying mass of bodies. “At least I got rid of this dreadful dress.... Back to my task, I guess. Now where is this....”   

  She was unable to finish her own soliloquy when her eyes beheld the form of Jareth in front of her.

  His mismatched orbs stared at her as if he was seeing a ghost, and his jaws had slightly dropped. He stood utterly bewildered before her. Gone was his predatory grin and had been replaced by utter bamboozlement.

  “Good, he’s taken aback, time to use that to my advantage”, she contemplated to herself and instantly broke into a feigned candid smile in his direction, forcing herself to step towards him.

  Her inside roiled with anxiety and nervousness, but she managed to portray herself as quite confident and assertive when she finally reached him.

  “Jareth”, she cooed and stretched out her hand to him. “I finally have found you.”

  He stood unreactive and only ogled with a gawping mouth as if he were about to respond but couldn’t find the appropriate words.

  “Jareth?” Sarah repeated his name in the form of a question and held his intense gaze with a bright smile that hopefully reached her eyes. “I never knew you for being short on words.”

  This finally jolted him out of his nonplussed state, and he physically shook his head to clear his mind.

  “Sarah?” he finally replied and accepted her hand for a brief kiss against her knuckle as if he were a robot, unaware of his bodily movements.

  His eyes never left hers and his flummoxed mien on his still countenance was persistent. He lightly bowed and twitched his brows, thoughts clearly formulating in his mind.

  It was quite obvious; he was utterly taken aback seeing her and had a challenging time to recompose himself.

  Sarah took this as a promising sign.

  “How do you know my given name?” he growled lowly; a hint of surprise, mixed with unease, audibly displayed in his voice.

  “You told it to me”, she lied and intensified her smile to cover up her untruth. She could not afford to implicate Hoggle in this.

  “Why would I do that?” he argued back and let go of her hand. “To know one’s name gives one certain power over the other. I would never be so foolish.”

  It was evident the use of his name had completely shaken him to the core and taken him out of his playbook. Sarah trembled internally, feverishly searching for the appropriate answer he would buy as the truth.

  “I don’t question His Majesty’s motives for including me in such a.... private nature”, she finally replied in a low, sultry voice while she slightly leaned into him and batted her eyes.

  She noticed him sucking in his breath momentarily and nearly quivering from her closeness.

  After a pregnant pause that seemed endless, he finally quirked his brows and briefly squinted his eyes at her before a smirk of mischief once again began to erase his doubt and replaced it with a puckish mien.

  “Indeed, I must have had my very.... personal reason for doing so”, he finally responded, a licentious grin playing around his tightly pressed lips, and the tilt of his head making it clear he found a new game to play.

  “It is only a small part of my name, so no harm done. Now would you like....”

  “I’d love to take in some libation and sit and have a chat with you”, Sarah promptly cut off his intended suggestion with a flirtatious titter and interlocked her hand into his elbow.

  She knew he was about to ask her to dance, and dancing was the last thing she wanted to do with him at this point.

  She needed to occupy his mind and find out more about him, so she could convince him he was stuck in his own nightmare.

  It was clear by Jareth’s reaction that she again had taken him by complete surprise with her brazenness.

  His brows twitched with oncoming chagrin over being so rudely interrupted and his affront over being what he considered manhandled.

  Nobody touched the king without his permission. He did the touching, not the other way around. This mortal woman had some gall to dismiss this most salient of all etiquette rules.

  Nevertheless, he allowed her to take control of his arm and lead her towards the edge of the dance floor where several cosy couches and lounge chairs had been arranged, lining the perimeter of the pillow pit.

  For whatever insane reason, he found her presence and closeness comforting and even addictive.

  He felt as if she had earned the right to touch him in such personal ways. But why? Of that, he was not fully certain, and it greatly bothered him.

  His mind raged like a wild tempest, trying to find the answer, but he was not permitted to linger on his cogitations, as the cheerful chattering voice of Sarah once more jerked him from his deep ruminations.

  “I would love a nice, mild red wine if you have something like that available”, she smiled at him with batted eyes, her hold on his arm increasing in pressure as she leaned her entire body briefly against his.

  He wanted to close in with his own to relish in the feel of her warm soft being so near to him, but all he could do was stare at her wordlessly.

  Finally, he regained his composure and displayed an equally coy smile.

  “There is not a drink here I couldn’t provide for you. This is, after all, my castle, and my soiree held in your honour. Your wish is my command.”

  “My honour?” Sarah enquired.

  It was her turn now to look stunned with raised eyebrows.

  “But of course, Sarah, you are the runner, this is your dream reality. Whatever you wish will be provided.”

  “My dream reality, riiiiight”, she slowly nodded and drawled her words while a glass of merlot appeared in her hand.

  She was briefly taken aback by its sudden appearance but quickly regained her wits.

  So, he was evidently still under the impression all of this was her concoction, her fantasy, not his.

  That he had relived this same fantasy now for thirteen agonizing years had not occurred to him, even with her slight alterations from her past two visits.

  He didn’t even remember mouthing to her to use his name. She truly had her work cut out for her.

  “Well, all right, if you say so. In that case, I would like to sit and talk to you instead of dancing.”

  She assertively took the lead and settled herself down onto a cushioned love seat that separated them with the seats facing each into an opposite direction yet allowed them to be vis-à-vis.

  This was, essentially, classic Victorian style furniture.

  He appeased her with an entertained twitch in the corner of his teasing mouth. Ever the playful fae, his eyes sparkled with interest of where this was going, and he took a long sip of his wine, his eyes never leaving hers.

  “I am surprised by your adult-like dress and version of your.... dream. I took you for a bit more.... childish and immature. What a delightful turn of events”, he grinned over the rim of his chalice and removed it from his lips.

  “It’s probably because I am older, Jareth”, Sarah carefully answered, gauging his reaction to her statement.

  When none was forthcoming, she charily proceeded.

  “You see, I am no longer the fifteen-year-old, petulant and incorrigible teenager you had to deal with during my run.”

  “Oh?” was his only remark with a disbelieving smirk, highly amused apparently over her words.

  “Yes, Jareth, I am twenty-eight, and the run happened thirteen....”

  “You never cease to amaze me with your imagination”, he speedily cut her off with a delighted titter.

  It was clear, he did not believe her and found all of this quite entertaining and enlivening.

  “So, in order to get what you want....” he stopped for a moment and licked his lips with a licentious gaze in her direction, “you make yourself older. You place yourself in the shoes of a mature woman of your own future. What are you trying to do, my innocent, sweet Sarah. Seduce me?”

  He chuckled with mirth and took another swallow, his Adam’s apple bopping with surfacing excitement over the possibility.

  Sarah emitted a furtive sigh. She needed to change his point of view and make him realize the dream for what it was, his own making. 

  “Tell me about yourself, Jareth”, she instead requested with a playful smile as she continued to gracefully sup her wine, trying hard not to let it affect her mind.

  She needed to remain vigilant and alert and retain her acumen to counter anything he might throw at her over her attempt to make him see the truth.

  “Hm, are you sure you want me to tell you instead of showing you?” he purred with overt sensuality and leaned forward in his love seat, a predatory smirk curling around his faintly glistening lips from the wine.

  Sarah swallowed hard from the overwhelming sensation of enchantment and irresistibility, he exuded.

  Her heart began to beat wildly and uncontrolled, and she had the sudden urge to capture those beguiling, wine-stained lips of his with hers and claim them for herself.

  Her bosom heaved with the oncoming temptation, and she was sure he tremendously enjoyed the view she presented him at this very moment.

  Yes, she definitely needed to keep her wits about him.

  Maybe she should have kept the gaudy Cinderella dress instead of exchanging it for this lowcut, sexy number, which apparently had him turned on more than she cared for.

  “Be careful what you wish for”, came to her mind, but it was too late to contemplate the point now.

  What had been said had been said.

  As much as she found him alluring and gorgeous beyond comprehension, she felt nothing for him beyond friendliness.

  She only was here on a rescue mission to save him, so his kingdom, and therefore her friends, would not be in any danger of fading into nihility and oblivion.

  And then there was also the small matter of her becoming trapped if she failed in her quest. So, most certainly, any feelings of the heart played no role for her in any of this.

  Or did they?

  “Then why do I want to kiss him so badly and hold him in my arms?” her heart quietly stated the question, she didn’t dare to ask herself.

  “Because he is using magic on you. The magic of typical fae seduction. This is not real. He is playing with you like one would play with a pet mouse. A mere passing attraction, nothing more. Remember how he tried to trap you here with his charm, and he’ll do so again if you are not careful.”, her logical reasoning centre countered.

  It was enough of a cold shower to tear herself out of his allure and back to the task at hand.

  No, her heart was most definitely not involved, only her desire for self-preservation.

  “According to you, this is my dream reality, is it not? So, quit trying to take over it and let me decide what I want”, she bit back and locked her determined eyes with his amorous ones.

  Instantly, they lost their dissolute glint, and he huffed his consent for her to continue.

  Having won this round, she reasserted herself and nodded.

  “I want to get to know you. So, tell me about yourself, Jareth.”

  “There is nothing to tell”, he retorted, still somewhat miffed over his failed attempt to seduce her.

  “Oh, but there is”, she argued back and challenged him. “In matter of fact, I know that there is.”

  “Hm”, he chuckled and cocked his head while his eyes perused over her as if she were a rare object he needed to study and decipher.

  “And what is it you think you know about me? You have only met me a few hours ago. Are we being presumptuous again?”

  He scoffed discrepantly and took another sip of his wine. Sarah took a deep inhale. She had hoped he would be less standoffish and more remembering.

  “Not presumptive at all, since you have told me some things about you last time we spoke. Unfortunately, we were interrupted in our friendly colloquy, and I thought we could pick up from where we had left off”, she smiled at him.

  “Last time? The last time we spoke was in the tunnels. Did that peach really muddle your mind that much?”

  A light snort escaped him, and it was Sarah’s turn to furrow her brows at him. She did not find this one bit funny. He had drugged her, and to her, this was absolutely not acceptable.

  “I don’t think it is a laughing matter to drug someone, especially a minor.”

  “I didn’t drug you, Sarah. It was enchanted, not drugged. There is a stark difference.”

  “I still didn’t consent to it, and I was a child.”

  “I didn’t have to apprise you of it, as it would have defeated the entire point. You took the peach quite willingly and couldn’t wait to sink your teeth into it, now, could you? Plus, I only gave you what you wanted deep down in your heart, and you just told me you are an adult. So, what is it, Sarah? Are you a child or an adult? You cannot be both.”

  For a brief moment, Sarah was rattled over her slip up, but she quickly regained her wits. The anger over the enchanted peach outweighed any and all unintentional uttered words on her part.

   “And what would you know what I desire deep in my own heart?” she spat back, now thoroughly aggravated over his justifications of what amounted to criminal behaviour in her view.

  “You again had assumed the peach was safe and failed to ask questions. That is on you, not me. And in regard to the matter of your inner desires, you are still here, are you not?” he retorted with his own ire and waved his hand as his gaze perused over the lively scene in the ballroom.

  “This is all your doing, Sarah. I only showed you the way, but you, you conjured all of this with your own mind.”

  Sarah sat flummoxed with a gawping mouth, unable to argue back over his astute points.

  He was correct, as much as she hated to admit it, he was absolutely correct.

  She had willingly accepted the peach from Hoggle after she had complained she was hungry, and he had offered it up to her.

  She had assumed it was all safe because it had come from an assumed friend, a friend, whom she had only met a few hours prior and in reality, knew nothing about.

  How imprudent of her.

  And if she was honest with herself, she had secretly yearned to be at a fancy ball with a fairy king and have him dance with her in the middle of the dance floor, viewed and admired by the entire envying crowd.

  If she had to throw her blame around, she deserved a hefty dose of it herself, and so did Hoggle, although he had acted under duress from what she had deduced.

  She let go of a deep exhale and shook her head with closed eyes.

  “You are right, Jareth”, she finally relented. “I have been very assumptive. Now can we get back to our nice, friendly chat we had?”

  “By all means”, Jareth agreed with the dip of his head and a forgiving smile curled around his upturned lips. “Please proceed.”

  “Tha.... I appreciate this”, she caught herself just in time to avoid thanking him and causing him to go on a rant once more over her breach of fae etiquette.

  “As I was saying, the last time we spoke, and it was not the tunnels, believe me. We spoke here, in this very same ballroom.”

  “Nonsense, Sarah”, Jareth huffed and dismissed her with the shake of his head while he took another quaff of his wine. “Not starting another argument, but the peach really has addled your brain. You just showed up here a few minutes ago, and we have not talked prior to now.”

  “Oh, but I can prove it, Your Majesty”, came her now taunting and jeering reply with challenging eyes, which caught his attention.

  The quirk of his eyebrow was the signal to proceed, and a latent smile twitched in the corners of her lips.

  “You see, you told me something about you, something you used to do as a child that nobody else knew about, aside from you and your parents.”

  He now sat erect and inert, his glass suspended in mid-air, as he had stilled in all of his movements, and his countenance took on a stoic mask. Only his intense gaze conveyed his utmost attention and interest in the matter.

  “You told me that you used to be a rumbunctious young boy and defied your parents’ wishes by going up peach orchard hill in the middle of the night and dance with the trouping fairies under the full crystal moon.”

  She took a sip in a nonchalant manner and observed him over the rim of her glass.

  How would he react to her statement?

  Would this be the end again of their evening and the beginning of another carousel round?

  “How do you know that?” he gasped after what seemed hours of silence. 

  “I told you; you told me about this last time we spoke in this very ballroom.”

  “What utter nonsense. When was this supposed to have taken place?” he huffed with an indignant chuckle, highly sceptical of her account.

  “Thirteen hours ago.”

  Another pregnant pause created a deafening silence around them, although the merry laughter and joculous laughter from the crowd, mixed with the laud, unending music, filled the room with a cacophony of noises.

  “You are lying”, he finally breathed his words with aghast. “Someone else must have told you. I most certainly never did.”

  With a jerky reaction, he jumped out of the love seat and glared at her with a mixture of anger and bewilderment.

  “I did no such thing. How dare you accuse me of lying”, Sarah spat back incensed and, likewise, jumped to her feet. “How dare you insinuate that I am not truthful with you. I have no reason to lie to you.”

  She was tempted to stomp off and leave him standing there in his bamboozlement, but it would defeat her own mission. She needed to keep a level head and not let her emotions of chagrin get the best of her.

  “He’s sick, Sarah; he is trapped in his own mind. Don’t fault him for the accusation. It’s the entire reason you are here”, her mind reasoned with her to calm her down.

  “You know he would not accuse you if he were of healthy mind. Be magnanimous and follow your heart. What does it say to you?"

  Sarah took a couple of deep breaths and turned to face the Goblin King. Her eyes locked with his.

  For a moment, she got lost in his gaze and wondered deep down if they ever could have a relationship that was not based on distrust and accusations over past incidences.

  She quickly shook herself free from this unsettling and unexpected thought.

  “Jareth, I have been here several times. I was sent here to help you find a way out of your trapped mind.”

  His brows furled and nearly created a unibrow over the intensity. The glare in his eyes had lessened and had been replaced by sheer confusion and befuddlement.

  “Who sent you, woman? Dare tell me.”

  Sarah wavered slightly. Was she allowed to tell him it had been the Fates? They never had stipulated whether she was permitted to tell him anything about them.

  “The Fates”, she finally replied with emphasis.

  “This is not possible”, he stammered. “What wicked magic is this?”

  Sarah kept staring at him with lightly parted lips and wide-open eyes, her heart hammering, and her breath heaving, hoping he would believe her and calm down enough, so she could tell him what he needed to do to find his way out.

  “Jareth”, she spoke out to him again, making sure to use his name. “You have been imprisoned by your own mind for the past thirteen years. You need to come with me and find your way back before it is too late. Your physical form is dying, Jareth.”

  She attempted to step closer to him, but he shied back and hissed, baring his teeth. He looked at her as if she were of pure evil and a threat to his very existence.

  “You are not Sarah; you are some evil witch, trying to bespell me and ruin my chances with her. Be gone before I send you straight to the bog or worse, the void.”

  “Jareth?”

  Sarah stopped in her forward progress and now realized that the other masked revellers were staring at her from behind their facial coverings.

  It didn’t take much imagination to know that their countenances were contorted into grimaces of dislike and aggression towards her.

  She took a cautious step back and tried to distance herself from the encroaching mass.

  Just like the other two times, she was back in the same situation of run and save herself.

  She tossed a pleading and imploring glance at Jareth, but he had already assumed his usual facial expression of yearning and hurt from her withdrawal.

  His arm reached out to her as if trying to stop her.

  For a moment, Sarah hesitated, pondering over whether to go back to him and cling on to him, regardless, when she heard him hiss his command to the other revellers to get her and destroy the wicked witch.

  He was still under the impression she was of dark magic, out to keep him from herself. It truly was a conundrum, and Sarah racked her brain on what to do.

  The decision was taken out of her hands when the crowd surged forward, teeth bared, and screams of “death to the sorceress” emanated from dozens of angry throats.

  She had no other option but to run.

  With all of her remaining energy, she pivoted and sprinted towards the glass barrier of the dream crystal.

  Her pursuers were right at her heels, trying to grab her as she passed a few on her way.

  She tore herself from their grip and raced towards the mirror.

  With ragged breath, she stood before it and glanced at the reflection of Clotho, dressed as the only unmasked servant, sadly shaking her head, before she grabbed the same chair, she was so intimately familiar with by now, and threw it with all her might into the glass.

Chapter Text

  Jareth let go of a loud, drawn-out moan of agony, and his body nearly catapulted itself off the mattress that was covered in thick downy sheets and covers, the pillows piled high around his ailing body.

  “Wiseman, heigh ho, come thee hither. Thou must aid His Majesty”, Didymus shouted into the hall with great urgency and galloped back to the side of his king, who was still groaning and distorting his body in obvious pain.

  “Help is coming, My Liege, thou must resist the torment.”

  He tried his best to keep his king from thrashing around too wildly and possibly hurting himself and was quickly aided by an overly concerned Hoggle, who had jumped up onto the bed.

  Together, they managed to stabilize him to some degree but were in constant danger of being flung through the room by his surprisingly strong resistance to their stranglehold.

  “Where in all bloody hells is ter bumblin’ idiot of a healer?” Hoggle grumbled with frustration over the slow arrival time.

  “On his way”, Didymus assured with a dejected voice as he struggled to hold a still violently fighting Jareth steady.

  “I guess he ain’ heard that we’s fightin against time here”, Hoggle still fulminated under his breath. “I can’s hold him much longer. Yer would thinks ter rat’s all weak now by how frail his body looks, but he still gots some fight in him.”

  “Thou must not call His Majesty such derogatory names”, Didymus admonished his friend with a stern look.

  “It’s a term of endearment, an’ yer knows that”, Hoggle shot back his justification. “Don’ act like yer never heards it before, an’ Jareth is fine with it. Always has been.”

  Didymus only rolled his eyes and scoffed under his beard but was prevented from a retort by the commotion coming from the doorway.

  “What in all the Labyrinth’s tunnels is happening”, the hat squawked as the Wiseman stumbled into the chamber, shuffling as fast as he could, which really was not fast at all but more comparable to a snail’s pace.

  “Mark thee this”, Didymus growled with vexation over the Wiseman’s sluggardly and dilatory pace. “By my troth, thou moveth any slower and it shalt be Yule before thou arriveth.”

  “Patience is a virtue, which you are sorely lacking”, the Wiseman grumbled his reply without diverting his gaze from the writhing form of his king.

  Closing both his eyes with a calm demeanour, he suddenly popped out of existence and rematerialized directly in front of Jareth’s bed, nearly scaring Didymus out of his boots.

  The fox knight lunged himself high into the air with his hackles raised and a snarl curled around his gnashing teeth.

  “Beshrew me”, he howled and clutched his chest upon landing back on the carpeted hardwood floor on his hind legs.

  “Such contumely language in the presence of royals and otherwise notables”, the hat declared with affront and dismissed the glaring fox’s fulminations with a haughty tsk.

  “I see no notables aside from My Liege”, a vexed Didymus growled but let the subject matter rest, for it would do no good to continue with the bickering.

  As soon as Didymus had let go of Jareth’s shoulder, Hoggle had been unable to keep holding him down and had been flung off the bed and was now wallowing around on the carpet, picking himself off the floor.

  “Well, yer daft piece of....”

  A quick hand gesture by Didymus had his friend swallow the rest of his insult he was about to unleash at the Wiseman and possibly him for releasing his hold.   

  It was of most importance that the king would be attended to. A squabbling contest between him, Hoggle, and that dim-witted hat would only delay precious treatment.

  Time is what they could not afford to swander.

  Hoggle slapped the imaginary dirt off his trousers while grumbling under his breath and crossed his arms in front of his chest, holding his tongue with heroic effort.

  His glare spoke louder than any words could have.

  Didymus shot the obnoxious birdhat one more warning with a snarl, exposing his sharp, five-centimetre-long canines, before he resumed his stiff position at the foot of the bed, watching stoically as the Wiseman leaned over Jareth, a pulsating yellow crystal in hand.

  Without delay or hesitation, the Wiseman zealously pressed the crystal into Jareth’s forehead and murmured indecipherable words while his eyes rolled back into his head.

  The hat mirrored his motions and soon slumped over with his tongue hanging out of his parted beak.

  Didymus furtively rolled his eyes but wisely refrained from any comment or movement.

  He was used to the irritable behaviours of the hat and the Wiseman. However, the old, wizened goblin healer was the only sentient being in the entire Labyrinth realm that was able to keep the ruler of this world alive.

  For thirteen years now, he had treated Jareth with daily doses of epinephrine blocking crystals that kept him calm during his manic episodes of sheer panic and convulsive torture.

  He had been in this semi-comatose state ever since Sarah had denied him and had returned to her world.

  At first, he had managed to pull himself out of the occurring spells of unconsciousness, but as time went on, he became weaker and weaker, and within a couple of months, he had succumbed to his damaged mind and had only awoken occasionally for some sustenance intake.

  His body began to wither away as the magic inside of him faded and was unable to regenerate. He barely ate and had to be force-fed especially over the past couple of weeks.

  Surprisingly to all, it had been Hoggle who had taken on the duties of watching over Jareth and made sure he was properly fed and cleaned.

  In a private confession over five bottles of goblin wine, he had told Didymus that he blamed himself for what had happened to his king.

  Had he listened and obeyed his king’s orders and taken the girl back to the main gate like instructed, none of this would have happened.

  No matter how much Didymus consoled him and tried to make him believe it was not so, Hoggle could not be persuaded to think differently and took on the duties of a personal caretaker for Jareth.

  The grumbling voice of the Wiseman, along with the whispers of the hat, had Didymus focus back on the happenings at the bedside. His king seemed to have relaxed and eased up on his thrashing around and now lay inert on his back.

  The fox knight let go of a relieved sigh upon observing the rhythmic up and down movement of his monarch’s chest as his breaths came slow and calm.

  The Wiseman withdrew from the bedside, and Hoggle once again took over the nursing duties by fluffing the pillows and pressing them back against Jareth’s side.

  “Well, he’ll be all right for a few hours”, the Wiseman declared and plopped himself into a chair that was not far from the bedside. “I think I best sit here in case I am needed again. And needed, I shall be.”

  “We’ll be needed and will stay here”, the birdhat repeated uselessly and looked with an important gaze around the room.

