This is a sequel to Darkness and Dreams, and might require familiarity with that story. It's hard to tell when you wrote both of them, you know? It was originally written in 2000.

"I love watching it snow," Alia said as the first snow of the season started to fall. "It's so quiet, so serene."

"It will not last. The ground is still too warm," Tieran pointed out.

"I know, but it's still pretty as it falls," Alia answered as they reached the lakeside.

She stood watching the fat flakes fall and disappear into the gray, flat surface of the lake. It was dark and calm, barely rippling, almost viscous. She pointed this out, turning to Tieran sitting on a bench behind her. "Does that mean that it's about to freeze?" she asked.

"Possibly. I do not know. I have never noticed it before."

Alia moved to stand directly behind Tieran. He looked up at her with mild curiosity then back out at the lake as he leaned back against her. They remained motionless like that for some time until Alia moved her hand up to brush the falling snowflakes from his hair before they melted. Alia played with his hair for a while, trying to straighten the short golden strands that were just starting to curl.

"What are you thinking?" Tieran asked with his eyes closed.

"How it's hard to believe, when I really think about it, that this head is connected to a heart that loves me so much. It's never happened to me before, so it's hard for me to wrap my mind around it."

"The brain thinks too much."

"That is its job, you know," Alia said with a small laugh, crossing her arms across his chest, resting her cheek on his head.

"I mean that it tries to analyze things it is not naturally equipped to easily understand. You said yourself the heart held the love. The thinking brain does not handle the deep emotions. When it tries to understand them it lags behind the heart, or what ever it is that deals with emotions. It is handicapped and must catch up."

"I guess that must be it. This feels right, it just doesn't think right."

"Exactly. You have been trying to use the wrong tool to understand it," Tieran answered as he pulled her hands down and held them in his own, bringing her head down level with his and kissing the cheek he could reach.

His mood seemed to change and he released her hands. "Shall we go see what the rest of the grounds look like through the first snowfall?" he asked as he stood up.

"All right," Alia assented.

They walked back up the path, the crunching of the gravel underfoot muted by the snow in the air. Soon Alia recognized that they were heading in the direction of the stables.

They found Night out in high spirits, prancing about the field with neck arched and tail held high.

"He seems to be enjoying himself," Alia said.

The horse caught sight of them approaching and raced, a deep blue streak, across the field to meet them. He stopped directly in front of them, ears cocked forward questioningly.

"It's called snow, if that's what you're wondering. Do you like it?"

He nodded his head up and down enthusiastically.

Tieran laughed. "Ask him that question again in three months and see what he says then."

Night took a step backward and looked dismayed, one ear still cocked forward, but the other turned off to the side.

"It builds up," Tieran explained gesturing at waist height to demonstrate, "and we usually receive a large amount of it here. Enjoy it while you can."

Night's spirits returned, determined to make the most of it, and he darted off across the field again.

.….

He piloted the machine down the road easily. The speed provided no challenge for him and very little pleasure. He sighed as he navigated another curve, then slowed as he entered town, looking for his appointment.

He looked forward to this mission with minimal enthusiasm, just another activity, something to fill some time before he found something else with greater potential. Everything lately just filled his time while he waited for something better. When would he find something with potential? This one might last him a while, but he never expected too much anymore.

He turned into the parking lot and flamboyantly pulled into a parking space. He lithely rose from the sports car and walked toward the office building, experiencing a moment's pleasure at the grace of his own movement. "Lithe." Yes, he liked that word. It described his movement well and he enjoyed its feel in his mouth.

Striding through the main doors and toward the bank of elevators, he wondered what the few people in the lobby would do if he suddenly did something unexpected, say, threw this briefcase he carried through the windows behind him. He toyed with the idea, then discarded it. He doubted the results would be worth his effort or the annoyance it would cause later by complicating the arrangements for this assignment. He would keep it in mind though, an annoyance once in a while held its own appeal if one became bored enough.

The elevator arrived and he rode up to the tenth floor alone. As the doors opened, he put a smile on his face and set himself to charm everyone he met. A simple task really, but he still reminded himself of the necessity of it. Until he found the person he sought, he had to cultivate everyone no matter how useless they seemed.

He approached the receptionist culling wilted blooms from a bowl of bronze and burgundy chrysanthemums at the front desk, unobserved until he stood immediately in front of the desk.

"Lovely flowers. So appropriate for this time of year," he smiled as she looked up at him, startled.