  Hoggle paid him no attention, and Didymus remained unwavering as well. A quiet ‘pfft’ from the hat over the ignoring of his salient statement and a soft snore emanating from the already sleeping Wiseman were followed by only the ticking of a clock that had first appeared in the room ten days ago.

  Didymus glanced nervously at the large wall clock.

  Three days; they had three days to stop their king from falling into the mental abyss and being lost in the void forever.

  “Where art thou?” Didymus whispered dejectedly under his breath. “Come on Sarah, for thee must saveth our king.”

**************************************************

  Sarah gasped and coughed as she regained her consciousness, laying on the damp and cold shower stall floor. Her hair had dried and was now tangled in an unmanageable mess.

  Her back and shoulder hurt as if she had been wrought through a mangler several times overs, and she could see the yellow bruises and contusions she sported on both forearms.

  Eliciting a pained groan, she pushed herself into a sitting position and leaned her back against the wall to regain her bearings.

  Both hands swiped uncoordinatedly across her face and removed the caked-on hair strands that had made themselves at home against her cheek.

  A chill coursed through her entire body, and she rubbed her crossed hands against her shoulders. It was an uncomfortable sensation, and she yearned to wrap herself into a warm towel.

  Standing up with wobbly legs, she had to hold on to the sides of the shower before carefully exiting the stall.

  Her gait was unsteady and tottery, as if she had consumed copious quantities of alcohol.

  One hand instantly reached out for the towel draped over the hook on the wall and speedily wrapped it around her trembling body as tight as she could get it.

  Another shiver ran across her torso, and she let a puff of air escape through her pursed lips.

  She felt nauseous to her stomach and clenched it with her left hand while her right supported her bend-over weight against the sink.

  Swallowing hard a couple of times to suppress the urge to vomit and force the bile in her throat to go back down, she let go of an elongated groan.

  Her mouth felt as if something had taken a dump in it, and she grimaced her face over the foul taste on her tongue. She quickly turned on her faucet and cupped water into her hand, sucking it eagerly from her palms.

  After a few hasty sips, she rested on her elbows and let her head droop over the basin. Her mouth still felt like cotton, but at least the worst of the malodorous sensation had dissipated.

  Her stomach continued to feel extremely bilious.

  She slowly reached for her toothbrush, not bothering to look up, and with the familiarity of a long-time resident about the surroundings, added toothpaste and began to slowly brush her teeth, as if each movement of her hand was cumbersome.

  The taste of cool mint began to infiltrate every pore of her tongue and gums and lessened her discomfort of her rebellious stomach.

  Rinsing out with some clear water and taking in a few more sips had her in a slightly better condition.

  “I feel like shit”, she grumbled as she stumbled over to the toilet and sat down, emptying her bladder with a roaring gush.

  “It has to be days again”, she contemplated, judging by the sensations flooding her body.

  Having finished the most necessary of ablutions, she stood up and took a look into the mirror.

  What greeted her shocked even her to the core. The woman staring back at her was a shell of her former self.

  Black rings outlined her eyes and emphasised the swollen bags beneath. Her facial skin looked pallid and wrinkled. The strands of hair had left seemingly permanent impressions up and down her cheeks and across her forehead.

  A large bruise was clearly visible above her right eye orbit, and her lips looked cracked and dry from the dehydration.  

  “And apparently, I look like shit too”, she added with sarcastic disgust, wrinkling her nose at her own reflection.

  She still felt weak and jittery as she untied the towel, having adequately warmed up.

  Before she turned away from the mirror, she caught the reflection of her naked body and stood in shock.

  Her ribs were clearly showing, and her stomach was sunken in. Furling her brows and lightly dithering her head, she tried to comprehend the rapid decline of her physical health.

  Even if she had been gone again for three days, which would only be seven all together, it would not be enough to turn her from an extremely healthy and athletic looking woman to a malnourished, anorexic patient on her deathbed.

  She swallowed hard at her own image and began to feel the anxiety returning to her heart and brain.

  What was happening was not normal. Was it the magic, the fact she was actively in a dream for hours, no, days on end?

  Where were the Fates?

  Why hadn’t they showed up yet and pestered her?

  She was certain they could provide at least some answers to the dire questions she now had, and she had many.

  Feeling a sudden rush of urgency, she skipped the dressing and instead reached for her long bathrobe.

  It was a tad too warm for the current weather, but she found it safer than not wearing enough. Her first priority would be to get some nourishment into her starved body.

  Her trips seemed to come more frequent with less breaktime in between and also completely unaccounted.

  With shaky legs, she made her way from her bathroom to the kitchen, holding on to the hallway wall while she stumbled as fast as she could towards the salvation of her fridge and cupboards.

  At least it was daytime, and she didn’t need to rely on any lights.

  Like a starving madman, she lunged at the fridge and only momentarily leaned herself against the door to keep from falling over.

  With the rest of her energy she had left, she ripped open the door and grabbed the tub with left over lasagne from who knew how many days ago now. She momentarily stopped and contemplated over it before she placed it back and opted for the milk instead.

  Sniffing the opened container to assure herself it wasn’t spoiled, she downed it in big gulps. It felt good to feel the cold liquid running down her oesophagus and into her empty, cavernous stomach.

  Not caring that she had spilled milk running down her chin and onto the front of her bathrobe, she set it back and grabbed the loaf of bread.

  With the ravenous hunger of a starving person, she bid into the loaf and barely chewed the pieces before she swallowed them.

  She could barely take in breaths between her bites and grabbed for the milk jug again to take sips in between.

  For several minutes, she crammed as much as she could down her throat and finally slumped down onto the ground in a milk and bread induced stupor, feeling completely exhausted.

  Just as she thought her misery had been granted a reprieve, she felt her stomach revolting from the onslaught of the cold milk and oversized chunks of bread, and she heaved as it began to roil with the oncoming regurgitation.

  She had barely enough time to pull the rubbish bin up to her chest and face before she met her entire consumption again on its way out and into the container.

  Gagging and convulsing, she finally emptied her entire stomach content and leaned herself back against the still open fridge.

  Never in her life had she felt sicker and more bilious as she did this very moment.

  Her stomach began to violently cramp up on her from the abuse, and she doubled over with the worst of stabbing pain she had ever experienced.

  Where were those pesty Fates?

  She sure could use their assistance about now.

  “Help”, she managed to spill from her parched lips as she coiled up from another bout of incredible pain shooting through her entire abdomen, causing her to writhe with convulsions. “Please.... someone.... help me.”

  She laid on the floor and grimaced in pain, the tears now flowing freely from her dull eyes that had lost all their lustre.

  Her mouth gaped wide open in order to suck in enough breath into her lungs. She felt like being cut open and suffocated all at the same time.

  Was this how it all ended?

  Was she dying before she had a chance to finish her mission?

  Why was her physical deterioration so advanced?

  She tried to form coherent thoughts and found it to be impossible in her wretched state.

  Just as she was about to pass out, she heard it, the voices, female voices, and then she felt hands grabbing for her, pulling her back up, and dragging her off to somewhere.

  “Oh, my dear, I think we arrived just in time.”

  The concerned voice of Lachesis penetrated her ears and made its way to her consciousness.

  She blinked open her eyes to a half-crack and looked emptily at the highly disturbed countenance of not only Lachesis bending over her but also Atropos and Clotho.

  Even they looked highly disturbed, and no teasing and taunting came from their lips.

  This had to be serious.

  “Am I dead?” Sarah mouthed weakly.

  “Not yet”, came Atropos’ somewhat sarcastic reply.

  “And we won’t let you die. At least not until the thirteen days are up”, Clotho came to her defence and tossed Atropos a reprimanding glare.

  Even she found it inappropriate to make fun of a person who was near death.

  Sarah felt her head being tilted and a warm liquid hitting her lips. She automatically opened them and allowed Lachesis to pour whatever it was down her throat.

  It tasted like hot honey, infused with a mix of fruits, and she could have sworn she tasted peaches.

  “Here, drink this. It will help your body to regain some of its lost strength and stamina. We cannot lose you so early. There is still too much work for you to do.”

 “Gee, thanks for the concern, but later on it’s okay”, Sarah’s mind grumbled with overt sarcasm.

  After a few more sips of the hot, treacle sweet tasting liquid, Lachesis released her hand from behind Sarah’s neck and allowed her to rest her head into the pillow.

  “Pillow?”

  She finally managed to fully open her eyes and take a weary look around.

  Sure enough, the Fates had placed her in her bed and covered her with a blanket.

  How thoughtful of them.   

  “What did you give me?” she asked and even managed to scoot herself a tad higher on her pillows behind her back, so she could sit up straighter.

  She could feel the energy surging through her body and restoring her vigour. Lachesis vanished the flask from which Sarah had drunk and smiled gently down on her, her hand tenderly caressing the mortal woman’s cheek.

  “Nectar mixed with some Ambrosia.”

  “Isn’t that the food of the Gods? I thought it’s lethal to humans?” Sarah asked, too tired to be shocked over the revelation she had just consumed divine food. 

  “Ordinarily, yes,” came the chuckled answer from Clotho, “but you are no longer an ordinary human.”

  “You can say that again,” Atropos added her joyous and pride infused dig over having remembered the mortal idiom from earlier.  

  Sarah knitted her brows and looked from Clotho’s and Atropos’ smiling visages back to a still troubled Lachesis, who had sat herself right by her side of the bed.

  “Why is my body so weak and looks like I have been starving in some abandoned dungeon for months?” she added, not waiting around on answers to her previous questions.

  She had too many and was afraid she could vanish any moment before being provided with any answers.

  The food was secondary to finding out why her body responded the way it did to her dream scaping.

  “And why didn’t you care for me while I was.... passed out?”

  “Oh, Child”, Lachesis sighed and gently removed another hair strand from Sarah’s eyes. “The magic you have been exposed to is changing you. You are becoming one of us, well, them.”

  “Them? Them as in goblins or Jareth?”

  She needed clarification on this last statement.

  “Them, as in Jareth. You are slowly turning into a fae. We sort of knew the magic would alter your physical state, but we had no clue it would happen so speedily. The amount of magic in this dream reality must be immense beyond comprehension. It also explains why it is so hard to break the king’s belief in his own creation.”

  “And for why we weren’t here”, Clotho inserted herself with a contrite expression, “we went back to the Goblin Kingdom to check up on the king himself; his physical form that is. We never thought you would deteriorate to such an extent and so rapidly.”

  All three Fates now looked at her with remorse and rue in their eyes. Even Atropos refrained from any sly remarks and for once had set aside her scissors.

   Sarah’s facial mien morphed from tiredness, to incredulity, to sheer panic as her brain slowly absorbed the information provided.

  “Oh, no, no, no, I can’t turn into a fae. I’m a mortal. What happens to my life here? I have a job, I have friends, family.... I have a job”, she finally settled on having.

  She really had nothing but her job if she was honest and even that one was at risk of being lost, as she had been placed on suspension a week ago for losing her temper on her supervisor.

  “For all purposes, your life here is over”, Atropos informed her cooly, yet her voice did hold a hint of compassion for her plight.

  “All of our decisions have consequences, Sarah”, Clotho reiterated and tilted her head. “Your decision to turn down the king thirteen years ago started events none of us could foresee or stop. A fae can only love once, and King Jareth had truly fallen in love with you.”

  “I did.... he.... what?” Sarah stammered but didn’t get a chance to elaborate on her question.

  “You, breaking his heart by rejecting him, had him fall over the precipice of reasonability and caused him to throw himself into madness”, Atropos finished up with a deep sigh. “And so, now we have this dilemma. Not the first time a jilted heart would endanger the existence of an entire culture. Helena of Troy comes to mind.”

  “Romeo and Juliet.”

  “That’s fiction”, Lachesis corrected a sighing Clotho, who stood with a romantic bat of her eyes and hands clutched to her chest.

  “So? I’m just making a point here”, she grumbled back with an irritated mien.

  “What we are trying to tell you Sarah, is that any and all decisions we make, no matter how inconsequential we think they are at the time, can have dramatic effects on a larger scale farther down the road”, Lachesis felt to clarify to a still highly disturbed looking Sarah.

  “Jareth.... Jareth loves me?” Sarah stammered and felt herself nearly blacking out. “But that’s impossible.”

  “Now why does that surprise you, Sarah? Because he was forced to play your antagonist during your run? Do you think you really were so witty to outsmart and outmanoeuvre his entire army? He needed you to come to the castle. Toby was just the bait. He never intended on keeping the babe. He always wanted you.”

  Sarah nearly choked at that revelation, and her eyes came close to popping out of her skull.

  He loved her?

  He had truly fallen in love with her during her run?

  The ambrosia began to take its desired effect, and she could feel all her senses and feelings coming back to fully restored power.

  “He what? I was only fifteen”, she exclaimed with sudden offended and disgusted affront. “I was but a mere child. That is perverted.”

  Sarah’s eyes dithered wildly from Fate to Fate with a disgusted sneer on her visage, only to be met by amused looking and somewhat accusative stares.

  “Oh, please, we all know you weren’t as innocent as you like to make yourself appear. You were two weeks shy of sixteen, and we know you had semi-sexual encounters with boys at your school”, Clotho stated with a dismissive scoff.

  “We also know that you have feelings for him in return and secretly wished for him to seduce you, otherwise this ballroom scenario would have never come to be. Now tell me we are wrong.”

  Atropos’ challenging eyes bore into Sarah’s stunned as she sat with a gaping mouth, trying feverishly to come up with a smart riposte.

  She couldn’t.

  “I am not”, was all she could mumble unconvincingly in retort to the accusation she had feelings for the Goblin King.

  How did they know?

  Internally, she was quite taken aback over their intimate knowledge of her teenage life.

  How was this possible?

  Had they been spying on her for her entire life?

  “They are the Fates, Sarah. They know everyone’s life intimately. It’s their job.”

  “Don’t lie to yourself, Sarah. It would do you good to acknowledge your own feelings instead of denying them. Maybe we could be done with all of this if you were less stubborn in your feelings than this infuriating fae king. You two are going to be the death of all of us soon.”

  Atropos snipped her reappeared scissors in the air with a sneer on her chagrined countenance.

  She about had all she could take of this obstreperous and denying mortal.

  Why was she so adamant she felt nothing for the Goblin King when it was so clearly visible for everyone else, besides herself and said Goblin King.

  “I.... well.... maybe, but that.... no, it’s not true.... I am.... agh.”

  She finally gave up trying to formulate a smart answer, and by the look on the faces of all three Fates now staring at her with knowing eyes, she knew the cat had been released from the proverbial bag.

  There was no stuffing it back into the sack.

  She suddenly hated herself.

  For years, she had done such a wonderful job in denying her own feelings for a certain someone, only to fool herself out of a happy life for thirteen long agonizing years.

  Years that had done nothing but cause her a constant pain, made her lose her family and friends, and antagonized everyone else around her because she could not bear seeing anyone else in a happy, fulfilling relationship.

  She was too proud to admit this to anyone at this moment, however, even though she had been quite obviously caught.

  Maybe she could hold on to the illusion just a bit longer.

  “And because of all that, I am now turning fae and be condemned to life.... no death.... What exactly is going to happen?”

  She was not able to receive an answer as the world around her began to blur and spin, distorting all well-defined vision.

  She had just stepped back onto the carousal of dreams and was in for another wild ride.

Chapter Text

  Sarah found herself back in the ballroom, appearing youthful and stunning, unlike her true physical form, and dressed in the same alluring dress she had wished onto herself during her last visit.

  Quirking her eyebrows, she pondered over the first noticeable permanent change since she had been forced into these dream crystal realities of Jareth.

  If this was Jareth’s dream reality, and according to the Fates it was, then shouldn’t she be back to wearing this godawful puffy white dress?

  Was his mind beginning to remember her visits and attempts to lure him out of his mental prison?

  She could only hope so, and she expelled a puff of air through pursed lips as her eyes began to wander the room.

  It was impossible to make out if anything else had been changed. The music was still the same and so were the rumbunctious dancers behind their freakish and hideous masks.

  He was nowhere in sight; not even a brief ghostly glance of him amongst the revellers could be detected.

  Sarah knitted her brows and sharpened her gaze.

  So, this was something else that seemed a tad off, as she always had caught a glimpse of him here and there throughout the masses from the start.

  “Where are you, Jareth?” she mumbled to herself and nervously chewed on her bottom lip as she kept scanning the vast room.

  Knowing in what poor condition her physical body was in, she, for the first time, felt a real sense of urgency.

  If she could get him to see the truth, maybe she would be able to return before her body wilted completely away, and she would be stuck here for all of eternity, even if it was outside some procured fantasy reality.

  As much as she had dreamed of the Labyrinth and its inhabitants, and often had secretly wished she could be a part of it, this was not the way she wanted her decision to be made.

  She had too much of an independent streak to allow anyone to take those choices and options away from her.

  No, she wanted to be in charge of her own life and destiny, not some cockamamie time schedule imposed on her by the three Fates.

  “I really wish you would show yourself to me”, she murmured in frustration.

  There, was that him?

  She thought she had caught the glimpse of a blue, glittery jacket, and a mane of wild blond hair.

  Her eyes dashed to the spot, and she saw him disappearing into the crowd, close to the same location they had occupied last time.

  “How is that possible? I wish to see him, and I suddenly do. Just like this stupid dress, I wished to change last night or whenever it was”, her mind shouted at her while her feet were already busy to catch up with her enigmatic king.

  “Maybe only small wishes come true.”

  Pushing through the dense crowd of nimble dancers, twirling enthusiastically, was no small feat, and she got jostled and bounced around.

  One even had taken a quick hold of her and had pirouetted her around like a spinning top for a couple of beats before she managed to tear herself loose.

  With all the manhandling and nudging, her mind quickly became occupied with evading the other participants and forgot all about her granted wishes.

  Not giving up in her pursuit, she kept fighting her way out and finally stood at the edge of the dance floor, with her eyes beholding the loveseat they had lounged in the previous night.

  He sat in the upholstery with a longing look, as if in deep contemplations. His eyes were downcast, and it was clear he had not noticed her yet.

  Why did he look so different today? Almost bordering on sombre.

  Was she finally getting into his mind?

  Was he beginning to remember her previous visits?

  For a brief moment, she studied his composure as he sat with slumped over shoulders, his elbows resting on his knees while he nervously twiddled his fingers, and his head was bowed low, so she could only see the top of his unruly mop of a hairstyle.

  This was not the visual of a self-assuring and overly confident Goblin King, but the sight of a broken shell of a man; one who had been brutally stood up or had lost something of high importance.  

  A ping of sadness infiltrated her own heart at seeing him so downtrodden, and she took a quick swallow to suppress the lump that had tried to invade her throat.

  She needed to hold it together, more than ever now.

  With renewed hope that her previous visits had not been for naught, she took in a deep inhale and momentarily held her breath to gather her inner strength before she let go of it and stepped right up to Jareth.

  “Hello, Jareth”, she greeted him with a slight trembling tone, a timid smile curled around her nervous lips.

  His head shot up upon hearing her voice, and his mesmerizing gaze beheld her with burning intensity.

  She could see the great relief shining in his eyes, as if he had been waiting on her and had lost hope that she would show.

  “May I join you?” Sarah followed up when he just stared at her wordlessly.

  He gestured his arm towards the empty chair and made an attempt to stand up.

  Sarah quickly motioned for him to keep his seat and lightly shook her head, her shy smile broadening with growing confidence.

  “Please, no need to get up.”

  She lowered herself into the seat next to him, facing him nearly straight on. He had yet to utter a single word, and his eyes beheld her, as if he was not convinced, she was really here with him, and that maybe she was just a figment of his imagination.

  “Are you all right, Jareth?” Sarah enquired, becoming worried over the lack of confidence in his eyes and the absence of cocky remarks.

 Where was the mischief, the teasing double entendre taunts with an underlying sexual meaning, the cruel smirk around his oh so inviting lips, and the salacious sparkle in his alluring eyes?

  It seemed as if all had been erased.

  What had happened?

  Had she made such an impact with her last two visits?

  Was his mind finally fracturing and breaking down the wall of illusion that was imprisoning it so firmly?

  “I am all right now”, he twitched a smile in response and cocked his head. “You look different”, he noticed and narrowed his gaze as if he was trying to figure out exactly what was different about her.

  “In what way?” Sarah asked, hoping he would see her for the mature woman she was at this time and not the fifteen-year-old imagined teenage girl.

  “I thought I had lost you”, he instead remarked absently, and his eyes glossed over with a desultory look that had Sarah worried in her seat.

  What was going on with him?

  His subdued and reticent behaviour unnerved her greatly.

  Before she could formulate a response, he once again captured her gaze with his, this time fully aware of her presence.

  “They are trying to keep me from you, you know. That’s why they chased you away”, he spoke softly with a hint of worry in his voice, as if he was afraid someone might listen in to their quiet colloquy.

  “Who is them?” Sarah whispered back and leaned further into him.

  “Them”, he repeated warily and tossed a furtive glance at the dancing pairs filling his ballroom. “They are trying to keep us apart.”

  “Why?” Sarah questioned him, trying to find the underlying cause of this strange conversation.

  “They try to keep me to themselves. If you accept me, then they will no longer have power over me”, he whispered nervously and constantly stole chary glances at the mass of revellers, who for the most part seemed to ignore them.

  “Accepting you? Power over....? Why would they have power over you?”

  His answers made no sense to her, but by the near frantic look in his eyes, she could tell he believed every word he had just uttered.

  Again, he did not answer her questions but seemed to have fallen back into his deep musings.

  “Sarah, so nice for you to have come”, his voice drawled suddenly and contained a hint of predacious seductiveness.

  “What?” she breathed her response, having taken by utter surprise over his complete change of tone.

  Gone was the forlorn expression on his face, as it had been replaced by that mischievous twinkle in his eyes she had become so accustomed to.

  His voice held a flair of prankishness, and she could tell by the way he raked his eyes over her that he was back to his usual game.

  It felt as if she was talking to two different personalities that seemed to effortlessly switch back and forth, one forlorn and desultory, and the other cocksure and playful.

  She was still too perplexed over the capricious nature of the sudden change of his disposition when she felt him grabbing her hand and pulling her out of the seat.

  “Let’s dance. I have waited long enough.”

  “What? No, wait, let’s talk for a while. I still have questions for you.”

  Fully disregarding her objections, he kept pulling her by her hand behind him and entered the dance floor with a slightly out of breath and flustered Sarah.

  She had not expected such manhandling from him, not after he had looked and acted so crestfallen, but this was no longer the dejected and wary Jareth, this was once again the imposing Goblin King.

  What had he meant by ‘they tried to keep him from her’?

  Why would they have power over him if they could keep them separated?

  She looked around at the enigmatic masked dancers, who surrounded them but didn’t seem to be interested in bothering them for the moment.

  Jareth snaked his arm around her waist and pulled her tight into his chest. It was much closer and with more emphasis than he had before, and Sarah momentarily felt her breath knocked out of her.

  Her eyes found his, and they locked in an intense stare off.

  How ineffably gorgeous he looked at this moment, and Sarah couldn’t help but to find herself lost in his gaze, just like she had the previous two times.

  She heard the familiar tune, but his lips didn’t move, nor did his feet, as all he could do was stare at her with unwavering eyes.

  His lips parted as though he was about to speak but then thought better of it and closed them again.