"Yes," she agreed, slightly flustered and annoyed that he had crept up on her. "Can I help you?"

"I'm sure you can," he answered, implying as he started to explain, that only she possessed the ability to help him.

.….

"So what did you do over the weekend? Meet anyone?"

"No. I told you, Maddie, I'm not looking."

"That's when the good ones show up. You really need to do something besides fix my computer for me," Maddie addressed the legs sticking out from under her desk.

"I would if you'd quit messing it up. What do you do to it, anyway?" Cara answered as she crawled out from under the desk after checking out the tangle of cables.

"I don't know," Maddie plead innocence. "It doesn't like me. If I look at it the wrong way, it locks up."

"It's a machine, Maddie. It doesn't have feelings and it doesn't care how you look at it," Cara spoke absentmindedly as she quickly tapped on the keyboard and surveyed the screen.

"Maybe it doesn't care how you look at it, but it definitely has issues with me." Maddie hovered in a corner of her cubicle, unable to help and unable to do anything else while her computer was down. She tried another tack with the conversation.

"Have you thought about the Christmas Party? Who will you go with?"

Cara turned away from the screen. "Honestly, Maddie, anyone would think you're my mother," she said in mock exasperation. "I haven't even thought about it. It's not even December yet. We just got back from Thanksgiving and you're thinking about Christmas parties already."

"You have to think ahead for these things. Guys go fast."

"And I suppose you've got yours lined up already?" Cara accused, one dark eyebrow raised, and leaned against the edge of the desk with her arms crossed.

"I'm not the one we're talking about here. I'm not the one who hasn't had a date in months."

"I've been in the hospital, remember?" Cara sat in the desk chair and turned back to the monitor.

"All the more reason to get out and date. You need to find a nice guy, fall in love. It'll change your whole outlook on life."

"Mm-hmm, I know. My roomie found one. I've seen what it's done to her. She's never around anymore, she's always off in hi-...another world," she corrected herself and hoped Maddie wouldn't notice.

"See. Where'd she find him? You should hang out with her, maybe there's more of them."

"He's not from around here. I think he's pretty much one of a kind. He's not my type anyway, her type exactly, but not mine." Cara tapped a few keys, starting a scan of the hard drive.

"Oh. Well, what about guys here at work?"

"Guys here? Like Walter in accounting?" Cara rolled her eyes at Maddie. She shouldn't be so judgmental, she told herself. Just because he looked funny and sniffled perpetually did not mean he had the personality of a calculator. Still, she always wanted to hand him a box of tissues.

Maddie gave her a pained look. "He's a nice guy once you get to know him."

"If you can stand the sniffles."

"So he has a sinus problem," Maddie tried to persuade her. "Okay, so he's not a good candidate. I didn't mean him anyway. Have you seen the new guy?"

"What new guy?" Cara asked, absently watching the screen and swinging the chair back and forth.

"He's some sort of consultant they've brought in. Probably gets paid an outrageous sum of money. That's your type, isn't it?"

"Maybe," she shrugged. "He's probably taken."

"Sue in reception says he's charming, handsome, and doesn't wear a ring."

"So he's not married. That doesn't mean he doesn't have a girlfriend. Have you seen him?"

"No – yes, that must be him over there," Maddie whispered and pointed over the cubicle walls to a man who had just entered. "No, don't look at him," she hissed as Cara stood to look. "Be casual."

"If you don't want me to look, don't point him out," Cara answered as she turned anyway to look where Maddie had pointed.

She could just see the head and shoulders of a taller than average man on the far side of the room full of cubicles. "What's the big deal? He's not even looking this direction," Cara said just as the inky black head of hair and broad shoulders turned around and looked at her, not only in her direction, but directly at her. Cara lost Maddie's answer when she was pinned by the brilliant green eyes, then he looked away and Cara turned to Maddie, who was looking at her expectantly.

"Well?"

"What?"

"He looked directly at you, so you got a good look at him. What do you think?"

"He's handsome, I guess," she answered noncommittally while trying to figure out why he had looked at her, what it meant, and how she felt about it. Right now, it gave her the creeps. The computer beeped and Cara gave up trying to figure it out as she finished her job and began to clean up.

"You guess? He could give any movie star you care to name a run for his money."

"He's probably a jerk. Guys that cute are usually so full of themselves that no one else can stand them."

"You could at least meet him first before you call him a jerk."