  It appeared he was fighting an inner war with himself, and Sarah wondered if it was his resurfacing logical mind, trying to destroy the impenetrable wall of his self-imposed prison.

  Slowly, they began to sway along with the music, all the while holding each other’s gaze.

  His mien remained insouciant as he twirled her gently through the crowd, being acutely aware of where each pair was behind him.

  “Jareth”, Sarah managed to breath “I have so many questions for you, but you never answer.”

  “How can I if you haven’t asked any yet”, he laughed back as though he found her comment quite enlivening. “Once you state one, I shall be more than happy to provide you with a suitable answer.”

  “He’s forgotten all about the previous two times I was here. Whatever recollection he may have had a few moments ago, they are now gone. Damn it, I had him exactly where I wanted him, on that chair instead out here, and his mind wondering over the apparent chances.”

  Sarah managed to divert her eyes onto his shoulder and wanted to scream. She had been so close to find some answers.

  At least, he had engaged into conversation, and it had appeared as if he was about to divulge why he feared the dancers were at the heart of his problem.   

  “Jareth”, she began with feigned confidence, trying to make herself sound poised and in control, “who are the trouping fairies?”

  He knitted his brows and blinked his eyes at her with an interested look.

  For a moment, she thought he would let go of her, as his hold on her became almost tenuous, and he nearly stopped in his circles.

  “Why do you want to know about trouping fairies?” he asked and seemed to have recovered from his initial flummox as he sped up the dance again and soon held her as tight as before.

  “Well, you told me that you used to sneak away during the night as a young boy to dance with the trouping fairies under the midnight moon on top of some hill.”

  “The peach tree orchard”, he assisted her in finding the correct name, and she nodded. “And why would I have told you about that? I don’t recall us ever having a conversation about it. The last thing I recall you saying to me was an insult directed at my Labyrinth in the tunnels.”

  “Damn, he thinks I’m still doing the run”, her mind cried out with frustration.

  He didn’t seem inclined to wait for a response from her and immediately continued in his explanation to her inquiry.

 “Trouping fairies are warrior fairies, ready to defend the enemy of the kingdom. They always march in formation, henceforth the name trouping. One can only see them in their physical form during a full moon and between the hours of midnight and three in the morning.”

  “Really?” Was all she could come up with in reply.

  “Really”, he smirked lightly amused by her baffled look and immediately led her into a wide circle and then walked her back into the parted crowd, keeping proper timing with the music and mindfully concentrating on his footwork.

  The other dancers, having been parted by the fast-moving pair, now began to pay them attention, and their gazes had turned from uninterested and bored to curious and in some cases outright hostile and bellicose.

  A few of the female attendees snarled at her with bared teeth and fiery flashes emanating from their shielded eyes, while some males intentionally guided their partners into her to shove her around.

  Jareth seemed to be oblivious to all of their antics and belligerent and antagonizing behaviour, as his gaze was laser-focused on her face.

  Sarah flicked them concerned glances during the fast spin Jareth once again took her into.

  The increasing closeness of their bodies and intensifying hostility had her gravely concerned.

  She needed to get him off the dance floor and quickly before the horde would turn on her again and force her to break the glass once more.

  It was the last thing she wanted to do, not after having been so close to break through his mental wall.

  Breaking the glass this time could mean the ultimate death for them both. She didn’t think there was enough time left for another carousel round.

  “Jareth, how old do you think I am?” she instead asked to redirect her attention onto him and keep from panicking.

  “Come again?” Jareth asked with a teasing smile painted around his lips and a puckish twinkle in his eyes, as if he had already won the game, he apparently thought they were still playing.

  “How old do you think I am?” Sarah repeated herself and stopped in her footwork, forcing him to equally halt in his dancing.

  “What kind of silly question is that?” he retorted and attempted to brush her off by trying to make her feet move again.

  She refused his efforts and doubled down on her unwillingness to continue the dance.

  He furled his brows over her stubborn resistance but refused to provide an answer.

  “Look at me, Jareth”, she repeated herself more pertinaciously. “Look at me and tell me how old you think I am.”

  “Obstreperous young girl, fine then if that makes you content and.... quiet”, he relented and expelled a deep huff of annoyance.

  His eyes bore into her with a sly smirk of appeasement before they began to travel along her jawline, both cheekbones, across her forehead, and over her lightly parted lips to come back to her expectant eyes.

  The longer and more intense he perused over her, the more unsure his gaze became, and his lids began to blink nervously.

  She could see his mind racing as he tried to make sense of what he was observing.

  “I don’t.... you are.... how can that be?” he finally gasped and let go of her hand and waist. “You are a fully grown woman of marrying age. Is that part of your wish? To make you older than you are?”

  “No, it is not. Why would I want to age myself?”

  “Oh, I could think of a few reasons”, came his lecherously smirked reply, but the tease was brief, and he returned to his puzzled state. “It is, after all, your fantasy.”

  “Jareth, I am not fooling you with an illusion to seduce you or whatever you think in your crude mind I want from you. I am twenty-eight years old, Jareth. I ran your Labyrinth thirteen years ago. This here is your dream not mine. Yours.”

  Her eyes beseeched him as he stood nonplussed before her, unable to retort or move.

  All the while, the other dancers had suddenly become fully aware of their king’s odd disposition and began to encroach with leering faces behind their masks, low growls and sharp hisses emanating from their throats.

  “We need to find a place and talk, Jareth”, Sarah urged at seeing the rapidly increasing danger from the crowd.  “Let’s go back to the chair and....”

  “No”, Jareth harshly interjected and exhaled a deep breath through his nostrils, his lips pressed tight with a slight downward draw.

  His body jerked and his head flicked as if he tried to rid himself of a bothersome thought.

  The glare in his eyes became urgent again, and she could tell his demeanour had shifted back to his wary and alert persona.

  “Come with me”, he urged her on, flicking a cautious glance at the obtruding mass of bacchants.

  He took hold of her arm and with the wave of his free hand catapulted the other revellers back, as though a shockwave had hit them.

  The now highly irate partygoers elicited high-pitched screams and snarling growls, but Jareth paid them no attention and waved his hand again, creating a protective bubble between the attackers and him and Sarah.

  “Where are we going?” Sarah huffed while being dragged behind him with evident urgency.

  His strides were long and determined, and he never bothered to take a look over his shoulders.

  “The balcony”, he finally replied and slowed down as they approached a beautifully carved glass door, Sarah had not noticed before.

  “Where did that come from?” she wondered aloud.

  Jareth only tossed her a sly smirk of hauteur and opened the door, signalling for her to pass through first.

  It felt as if she were traversing a portal, and with timid, unsure steps, Sarah walked through the opening at his urging and gave a wary gaze back.

  She could see the other dancers having resumed their carefree gallivanting as if nothing had happened.

  Puzzled over the sudden change, she scrunched her brows over this very odd behaviour.

  None of it made sense, or did it?

  In an instance, Jareth had followed behind and closed the door, preventing her from viewing the ballroom.

  With a cordial smile, he gestured for her to keep walking to fully step onto the balcony, and Sarah hesitantly followed his request.

  As soon as she stepped out of the shadow, of what she perceived was a portal, the area lit up in a wonderful array of multicoloured lights, provided by tiny pixies dashing through the air in delightful chases of each other.

  Every once in a while, their small giggles infiltrated her ears, and Sarah couldn’t help but to titter in response.

  She stepped further onto the vast balcony that spanned a good thirty metres along the windowed wall of what she presumed was his castle.

  It all appeared so much nicer than what she remembered his castle to look like.

  Was she still in his crystal reality?

  Of course, she was. It was only an extension of his illusion, and she let go of a vaguely disappointed sigh.

  “So, where are we?” she asked him and turned to face him.

  “On the ballroom terrace. The steps on that end lead out to the gardens”, he informed her with a soft and caring voice, the pride clearly showing in his eyes.

  He dipped his head toward a wide set of swooping elegant stairs, lined by tall blooming, illuminated flowers, which seemingly attracted the vast majority of the sprites and pixies, for they kept zooming around the enticingly fragrant bushes.

  “Wow, it’s beautiful out here”, she breathed and threw him a shy smile to show her appreciation.

  “Sarah, I.... I have not brought you out here to admire my architecture or estate, but it is noted nevertheless.”

  In a trice, his voice seemed official and cold again and lacked any of the sultriness, warmth, and playfulness from just seconds ago.

  Sarah squinted her eyes and knitted her brows.

  He seemed to be bothered by something, and his distrust was clearly written across his stoic visage. Again, she could sense the mercurial shift in his personality.

  “Something is bothering you”, she  mentioned and turned fully to face him, her admiration of the balcony long forgotten.

  “How astute of you.... Sarah, or whoever you are.”

  His voice was laced with disbelief and an underlying accusation over her identity.

  Did he take her for an imposter, a swindler?

  Would he accuse her of being a witch once again?

  The mannerism of his facial expressions and voice definitely hinted as this.

  His eyes were hooded, and his brows knitted to where his gaze became stark and scrutinizing.

  There was no longer a wistful longing in his eyes but a sense of needing to know what he was looking at.

  “What are you talking about? Of course, I am Sarah. Why do you doubt me?”

  “Because....”, he hissed back with darkening eyes, “.... you neither act nor look like the Sarah I know.”

  “The Sarah you know? How much do you actually know of me? You’ve only met me a few hours ago.”

  “Ah, you just told me out in the ballroom that you ran my Labyrinth thirteen years ago, and now you claim I’ve only been knowing you for a few hours. So, which is it? Hours of thirteen years?”

  He stepped closer to her, his face awash with a dangerous shadow of suspicion that caused her to step back to keep a certain distance between them.

  This was certainly not going her way, for she had made an egregious blunder.

  She needed to allay his misgivings, and she needed to do it fast. An irate Goblin King is not what she needed right now.

  “Jareth, if you calm down and let me explain, it will all make sense to you”, she hastily replied and held out her hand to stop his forward progress.

  Her flat palm made contact with his chest, and he halted in his steps.

  As much as he wanted to intimidate her, and mistrusted her, the light touch of her hand against his frock ceased his chagrin and instilled a calmness that coursed through his being like a river of blissful equanimity.

  “You have five minutes before I shall call my guards and have you escorted back to the oubliette from which Hoggle freed you.”

  “You called him by his correct name”, Sarah exclaimed, completely disregarding his warning over the arrest.

  “I have?” Jareth flummoxed, momentarily taken aback by her cheerful response over the correct usage of this infuriating dwarf’s name.

  Sarah nodded, twitching a smile at him while she bit her lower lip. His eyes had lost their harshness and a brief flicker of recognition flashed across his visage before it retained its cold mien.

  “Five minutes. The clock is ticking”, Jareth drawled and crossed his arms in front of his chest, looking once more like the imposing, threatening Goblin King.

  “Jareth, I am who I say I am. I have run and bested your Labyrinth thirteen years ago. You have created this ballroom fantasy in your own mind because I left you. You asked me to stay at the end, and I denied you and....”

  “Nobody bests my Labyrinth”, he shouted his interruption with dangerously squinted eyes.

  “Well, I did, and you returned Toby. He is now fourteen years old, a healthy, normal, mortal teenage boy”, she shot back, unwilling to let him rattle her.

  She had to get through this thick skull of his, even if it cost her a trip to the oubliette, which she didn’t believe he was capable of doing, as he was stuck in his own dream reality.

  It did not include harming her.

  Him having brought her to this balcony and interrogating her over her accusations already proved that she was breaking down the walls of his mental prison. She only needed to keep hammering away at his defences.

  Jareth elicited a deep growl as his eyes blackened, and he forcefully grabbed her hand and twisted it off his chest, stepping into her with the look of death on his piqued countenance while Sarah cried out in pain.

Chapter Text

  “Jareth, you are hurting me”, Sarah cried out, her vision being watered over by the tears forming in her burning eyes from the pain shooting through her hand and wrist.

  Instantly, his twisting and crushing grip on her hand lessened, and he completely released her, stumbling back with a look of sheer horror on his countenance.

  “I am so.... oh, please, forgive me, Sarah”, he breathed with consternation, genuine contrite showing in his dull eyes. “I.... I don’t know what came over me.”

  She could tell he was in a complete state of shock as she rubbed her sore wrist and hand with her other and slightly bent over with a pained grimace on her face.

  “Sarah, I never.... I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  The utter look of bewilderment, mixed with rue and contrition in his eyes had her straighten out and swallow down her own tears.

  Something was going on with him. He was fluctuating between two distinct personalities, apparently against his own volition and will.

  “It’s all right, Jareth, you didn’t cause any injuries. I don’t think it’s your fault.”

  “Sarah, I hurt you, and I never wanted to.... it’s unforgiveable. Here, let me help.”

  He reached out for her, but she instinctively flinched and shrunk from his touch.

  A sad glint flashed in his eyes over her rejection caused by the fear of him, and his beautiful visage was once again riddled with a dejected expression.

  He let his reaching hand fall flaccid by his side and was in the process of turning away from her, deep sorrow washing over his face.

  Sarah felt immediately agitated with herself for having sent him the wrong signal. She wasn’t afraid of him; it had been a reflex, a natural automatic reaction to her distressed state.

  “Jareth, I would be honoured if you would take a look at my hand”, she stated quietly, and he turned back towards her.

  “You are not afraid of me?” he asked with a doleful voice, and she shook her head, a smile twitching on her lips. “I could never be afraid of you, because I know the real you would never hurt me.”

  His desolate mien brightened at her words, and he re-approached her with his hand reaching for hers.

  This time, she allowed the touch, and he ever so gently cupped it between his palms. Only now did she notice that he had somehow rid himself of his gloves.

  Feeling the warmth of his bare skin pressing against hers had her heart flutter and her breath hitched.

  She felt a tingling sensation all up and down her spine. A radiating heat spiralled from the palm of her hand to its back, into each of her fingers, and across her wrist.

  Her eyes were glued onto his two strong hands with the long slender fingers. His skin was pale but had a scintillating shimmer to it. She could not detect any flaws, and she was mesmerized by the beauty of them.

  His fingernails were slightly pointy as if they were well trimmed claws and were covered in golden glitter.

  She could hardly tear her gaze from them.

  Although they appeared capable of slicing through her throat, she felt no fear or alarm from allowing them so close to her vulnerable pulse by her wrist.

  “His skin is all covered, no, not covered, impregnated with this substance. It has to be that same glitter that’s everywhere in his Labyrinth. Maybe it is the magic. It must be the magic. What else could it be?” her mind kept telling her, and she quirked a soft smile at him when their eyes met fleetingly.

  “Your hand is bruised. I can heal you. Please trust me.”

  His pleading eyes implored her to put faith into his words, and Sarah nodded her approval.

  “I trust you, Jareth.”

  His hands folded into each other, completely engulfing her bruised hand and wrist.

  She felt the warm current of electricity coursing through her appendix, which she figured was his magic seeping into her skin. His entire demeanour had changed from aggressive to amiable and caring.

  The pleasant sensation had her relax into his touch, and she licked her lips and nervously chewed on them.

  Jareth quirked an imperceptible smile in return. His breathing had slowed, and he slowly closed his eyes, as if to concentrate on her injury.

  “Close your eyes”, he murmured softly, and Sarah followed his example and, likewise, shut her lids with only a wisp of anxiety ghosting through her.

  She could feel his magic penetrating her skin and flowing through her entire arm. The sense of equanimity coursing through her whole being made her want for this to never stop.

  She relished in his touch and almost became lost in the sensation, the same way she had found herself lost in his intoxicating eyes every time she looked at them.

  It was his softly spoken words that roused her from her near trancelike state, and she opened her eyes to look at her still enfolded hand, not daring to let her gaze wander to his enthralling orbs and allowing him to draw her under his enchantment once more.

  “All done. You won’t even have a bruise.”

  He cracked a relieved and apologetic smile but refused to let go of her.

  His slender fingers slowly brushed against the back of her hand, and she felt in no hurry to break the contact.

  It felt right, as if they were meant to be connected in physical touch. Her breath hitched, and her heart hammered in her chest.

  What was happening?

  Why was she feeling as if she wanted to be physically connected to him?

  She had never experienced this sensation before, but then again, she also had never directly touched his skin before.

  “It’s just a dream, his dream, not mine”, she told herself to ease her troubled mind over the surfacing desire of a certain nature.

  “Can I have my hand back?” she finally asked timidly and gently yet assertively pulled her hand out from between his clasped ones.

  A flash of brief disappointment shot across his twitching face, but he quickly schooled his mien and tilted his head, as though he had just remembered an amusing and entertaining hilarity.

  “I didn’t take you for being a shy damsel”, he teased with a capricious smirk lying in wait around his pressed together lips. “Does my contact make you.... nervous, Sarah?”

  He could not have used any more sex appeal and erotic sensuality in his voice as he did in this moment, and he leaned himself forward, placing his face squarely at only centimetres from hers.

  His lips were so close, and Sarah couldn’t help but to stare at him, at them.

  Her own lips parted ever so lightly, and she felt her chest constricting with the oncoming sensation of just wanting to give in to his charms and find out where it would lead.

  No, she could not let herself be spun into his web of seduction. She needed to stay focused and on task.

  This was too important to give in to fleeting carnal desires that may or may not be genuine, as he most likely used magic to make her feel the way she did.

  “No, not nervous”, she squeaked out and tried to distance herself by leaning her torso away from him.

  “Oh, but I think you are”, he countered, still with as much of a libido-arousing voice as before.

  As unsettling as his amorous behaviour was, and the frustrating manner in which it affected her, at least he didn’t seem to be dangerous now and confused as to what she was doing here or whether she was an imposter.

  Apparently, that part of his personality was currently being suppressed or had exited his castle all together.

  She hoped for the latter.

  “I would love to see your garden”, she exclaimed and managed to turn herself around just in time before his lips made contact with hers.

  With her back turned to him, she missed the puckish smirk that broke out all over his entertained visage.

  She took a few steps toward the balustrade and looked out over the expanse of the ever-shifting walls of the Labyrinth.

  Below were the gardens, he had spoken of, nestled in a dim, semi-darkness and just out of her perception.

  Her gaze travelled across the estate and out into the distance. She could make out the Forbidden Forest where she had fallen asleep after taking a bite of the tainted peach.

  Her heart raced from the memory, and she closed her eyes for a few precious seconds in order to shake herself from the recollection.

  It was the touch of his jacket brushing against the back of her bare shoulder that had her startled out of her reverie.

  “Still so jumpy and skittish. My, my, Sarah, did you also leave your courage behind when you left my Labyrinth?”

  “What?”

  She spun herself around and nearly collided with is chest. Only her speedy reflexes of bringing her arms to her own chest prevented her from being swallowed up by his imposing figure, so close to her.

  “So, you believe me when I’m telling you my run was thirteen years ago?”

  She stared at him with baffled eyes.

  Was this the Jareth who started to break through the walls of his crystal dream reality prison?

  The toying smirk on his lips didn’t lighten the level of ambiguity over whom she was actually talking to.

  He placed both his hands against the balustrade against which she had backed up and now pressed her buttocks into.

  He, for all purposes, had trapped her, caged her in.

  His arms and hands blocked her way out to the sides, the balustrade blocked her from behind, and his increasingly irresistible, strong body occupied the way straight forward.

  “I kind of like this older Sarah. You look quite.... appetizing, my dear. Ready for immediate consumption.”

  His eyes flashed with a dark lust, and his lips broadened into a lecherous smirk.

  “The gardens, Jareth, just show me the gardens for now; that will suffice”, Sarah clumsily laughed off his crude advances and managed to sneak free underneath his arm.

  Jareth simply expelled an enlivened chuckle and motioned with his hand for her to take the steps off to her side.

  So, the little vixen wanted to play hard to get.

  He could appease her in her follies and see where this would lead to. It might turn out to be quite pleasurable.

  With the lascivious consideration on his mind, he languidly followed a rather hurried Sarah down the steps, which were now brightly illuminated by the thousands of sprites flittering about in the warm summer breeze.

  Within seconds of stepping down into the actual garden, Sarah’s misconceptions and concerns about an overly amorous Goblin King vanished along with the darkness, as the garden now shone in an array of iridescent colours, each trying to outdo the other.

  Pixies fluttered up to Sarah’s face, stopped briefly to peruse over her, and then flew off to dance through the air to unheard melodies.

  Sarah was fascinated by the display and could not get enough of the bioluminescent flowers of silver, gold, purple, blue, red, and any shade and hue in between.

  Illuminated glitter specks seemed to dance in the air and were stirred up every time a pixie or sprite touched one of the open flowers and disturbed its centre.

  Sarah couldn’t help but laugh aloud over the ineffably beautiful display.

  Not in a million lifetimes could she have dreamed up anything so enchanting and mesmerizing.

  Was he showing her his world as it truly was, or was this only another illusion to spin his web of allure around her?

  She glanced back at him. He was close yet kept his formal distance.

  The predatory smirk and glint in his eyes had been replaced by a look of admiration, appreciation, and.... she didn’t dare to decipher the last feeling that was gleaming from his mismatched eyes.

  “I see you enjoy my garden”, Jareth spoke softly and signalled her to take a closer look at an enticing flower of sheer purple, which glowed brightly and was surrounded by swirling golden glitter, as if hundreds of tiny sprites were zooming around in circles.

  “How could I not; it is magical”, Sarah replied with wonder in her eyes, unable to find a better word to describe what she was seeing.

  “That they are”, Jareth chuckled his reply with amusement and pride over her reaction. “Come, walk with me. I promise not to bite.”

  Sarah turned to look at him.

  The fleeting glint of lust was immediately replaced by a genuine and innocuous warmth that lit up his entire visage. He was neither the chagrined, frightening nor the lewd king for the moment, and she found it safe to interlock her arm with his proffered one.

  “You know, I always dreamed of taking you for a stroll through my gardens and show you the real Labyrinth.”

  Jareth’s softly spoken confession took Sarah for a surprise, and she nearly stopped walking as she flicked him a cursory glance.

  He didn’t look at her but straight ahead of the path, a deep longing reflecting in his absent eyes, as if he was in a different world.

  And maybe he was.

  “It’s a beautiful dream, and I’m glad you are showing this to me now.”

  His perfunctory pressure increased on her arm, and the light patting of her hand with his once again gloved one was an intimate small gesture, she hadn’t expected.

  He continued to guide her ever so gently down the path and allowed her to stop and gaze around, taking in all of the wonders from his garden.

  “You wanted to talk earlier and find out more about me”, he suddenly stated, as he threw her a testing glance with a quirked smile lying in wait.

  “I do”, Sarah replied with enthusiasm, hoping she would finally be able to find a way to convince him of the brutal reality, and the danger they were both in.

  “My lady’s wish is my command”, he smirked and pointed towards a small white bench that had appeared out of nowhere. 

  Having him so companiable, Sarah appeased him in his entreaty and took a seat, with him seating himself beside her.

  He was close but not close enough to touch. Sarah found she was almost disappointed over him keeping his respectful distance.

  Maybe it was for the best, as she needed to keep a clear head and be able to formulate her responses and questions exactly right to nudge him into the direction, she needed him to go.

  “All right, well, I had a long but happy childhood. Yes, I was a rebel as you already know about my sneaking out to dance with the trouping fairies. Being a young boy with the prospect of becoming king has its benefits as well as its grievances. One downturn is that the entire kingdom is looking at your every move, and the other that you are expected to grow up much faster than your common peers.”

  “And you rebelled against that?” Sarah stated the obvious, earning her a mischievous twinkle from his eyes and sly smirk.

 “How perceptive of you. I did, and for a long time, I was considered a playboy prince, whose only ideology was to carouse with loose women, drink wine in excess, and live a carefree life regardless of the consequences.”

  “And did you?” Sarah asked with a voice so quiet, he nearly missed her question.

  “Did what?”

  “Carouse with women; do all those things?”

  “‘I did, for a while, and I am not proud of this epoch in my life. “

  “So, what made you change and grow up?”

  “Now who says I am grown up?” he smirked puckishly, and Sarah gave him the ever so lightest shove against his arm.

  The contact was fleeting, yet it kindled a feeling of more longing and wistful thinking when their eyes locked onto each other.

  She quickly shook herself out of such thoughts before she once again fell to the allure of his gaze.

  Nothing good would come from it.

  “The death of my parents is what had me turn into a grown up fae from one moment to the next”, Jareth replied after a pregnant moment of silence. “They died suddenly during a coup attempt. One of my father’s advisors had poisoned the wine they had been drinking to celebrate Beltane.”

  “The only reason I did not succumb to the same fate was that I had sneaked away with two concubines to.... well, let’s just say, ever since, I swore off the carousing and began to find a purpose in my life. I always believed that had I been at the festivities, I could somehow have stopped the double regicide.”

  “Oh, Jareth”, Sarah whispered, placing her hand caringly against his forearm. “This was not your fault. Nobody could have predicted that, and had you been there, you most likely would have been assassinated as well. Do not blame yourself for this.”  

  He looked at her hand touching his arm and a wistful smile quirked on his lips. With the greatest tenderness, he placed his gloved hand over hers and squeezed down.

  “Do not feel pity for me, as it would constitute an insult to my person. I do, however, accept your compassion and sympathy.”

  “All right’, Sarah replied with a soft smile of her own, “then that you shall have.”  

  “I was immediately placed in charge of the kingdom to become the next ruler by default, so to speak. I declined and instead elevated my younger sister to the position, placing strong protective spells on her, and the kingdom, while I spent the next seventy years going after the traitors and murderers, eradicating them wherever they resided and made an example of them with public executions. I became cruel in my quest for revenge. You would not have liked me much back then.”

  He flicked a cursory glance at her to gauge her reaction. She only smiled in support and nodded for him to continue.

  “During my quest for bloody revenge, I formed an alliance with the Goblin Kingdom and its inhabitants, ferocious goblin fighters, feared by all but myself.”

  “Ferocious? Feared? You could hardly call the goblins I encountered in your Labyrinth fearsome creatures. They looked like something out of a Muppet movie.”

  Jareth couldn’t help but let go of a loud, entertained guffaw and bent back his head with a wide-open mouth. His entire body shook from his amusement.

  “Oh, Sarah, how innocent you still are. Those were mere childish illusions. The so called ‘Muppet Army’ consists of the most cruel and vicious creatures in the entire Underground. I am the only one capable of controlling them with my strong magic.”

  Sarah furrowed her brows while sinking into deep contemplations. So, the goblins were vicious and fearsome, not cuddly, and cute?

  What about the other characters?

  What about her friends: Hoggle, Sir Didymus, and Ludo?

  As if Jareth had read her thoughts, he squeezed her hand again to draw her attention back to him.

  “Sarah, your friends may not be exactly as you had envisioned them, but they do exist. Ludo is a gentle giant, Sir Didymus is a fox knight, albeit quite a bit taller and more intimidating than you envisioned, and he is also not riding a sheepdog. That was Merlin projected into the run.”

  He smirked at seeing her stunned, wide-eyed visage of sheer incredulity.

 “Hoggle is a dwarf and looks the same; him, you envisioned quite accurately, although he is actually one of my closest friends and advisors, neither disgruntled with me, nor cowardly, or disloyal. Toby’s kidnapping and your run was actually his idea.“

  “His idea? What? How? Wait one cotton picking minute here”, she nearly shouted at him in utter astonishment and disbelief, not willing to just accept this part of his retelling.

  He had to be mistaken.

  “What do you mean it was his idea? I am the one who wished Toby away, and he helped me getting him back. I saw the two of you constantly arguing and bickering. You threatened him, and he kept calling you a rat, and.... Maybe, I should not have said that”, she added in remorse of feeling like she had just snitched on Hoggle calling Jareth a rat.  

  Jareth only laughed louder and shook his head while wiping the entertained tears from his eyes. Apparently, he found all of this beyond hilarious. Sarah failed to see the humour.

  “Sarah, I had watched you in owl form for many years prior to you running my Labyrinth. You drew me to you with your belief. I became fascinated with you, and with your strong believe in magic and fairy tales. As you grew and became a near woman, I made up my mind to bring you to my world and show you that all of what you fantasized about was true. I yearned for your companionship.”

  “Jareth, I was fifteen. You are what? Hundreds, thousands of years old?”

  “It is true that I am much older than you, but I have been alone for so long. I wanted to choose my partner when the time felt right, and I felt a true connection with the one I decided to share my life with. Mortal age was inconsequential. It is fleeting and always moving on while mine remains the same.”

  He gauged her quiet reaction before continuing.

  “At that time, I was only infatuated with you, intrigued. To return to my telling, Hoggle, knowing of my desire, suggested to create a story that would bring you to my world voluntarily, or semi-voluntarily, as I was not allowed to just snatch you up”, he amended in seeing the dangerous flash in her eyes, ready to remonstrate.

  “How comforting”, Sarah breathed with a sarcastic huff, not sure she liked where this was going. “I would hardly call my visit voluntary.”

  “Be that as it may; as I watched your run and had more direct interactions with you, I noticed how easily you made friends with my subjects. I created the adventure for you and allowed your own suggestions to create the story of your run through my Labyrinth and the rescue of the baby brother.”

  “Just imagine my surprise when you broke out of that dream crystal reality, which you had created. You wanted me as much as I wanted you. Dream crystal realities never lie, and by then, I knew I had fallen in love with you. But your subconsciousness conjured the clock and tore you away from me, leaving me behind with a yearning and want.”

  Sarah swallowed and didn’t dare to interrupt him. Somehow, she knew, he was about to explain everything to her, and supply her with the key to break him out of his prison.

  “Your friends intentionally helped you to get to Goblin City and defeat my so called ‘Muppet Army’”, he smirked at seeing her flabbergasted countenance.

  “So, it was all just a trick to get me to.... what.... stay and.... oh my god, your proposal at the end, it was.... that was not my imagination for a happy ending, was it?” she gasped with a sudden clarity.

  “No, Sarah it was not your imagination”, Jareth admitted with a deep sigh. “It was real. You however, denied me, thinking the child was still in my possession, although he had been returned to your world prior.”

  “Toby had already been returned?”

  “It was a miscalculation on my part to not let you know. You kept projecting him all over the Escher Room, distracting yourself from my plea to you. As a result, you ended up leaving, and I, I was left behind in a destroyed room of broken dreams and wishes.”

  “Broken dreams and wishes”, Sarah murmured, her mind frantically trying to piece together all the clues he had tossed at her.

  She knew, somewhere in his retelling resided the revelation on how to free him, and her.

  But where was it?

  Finally, a sense of understanding washed over her face, and she looked up at him with a newfound clarity.

  “It was during the breaking of the Escher Room that you imprisoned yourself here in this dream reality, wasn’t it?” she exclaimed. “The room of stairs is actually your dream world where everything is in order, but also goes any which way, because any dream is possible.”

  Jareth quirked a smile, feeling a sense of hope wash over him. She was beginning to understand.

  “So, when the room broke into pieces”, she continued her expounding with growing excitement, “so did the dreams it held, and you were imprisoned here in your own reality, because it was here in this ballroom you had fallen in love with me, and the broken chards of your.... heart captured you in this fake reality.”

  She trailed off and looked at him with understanding and deep sorrow. This had been her doing all along. Her denial of his offer caused the room to break up and trap him in his own reality from which he could not escape.

  She had trapped him; she needed to hand him the key to free himself. It was all so clear now.

  “Yes, that is exactly right”, Jareth nodded. “But I don’t know how to escape.” 

  “Jareth, I know how to free you; the three Fates told me”, she urgently declared and pulled him with her as she jumped from the bench.

  “Where are we going?” Jareth asked bewildered but didn’t resist her.

  “We must get back to the ballroom while you are still lucid, because you have to....”

  She was unable to finish her words as the world around them began to spin, and they found themselves back in the ballroom, surrounded by sneering dancers.

  When Sarah looked up, she beheld a Jareth who gazed at her with a lecherous and calculated smirk while he took her into a fast twirl, singing his familiar song of a falling down world.

Chapter Text

  Hoggle paced nervously up and down at the foot of his king’s bed, his thick, oversized hands clasped behind his back, and his eyes cast down towards the ground.

  His constant mumbling of “oh, what ter do, oh, what ter do” was beginning to seriously grate on Sir Didymus’ last nerves as he tried his best to catch forty winks before his next shift.

  The dwarf had been at his quiet rambling and traversing of the king’s chamber for hours now.

  Luckily, the decorative carpet runner by the foot of the bed dampened his footsteps to a manageable degree, or the fox knight would have gladly and exuberantly evicted him by now.

  “Beshrew me, must thou continue in thy muttering? Why will thee not sit down and catch a snooze? Thou hast not rested in days.”

  “Ah, shut it, yer fleabag”, Hoggle dismissed him with a sneer and handwave before resuming his pensive wandering activity again.

  “I am attempting to ‘shut it’ as thou hast so eloquently stated”, Didymus retorted with a huff of indignation. “Thy wandering is most verily counterproductive to the situation at hand.”

  “Yer kvetchin’ an’ bellyachin’ is every bit as counterproductive ter me. I’m tryin’ ter finds a solution.”

  “Oh, Brother Hoggle, thou must not bother thyself with such matters. There is only one solution to the king’s affair, and it is implemented as we speaketh. Hast patience, my friend, for it is a virtue, thou art sorely lacking.”

  Didymus had barely enough time to suck in his head and move his upper body out of the way when he saw the pillow flying in his direction.

  It harmlessly hit the wall behind him, and he narrowed his canine eyes at the infuriating dwarf before him.  

  “Thou art cupshot” Didymus fulminated. “By my troth, Brother Hoggle, I sweareth....”

  The next pillow hit him squarely in the snout and knocked him out of his chair, which he had tipped back on its back legs, his booted feet resting comfortably on the armrest of another.

  Didymus crashed rather unceremoniously onto the floor while the chair fell over with a loud thump and hit him upside his head.

  “Day-brained clamperton, cease in thy folly at once. Hast thou become weak in thy mind?”

 Didymus growled with increasing chagrin over his friend’s unruly behaviour while Hoggle stood with tightly clenched fists the size of tenpins balls and blew air through his flared nostrils.

  He was in no mood whatsoever for any of Didymus’ shenanigans and big fancy talk today, nor did he wish to be lectured in proper decorum.

  No, not today.

  The fox could stuff his silver-tongued, mannerly speech down his canine throat, and he’d gladly assist him in doing so if the obtuse knight was not going to shut up on his own.

  Naturally, the rumpus had alarmed the guards outside the King’s chamber doors, and in an instant, they flew open with half a dozen snarling and spear wielding goblin soldiers storming through the entrance, followed by a perplexed Wiseman and his even more bewildered hat.

  “What in all of the sacred Underground is all this commotion about?” the old goblin healer shouted with aggravation and scrutinized the still on the floor wallowing fox knight and the fist-balling dwarf, wearing a piqued grimace, standing motionless over him.

  “Don’t you know not to make loud, sudden noises when in this chamber? It is detrimental to His Majesty’s wellbeing.”

  “Twas this boil-brained pumpion, who hath disturbeth His Majesty’s peace. Thou telleth it to him”, Didymus grumbled and finally stood straight again, indicating for the six goblin guards to lower their spears.

  “Out upon thee”, he commanded them with a stern bark, and they hesitantly retreated from the room, tossing warning glances at the obstreperous dwarf before shutting the door again after another reassuring nod from Sir Didymus that everything was under control, and their king was in no danger.

  “Talks about yerself. If yer ever can keeps yer snout shut, I won’ have ter teach yer a lesson in proper decorum”, Hoggle fumed through gritted teeth and refused to open his fists.

  “Proper decorum. Thou hast the gall to lecture me about proper decorum? It was thee who disrupted the serenity from the beginning with thy constant nattering and pacing up and down, up, and down”, Didymus snarled back, moving his paw frantically back and forth to underscore his point.

  “Natterin’? I was expressin’ me worries about our king, yer flea-bitten pillock.”

  “Flea-bitten..... Beshrew me; thou art an oversized lardhead with an enormous cavity of emptiness where any reasonable person would normally contain a workable brain.”

  “Lardhead? I show yer lardhead, yer scrawny dog pizzle.”

  “Thou hath crossed a sword’s line, Knave. No one insults a royal knight in His Majesty’s services”, Didymus snarled back and laid his paw against the hilt of his sabre. “Must I draw upon this to teach thou proper manners?”

  It looked as if the two were about to enter into a physical confrontation, which surely would have gone to the fox knight as the winner.

  Hoggle was much too short and only reached up to the hips of the two-metres-tall, wolfish looking canine to win this battle of stamina and strength.

  However, he was quite a bit more rotund and might take him down with sheer middle-centred weight.

  It definitely would make for a match of the ages.

  The Wiseman quickly inserted himself between the two backbiting parties, and the hat swivelled his head back and forth, looking from Hoggle to Didymus and back to Hoggle with reprimanding eyes.

  “Stop it, he says”, the hat squawked with all its might and underscored his command with a stark head bob. “You are both behaving undignified.”

  Another resolute head bob with closed eyes made the hat feel important and official.

  It was not often he was able to tell a royal knight that he was out of order. Sometimes, it truly was good to be the Wiseman’s hat-companion, as it did bring along some prestige with an otherwise exasperating job.

  “Now either one of you tell me how long His Majesty has been like this.”

  The assertive words from the Wiseman brought the two quibblers out of their stare off and growling contest, and their eyes immediately fell onto him.

  Even the birdhat bent forward and looked first into the Wiseman’s eyes before his gaze turned onto his unmoving and sleeping king.

  “Yes, how long has he been like this?” he repeated the question with a flair of conceited importance before leaning himself all the way over to the Wiseman’s ear.

  “What do you mean like this? He looks normal to me”, he whispered quietly at him, only to draw an exaggerated eyeroll from the old goblin healer.

  “Thou must explain thyself”, Didymus replied with a baffled look. “His Majesty has been quite peaceful in his slumber.”

  “Exactly my point”, the Wiseman murmured back, scratching his chin while appearing to be in deep thoughts. “He never has been peaceful. He has always been restless and often downright violent. This is not normal.”

  Immediately, the feud between Hoggle and Didymus was forgotten, and both hurried closer to the bed to take a more detailed look at their king’s serene and still visage.

  His body lay completely motionless without any of his usual jerking movements of his arms and legs. Not even a twitch was perceptible on his masklike countenance.

“Forsooth, it is most aberrant indeed”, Didymus agreed and narrowed his honey-brown eyes.

  “Is this good or bad?” Hoggle wondered aloud and clambered onto the bed to inspect his monarch’s face from up close.

  With the bed being so high and him being so short, he could barely see over the top of the mattress pad.

  After intently studying Jareth’s face for a moment, he looked expectantly at the Wiseman, hoping for good news.

  The healer merely stood over the king and scratched his wrinkled chin with contemplative eyes and a constantly expelled ‘hm’ at regular intervals, immediately mimicked by his birdhat.

  Hoggle felt like ripping the hat of the Wiseman’s head and stomping on him until he was flattened into the woodwork.

  “It is hard to say”, he finally muttered. “I would say it is a strong possibility of something happening that will have consequences going forward from here on out.”

  “Yer don’ say”, Hoggle riposted with an eyeroll.

  “Forsooth, this was most verily enlightening. Note my sarcasm”, Didymus voiced his rejoinder and followed it up with a frustrated groan. “Hast thee not a more concrete and precise answer?”

  “What don’t you understand? It was quite clear”, the hat stated momentously, as if though he knew what was happening, albeit he was every bit as flummoxed as the rest of them.

  “Something happened and will impact everything from now on”, he repeated the words with evident importance.

  “Yer mother was a parrot, wasn’ she?” Hoggle grunted. “Nothin’ yer jus’ babbled made any sense. Yer jus’ repeatin’ his nonsensical drivel.”  

  The Wiseman in the meantime had pulled a crystal out and floated it over the sleeping form of an immobile Goblin King.

  Every so often, his thick, bushy eyebrows would furrow, or his bulbous nose would twitch. Only quiet, little ‘hms’ mumbled to himself broke his quietude.

  Nobody seemed to notice his examination, as the other three were still engulfed in their own personal battle of insults.

  It wasn’t until he allowed the floating crystal to explode over the body of the king with a loud fizzing sound, showering him with purple glitter that settled all over his face, that they stopped their fracas disputations and paid him any heed.

  “It is worse than I had feared”, the old healer finally declared and turned his attention towards the fox knight with a deeply concerned mien on his wizened countenance. “It is the Fading”, he added with a disconsolate sigh.

  “The Fading?” both Hoggle and Didymus exclaimed with shock at the same time, their eyes growing wide and round, and their mouths gawping open in shock.

  This, they had not expected, not that they were exactly sure what the Fading was.

  “We need to go and get the three Fates, and the mortal girl, and we need to do it quickly”, the Wiseman declared loudly without going into an explanation of the Fading and raised his staff, causing the glitter to continue to cover the king’s neck and torso with fine, purple dust.

  “The Fates?” Hoggle and Didymus asked again in unison, their stunned eyes blinking with befuddlement.

  “Yer gonna bring Sarah here?” Hoggle added to his gasped question.

  “You heard him. Get the Fates and the mortal girl and make it quick”, the hat reiterated the Wiseman’s demand and once again retained his haughty mien.

  Without another word of objection, Didymus raced to the door and ripped it open, galloping out of the room on all fours to give him more speed.

  Hoggle jumped off the bed and attempted to follow the fast-disappearing fox knight but was stopped by the Wiseman’s outstretched arm, holding the staff.

  “You, my short friend, I need here. You must keep His Majesty company. Here, take this and keep hovering it over his face. It’ll prevent the Fading from consuming him.”

  Before Hoggle could remonstrate over being called ‘short’, the Wiseman handed him another crystal with whirling purple glitter inside its orb.

  “Can’ts yer do it yerself? I needs ter go an’ helps Didymus fetch ter Fates an’ me Sarah”, Hoggle growled back his response, quite unhappy over having to stay behind.

  It wasn’t that he didn’t wish to stay and take care of his king, just the opposite, but he felt himself not qualified enough to oversee the salient task of keeping the Fading at bay while taking care of Jareth without anyone else present.

  What if he would screw it up and make it all worse, like he had with Sarah’s run back then?

  He still blamed himself for the disaster and fallout that had followed.

  “Too much trouble for you, short one?” the hat mocked him with a head waggle, and Hoggle felt the urge once more to punch him off the Wiseman for his insulting tongue.

  The Wiseman, having the wisdom to detect another fight coming on, quickly laid his hand onto Hoggle’s shoulder and stilled his pique by forcing him to look up at him.

  “It is for me to go with Didymus. You need to stay here. It is of most importance you hold the crystal over His Majesty’s face. Yes, yes, indeed, of most importance. Your king’s life depends on it. Indeed, it does”, the Wiseman declared with immense importance, and Hoggle’s eyes grew larger over the paramount task he had been given by the most prominent healer in all the Underground.

  “Well, if it’s that important”, he flustered back and took the crystal while he climbed back up on the bed and leaned over Jareth, hovering the crystal with precision over the centre of his sleeping countenance.

  “Jus’ hurry; in case somethin’ happens with ter ra.... His Majesty.”

  He quickly had changed his perceived insult, which truly was a genuine term of endearment, for when him and Jareth bantered with each other.

  He had been using it for centuries. It made him feel better using the familiar nickname, but the old goblin wizard did not seem to share his sentiment.

  The Wiseman, nor his hat, bothered with a reply and instantly poofed out of existence.

  The dismissal elicited a quiet sigh from Hoggle, but he, nevertheless, continued in his most important task without any sly remarks.

  There was no one here to hear them anyway.

**************************************************

  Didymus, in the meantime, had made it to the large portal mirror in his king’s study and stood with panting breath before it. Instantaneously, the Wiseman popped into existence right beside him.

  “Ready?” the old goblin wizard asked him, and the valiant fox knight nodded without diverting his concentrating canine eyes from the now liquefied glassy surface.

  In unison, they both stepped through the mirror after the Wiseman had waved the portal open, displaying a darkened room to their eyes, holding a small, single bed and three figures that solemnly surrounded it.

  Their arrival, albeit sensed, was barely acknowledged by the three Fates, who had gathered around Sarah’s bed.

  The room was eerily quiet and kept dimly lit. Only a small crystal, hovering over the bed, provided some light.

  Stepping closer, Didymus noticed that it was the exact same purple orb with swirling glitter as the one used on his king. His eyes quirked wider and then narrowed at the sight.

  “How long has she been like this?” the Wiseman asked without any formal introduction or greeting.

  It was not necessary, as they all knew each other quite well and had for eons.

  “Since a day and a half. She went from a fitful state into nearly comatose”, Atropos responded and tossed both the new arrivals a cursory glance. “Why are you here?”

  “They’ve come to gather the body of Sarah”, Clotho the Spinner advised her and looked up to lock eyes with the Wiseman, who had approached the side of the bed and looked with a worried gaze at the unmoving mortal.

  “It is the Fading, isn’t it?” Lachesis added, fully aware now on what was occurring.

  “Quite so, yes, indeed, the body is drooping. It must be returned to the Underground, more precisely into the King’s chamber at once”, he reiterated Clotho’s statement.

   Even Atropos, who usually was the most nonchalant and aggressive one, let go of a gasp and clasped her hand in front of her dropped-open mouth, a look of shock in her rounded eyes.

  “Not the Fading. It is much too soon for this. Her string is still....” She took a glance at Sarah’s lifeline, she held in her hand, and produced another gasp, “.... her string is wilting and weakening. How could I not have noticed?”

  “It came on so rapid, none of us realized. It happened when the revellers forced them back into the ballroom. It is them who are keeping the king’s mind imprisoned”, Clotho continued with a sombre voice.

  “I have been listening and watching. Jareth realized it the last time and managed to have a private moment out on the balcony with Sarah. They almost made their escape. Had they only been able to go to the other end of the garden, they would have been out of the sphere of influence on his mind, and he could have broken the barrier there without any issues.”

  Clotho expelled a deep sigh and shook her head. As much as she had tormented the young mortal woman, she did not wish her ill.

  She was vital to the success of their mission, and she kind of had admired her spunk and fire, although she would never admit to this.

  “Yes, yes, so it could have been”, the Wiseman nodded with an accompanying crestfallen sigh.

  “It wasn’t meant to be”, the hat added with a sigh of his own, but garnered nothing but the annoyed glaring glances of everyone present.

  “For sitting on the head of a Wiseman, you are quite daft and imbecilic”, Atropos riposted with the shake of her head and an exaggerated eyeroll. “Maybe I should wring your thread of life and see if that improves your mental acuity.”