"Maddie, I don't want date anyone, least of all him or anyone else from the office. Dating in the office is always a bad idea. What if you break up? Then you still have to see them and be civil to them everyday. I'd prefer to not to see any of my exes after I break up with them."

"All right. I was only trying to help."

"I know, but I don't think I need any." Cara doubted Maddie had genuinely surrendered – she thought she would probably be hearing more on the subject before the week was out – but she accepted the temporary relief.

"What are you doing for lunch?" Maddie changed the subject.

"I have a few more work orders to straighten out then I'm brown-bagging it in the break room. Why?"

"Good. I brought mine, too. Stop by when you're done and we can eat together."

"All right," Cara agreed as she picked up her clipboard with her work orders on it and the toolbox carrying the odds and ends she might need in the course of the day.

Cara thought about Maddie as she walked to the next cubicle on her list. She had given up too much already staying here on her own for college to just fall back into the pattern of marrying some guy to stay at home and keep house and have kids. She preferred to have a life and an education and to be able to use it. She had plans, she was going to do things, even if it had meant alienating her parents.

.….

"How was your day?"

"The usual. Fix people's computers when they do something stupid and won't admit it." Cara answered the voice from the couch behind her. Jareth had taken to popping in on her as he did his Listians. She was not a member of his fan lists, but she had read enough of the writings in the archives and the few days she had subscribed to recognize that she had somehow become an honorary member worthy of periodic pop-ins. "Shouldn't you be putting the Labyrinth back together?"

"Why bother? It works well enough as it is. The Listians are the ones who use it most now and they will not notice the difference. They rearrange it as they see fit anyway."

"So you came to visit me instead?"

"The idea of a civil conversation without sexual innuendoes appealed to me."

"I'll take that as a compliment… I think."

"That's how it was intended. May I ask why, if you are frustrated by people and their computers at work, you are sitting in front of one now?"

"Ah, but this is different," she explained as she turned around. Jareth sprawled, as she expected, full length on the couch. "This is my computer, a computer that works, a computer that is connected to the Internet and has games."

"I see."

"So what did you want to have a conversation about? Neither Tieran or Alia are here, so if you wanted to talk to them you're out of luck."

"I didn't expect them to be here. You'll do perfectly well. What else did you do today? I, myself, have done nothing," he said as he placed his hands behind his head. "Another blissful day sitting on my throne watching goblins chase chickens through my throne room. I've tried banning them, but they forget by the next day."

"Who? The goblins or the chickens?"

"Both," he answered with a small smile. "The chickens were only slightly less obedient than the goblins. But what about you? You must have done something other than fix computers today."

"Aside from fending off another attempt to marry me off, no, I didn't do anything else. That's my job – to fix computers." Cara turned back to the computer.

"Who's trying to marry you off?" Jareth asked as he sat up on the couch and swung his legs down to the floor.

"This woman I work with, Maddie. She's a friend of sorts, but sometimes she's more like a nagging mother. She thinks I need to have a man in my life to be happy. She thinks that since I haven't had a date in the last nine months, I must be suffering and need help finding one. Never mind the fact that I've been seriously ill for six of those months," Cara answered, waving her hand to show the irrelevance of this piece of information.

"And you don't want to be married off?"

"No, if I'd wanted to do that I would have gone back to India with my parents and married who they picked out for me like they wanted me to. I mean, I'll probably find a guy someday, but I don't want to marry just any guy. I have my standards."

"And Maddie's choices do not meet them?"

"No. I mean, there's this new guy who just showed up for work today. She doesn't even know his name, but she points him out to me as a candidate. I'm sure she's going to try to fix me up with him eventually."

"Then you don't know enough about him either to know if he doesn't meet your standards?"

"No, I guess not," Cara conceded, "but she could at least wait until she knows his name and if he's available before she starts shoving me in his direction. I mean, he's cute and probably makes a ton of money as a consultant – that's what he's there for – but there's no telling what he's like. I still don't even know his name."

"What would disqualify him? Idiocy?"

"Well, yeah, I couldn't live with a moron who couldn't hold a conversation. But he can't be an idiot, he's a consultant. He has to know something."

"What else?"

Cara thought for a moment. "He would have to let me do what I want. I don't want my life dictated for me. So no dictators."

"No dictators. Anything else?"

Cara suddenly became facetious. "He has to be able to live with me becoming rich and famous, of course," she said with a big grin.

"But of course," Jareth agreed. "What good are they if they can't handle fame and fortune?"