  “I swear by all seven gods in the seven heavens, if you retort to this, I shall rip you off my head, throw you on this floor, and incinerate you where you lay”, the Wiseman voiced his threat and effectively shut down any reply from the hat, who looked as indignant as he could make himself, not that anyone cared about his feelings.

  “What dost thee require of me?” Sir Didymus broke the following silence that hung thickly in the air and bowed with panache at the three Fates.

  “Pick her up gently and bring her back with us. Only you can do this, as you have her permission.”

  “I alone hast the lady’s permission? Beshrew me, how can that be?” Didymus flummoxed.

  “Yes, you. She gave you permission right after having returned from her run when she declared that she needed all of you from time to time. Since Hoggle is needed with the king, Ludo not able to fit through the portal, and the Wiseman too weak to carry her, even in her near weightless state, that leaves you to fulfil the task”, Lachesis smiled at the puzzled fox knight. 

  Didymus nodded in understanding, and the three Fates made way for him when he walked up to the bed and tenderly scooped a limp Sarah into his strong, heavily furred arms, cradling her with the utmost tenderness.

  Her frail and emaciated body nearly disappeared in his thick fur as he looked with dejected eyes at her listless form.

  “I shalt take care of thee, Milady. We will saveth the both of thee; to this I sweareth my onus”, he mumbled his promise and turned to leave.

  He hesitated momentarily before the portal mirror and gave a look towards the Wiseman, who nodded and encouraged him to step up to her vanity and climb through.

  Slowly and meticulously, the party of six traversed back into the king’s study through the portal, which instantly flashed upon their exit, and the mirror burst into thousands of tiny glass shards with an explosive boom.

  It had served its purpose and would no longer be needed.

  Sarah’s time in the Above as a mortal had come to an end.

**************************************************

  Emerging at the other side of the portal, the small procession of a leading Wiseman, followed by a Sarah-cradling Sir Didymus, and the three Fates, walking next to each other behind him, had every goblin guard and every servant, fae or otherwise, in the castle stop and hold their breath.

  As the group sped hurriedly through the long corridors, everyone they passed bowed their heads and stood in crestfallen silence, deep sorrow carved into their blackish, demonlike faces.

  Not a sound aside from their footsteps was heard in the entire castle.

  “Sarah”, Hoggle called out when the door to the chamber opened speedily and with a loud boom.

   Didymus strode with long steps towards the other side of the king’s bed and gingerly laid Sarah next to Jareth.

  Hoggle had already moved the blankets back, so they could cover her shivering body once Didymus had let go of her and stepped aside.

  Hoggle blinked his eyes at the dreadfully pallid and ashen visage of his friend from so many years ago.

  A deep sigh escaped his chest, and he lightly shook his head as he readjusted the crystal over Jareth’s equally frail and pallid face.

  “You can let go now”, the Wiseman instructed him with a much softer voice than was normal for him.

  Even the obnoxious hat refrained from any wisecrack remarks and only swayed                       pensively from side to side with half-cracked eyes.

  The sight of the two debilitated bodies, lying next to each other under the thin blanket, brought home the urgency of the task Sarah was still in the middle of performing inside the dream crystal reality.

  While the Wiseman chanted an incantation that had both crystals levitate over each countenance, Lachesis held up her scrying orb and placed it in the middle of the small table by the fireplace, surrounded by several comfortable chairs and a settee.

  “Come”, she motioned for everyone to attend her sitting. “We will have to keep an eye on both, Sarah, and the king.”

  “Can’ts yer enter ter dream again an’ helps them?” Hoggle enquired, fully aware that Clotho had been able to insert herself previously as a servant.  

  “Only as an observer she can”, Lachesis apprised him with a compassionate smile, seeing the hurt and fear in the dwarf’s eyes. “She is not allowed to meddle in the affairs of the living.”

  Two of his closest friends were locked inside the crystal, trying to break out. It had to be taxing on him. For years, he had taken such great care of his king and had carried the burden of guilt with him.

  “Not even a tiny bit?” Hoggle asked with the last flicker of hope, already knowing what the answer was going to be.

  “You know it is against the rules to interfere for any of us”, Atropos stated half-annoyed, and half-saddened herself. “The gods themselves would punish us greatly if we were to take destiny into our own hands.”

  As much as she had enjoyed riling the young mortal woman, she never had meant her any harm or had wished her any woes. After all, it was never a pleasant experience to cut anyone’s life-thread.  

  Her outwardly brash and cold exterior was nothing more than a facade to hide her true compassionate feelings from outsiders.

  Only her sisters knew of her true empathetic proclivities, and she wanted to keep it that way.

  The status quo had to be upheld in order to protect her reputation as a ruthless life-ender via the snip of her scissors.

  Hoggle heaved deeply and situated himself at the foot of the bed between Jareth and Sarah where he sat cross-legged and stared emptily at the two unmoving forms.

  For all purposes, and the casual observer, they appeared deceased, and only the faint up and down movement of their chests hinted of life beneath the ashen death masks and skeletal frames of their bodies.  

  “You don’t have to sit watch”, the hat reiterated the Wiseman’s words from earlier, letting Hoggle know he would take over the duties, but Hoggle pretended not to have heard him and sat unmoving.

  “Hoggle?” the Wiseman wondered and squinted his eyes at the dwarf.

  “If it’s all ter same ter yer, I would likes ter sit here an’ keep me watch. It’ll keep me occupied an’ me thoughts from strayin’ where they don’ have permission ter stray ter.”

  “What nonsense is he saying now?” the hat whispered into the Wiseman’s ears, not having comprehended one word the dwarf had babbled.

  “He’ll keep sitting watch, quite so, indeed he will”, the old goblin replied and lowered himself into the chair by the bedside of his king. “I think, I will rest here for a moment myself and contemplate over what to do next. Yes, I think that will be wise.”

  The Wiseman reclined himself and propped his chin up with his hand while his elbow balanced on the armrest. His hat was not happy to hear him snore quietly within seconds of having taken a seat.

  “Wake up. I want to watch the crystal and see what is going on with the king, and this Sarah woman.”

  His words went unheard as the snores only intensified in duration, volume, and intensity.

  “Can you at least turn your head, so I can peek around the bedpost? It’s obstructing my view”, the hat kept up his remonstrations to no avail.

  Meanwhile, Didymus had padded over to the table with the Fates, who now sat on their knees around the orb, disregarding the comfortable chairs available.

  He had unsuccessfully tried to persuade a quietly brooding Hoggle to join him, but his friend had refused to leave the side of ‘his Sarah’, as he referred to her, and the rat.

  Didymus had patted him on his shoulder and left him to his devices. He knew there would be no changing his mind.

  Lachesis glanced up at the fox knight when he approached the table. A gentle smile graced her closed lips before she redirected her gaze back onto the scrying crystal.

  Didymus lowered himself into an empty chair behind her with his canine eyes glued to the happenings inside the crystal.

  The large orb clearly depicted the ballroom, as if it were playing a movie. Even the music and the rambunctious laughter from the guests filtered through.

  Most of them were dancing again, but they all seemed to be centred around the pair in the middle.

  It was clear by the look on Sarah’s face that she tried desperately to escape the Goblin King’s vicelike grip as he twirled her along with the music, carefully guiding her through the throng of revellers.

  “He is an accomplished dancer, I give him that”, Clotho mentioned in passing with a look of admiration but only earned herself an admonishing glaring stare from Lachesis.

  “Quiet”, she hissed at her sister over the remark. “We are not here to admire his dancing skills. We need to see if we can find something inside the orb that can help us guide them along without directly interfering.”

  “I thought we are not going to help?” Atropos injected herself into this conversation.

  “We are not, not in the true sense of helping. I am merely saying that if we see something that looks promising, we should guide them to whatever it is we are seeing”, Lachesis danced around her answer and tried to appear innocent.

  “Uh-huh”, was the only answer coming forth from Clotho while Atropos’ lips curled into a devious smirk with knowing, glinting eyes.

  “And I think we just found it”, Clotho shouted and caused her sisters to focus back onto the crystal.

  “Well, now I did not see this one coming”, grinned Lachesis as everyone, including an eyebrow raising Didymus leaned forward to catch a closer look of a tightly embracing Sarah and Jareth, falling headfirst into the large pillow pit.

  “Art they doing what I think they art doing?” he yapped, and all three Fates nodded with a big grin on their lit-up faces.

Chapter Text

  Sarah stared with horrified eyes at a devilish grinning Jareth, looking down at her with a licentious expression clearly written all over his smug face.

  He reminded her starkly of how he looked when she had first danced with him all those years ago and had been unnerved over the encroaching crowd then.

  “Déjà vu”, she murmured to herself and sucked in her breath.

  She needed to get him out of this once again imprisoned persona and bring the lucid Jareth back to her, so she could get him to break the crystal wall.

  Judging by the increased combativeness of the other partygoers, and Jareth’s almost distorted lecherous face, she knew time was running short.

  An icy chill ran down her spine when her eyes glanced back at his smirking visage.

  There was nothing enticing nor romantic about him anymore. He was one-hundred percent predatory. It seemed the ravers had retaken their stranglehold over his mind.

  “Shit, shit, shit, what do I do? I need to bring him out of this and fast.”

  Her frantic mind raced a million kilometres a second, trying to figure out how to break the spell under which he was held.

  “It’s his mind, get to his mind, find a way to disrupt the brain processes.”

  “His mind”, she quietly mumbled to herself, lost in her musings, as she lowered her gaze and looked down at his chest. “It’s his mind.”

  The screeching, clamorous noises from the surrounding dancers increased in viciousness, and she could see them closing in rapidly.

  They had been encircled, and this time, there was no open path towards the crystal barrier. Her escape route had been effectively cut off, not that she had that choice any longer.

  Somehow, she could feel that her body had reached its limits of what it could do.

  Was it already the thirteenth day?

  It hadn’t felt like this to her in this reality, but with each visit back to the tangible world, her body had suffered enormously, and days had gone by.

  “Oh, you pretty thing, you are going to lose”, one of the masked male attendees hissed into her ear, and Sarah swivelled her head in his direction.

  A big, thrawn grin covered his greenish painted lips, and his nearly yellow eyes glared with a joyous fire behind his obscure mask. Sarah recoiled from his revolting image.

  “I’ll make you mine”, he sibilated his added promise before he was pushed back into the swelling crowd, and a female stepped forward, breathing her foul stench into Sarah’s face.

  She crinkled her nose over the unexpected odious air that escaped the otherwise beautiful woman’s mouth. Despite the dangerous situation, she couldn’t resist waving her free hand across her face to disperse the foul odour.

  “You’ll never have him. He’s ours; he’s mine. We’ll keep him forever.”

  Her delirious laughter rang out like ear-splitting skirls, and Sarah grimaced her countenance in pain.

  Before the mystery woman dissolved into the mass of bodies, she blew more noxious air into Sarah’s face.

  Sarah nearly convulsed and had trouble of keeping her gag reflexes in check over the malodorous and putrid stench that reeked of the bog. 

  Her eyes briefly crossed, and she had to hold on a tad tighter to Jareth to keep from buckling in her knees.

  He only widened his salacious smirk and now licked his lips at her in anticipation, as if she were a dish best served incoherent from foul odour.

  Sarah haphazardly collected herself and tried to push off him, but he kept her in a tight grip, flush against his body.

  “Jareth”, she began to hopefully divert his attention to a conversation and away from the lewd thoughts, he clearly displayed unashamed on his lusting visage. “You are holding me too tight. I think I need to rest. Could we get something to drink?”

  “Rest? Well, I shall let you rest on your back with me on top of you. How would that suit you?” he drawled his coarse inuendo and further tightened his grip around her, pushing his hips amorously into hers.

  She could feel the hardness between his loins and involuntarily quirked her eyebrows over feeling what she suspected was his arousal.

  “I see you like it. Pretending to be so young and innocent when in reality you are a fully grown, mature woman, a ripe peach ready to be plucked and consumed.”

 He tossed back his head and laughed loudly.

  His maniacal cackle created tremors and shivers throughout her entire body, but none were caused by a desire to appease him in his request.

  “Let me show you what I want and allow me to set your loins on fire, you precious thing with those cruel eyes.”

  Sarah’s heart was about to jump out of her chest, infused with a paralyzing fear over what he would do next.

  “But you want him, don’t lie to yourself. You find him attractive and charming, and you desire him”, her libido whispered to her, and Sarah shook her head.

  “Not like this, I don’t”, her reasoning mind shouted back. “Definitely, not like this.”

  “Release me, Jareth. You are hurting me”, she growled at him and intensified her resistance to his advances and the strong hold he held over her.

  “I love me a female that resists”, he smirked and took her into a fast twirl with his loins pushing vulgarly into hers.

  She could feel his desire and hardness through her thin gossamer dress, and even though she felt appalled by his crude behaviour, she couldn’t help but to feel a wanton yearning flaring up inside of her.

  “I told you; you want him. Go, let yourself give in to him. You’ve been waiting years to be his and give your body and soul to him. Now is the time.”

  “No, I don’t”, she gasped her response to her libido’s attempt to succumb to his seduction.

  Had it been ensnared by the enchantment as well?

  It sure sounded as if it was trying to sway her to give up on her mission all together.

  She could not allow this.

  The music became louder and faster, and soon she felt like a whirling dervish being spun at an incredible rate in tight circles.

  The crowd became one distorted blurred scene, akin to what a fast carousel rider would experience as it picked up speed in its endless rotations.

  Jareth and she became the passengers to his fast-moving feet, acting as the carrousel, while the crowd and the ballroom morphed into the backdrop.

  She focused her eyes back onto Jareth’s smirking visage to keep from becoming dizzy and faint from the berserk spinning scenery that now all blended together and was nothing more than one revolving distortion of her vision.

  “Stop him”, her mind shouted at her with increasing urgency and panic.

  “How?”

  “Break his concentration”, came the suggestion.

  “But how?”

  Sarah was now in such a frazzled and frenetic state of mind from the frenzied twirls of Jareth that she was afraid she would lose all control.

  This was madness, an unhinged, maniacal, and out of control circumstance that was in danger of spelling doom for her, and Jareth, if she could not stop it.

  “Kiss him.”

  Her libidos unexpected and sudden suggestion had her stop in her overwrought and desperate search for a solution.

  “Kiss him?” she quietly mouthed to herself and knitted her brows while Jareth suddenly changed directions and with equal zeal now turned her the other way.

  Any longer, and she knew she would greet whatever it was that still resided inside her stomach, even if it was nothing more than her own bile.

  “Kiss him, you stubborn fool”, her libido shouted with all its might, clearly vexed at her indecision.

  “Yes, kiss him. Break his concentration. It’s the last thing he’ll expect”, her logical mind unexpectedly second her libido’s salacious suggestion. “Do it now.”

  Without given her actions another thought, Sarah moved her head forward, pushed herself up with her hand on his shoulder, and pressed her lips in a desperate last attempt against his.

  His eyes shot wide open at the unanticipated contact, and he instantly lost his footing. Sarah intensified the pressure of her lips against his, not allowing him to draw back.

  The kiss was rough and not well executed, but an unseen energy seemed to course through both their touching mouths, causing a light tingle against their lips as though she had stuck her tongue against a live, low voltage wire.

  Jareth began to stumble and slow in his tight rapid circles. Their eyes were locked, and she could clearly see the shock in his owled orbs.

  Not relenting in her kiss, she could see the lecherous glare in his gaze slowly vanish and being replaced by a much softer and warmer look.

  The grip on her hand intensified as he lost his balance and bumped harshly into the other swirling and agitated dancers, who pushed them around as if they were spinning tops.

  To keep from falling over and crushing Sarah, Jareth pulled her as flush against his body as he could while trying to steady his feet.

  The jostling by the other pairs did not help the situation, and Sarah’s refusal to break from the kiss only intensified his tottering.

  As they bounced and wobbled on unsteady feet across the ballroom floor with their lips locked, they did not notice that they had approached the edge of the pillow pit.  

  With their eyes glued to each other, they completely missed the drop off, and when Jareth took a step to the side, he completely lost his balance and took Sarah with him as they tumbled into the vast sunken area, filled with oversized, plush pillows.

  It wasn’t until they were in a freefall that Sarah let go of his mouth and elicited a subdued scream.

  The landing into the mountain of puffy pillows was as soft as expected, and they sunk immediately underneath most of them and towards the floor.

  Jareth held on tight to her and now had one arm wrapped across her head, as if to shield her from any dangerous objects.

  They bounced a couple of times into the air when they hit the last pillow on the ground and finally came to rest on top of it.

  They were still enfolded into each other’s arms and laid as if they were lovers stretched out in a caressing embrace on a duvet.

  Sarah’s gasping face was only centimetres from his, and her questioning eyes perused intently over him.

  “Jareth?” she asked softly with remaining fear clearly visible in those shining emerald-green orbs. “Are you....”

  “It’s me, the real Jareth”, he answered her unfinished question and twitched a smile her direction.

  She let go of her held breath and smiled back with great relief.

  Not seemingly in any hurry to peel themselves out of the pillows, they remained motionless and merely looked at each other, as if finding answers within one another’s gaze.

  After what appeared eons, Jareth leaned ever so lightly forward, and his lips gently captured hers.

  She let a stunned gasp escape her but did not refuse his advance. Instead, she lightly parted her lips and allowed him to seek refuge with his tongue in her mouth.

  Unlike the desperate, poorly executed, impulsive kiss from earlier in order to jolt him out of his mental prison, this one was deliberate, gentle, and full of sensible emotions.

  She could feel his lips tremble as they tenderly caressed hers.

  His tongue was languid and meticulous as it ever to gingerly probed the inside of her mouth, testing her willingness.

  Sarah, at first tentative and unsure while battling her ambivalent feelings for him, soon relaxed into his emotive oscillation, giving in to her own cravings of kissing him.

  A wistful and longing sensation engulfed her heart, and it felt comforting and content, as if she had come home after a long absence.

  “Told you, you want him”, her libido voiced its judgment, and this time, she could not find any fault in its statement.

  He finally drew back and gazed again into her eyes. A small smile cracked his waiting lips and slowly swept over his entire countenance when he saw the same want in her eyes as he felt in his heart.

  “I apologize if I was out of line, but....”

  “Shhh, it’s all right, Jareth”, she stopped him with two fingers placed gently against his apologizing lips. “I would not have allowed it if I had not wanted it to happen.”

  As if to allay his still lingering doubts, and to eradicate the last remaining shred of insecurity, she placed another soft kiss against his tremorous lips.

  It was short and chaste, and yet it conveyed more to him than any lengthy spoken words could have.

  “Are you back with me?” she asked him, her eyes searching for any signs of his changing persona.

  He nodded and began to help her roll out of the heavy pillow they had sunken into. 

  Sarah sat herself up with his assistance, and he seated himself next to her, his back leaning languorously against another pillow and his legs cocked at the knees.

  “I’m aware of what is happening. I think the kiss broke the hold on my mind”, he replied with a quirked and slightly abashed smile in her direction.

  Resting his arms on his kneecaps, he let go of a deep sigh and breathed heavily through his nose. His eyes had dulled again, and his brows were slightly furrowed.

  “How did you even get here?” he asked unexpectedly and flicked a cursory glance in her direction, as if he were just now registering her presence. “And how long have I been in this place?” he added with another sigh while he rubbed his face with both hands.

  “The three Fates brought me”, Sarah smiled, and he bobbed his head in understanding.

  “Ah, that explains a lot”, he chuckled with frustration.

  “And to how long you’ve been here, well, let’s just say for an awfully long time. Thirteen years to be exact.”

  Instead of answering, he took hold of her hand and squeezed down on it. She noticed he was no longer wearing any gloves, and the sensation of his bare skin against her had her hitch her breath.

  Without thinking, she turned her hand over and interlaced her fingers with his. He smiled down softly at her and caressingly wiped a lose hair strand out of her eyes and tucked it behind her ear.

  “You have aged quite nicely, Sarah”, he remarked softly, and his eyes rested deeply on her still countenance. “Yes, quite nicely. You know, I tried to imagine you as a mature woman, but the imaginary visions don’t hold a candle to reality.”

  She smiled tenderly at him and gently brushed her fingertips across his cheek, tempted to kiss him again when the hissing and sneering noises from above the pit took away her attention.

  “Oh, Jareth, what are we going to do?” she cried out and leaned her head back against the pillow to stare up at the jeering and snarling revellers, who had accumulated on the edge of the pit above them and hurled grave insults at her.

  “We can’t just climb out and fight our way through the angry masses.”

  “Why would we want to do that?” Jareth asked bewildered. “It’s quite cosy and comfortable here. Why don’t we stay right here? They will eventually become bored with us and leave.”

  “Oh, Jareth, you don’t understand the urgency of the situation. If we don’t get out of this pit immediately and have you destroy the glass barrier, we will be stuck here forever without an avenue for escape. Is that what you want?”

  Sarah tossed him an exasperated glance. Had he still not realized what was at stake here?

  He looked at her with puzzled eyes from a tilted head, as if she were a circus attraction, he had to study more intently.

 “Jareth, in order for you to break the enchantment you placed yourself under when the Escher Room broke apart and trapped you in this crystal dream reality, you need to break the glass barrier, just like I had done during my run. It is the only way.”

  “But I thought we could get to know each other a bit better first. I finally reunited with you. I don’t want to leave and risk not seeing you again. It would be worse than just staying here in this dream, with you.”

  His eyes were overshadowed with the fear of her leaving him once more, and Sarah needed to act quickly to allay his unfounded misconceptions.

  Her free hand came up to his cheek, and she gently cupped the side of his face.

  “Jareth, we are going to go together; you and me. But we have to do it quickly. I had exactly thirteen days to fulfil the task, and I know I have used up most of them already. If I don’t get you out of here in time, my physical body will die, and so will yours. Your kingdom is at risk, Jareth, your entire kingdom, not just you and me.”

  He had briefly closed his eyes to relish in her tender touch, but her spoken words tore him from his serene moment, and his eyes flew open with sudden comprehension and awareness.

  “I completely forgot about this. How could I?” he chastised himself and knitted his brows as his breathing increased, and his nostrils flared. “You don’t know how long we have?” he asked quickly, and Sarah shook her head, having removed her hand and sunken back into the pillow.

  “It’s not your fault, Jareth. You were trapped here against your conscious will. Your mind lied to you the entire time and.... they did too. Whoever they are, they want you to stay here.”

  Jareth wiggled his index finger of his free hand while he refused to let go of Sarah’s. Immediately, a clock appeared. The exact same one that had appeared in Sarah’s dream crystal.

  She gasped when she saw the time.

  “Thirty minutes, we have half an hour. Oh, god, Jareth, we’ll never make it. We’ll be stuck here forever.”

  The setting-in panic constricted her chest, and she found it hard to breath. She gasped and tried to suck enough air into her lungs. Jareth leaned over her, and it was him this time who cupped her face.

  “Sarah, listen to me. You have done it before. Through dangers untold, you had made your way to the castle beyond the Goblin City. You can do it again; we can do it together this time.”

  His closeness and gentle touch calmed her nerves, and her breathing slowed to its normal rate. She took in a deep inhale and nodded, assuring him she was composed enough to continue with their discussion of a plan.

  “Who are they?” Sarah enquired again after tossing a furtive glance at the vicious revellers from above.

  “Those would be all my insecurities and negative thoughts I have harboured since I was a child. Somehow, after you projected dancers into your dream reality, they became a constant fixture, and my own darkness and negativity became trapped inside of them.”

  Sarah had gradually raised her eyebrows at hearing his explanation. She had never thought this could be possible, and she gave the jeering crowd at the edge of the ledge a scrutinizing look.

  “As the years went by, they have become stronger”, Jareth continued, and she redirected her gaze onto him.

  “This is all because I denied you, and you were too upset, and.... I am so sorry. I didn’t know. I never meant for any of this to happen.”

  Sarah lowered her head, as if in shame over having been part of his agony, and this situation where both could lose their lives, and so much more.

  “Sarah, we can do this”, he replied and lifted her chin with his two fingers. “I do believe in you.”

  “You do?”

  “Most verily. Have you forgotten?”

  She shook her head, a reminiscing smile resurfacing on her downdrawn lips, lifting them into a frank and candid one.

  She clearly remembered the song he sang to her in that room; that now broken and fractured room that caused so much heartache.

  “And I do believe in you”, she whispered her response.

  Jareth leaned forward, and she allowed him to place a gentle, tongueless kiss against her lips.

  “Let’s get out of here”, he declared. “I cannot wait to show you my real kingdom, and there are a certain few who are anxious to see you again.” 

  Sarah bit her lower lip and beamed up at him while an equanimous warmth began to surround her heart.

  Neither one had spoken the certain words, but each knew deep down in their heart what they felt about the other.

  “Sarah, that back wall you shattered is not the only place to do so. I know on this other side there is an equal crystal weakness. I only need to get to it.”

  “You won’t be able to. You would have to go right through the middle of all these.... these.... vicious things”, she finally settled on the description, lost for a more precise name.

  “Then we’ll just have to create a diversion”, Jareth smirked, and Sarah narrowed her eyes at him. “I have a plan.”

  “Of course, you do”, she deadpanned but leaned closer into him.

  “They really are not after you. Remember, they reflect my negativity and demons, but none of them would ever harm you. They are angry, yes, but this is all for show. I need you to make a dash for that wall and pretend you are looking to escape through the same spot.”

  “How can you be so sure they won’t attack me?” Sarah asked unconvinced.

  “Because I know them intimately. They are my dark thoughts, remember? Just as I could never hurt you, neither can they. They will gladly allow you passage while I remain here. It is me they want, not you. All they want from you is to be gone, and we’ll pretend to give them exactly that.”

  Jareth tilted his head and gave her a waiting look, hoping she would agree to his plan.

  It was risky, yet doable. She only needed to draw them away long enough, so he could reach the back wall.

  Slowly, Sarah nodded her affirmation, constantly chewing on her lower lip, as if not completely convinced this could actually work, but she didn’t object. They truly had no other choice but to go for it, for they were out of time.

  “All right then”, she finally voiced her consent over the plan and stood up. “I guess here goes nothing.”

  She turned to him one more time and without hesitation took his face into her hands and kissed him. It was not as long or intense as Jareth would have wanted it, but he gladly took whatever she gave him willingly.

  “We will have a long talk when this is all over.”

  “Yes, Ma’am, I am counting on it”, he smirked back, grabbed her around the waist and tossed her out of the pillow pit and onto the ledge.  

  Jareth watched with concerned eyes as Sarah punched her way through the rough crowd while they jostled her around and turned their attention away from him and onto her.

  As predicted, they allowed her to fight her way through their throngs and make her escape towards the same spot, she always ran to.

  Like a herd of willing zombies, they followed her to ensure she would not turn around.

  Jareth held his breath as one by one his angry demon-thought-fabrications turned from him and followed dutifully behind Sarah.   

  “Nice work, my beloved Sarah. I knew I could believe in you.”

  Giving the revellers one last cursory glance, he swiftly heaved himself out of the pillow pit and stealthily padded towards the back wall, keeping himself to a low profile as he scampered alongside the edge of the room where the long curtains and tapestry provided ample protection against being spied.

  He reached the designated spot without any incidence since everyone had followed Sarah to the opposite side of the room. He could barely make her out in the sea of heads, masks, and heavy, pompous gowns.

  His eyes turned back onto the crystal barrier that shone brightly before him, and he let his hands wander across it, searching for a weak spot. He had one chance at this, and one chance only.

  One quick glance at the clock, which still hung suspended in mid-air, told him they had only a couple of minutes left.

  Sarah was bogged down at the other end. She turned, and despite the mass in front of her, she managed to find his eyes and for a moment held his gaze.

  Jareth saw her nodding and picking up the same chair she had always used. Mimicking her gesture, he, likewise, picked up a chair, and nodded in return.

  For a moment, it felt as if time itself was standing still.

  The clock began to chime, its loud gongs reverberating throughout the crystal, causing the walls to slightly vibrate from the rebounding soundwaves.

  Nine....

  Ten....

  Eleven....

  Twelve....

  Sarah swung her chair as hard as she could and broke the crystal barrier. In an instant, she was swept out of the crystal dream reality along with the other attendees.

  Jareth elicited a loud scream and crashed his chair against the glass just as the thirteenth chime rang out.

  The wall shattered with an ear-splitting, explosive sound into a million fragments.

  He had barely time to throw his arms in front of his face to shield him from the impact when he felt the suction of the void on his body, and he was being catapulted into the dark emptiness.

Chapter Text

  The immense cloud of wildly flying trenchant, micro-fragmented glass hit Jareth violently in his face as it doused his entire body with its shockwave.

  Like a tornado, the strong suctioning winds catapulted him out of the bubble he had been existing in for thirteen years.

  He was powerless at the moment and could do nothing but drift aimlessly in the void.

  So, this is how the nihility of space and time felt: weightless, timeless, purposeless, and without direction.

  Although he was surrounded by darkness, he could vividly see the illuminated large blocks of stairs from the Escher Room floating around him, reassembling themselves into ever larger pieces until they consisted of entire staircases, staircases that had no beginning and no end.

  They just were.

  He watched with stunned eyes the rebuilding of his room of dreams until it was once again complete.

  Despite his desire to float to it and come to rest on one of the many landings, he was pulled away, as if he was tethered to an invisible string.

  With wistful eyes, he watched the collection of staircases and platforms fade into the black vastness of the void.

  Having the room gone from sight, he diverted his gaze onto the distance off to his right.

  He detected several of the tossed around revellers.

  Their masks had dissolved, and he could clearly see the distorted, hideous faces of his negative thoughts.

  They repulsed him, and he turned away from them with a feeling of intense shame and guilt.

  One by one, they popped out of existence until he was left alone to drift in empty space. He started to feel a sense of great unease wash over him.

  Was he stuck here?

  Did the breaking of the crystal wall condemn him to exist here in this untenanted, bare void for possibly eternity?

  Had they been too late, after all?

  And where was Sarah?

  His frantic eyes searched for anything of substance. He was about to panic when he spotted her.

  Sarah!

  She floated effortlessly towards him, a sated smile on her lips and a joyous glint in her eyes. They shone like two bright guiding beacons in this impenetrable darkness.

  He narrowed his eyes at her aberrant wardrobe.

  Gone was the elegant and seductive dress, she had worn in the ballroom, and it had been replaced with a pair of mundane grey shorts and a small, equally grey tank top.

  He quirked his brows at seeing that she evidently did not wear a bra beneath her top, for he could clearly see her nipples standing erect through the thin fabric.

  A small, salacious smile began twitching around his lips.

  He already had forgotten about the empty space he was caught in and could only concentrate on her enticing form coming closer with each passing second.

  “Jareth”, she exhaled and floated effortlessly into his inviting arms.

  As if on instinct, he instantly folded them around her body and pulled her tight, afraid she might continue drifting away and disappearing on him like the Escher Room.

  He could not bear it were she to vanish again.

  He felt greatly relieved when her arms wrapped around his neck and held on to him with no intent of letting go.

  Her jubilant smile was intoxicating, and he found himself becoming lost in the twinkling of her emerald-green eyes, which flared like two supernovas in the darkness.

  “We did it”, she exalted, and her smile broadened even more.

  Before he knew it, she had pressed her lips against his and placed a short but enthusiastic kiss against his unsuspecting mouth.

  He was too stunned to keep her from breaking the osculation and inwardly cursed himself for his misjudgement of her reaction and for being so foolishly unprepared.

  It would not happen again.

  “You are here”, he breathed and returned her smile.

  “I told you I would, didn’t I? Like you, I keep my promises”, she grinned and tossed him a playful wink.

  He refused to let go of her and kept holding her flush against his body.

  His attire, too, had changed from the scintillating blue frock and white cravat to a plain, tan coloured poet’s shirt that hung loosely over a pair of tight grey breeches that left his calves exposed.

  His boots and gloves were equally gone. 

  “I guess that’s what our bodies are wearing”, Sarah remarked at seeing his scrutinizing face and the light wrinkle in his nose over his own wardrobe, or the lack thereof.

  “Last time I had left my body, I had been placed into my bed at my house. I am sure you are laying in your bed at your castle. Someone is taking care of you; that is evident from the clothing change.”

  He didn’t answer but kept his pensive mien on his countenance.

  “Jareth, what is it you are contemplating over?”

  She could tell by his intense knitting of his brows and faraway look that he was musing over something of quite importance.

  He finally looked back at her with a wondering gaze in his questioning eyes.

  “I wonder if we were too late. If this here resembles our minds, and we broke free, shouldn’t we be back in our bodies by now?”

  Sarah raised her brows at him.

  Before she had a chance to join him in his ruminations, however, she was violently ripped from his arms, and with an elicited scream of surprise, and two horrified eyes gazing at him in sheer terror, she floated out into empty space, away from him.

  “JAAAARETH”, was all he heard from her before her voice faded into nihility, and an eerie silence surrounded him.

  “NOOOOO”, Jareth screamed with oncoming panic while his eyes followed her drifting further and further away.

  He tried to desperately follow her, but he, likewise, was being pulled into the opposite direction.

  Like two separated rockets, they both were dragged towards two different points of the void.

  “SARAH, COME BACK TO ME”, Jareth cried out before he screamed incoherently with agony, and the tears filled his eyes, blurring his vision to the point he could no longer distinguish her vanishing form.

  In an instant, everything went dark, and he lost all awareness.

**************************************************

  “Beshrew me, what is happening?” Sir Didymus exclaimed loudly with oncoming trepidations and jumped to the bed of his king in one giant leap.

  Hoggle sat flummoxed and with panic shining in his eyes on the bed between Jareth and Sarah and raised his hands in defeat with shrugged shoulders and a baffled mien on his terror-stricken face.

  “Out of my way”, the Wiseman declared as he roused himself from his slumber, having been awoken by the sudden commotion in the room.

  “Out of his way”, the hat reemphasized pointlessly, since nobody stood between him and the bed to begin with.

  As if on command, the six goblin guards stormed into the chamber, speers at the ready and wildly swivelling their heads in search of the assumed intruder.

  “Get those idiots out of here”, the Wiseman commanded a still bamboozled Didymus, who quickly dismissed them by shoving them right back out of the door.

  “What’s happenin’ with ter rat an’ Sarah?” Hoggle yelled in sheer panic now and couldn’t make up his mind whether to hold down the body of his king or of Sarah, as both equally writhed and lifted off the bed, as if they were in      terrible pain or possessed by an evil entity.

  That he had used his special term of endearment in front of a disapproving Wiseman completely sailed over his head, not that he had cared had it been noted.

  The three Fates, who still sat assembled by the table were the only ones who were composed and even wore joyous smiles on their near giddy faces.

  Not one of them jumped up in fright as they looked over the small mayhem by the king’s bed.

  “Calm down, friends”, Lachesis tried to cool their excitement. “Sarah has successfully completed her task. Our king has been freed.”

  “Then why are they both floppin’ like fish on hot dry land?” Hoggle retorted stubbornly, unconvinced over the reassuring statement.

  Even Didymus tossed the Fates a dubious look with squinted canine eyes.

  Only the Wiseman nodded his head in silent agreement, along with his hat, as if that birdbrain was in full comprehension of what was truly unfolding.

  The Wiseman had his doubts about that, but it was best to keep quiet on the suspicion and not get into another useless and badly timed quarrel.

  “We have witnessed it in the crystal. The walls have been broken. His Majesty’s mind has been freed and is on its way back to his body. The struggle comes from it not wanting to go willingly and being separated from Sarah”, Lachesis explained with a smile trained on Hoggle, as if she was explaining it all to a small toddler.

  “What’s Sarah gots ter do with his mind?” Hoggle kept inquiring, still not looking convinced.

  “Everything. Both their minds are linked now and will need each other, just as it had been intended from the start. She will be staying with him here”, Clotho expounded.

  “Tergether? Yer means, he’s finally wons her?” Hoggle exclaimed with a brightening smile on his comprehending rotund visage. 

  “It appears that way, considering the way they were locking lips earlier”, Atropos chuckled and waved off an admonishing looking Lachesis. “What?” she grinned back. “Isn’t that what we had all been hoping for?”

  “Well, let’s just get their bodies revived and strengthened. Not all is in the clear yet. The mortal woman could still succumb to the stress of her physical ordeal”, Lachesis cautioned.

  Hoggle immediately tossed a wary glance at Sarah and bit his swollen bottom lip. He didn’t want anything to happen to either of them.

  His guilt complex would not be able to handle if she would fall victim to his ill-thought-out plan from thirteen years ago. He’d willingly walk into the bog and not come out again if that would guarantee her survival.

  The Wiseman and Sir Didymus had in the meantime held down the bodies of Jareth and Sarah.

  Hoggle quickly shook himself out of his pondering state and assisted the Wiseman with Jareth. Didymus had Sarah quite under control as her body was much too weak to put up any meaningful fight.

  He almost chuckled at the thought over how she would react when she would see the true Didymus leaning over her.

  It may just give her a heart attack, and once again, he became worried over her wellbeing. Perchance it would be best to keep the intimidating fox knight away from her until she had fully recovered.

  Slowly, the struggles of Jareth and Sarah became less and less violent and within a few moments had fully dissipated. Both bodies now lay completely motionless, their breathing stable and relaxed.

  A quiet moan escaped the parched lips of Jareth, and he slowly blinked open his eyes. He stared with half-cracked lids onto the ceiling, trying to focus his gaze.

  His vision was fuzzy, and he could not make out any details of his surroundings, except for the fact the darkness had gone and had been replaced with a bright light and some mottled colours.

  Several different voices infiltrated his hearing, and he twitched his lids several times before he turned his head and trained his focus on the still distorted image of the person standing by his side.

 “Where am I?” he asked hoarsely, his throat feeling as dry as desert sand.

  “Your Majesty, you are safely in your chambers. Welcome back to the world of the living”, the Wiseman declared.

  “Living?.... Sarah..... where is Sarah?” he immediately wanted to know and tried to locate her with roving eyes.

  “Laying beside you, but she is not awake yet, Sire”, the Wiseman replied in his calm voice, and the birdhat nodded as if he was given his second opinion on the old healer’s statement.

  Upon hearing the king’s voice, all prattle stopped, and the bed was instantly surrounded by everyone in the room.

  Hoggle beamed at his king while he kneeled on the bed by his side. The slight movement of his knees took Jareth’s attention away from the Wiseman, and he languidly turned his head into the dwarf’s direction.

  “Get.... your dw.... dwarf ass off.... my bed.... Higs.... worth”, Jareth panted with ragged breath, working hard to spill the words from his mouth.

  It was tedious work, but he insisted on making his statement.

  Despite his attempt to sound forceful, it was barely a whisper. Hoggle knitted his brows but refrained from making an immediate riposte and hurried himself off the bed to stand beside Didymus and the Wiseman.

  “Oh, he’s back all right, an’ charmin’ as ever”, he grumbled, but the big smile around his upturned lips belied his words.

  “It’s Hoggle, an yer knows it”, he added with a broad smirk, drawing almost a chuckle from a severely enervated Jareth.

  “Hark on that”, Didymus grinned behind his paw. “How fare thee, My Liege?” he addressed his king and bowed with exemplary panache.

  Jareth tossed his teary-eyed fox knight friend a grateful but perfunctory smile. His physical strength failed him to even draw up his lips in his devitalized state.

  “My.... friend.... nice seeing.... you”, Jareth managed to whisper with a heaving breath as though he were not able to suck enough air into his lungs.

  While everyone now crowded around the bed to wish Jareth a ‘happy awakening’, the Wiseman became impatient and irritated with the well wishes and disruptions.

  It was obvious by the king’s inability to keep his eyes open that he needed to treat him immediately with a regenerative elixir and several other stimulants to rid him of his lingering ailment.

  Thirteen years in a comatose state had him completely drained of all energy, magical and otherwise. His body was malnourished and barely functioning.

  “I’ll take care of it”, Didymus whispered at him, having noticed the Wiseman’s grumpy disposition.

  The wizened goblin healer grunted his appreciation, and for once, the hat had nothing smart or foolish to add to this conversation.

  “Come thee hither”, Didymus declared loudly and physically gathered everyone into a huddle. “His Majesty requires treatment for his malady. Thou must keep quiet and step aside. Maketh way, maketh way.”

  “Of course”, the three Fates agreed in unison and nodded as they made their way to the other side of the bed where Sarah was still lying unconscious and inert.

  “The girl should be waking up any moment as well, at least, I hope so”, Lachesis stated with troubled eyes, the back of her hand brushing gently against Sarah’s pallid cheek that resembled nothing more than grey, dry skin, and a prominent cheekbone.

  “Mortals are so finicky and weak”, Atropos scoffed derisively, but her true sentiment was reflected in her disquieted mien and near rheumy eyes.

  She, too, was on tenterhooks over the young woman’s precarious condition. A quick glance at the mortal’s life thread told her Sarah was teetering on the brink of death.

  The purple crystal from the Wiseman still swirled over her torso and face, and it moved freely up and down the entire length of her body in timed, unhurried intervals.

  While the Fates and Sir Didymus settled themselves down by the table and chairs, Hoggle persisted to stay close to Jareth.

  “I ain’ts leavin’ ter rat’s side”, he fulminated and held up his hand to still any forthcoming objections. “An’ don’ yer lecture me on ter name. I tolds yer, it’s a term of endearment.”

  “Strange use of word for an endearment”, the hat squawked quietly, and Hoggle wrinkled his nose at him, ready to riposte with all his might should the obtuse hat persist.

  The Wiseman, on the other hand, decided it would be best to ignore the incorrigible dwarf and continue with his treatment of his king. It was of the utmost importance to get the elixirs into his body.

  The birdhat only continued to grimace at Hoggle the best he could with his stiff beak, but kept it shut for once.

  Any further retort, and he quite clearly could see himself being tossed onto the floor, or worse, shoved under the bed.

  He hated cobwebs, and he was sure there were a few lingering beneath, just waiting to ensnare and repulse him.

  “Sarah”, Jareth managed to breath, and his enfeebled hand searched slowly yet undeterred for her presence next to him.

  “Right.... left.... a little more to the left.... stretch out.... almost there”, the birdhat guided him along with his succinct directions, eliciting a quiet sigh with an eyeroll from the Wiseman.

  Hoggle felt tempted to take the king’s hand and place it on top of Sarah’s, but he knew Jareth would not take kindly to such an assist. No, he had to do this by himself.

  To help him in any form would disrespect him as a king, and as a fae.

  Jareth slowly managed to scoot his hand across the mattress and finally found Sarah’s. He determinedly clasped down and curled his fingers tightly around hers.

  He would not let go of her, not ever again.

  “Here, Your Majesty, you must drink this to regain your strength quickly, and without delay.”

  “Sarah?” Jareth asked again, his eyes beseeching the Wiseman, while he refused to open his mouth to the vile the old healer held against his uncooperative lips.

  “There is nothing we can do but wait for her mind to return as well. Now, Your Majesty, please, you must take this. You are not doing the young woman any service, nor your kingdom, should you fade away on us all.”

  “My kingdom”, Jareth whispered with sudden clarity and for a moment closed his eyes.

  Yes, he had to think of his kingdom and all the subjects that resided within its borders.

  He had an obligation to them, for he had no heir, and he most surely did not want some of his cousins or nephews to ascend to the throne of Goblin King. The goblins would tear them to shreds and lay waste to the entire realm.

  No, he needed to get well, pray to the deities above for Sarah to recover, and convince her to accept his proposal this time.

  Any heir to the throne acceptable to him, the Labyrinth itself, and the goblins, would have to come from her, nobody else.

  He weakly nodded his ascent and, with the help of the Wiseman lifting his head, quickly sipped the green liquid and let it run down his gullet. 

  He lightly grimaced his face over the bitter taste.

  Why could he not have added some sweetness from the peaches in his orchard?

  As if on command, the hat let go of a chuckled squawk and weaved his head back and forth.

  “No added sugar for the revitalization tincture, or it won’t work properly”, he declared with such importance one might think he were the actual healer and not just a wardrobe accessory.

  Jareth was too weak to acknowledge the little dig, and the Wiseman thought it best to shrug it off as well for the moment.

  He would have a talk with his hat later when they were back in the bothy outside his gardens in a couple of days, or maybe it would take weeks. It was hard to tell at the moment.

  “Now this one”, he advised Jareth and held up an ampoule with a purple fluid swirling around inside the glass tube.

  Jareth wrinkled his nose but followed the instructions. This one tasted as bitter as the previous one, and he shuddered lightly with a grimace face.

  “Water”, he gasped, yearning for something to wash the pungent and acidic taste from his tongue.

  “Not yet; there is one more”, the Wiseman informed him and held up a third ampoule with a brightly orange liquid that emitted white steam from the top of its small glass tube.

  “If I would not.... know better.... I.... would say.... you are trying to.... to poison me”, Jareth voiced his distaste in an already remarkable improvement of his strength to talk.

  “But it is working, is it not?” the Wiseman asked in a monotone voice, giving Jareth a lecturing gaze. “Now open.”

  “Open”, the hat repeated the command but in a quiet, subdued manner, and under his beak.

  “I am going to fire you.... when I have recu.... perated”, Jareth threatened without any response or reaction from the old healer.

  Lifting his head with barely any assistance from the Wiseman this time, he quickly chucked the liquid and let his head fall back onto the pillow.

  Surprisingly, the last dose had the cloying taste of ambrosia.

  “You cannot fire me, as I am not in your services”, came the Wiseman’s calculated retort, accompanied by the slightest crack of a smile. “You are in mine.”

  “Just because you are the Labyrinth’s physical representation doesn’t mean you can torture me”, Jareth decided to be a difficult patient.

  It was the first time Jareth had ever heard the Wiseman let go of an honest guffaw as he tilted back his head and roared his amusement.

  Promptly, and to no surprise, the birdhat immediately joined in.

  It was a temporary and short-lived cacophony of merriment. As quickly as the laughter had rung out, as quickly it stopped, almost in unison with the hat.

  “Now rest. I am going to take a look at Sarah.”

  Jareth nodded, and he turned his head towards her. His eyes beheld her immobile form that appeared extremely emaciated beneath the thin sheet.

  Her face was ashen, and prominent dark circles ringed her closed eyes, and her cheeks were hollow and sunken, accentuating her stark, prominently sticking out cheekbones.

  Her entire countenance looked gaunt and deathlike, and he hitched his breath while his heart quit beating.

  In all honesty, she had the appearance of a living ghost, and it frightened him beyond measures.

  The only part of her that looked like the vibrant Sarah he recalled from the dream reality was her long, luscious, raven-coloured hair.

  He felt the urge to reach for it and caress it, but he still had not regained enough strength to twist his body to do so. Instead, he reaffirmed his hold on her unresponsive hand and brought it slowly up to his lips.

  He was capable enough to place a caring kiss against the back of her knuckles and let it linger against his lips.

  Closing his eyes, he let go of a deep sigh, and his lips murmured words that were not perceivable to any ears.

  It was a silent prayer to Danu and the other gods that inhabited the seven heavens.

  He was not a religious person, far from it, but in this instance, he thought it best to recruit any assistance he could possibly think of. At the very least, it could not hurt.

  His arm weakened, and he let his hand fall onto his chest, still holding on firmly to Sarah’s.

  It came to rest right over his heart, and he placed her palm against his shirt. Maybe the rhythmic beat would transfer some of his life energy into her.

  It was worth a try.

  He closed his eyes, feeling incredibly drowsy and enervated. His surroundings with all the noises and lights slowly disappeared into the background as he fell into a deep slumber.

  His last thoughts were of Sarah before everything went dark one more.    

**************************************************

  Sarah watched with incredulous eyes as Jareth zoomed like a rocket away from her. She could tell he was calling out to her, but no sound touched her ears, and she wanted to cry.

  Was this the end?

  Had she failed, after all?

  Why would they be separated via such a violent force?

  “JARETH”, she called out for him, but she knew he could not hear her.

  Each attempt to try going after him was in vain, and she eventually gave up. It was pointless; the drag on her body by this unseen force was much too strong. Exhausted and dispirited, she let herself be carried along.

  Jareth disappeared like a dimming light in the vast darkness until even the tiniest glimmer of him had been extinguished.

  Sarah reached her arm out, not expecting anything. It was merely a reaction to her yearning, her pain of losing him again.

  Her last thought before she lost consciousness was the regret she had that she had never told him how she felt about him and that she was so incredibly sorry for having denied him thirteen years earlier.

  If only she could reverse it all.

  “I wish....” she mumbled as she faded into the void, unable to finish her request.

**************************************************

  With a loud rasping gasp for air, her body lurched off the mattress, only to fall back into the soft pillows and sheets.

  Her eyes shot wide open and stared unblinkingly at the ceiling. They were void of any sign of comprehension as she lay still with a parted mouth, breathing irregular.

  “Quickly”, an unfamiliar voice called out, and she felt her head being lifted and a bitter tasting hot liquid being poured down her throat.

  Her gag reflexes were weak at best, and she could feel the liquid running all the way down her gullet and into her stomach.

  She felt retched, and her stomach recoiled from the sudden influx of the content.

  Before she could try to make sense of it all, another dose of strange liquid was poured into her mouth and forced down her throat. It, too, had a bitter, acidic taste to it, and she wanted to spit it back out.

  Her tongue tried its best to rid itself of the nasty aftertaste, but her attempt was interrupted by a third liquid being poured into her mouth.

  This one felt more like gooey, viscous honey and tasted cloyingly sweet.  

  In an instant, she felt a warm current coursing through her entire body, filling her with an energy she had not felt before. It was comforting and unsettling all at the same time.

  Her eyes began to focus, and she blinked her lids a few times, trying to rewet the dryness of them.

  Slowly, her vision began to clear, and she could make out a ceiling with intricate carvings and murals.

  A sudden myriad of voices penetrated her ear.

  She thought she recognized a couple of them but wasn’t sure. Everything in her mind was still blurry, and she tried to shake herself off the foggy sensation that still had her engulfed.

  Her breathing became deeper and more stable, and the warm sensation spreading through her body instilled a feeling of serenity and equanimity.

  Taking time to sense her entire body from head to toes, the pressure against her right hand began to penetrate her consciousness.

  Somebody was holding her hand and caressing it gently by rubbing tender circles across its back with what she presumed to be a thumb.

  She could feel the rhythmic heartbeat of whoever’s mystery body it was being pressed against. 

  With all the feeble energy she had, she turned her head to the side and stared into the beaming eyes of Jareth.

  His broadening smile, so close to her own face, greeted her, and she feebly attempted to twitch a smile back.

  “Welcome home, Precious”, Jareth whispered while a single tear of joy ran down his left cheek.    

Chapter Text

  “Jareth”, she whispered barely audible and looked at his tearstained yet joyous countenance. “Where.... how.... what hap.... pened?” she stammered, trying to formulate a coherent question.

  It was incredibly energy draining to even whisper, and her mind was still frazzled and somewhat absent, as if she was shrouded within the cloak of drowsiness of a deep slumber.

  It truly was a struggle.

  “Shhh, it’s all right, Sarah. You did it. You managed to free me, us, in time. We are in my chamber at the castle”, Jareth assuaged her worries that had made their visible presence on her gaunt countenance via a pair of lightly knitted brows.

  She was not able to answer, as cheerful voices infiltrated her awareness and took her attention from Jareth. She recognized the voices now, and she turned her head laboriously in their direction.

  The three Fates were standing by her bedside with ebullient faces, wearing broad toothy smiles of evident relief. Atropos winked at her and teasingly wiggled her restored life thread in her hand.

  “Where.... are your.... scis.... sors?” Sarah managed to ask weakly, followed by a dry cough from a tickling throat.

  “Not needed anymore”, Atropos rejointed with another playful wink.

  Lachesis smiled warmly down at her and gently patted her free hand. Even Clotho lightly brushed a touch over her arm with rheumy eyes.

  “You had us quite worried for a few moments. What a clever idea to divert the reveller’s attention towards yourself to give the king a chance to break through the barrier”, Lachesis stated proudly.

  “Yes, quite clever indeed.... for a mortal”, Clotho riposted, but her broad grin belied her sarcastic, disparaging words.

  “Out, get out of me way. I wants ter see me Sarah.”

  The boisterous and demanding voice of the dwarf was quite forceful and adamant as he pushed the frowning Fates aside to create a path to squeeze through and worked himself next to the bed.

  He disregarded their quiet grumbles over his perceived rudeness of shoving them around, but he paid them no heed.

  “Hog.... Hoggle” Sarah exclaimed with as much energy as she could muster, followed by another dry cough.

  “Sarah”, he responded much softer and blinked happily at her. “We’s been worried about yer. I’m glad yer back.”

  Sarah could only smile at him and reached her free hand out to him, since Jareth seemed to be reluctant to let go of the one in his.

  She was perfectly fine with it, as she, too, did not want to break the physical contact with him. It seemed to instil her with more energy as she could feel the electricity penetrating her hand via his touch.

  It also assured her that he was still there with her.

  “Hog....” she started up again but Hoggle shooshed her and placed his fat, stubby index finger against his swollen lips.

  “No talkin’. Yer are still ter weak, but we’s all here, even Didymus.”

  “Didy.... mus?” Sarah whispered, disregarding his request for her to be still and silent. “Whe... where?”

  She was still too enervated to lift up her head, and her eyes quickly dithered across the room, completely overlooking the tall, wolfish creature at the foot of the bed.

  “I can’t....”

  “Right here, Milady, but thou must not be frightened of my appearance.”

  Didymus stepped closer and smiled gently down at her, meeting her now staring and incredulous eyes. She pursed her lips as if to speak, but no words escaped her flummoxed tongue.

  “Tis my true form; I dost admit, but I am still the same on the inside”, he quickly added to assuage any worries she may harbour over his intimidating appearance.

  “He’s jus’ a larger fleabag than yer envisioned him, but he’s still ter same pillock”, Hoggle chimed in and rolled his eyes puckishly while smirking at her.

  All Sarah could manage to bring forth in her enervated state was a relieved smile and perfunctory nod of her head. Internally, she laughed out loud over Hoggle’s description.

  Luckily, Jareth had already prepared her about the real personas of her friends. Without it, she would have most likely fainted.

  She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Despite feeling somewhat rejuvenated, she still sensed an overwhelming drowsiness overtaking her.

  She tried to fight the oncoming sleepiness. There were so many questions she had. She also wanted to talk to Jareth.

  They had so much to discuss, especially after what had happened inside the pit, and his declaration of love out in the garden if any of that could be believed.

  “I knoweth thou hath questions, but Milady must rest for now. We fare ye well for the moment. Returning, we shall”, he declared regally and grabbed Hoggle’s arm, indicating it was time to cut their welcome visit short.

  Hoggle grumbled in opposition but quickly relented. The fox knight was right; they needed to let both of them rest and regain their strength. There would be ample time to reconnect and visit after she had fully recuperated.

  “We’ll sees yer later, Sarah”, Hoggle felt the need to apprise her, alas she seemed to have already drifted off into a deep sleep.

  Her eyes were closed and her breathing steady. She still had her fingers interlocked with Jareth’s, who, likewise, had fallen into a restful slumber.

  “Let’s all go and leave them to their recovery”, Lachesis second Didymus’ concern.

  The three Fates nodded in unison and each gently touched Sarah on her arm and bent down to place a chaste kiss against her pallid cheek.

  “I shall weave nothing but happiness for you”, Clotho whispered into her ear before withdrawing with a cryptic smile.

  “My scissors will no longer be needed for you”, Atropos declared with a happy grin and patted her arm before joining Clotho at the foot of the bed.

  “Our work is done here, Sisters,”, Lachesis declared after having watched her sisters impart their personal gifts onto Sarah. “I shall do my best for the weaved threads to avoid sorrow and danger”, she speedily added her own gift.

  Stepping back, the three Fates stood silently at the foot of the bed for a moment before instantly popping out of existence, leaving nothing behind but the scrying crystal that held all the recorded happenings from the crystal dream reality within.

  It was their last gift to Jareth and Sarah, so they would never forget.

  After having observed the Fates disappearing, Hoggle and Didymus meandered towards the chamber door and gave one more concerned glance back at their sleeping king and Sarah.

  Only the Wiseman and his hat remained.

  The immemorial wizened healer, and personification of the Labyrinth, would not leave their side for the next several days, not until he had deemed them fit to resume their daily lives.

**************************************************

  Over the next three days, both, Sarah, and Jareth, oscillated between full consciousness and deep sleep. With each day that passed, their bodies became stronger, and their vitality returned at a steady pace.

  Being full fae, Jareth was the first to full recuperate. Hoggle and Didymus had apprised him of everything that had happened while he had been in his comatose sleep.

  At first, he had wept like a child upon hearing of the dilapidated state of his kingdom.

  He felt deep shame for having allowed himself to succumb to such a dreadful psychological state that he had endangered the entirety of the population.

  He was a king and a fae. He should be immune and above such foolish behaviour and actions.

  How could he have allowed his heart to cause him to sink to such depths. The guilt was deeply edged into his fretting visage.

  It had taken all of Hoggle’s persuasion skills and dwarf charm to allay his concerns and dismiss his profoundly seated guilt.

  Only a short, heavily guarded trip into Goblin City, arranged by Hoggle and Sir Didymus, had fully assuaged him and eased his complex of culpability.

  It helped tremendously that he had been jubilantly greeted by the populace, who had immediately celebrated with a cannonball chicken shooting event, chicken races, egg tossing contests, and a full night of music, dancing, feasting, and imbibing.

  Jareth had kindly excused himself from the festivities with the confabulated justification of not being quite up to par for such strenuous activities and lengthy celebrations.

  It was only partially true. In all honesty, he yearned to keep his vigil by Sarah’s bedside and hold her hand as she struggled to improve.

  He felt regretfully responsible for her condition.

  Had it not been for him, she never would have been in this situation but would most likely be living happily in her world with her own family and possible beau or even husband.

  He didn’t dare to think she was spoken for, and the subject had never entered their conversations in the dream reality, but most certainly a beautiful woman such as her would not be going through life alone.

  The thought of her being unavailable to him tore on his very soul and heart.

  Hoggle assured him that she was not married, but as to whether she had a love interest in the Above, he did not have an answer to, and so, Jareth suffered on, tormented by unallayed fears of losing her all over again.

  It took her much longer than him to regain strength and vitality. Her mortal body was not only regenerating from the exorbitant ordeal, but it was also physically changing.

  Slowly but steadily, as foretold by the three Fates, she became one of them, one of the long-lived and near immortal fae folk.

  Her hair became lusher and attained a satin sheen, her skin turned more translucent with a golden shimmer embedded into the outer layer, and her eyes acquired the typical fae markings and sweeping brows. 

  Jareth, along with the Wiseman and his hat, watched her transformation with mesmerized and spellbound eyes.

  Each day, her changes became more pronounced while she mostly slept and only woke for her ablutions and intake of nutrition.

  Jareth had hired a female attendant for her personal and intimate needs but had adamantly refused to move her to another chamber.

  He instead began to sleep on his couch, as so not to disturb her, even though his bed was large enough to accommodate four adults easily.

  Upholding her virtue was of the most importance to him, and he would not compromise any of it by sharing his bed with her until their relationship had been solidly established.

  To do otherwise felt morally wrong.

  “She’s turning quite nicely”, the old Wiseman remarked with a sated bob of his head after the fourth day of her transition.

  “Indubitably”, the hat concurred. “She’ll be one hot to trot halfling. Oooh, Mama, hold me back and tie me down.”

  That Jareth and the Wiseman both tossed him a stark reprimanding look with narrowed eyes and furrowed brows escaped his ignorant birdbrain completely, and he kept cheeping and peeping over her gorgeous and enticing looks.

  Finally, having lost his last thread of patience, Jareth ripped the hat off the Wiseman’s head and stuffed it with a rag in his beak into a magically conjured closet inside a crystal.

  He sent it to his Escher Room for the time being. The Wiseman only raised his eyebrows over the outrageously bold move but refrained from any disparaging remarks.

  Not in all of his eons of existence had anybody ever dared to lay as much as a pinkie on his hat. After all, he was the personification of the omnipotent Labyrinth, but even he had to admit that the king’s actions were unreservedly justified.

  His hat had definitely stepped over the line and deserved his time in jail. He was only glad Jareth had not decided to send the offending accessory of his person to the bog.

  Wearing an odorous headpiece, dripping with foul smelling bog goo, was not a pleasant thought, indeed.

  The chamber became much quieter and tranquil after the eviction of the unruly hat, and Jareth resumed his silent and patient vigil.

  During Sarah’s waking spells, they would always sit by the sunny window and talk while having tea and baked good.

  He would tell her about his kingdom and the places he planned on showing her.

  Hoggle and Didymus stopped by for at least an hour every day to catch up on old times, and Jareth usually would leave the three to themselves during their visits.

  Sarah had taken the news of her physical transformation surprisingly well. Jareth had been a nervous wreck, trying to apprise her of the change, but she had caught him off guard with her calm and accepting demeanour.

  “It’s really quite expected”, she told him over some afternoon tea. “The Fates had already told me it would happen before I entered the dream reality for the last time.”

  “Are you sad that you cannot go back to your old world?” Jareth asked with an anxious and chary tone in his voice while his heart hammered wildly in his chest over her answer.

  “Not really. I don’t think I ever truly belonged there. Not after returning from the Labyrinth thirteen years ago. Hoggle had been right; once you get to the centre, you can never leave.”

  She tossed him a reassuring smile and laid her hand confidently over his, seeing his contrite and guilt-ridden eyes.

  In lieu of asking her whether she had a special someone waiting on her, which he so desperately wanted to know, he decided to avoid this particular subject all together and alternately proceeded to tell her about the scheme Hoggle and him had brewed up in order to bring her to his world.

  Instead of becoming angry with him, she had been flabbergasted that it had been Hoggle’s initial idea. She had always been under the impression that him and Jareth were more adversaries to each other than bosom buddies.

  Jareth strongly objected to the term bosom buddy, and it was the first time he had seen and heard Sarah laugh out heartily since she had awoken from the crystal dream ordeal.

  Yes, he didn’t dare consider what she had gone through a crystal dream. It had been pure torture, a terrifying nightmare, and his heart still contracted with a stinging fear when thinking about how close they both had come to their ultimate demise.

  The subject of where she would go and live once she had fully convalesced was being carefully avoided by both parties.

  Neither wanted to deal with the harsh reality that they may not be together, after all.

  Sarah had her self-doubts over being of mortal and mundane birth. Even in her own world, she was nobody special and a mere commoner.

  She had no money, no dowry, no high-ranking status within her own society. She was not famous, nor rich, nor powerful.

  She was just one of the masses, invisible to all.

  Why would an omnipotent fairy king want someone like her? Her own family had disowned her.

  The very idea itself was preposterous.

  She was certain he had his own love affairs or maybe even a wife of whom she had not been notified about.

  Kings in the old days always had wives and mistresses and didn’t take fidelity very seriously.

  He was also a fae, and she knew that his kind was quite sexual and vivacious. Their hedonistic lifestyle had been widely documented.

  No, someone that charming and alluring was not alone in his bed at night, and even though he had declared his almost undying love for her in the crystal dream reality, it had just been that: a dream reality, and his actions and words could not be taken for face value.

  She had witnessed many personalities of his in the crystal and didn’t want to put all her hopes on this particular one.

  Many times, she had wanted to ask Hoggle and Didymus about his private life, but then decided to avid the subject out of fear to hear the stark truth, and they had never volunteered any info of their own.

  After lying in bed, recuperating, and being able to contemplate about everything for over a week, she had finally come to the conclusion that he was only being polite and cordial out of a feeling of guilt or gratitude for having him pulled out of the crystal and therefore having saved his kingdom. 

  Ever since she had awoken from the coma, he had not even attempted to kiss her, unlike he did inside the dream crystal reality.

  There was nothing more to say except that it really had all been nothing but a wonderful dream, an illusion of his desire and yearning for her. His declaration of love must have been just another part of it all.

  And Jareth, for his part, was overly concerned that he had overplayed his hand, and that she most likely held the impression of him being nothing more than a lecherous womaniser and arrogant prick.

  Why would she want someone like that when it was clear she had high morals and ethical standards.

  She was a gorgeous woman, inside and out, and her values for morality and ethics far outshined his. Surely, she would not condone his previous philandering and carousing.

  Most likely there was a special someone waiting on her in her world, someone who suited her better.

  She also had her family and her brother Toby. She would never want to leave any of them behind voluntarily, but the choice had been taken out of her hand.

  Would she hold it against him?

  He had proclaimed his love to her in a moment of weakness, had told her how much he loved her, and that a fae could only love once in his or her lifetime.

  Yet she still had not reciprocated his words and therefore his feelings. No, she did not feel love for him. Sympathy and compassion, perchance, but not love.

  She may also have not believed his confessions of love and dismissed them now as a mere ploy to keep her in the crystal nightmare, nothing more than a desperate attempt by a desperate soul at the time.

  Every time he felt the overwhelming urge to hold her, press her against his body and kiss her deeply to let her know how he felt about her and yearned to make her his wife and queen, she had turned her head with a downward gaze.

  She clearly did not want him in this way. She had only fulfilled a duty that had been forced upon her. He best keep the kisses she had given willingly in the dream reality and treasure them for what they were, wonderful illusions.

  In their innate stubbornness, each held on to their fears, insecurities, and misconceptions about the other, and so the days went by, avoiding any talks that had anything to do with discussing their private lives, their feelings for each other, and the future of more than just a day or two in advance.

  After a week of nearly continuous bedrest, interrupted by brief moments of sitting by the sunny window, the Wiseman deemed it safe for Sarah to dress and take a quiet walk through the royal gardens.

  She needed fresh air and some exercise to work up her stamina, he had proclaimed, which was immediately second by the once again freed birdhat.

  The weather had abandoned its oppressive heat and had turned slightly cooler. It was the perfect temperature and humidity for a leisure stroll.

  Jareth had chomped at the bits to take her for a bimble, and even though Hoggle had wanted to tag along, after all, those flowerbeds and bushes were his creations, he had courteously stepped aside to give Jareth a chance to show them to her in privacy.

  Like everyone else in the entire kingdom, he wanted the two to end up as a permanent couple.

  The kingdom was in dire need of a queen and an heir. It was high time for the rat to get married. Everyone had suffered long enough.

  The distancing of the two, accompanied by their reticence to talk about anything private in regard to possible partners or families, had him roll his eyes so much, he thought he would become permanently cross-eyed.

  Several times, he had been tempted to take each one aside and have a good talk with them, but it was not his place to instil sense over their feelings for each other into them, at least not yet.

  The Wiseman, too, had thought it best for them to work their way through their reluctance by themselves.  And since he was the personification of the Labyrinth, it’s physical mouthpiece, anyone could hardly go against such wisdom. 

  So, here they were, an elated Jareth proffering his arms to a still tottery and weak Sarah, who smiled at him gratefully for his assistance.

  To the casual observer, the two looked like any ordinary couple on a nice stroll, but to the sharp eyes of Hoggle and Didymus, who had hidden themselves in some of the bushes along the outskirts of the garden, the interlocked arms were nothing but casual. 

  “Yer thinks he’ll finally tells her how he feels about her? I don’ think I can’ts take this much longer. If he won’, I will”, Hoggle whispered with exasperation while his eyes followed the pair down the path by the lavender bushes.

  “It is not thy place to inform Her Ladyship of His Majesty’s feelings for her. Thou must hast patience. Remember, patience is a vir....”

  “A virtue of which I don’ have any”, Hoggle cut him off with an exaggerated eyeroll. ”I knows, yer been tellin’ me enough of it.”

  “Then let’s vacate the premises and provide them their privacy. Come hither, Brother Hoggle, for it shalt all work out in the end.”

  With a reluctant grumble, Hoggle followed the swiftly disappearing fox back into the castle. He gave one more last hopeful glance back at the couple before Didymus shut the door in his face.

  Sarah had never felt so unsteady and infirm in her entire life. Not even when she had suffered from a severe case of the flu at the age of twenty and had been bedridden for nearly three weeks that she had felt so wobbly on her feet.

  Jareth kept her propped up and was extremely patient with her slow snail pace of setting her chary steps.

  He kept tossing her encouraging small smiles with twinkling eyes, and Sarah couldn’t help but to blush and chew on her bottom lip over his caring attitude.

  It was the first time since they had left the dream reality that they had been so close to each other for such an extended time. They had shared closeness in a touch, but it had always been brief and fleeting.

  He now held her pressed against his side, and she had both her hands on his arms to stabilize herself.

  “I never felt so feeble in my entire life. Gosh, I can barely walk”, she groaned with frustration and scrunched her face in stark concentration.

  “You are doing exceptionally well, Sarah, considering what you went through over the thirteen days inside the crystal and the two weeks of physical change and recuperation since, it is a wonder you are.... you are alive”, he whispered the last few words and swallowed hard, not wanting to think of what could have been and how close she had come to dying on him.

  For him!

  They continued step by slow moving step, and it was clear that Sarah was considerably more agitated and frustrated over her lack of progress than Jareth.

  He did not seem to mind in the slightest that they had only managed twenty metres in the past ten minutes.

  He continuously pointed out peculiar flowers and bushes at which they stopped to rest, so that Sarah could view them without feeling hurried.

  She felt grateful for his patience and candid display of compassion. Maybe he felt something deeper for her, after all.

  She could only wish, but wishing is what she tried to avoid at all costs.

  “Let’s sit and watch the sprites play on the water”, Jareth suggested when they had reached a small garden pond that was ringed by an assortment of fragrant flowers of red and purple.

  Colourful waterbirds, similar to ducks and swans, floated languidly on the still surface of opal blue. Every so often, a fish broke the surface in its hunt for a tasty watersprite, who danced and skipped across the water’s surface in small swarms.

  Pixies visited the aromatic blossoms of the flowers and often twirled in mid-air, eliciting bright laughers that rang like little silver bells. 

  The small bench by the edge of the pond was just the right size for two people to sit close together.

  Sarah tossed Jareth a warm smile and leaned herself against the spine-conforming backrest.

  He briefly closed his eyes and expelled a deep sigh of complete content, knowing he had her finally here with him, on this bench, he so often dreamed about sharing with her in tender moments.

  “I used to come here often”, he explained unforced with his eyes closed. “It is my favourite spot to come to and just relax and regenerate. The peace and quietude here is unrivalled in all of my kingdom.”

  “I can see why”, Sarah smiled. “It is absolutely beautiful.”

  He squinted his face to the sun and then looked at her from under one half-cracked open eye. A mischievous smirk lay in wait around his soft lips.

  “It’s also a very private spot. Guaranteed of no interruptions and intrusions.”

  “Ah, I see”, Sarah drawled and tossed him a scrutinizing look. “His Majesty’s private little make out place.”

  “Now, I didn’t say that”, he laughed and turned his face to fully look at her.

  “Sure, you only hinted on it in a quite obvious manner. How many females have you taken to your little secluded spot?”

  She challenged him with narrowed eyes and a puckish grin of her own. Two could play that game. “Dozens? Hundreds? Thousands?”

  “Thousands? Even I could not keep up with that many”, he laughed aloud with mirth. “No, just one”, he declared more subdued and tilted his head.

  “One?” Sarah laughed with incredulity, not buying his claim. “And when was that?”

  “Just now”, he whispered his reply, diverting his gaze briefly onto the water. “You are the first and only one”, he stated more directly and held her nonplussed gaze.

  Sarah sat with a gawping mouth, unable to retort to his statement. She had expected to hear an answer of at least dozens.

  Why she even cared about it completely evaded her as well. It was none of her business whom he brought to this beautiful spot.

  “Me? But you’ve come here for so long. Why have you never brought any of your female friends? You told me in the crystal dream that you had many affairs in your younger years.”

  “Because this is part of the King’s Garden. The only female allowed in here is a very close family member like my mother or sister or....”

  “Or?” Sarah asked as he had stopped in his answer with a wistful smile twitching across his now still visage.

  “Or my chosen one, the one whom I plan on proposing to and ask for her hand in marriage”, he finally concluded as he stared silently into her nonplussed eyes.

Chapter Text

  All Sarah could do was stare wordlessly and with deadpan eyes at Jareth. Her thoughts were racing incoherently through her addled mind.

  What was he saying?

  Was he saying what she thought he was saying, or was she imaging it?

  She wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

  She searched his unblinking, expectant eyes, a certain nervousness and anxiety clearly displayed on his frozen countenance as he sat motionless before her and seemed to hold his breath over her forthcoming answer.

  “Jareth, what are you saying?” she finally asked him carefully, feeling timid and unsure over how he would answer.

  “Sarah, I am saying that....”

  He stopped and took a deep inhale before tenderly enfolding her hands with his. Once again, his gloves had disappeared on him, and the feel of his warm, soft skin against hers took her momentarily for a loop.

  Her heart skipped several beats, and her breath hitched, unable to continue.

  This felt exactly like the moment when he had proclaimed his love to her in the dream reality garden, just before the dancers had interfered and forcefully transported them back into the ballroom.

  Could this really be happening?

  Could he really have been true, honest, and of clear, reasoning mind when he had admitted to his feelings for her inside the crystal dream?

  Her heart didn’t dare to beat, and the blood rushed to her head, monetarily drowning out the melodious chirps and laughter of the playful pixies around them with its roiling sound pounding against her eardrums, as if she stood underneath a cascading waterfall.

  Time decided to stand still for her as she stared deeply into his softly gazing eyes that held so much love, pain, and regret in them; it nearly made her cry.

  She swallowed down the lump in her throat and felt her heartbeat resuming its intense drumming beat.

  “Sarah, I don’t know whether you have someone special waiting for you in your old world....”

  “There is nobody”, Sarah hurried her unintended interruption to allay his concerns and bit her bottom lip when a relieved smile twitched in the corners of his lips, and his eyes flashed briefly.

  “There isn’t?” he asked, as if to reassure himself he had heard her right.

  She nodded with a quirked shy smile of her own. 

  “There is nobody. My family has practically disowned me, and I have not seen them in years.... it’s a long sad story, and I never have felt the urge to start a relationship with any man, because I....”

   She trailed off lost in thought and lowered her gaze as though she were ashamed of herself while the increase in blood coloured her entire face a bright pink.

  He found her display of pure innocence beyond enchanting at the moment.

  “I’m not very experienced in, well, you know, in the matter of.... of physical.... well, um.... of sex, unlike you”, she stammered awkwardly through her reply, trying frantically to find the right word to convey her inexperience in a not so shameful and self-accusing manner.

  “Oh, Sarah”, Jareth almost laughed aloud, greatly relieved at hearing her confession of not having a mate.

  Once again, he found her fumbling for the correct words and the blush that accompanied her confession incredible endearing, and his heart swelled with the warm feeling of knowing he would be her first, whenever she would allow the intimate contact. 

“Do you really think I care about whether you had many lovers or none? Or how experienced or inexperienced you are in the matters of physical lovemaking? How shallow would I be if I would place emphasis on something that may have happened in the past but is so inconsequential to us. All I wanted to know was whether I would be trespassing on anyone’s territory with what I have to ask you.”

  Sarah lifted her gaze and flicked him an abashed smile, her skin was lightly flustered and had retained the soft shade of pink around her cheeks.

  Jareth had the overwhelming urge to kiss the colour right off of her and take her back into his chamber.

  How he loved this woman, and she apparently didn’t even know about his intense feelings.

  He needed to set the record straight, and for the last time, clear the air. They had tiptoed around each other for the past week and a half.

  The time had come to lay the cards on the table; all of them.

  “You won’t be trespassing on anyone’s territory”, Sarah assured him once more, and he nodded with understanding.

  “Sarah” he started up anew and nervously flicked his tongue across his upper lip as he increased the grip on her hands, his eyes unyieldingly holding their gaze into hers.

  “I have lived an exceptionally long time, nine centuries to be exact, and I have never felt this strongly about anyone before in my entire existence. I knew from the first time I laid eyes on you that I wanted you.”

  He motioned her with one hand to be still and to let him finish when he noticed her wanting to speak before he hastily retook her let-go hand into his and continued uninterrupted.

  “I did not want you in a sexual sense as if you were a passing dalliance, no not at all. I wanted you with my heart, with my soul. Yes, you were too young, and in the eyes of mortals this is frowned upon, but I was willing to wait, to let you grow up and mature.”

  He took an intake of air to fill his lungs and still his trembling body.

  Sarah could tell, he was pouring his heart out to her and that it was difficult for him to spill the proper words from his trembling lips.

  He was not used to be so unbosoming with his personal feelings, but this was much too salient to hold back and be evasive.

  She did not dare move a muscle or even breath herself, as so not to disturb his thoughts.

  “I know I messed things up in my haste and desire to win you over. I had overlooked your innocence and tender age, and I am trying to make amends. Sarah, one thing I know for sure is that my feelings for you, my deep love I hold for you, will never fade. Like any fae, I can only love once in my entire lifetime. You, my sweet Sarah, you hold my heart. You alone, and with that, I am your slave.”

  He stopped again and took another deep breath before continuing.

  Sarah sat agog with a hammering heartbeat and enrapt eyes over his heartfelt divulgence, waiting on his question, he was building up to.

   “Sarah, as much as I would love to, I am not asking you to make a decision today in regard to us. I am merely asking you to consider my proposal of courting you, of giving me a chance to show you who I truly am, and to hopefully make you fall in love with me the way I am in love with you. I only want to....”

  “Yes, I do”, Sarah hastily interjected with a teary smile and bite of her bottom lip, not letting him finish his longwinded rambling.

  He shut his mouth and kept looking at her with confounded eyes, as if he hadn’t fully understood what she had just told him.

  She smiled broadly up at him, yet he only gave her an incomprehensible stare.

  “What?” he finally mumbled barely audible with a complete lack of comprehension and blinked his empty eyes twice over.

  “I said, I do.”

  “Do what?” he asked dumbfounded, having completely forgotten what he had asked her only moments ago.

  “Oh, for crying out loud, Jareth. After all that lengthy speech of yours, do I have to show you for you to understand?”

  She didn’t allow him to respond, as she speedily slipped her hands out of his grip, cupped both sides of his face, and pressed her lips resolutely against his before he had a chance to react.

  Her eager tongue demanded entrance to his perplexed mouth, and it took him a few seconds for his stunned brain to catch up with the happening of the moment.

  Once he realized what she was doing, he fervently reciprocated and in turn invaded her mouth with his tongue like a questing knight, storming into the tallest tower of the castle to free his bespelled love from her prison.

  He quietly mewled into the kiss and wrapped his arms tightly around her body, holding her fast against him.

  Her arms, likewise, travelled up his back and enfolded him completely. How warm and soft she felt in his embrace, and his body reacted in a predictable physical manner.

  He no longer cared whether she would notice.

  He wanted her to notice.

  He wanted her to know how she affected him on a physical level.

  They both closed their eyes and relished in the tingling sensation of their first real kiss outside an illusionary bubble.

  A kiss that had their stomachs tied in knots and invaded by fluttering butterflies while their hearts were about to jump out of their chests from the wonderful sensations flooding the very cores of their being.

  He never thought a simple kiss could ever feel so sensual, erotic, and fulfilling without having to lead to physical pleasure.

  But this was no simple kiss.

  This was not an opening act for a quick dalliance or a meaningless, one-night liaison.

  No, this was a declaration of true love, of everything he felt deep inside of him for her alone.

  It was a connection, a binding of their hearts and souls. He could feel the magical energies transferring and mixing, becoming one, inseparable from the other.

  His brain bombarded him with rapid flashes of images of them together in situation and activities he never thought him capable of doing with any woman: leisure, hand in hand strolls through the gardens, a romantic boat ride, a picnic, chasing each other across a blooming meadow while they both gaily laughed and finally tumbled entwined in each other’s arm to the ground and kissed fervently.

  None of the evocative images were of a sexual nature but genuinely originated from his heart and depicted his deepest desires: the need for a true mate with whom he could share his life, his joy, and his pain.  

  Very slowly and reluctantly, Jareth released her lips with closed eyes. He felt unwilling to remove his arms and risk having her slip from his embrace, and so, he held on to her, only allowing her lips to separate from his.

  Their eyes slowly fluttered open as they held their unyielding gazes.

  Sarah could only see the deep love he held for her in his mismatched eyes, and she knew immediately, she, too, felt exactly the same.

  She was in love with him, with Jareth.

  “I love you”, she whispered her admission, and Jareth felt as if he had somehow slipped back into a wonderful dream.

  If it was, he surely did not want to awaken from it.

  “You love me?” he felt the need to ask again, making sure he had heard her correctly.

  “I do. I love you, Jareth.... with all my heart”, she breathed away his doubts and flicked him a genuine, candid smile.

  “You don’t know how happy you make me hear these words spilled from your lips. I have waited so long to hear them.”

  He closed his eyes, a serene smile curled around his upturned lips, and enfolded her head as she laid it against his chest, so she could listen to his hammering heartbeat.

  “You may get tired of hearing it, because I’ll be saying it a lot”, she giggled into his embrace, and she felt the rumble within his chest as he chuckled in return.

  “I shall never tire hearing you proclaim your love for me, and me only, my eternal love.”

  He pressed his forehead into hers, and they sat still for several quiet moments.

  It wasn’t until a small pesky pixie had come over to investigate why the two were seated so inert, staring at each other, as if they were mortar-turned statues.

  Her ringing little laughter, and the tickling of her fluttering wings, had Sarah lift her head and gaze at the small creature, who smiled toothily at her.

  With a zigzagged zoom, she sped out of the reach of Jareth’s playfully swatting hand, snickering the entire time, as if it was nothing but a friendly game of chase and catch.

  Sarah chuckled with amusement and flicked a glance back at Jareth, who couldn’t help but to titter himself.

  For a moment, they once more held their silent gaze.

  “I am so sorry it took me so long to tell you”, Sarah finally spoke up, a faint shadow of rue washing across her countenance, “but I thought.... I believed that what you had said in the dream was not real but just part of....”

  “.... the illusion?” Jareth finished for her, and she nodded with a contrite mien.

  “Yes. I wanted to believe, but seeing you interacting with the others, and in your domain, after you had recovered made me question myself. I couldn’t fathom how someone so charming, wonderful, and.... don’t get a big head now”, she laughed at seeing his conceited smirk plastered all across his grinning visage.

  “I am an alluring fairy king, after all”, he chuckled but then fell quiet to listen to her confession.

  “That you are”, she snorted her reply and bit her bottom lip. “I couldn’t fathom how someone like you would be all alone without a wife, or at least a permanent love interest, and be remotely interested in someone like me.”

  She lowered her gaze and pressed her lips together, as if she were ashamed to have spoken the words. Jareth gently lifted her chin with his fingers to force her to look back into his eyes.

  Her self-deprecatory words disturbed him greatly.

  “What do you mean by ‘someone like me’?”

  His words were softspoken and full of concern, and his troubled eyes searched hers for the answer.

  “I’m a nobody, Jareth. First off, I’m just a mortal....”

  “Sarah, you are not a nobody, far from it”, he vehemently cut her off, almost incensed over her self-degradation. “How can you even say something like that? You are the Champion of the Labyrinth. Do you even grasp the importance.... the salience of that title?”

  He tossed her an almost scolding glance.

  “And you are also no longer mortal”, he added with haste. “You are a fae now, one of us.”

  “Be that as it may,”, she continued stubbornly and placed her finger gently against his protesting lips to still any further remonstrations and counterarguments. “I felt I was not worthy of your favours, and I thought that if I would let you know how I feel about you, you would....”

  She lowered her head and expelled a deep breath while closing her eyes, chewing nervously on her bottom lip.

  He could detect the hint of a tear clinging on to her bottom lashes. Jareth gently took hold of her hand and removed it from his lips.

  “You thought I would do what?” he asked so quiet, she nearly didn’t hear him.  

  “I was afraid you would laugh at me and ridicule me”, she finally admitted her deepest fears. “Making fun of me for feeling the way I do about you.”

  “You really believed I could be so insensitive, cruel, and cold-hearted? That I would do something so despicable as to ridicule you for admitting your feelings for me? Oh, Sarah.”

  He almost sounded hurt and when she flicked him a cursory glance to gauge his reaction, she could see the distress over her statement in his dimmed eyes and knitted brows.

  She felt mortified over having misjudged him so gravely and needed to make amends.

  “Oh, Jareth, please don’t take this the wrong way. I didn’t know any better. All I knew was that we hadn’t parted under the best of circumstances, and I was afraid there might be lingering resentments on your part, and really, I didn’t know you, but I wanted to get to know you, but I was afraid to, and I was too young, but then I grew older and realized, and....”

  He brought her nonsensical, longwinded rambling to an abrupt end with a passionate kiss that had her immediately silenced.

  It was his turn now for his lips and tongue to take her by surprise and conquer her mouth to assuage her unfounded fears.

  His arms came around her back and pulled her flush against his torso. He scooted himself closer to her, and she could feel him pressing his hips against hers, conveying to her how much she affected him.

  Sarah could do nothing but capitulate to him.

  His hands began to rake across her back and wander down towards her hips and bottom. She felt him clasping her butt cheeks and gently pulling her against his lap.

  She didn’t fight him.

  Becoming lost in the sensual kiss, she subconsciously draped her leg across his lap and positioned her body, so her lower half pressed tightly against his.

  She could feel the growing hardness of his arousal through his gossamer-like breeches, which in turn lit her own fire the way she had never experienced before.

  “Can you feel me becoming hard for you?” he mouthed into the kiss and took hold of her hand to guide it towards his loin and cup his erection. “Do you think.... a nobody could evoke such a reaction from me?”

  He intensified his kiss and took immense pleasure from the way she reacted to his ministrations.

  “Sarah, I love you, I have always loved you. Don’t ever doubt the validity of that.”

  They finally broke the kiss and pressed their foreheads against each other. Sarah took several deep inhales with closed eyes, her hands gently cupping his face after having thoroughly explored his aroused manhood over the thin material.

  Although inexperienced, she nevertheless had experience in fondling a man’s body.

  She just never had allowed herself to take that ultimate decisive step. No, he would have to be someone special to give herself to him so fully.

  He would have to be.... Jareth.

  She knew that now.

  “I want you, Jareth. I want you to make love to me.”

  He opened his eyes and, likewise, cupped her face, staring deeply into those shining, emerald-green orbs of her.

  “Are you sure you are ready for this step?”

  “You don’t want to?” she asked instead and tilted her head, her insecure eyes searching his.

  “More than anything, Love”, he quickly assuaged her doubts. “I just want to make sure you are fully ready. I do not want to rush you, and I do not want you to think you have to appease me or that I....”

  “I want to make love to you, Jareth”, she interjected him with a light huff over the insinuation it was about him; her gaze determined and adamant. “This has nothing to do with appeasing you and all with my own desires. I am certain now that I want to give myself up for you. You are the one, so don’t ever question my motives.”

  “Oh, Love, you overwhelm me”, he whispered back, completely enfolded into the sensation of utter bliss.

  Could there be anything more perfect and serene than the feeling deep inside his heart right now.

  She was willing to give herself to him, right now, and without any reservations.  

  “I think we best take this to the castle then. I’m not sure you want your first experience of that kind to be witnessed by these pesky pixies and imps.”

  His comment elicited a mirthful chuckle from her, and she shook her head, agreeing fully that this would not be what she had in mind. She positively did not want to give anyone a salacious show but Jareth.

  “I concur. Let’s take this somewhere more private.”

  Raising herself off the bench with Jareth’s assistance, she found that she had regained most of her strength in her legs and was no longer tottery and unsteady in her gait.

  She elicited a surprised chuckle. Jareth only flicked a boyish smirk at her when she tossed him a questioning gaze and interlocked her arm with his proffered one.

  “The kiss”, was all he said in reply, and she nodded with comprehension over his laconic answer.

  She, too, had felt the surge of energy flooding her body during the osculation and knew a transfer of magic had occurred.

  Taking in a deep inhale with a sated smile on her lips, she urged him to start the walk back towards the castle.

  This time, she felt alive and spry, and her legs were no longer in danger of buckling at the knees and giving out from under her.

  She closed her eyes for a deep inhale and gifted Jareth with a genuine elated smile of pure happiness, radiating from her beaming visage.

  “I feel so alive and content when I’m here”, she proclaimed joyously, and Jareth squeezed down on her arm and hand, he had enfolded into his.

  “It is because you belong here. You have always belonged here. The magic and life force of the Labyrinth courses through you now.”

  “I can sense it. Is this just temporary due to my transformation or will this sensation last?”

  “Your sense of belonging and fulfilment will always be with you. I cannot promise you perpetual happiness and bliss without a cloudy day sprinkled in here and there, but I can promise you that I will always be there for you....”

  “.... as my world falls down?”

  “If it should fall down, if, which I shall do my best to prevent from happening ever”, he smirked his reply and tossed her an impish yet promising wink.

  Her smile broadened, and she laid her head against his shoulder as they continued their leisure stroll back into the castle.

  She finally knew where she belonged, and she no longer worried herself over what was to come.

  “Ah, hath His Majesty enjoyed the bimble in the gardens with thy lady?”

  Sir Didymus greeted them with a beaming grin, exposing his ferocious canid teeth.

  Where before Sarah had shied away from the intimidating display, she now grinned and was tempted to pet him on his head, as if he were a well-trained house dog.

  “It was refreshing and quite.... productive and propitious, I do must admit”, Jareth added with an informative glance over at Sarah.

  Didymus raised his bushy eyebrows with a comprehending nod and grin. Inclining his head towards his king and Sarah, he bid them a hasty adieu.

  He needed to find Hoggle and inform him of the great news. There most likely would be a wedding soon, and they needed to get started on the preparations.

  Sarah’s eyes followed the swiftly disappearing fox knight with amused eyes and a quiet snort.

  “You do know he’ll be informing the entire kingdom about us now and is most likely already planning our wedding together with Hoggle”, Jareth smirked, and Sarah tossed him a wide-eyed stunned look.

  “Our wedding? But we haven’t even discussed this subject yet. Isn’t that a bit jumping the gun? I mean, we just declared our love to each other and agreed to court and were about to.... well, check things out”, she added with a quiet snort over the thought of what they were going to check out.

  “But, Love, I thought you knew that there’ll be a wedding soon”, Jareth purred seductively into her ear and grabbed her around the waist to pull her flush against his body. “I am so ready, can’t you tell?”

  She could feel his arousal through the gossamer-like fabric of his pants, and she felt her own fire re-igniting despite her objections of a too soon wedding.

  It seemed her body was once again betraying her mind.

  “I don’t think we should rush into anything”, she weakly objected and chewed on her bottom lip, trying to figure out how to word her answer carefully as not to hurt his feelings.

  “Why don’t we just court for now and let me get used to the idea and have some fun of a certain kind in the meantime.”

  She tossed him a sultry wanton gaze while she flicked her tongue over her lips.

  Jareth elicited a mirthful laugh and placed a quick yet tongue infused kiss against them, feeling himself becoming rigid all over again over her salacious display and the evident hunger in her eyes for him.  

  “No worries, Love. We won’t rush into anything. But it is entertaining seeing the two all riled up about it. They’ve been waiting as long as I have for the good news.”

  He tilted his head and greeted her now narrowing eyes with a mischievous grin. “Plus, I think it will be a lot of fun getting to know each other more thoroughly before we make that plunge into marital bliss.”

  Her bright ringing laughter was like an answered prayer and salvation to his ears.

  She wrapped her arms tightly around his neck and commanded his lips with hers.

  He nearly melted under the passionate onslaught, and her eyes were hooded and darkened with dilated pupil when she released them.

  “All right, let’s explore. Take me to your chambers, My King.”

  “As my lady commands”, he laughed, and in a flash, the two were gone.

  They never heard the excited yelp from Sir Didymus, announcing to all the staff members in the castle that there would be a wedding soon.

  They also never caught the joyous chants, which slowly worked their way through the entire Goblin City and into the farthest reaches of the Labyrinth Kingdom.

  “The King and the Champion of the Labyrinth are getting married.”

**************************************************

  Somewhere deep inside another realm, far removed from the Goblin Kingdom, three toga-wearing, middle-aged women sat leisurely in a sunroom while working quietly on a weaving.

  “And what do you have here?” Lachesis asked her sister Clotho with a wicked smile curled around her lips as she looked over her shoulders to inspect the new weave.

  “Oh, just a little something I did in my spare time”, she grinned and held up the small web of strands that formed an intricate pattern, not unlike the Labyrinth itself. 

  “Now you said you would not interfere with King Jareth and Sarah”, Atropos admonished as she set her scissors aside to take a closer look for herself.

  “It’s only an innocent wedding present”, Clotho chuckled while Lachesis took the small web out of her hand and perused over it with a mischievously grinning countenance.

  “Oh, it’s innocent all right”, Atropos chortled, and Lachesis and Clotho joined her in her merriment. “When shall we give it to them?”

  “When the time is right, sisters, when the time is right”, Lachesis smirked and looked out into the distance, a cryptic gleam in her puckish eyes.