Old Friends
by Tichfield
Based on a story idea by Pika la Cynique and used with permission.
The Endless copyright DC Comics and created by Neil Gaiman, among others.
Jareth, Labyrinth, etc. copyright the Jim Henson Company
I don't own any of these characters.
Spoiler warning: I refer to events from the entire Sandman continuity.
Note: This story was originally posted under a different pseudonym.
"There's a goldfish crawling up your owl. I think they're snuggling."
"So there is. Thank you, Barnabas. And thank my Sister for granting me this boon."
"Anything for an old friend." The dog sat and wagged his tail across Destruction's dirty floor. "It's nice to be somewhere that paint doesn't move. Or talk. Vermillion's chatty and won't take no for an answer."
"Hungry?"
"Always."
"I made beef stew in your honour. I'll serve it just as soon as I finish this painting."
"What is it, anyway?" Barnabas peered at the canvas. Apart from the goldfish napping on a white owl's beak, "I see a clock, a human outline, bits of glass, and... is that a city in your Brother's garden?"
"It's a maze." The artist added a splash of yellow to a city wall and stood back to admire the effect. "A labyrinth. Do you like it?"
"I think I do." The dog twisted his head, trying to find the right angle from which to see the picture. "The perspective gives me headaches, and that's saying a lot when you know where I've been lately."
"True."
"It's... surprising. The city looks broken. Shattered. I thought you avoided those themes."
"I do, mostly." Destruction sighed and swirled his brush in a jar of cloudy water. "This is an anniversary present."
"I didn't even know you had a mate. Listen, if she has her own dog, a nice girl, I mean..."
Destruction laughed and kept his smile as he walked to the kitchenette on the opposite side of the studio.
"Not that kind of anniversary. It is the celebration of a choice I forced upon a friend, and a promise that he kept me to."
"If he's a friend, why don't you deliver the painting yourself? You know I'll leave bite marks. That's without counting the slobber. I can't really help it."
The redhead tested the side of an iron pot with his finger and decided on potholders as a necessary prudence.
"I can't. He was a very good friend for a very long time, and we're connected."
"Connected?"
"If I set foot inside his kingdom, it will unravel. Whether I will it or not."
"Part of that autopilot you have going, I take it. Is the stew ready?"
"More a part of my binding promise to him." The artist picked up the pot and carefully emptied its contents into a deep porcelain bowl.
"Why doesn't he come here, then?" Barnabas sniffed. "That smells good."
"Jareth carries his kingdom with him wherever he goes. It is his nature."
"Like your Sister turning everything she touches into gelatin ribbons?"
"Very much like." The bowl at last found its way beneath the dog's eager jaws. "So much alike that you should have free passage through his maze, bearing her touch as you do." Barnabas gave no answer, but Destruction had expected none. "While you eat, I'll tell the story."
Long before my resignation, Jareth was third among the Powers of Faerie. The Goblin King, they called him. Conqueror, baby-snatcher, Woe's Owl. Mortals thought him Despair's creature. This was never so. In truth, he and my Sister never saw eye-to-eye. She courted him once, and he refused her. This was a foolish and a dangerous thing, but beautifully done.
Her wrath was terrible. I felt my Sister's hooks sink into him, and knew that if his path continued as it was, the goblin realm would turn to rubble at my touch. It seemed a waste, and poor reward for one who had so often served me. I offered Jareth my protection, as his patron.
He accepted.
Though a king, his was a lonely life. For all that he had armies at his call, for all the riches that he gained, or the vastness of his kingdom, there was no one he could speak to. No friend on his level, no confidant in whom he could trust his doubts and plans and hopes.
This pleased my Sister greatly.
Titania saw in him a threat to her borders, Oberon a rival for his love. The mortal powers remembered only his kidnappings, and saw in changelings taunt and mockery, instead of opportunity.
He thrived on change. On chance, vivacity, life, trickery. There are those among the Faerie court who trained with him. Cold iron was not so hated by him as stagnation, or the lingering of a pleasure past its peak. It was this that drove his conquests - the need for the new, the need for the different.
In his own way, he was kind. He saw that others needed change as much as he did, and did his best to provide it when it suited his ends.
No, Barnabas. He was never Delight's. She shunned him for his cruel kindness.
Yes, he did think it kindness. Even the snatchings. He only took unwanted children - those who were destined for a life of drudgery and boredom, to be raised by parents who cared little if they lived. There had to be no doubt of that. In his youth he took a dozen cherished infants, by mistake. Instead of thriving in his city, they shrivelled and turned dull and uninteresting. It was the unwanted and neglected that flourished in his care. This was what he brought them for. This was why he took so many human children. The Fae, with few exceptions, do not age. They fossilize. Human offspring change throughout their lives, scarcely standing still, always showing something new or novel aspects of an earlier development. This fascinated Jareth, and he was drawn to them as flowers to sunlight.
When he conquered a fresh land, he made certain all his subjects knew the words of summoning, the words required to bring his servants to the crib. Often, he'd leave something in return - an obedient fairy child who would not last long in the world of blood and iron, but would please those couples who believed a 'difficult' child was cursed.
His conquered people? Some complained, some did not. He set his armies against nations that grew still and silent, fallow and grey. He sought to bring them change. Concern. News. The usual boons of war. I saw too much of it, and would rather not dwell on unpleasant memories.
He saw in me a creative force, and for this I have always thanked him. I would like to say I loved him for it - but I'm not sure I ever did.
That I cared for him, no question. I cared about his fate. Of what would befall him when I left. I asked the question to my Brother, but he only shook his head and clutched his book even closer than usual.
I knew what that meant. Destiny never sought to hide from me that which I knew already. If he kept his silence, then it meant that what befell was something I could not foresee.
Despair would not forgive his injury because the slight was centuries past. She could not, being what She is.
Jareth would need another patron and protector. Delight turned her back to him. Destiny was a negation of all he loved. Death's wings flew seldom where the faerie lived.
That left Dream and Desire.
"You asked them for help?" Barnabas licked his lips and looked wistfully at the empty bowl below him. "I've met them once or twice. Can't see it."
Destruction smiled and shook his head.
"I played on their vanity. I told them that I had a great gift for them, an ever-living king to serve their purposes and be an anchor in troubled times."
"Anchor?"
"We change. Endless we may be, but not constant. Your mistress can tell you much about that."
"You know she wouldn't."
Silence, for a moment. Then quiet agreement.
"No. She wouldn't."
The dog looked him in the eyes. Red hair shone golden in the afternoon light, and looked like nothing so much as a village on fire.
"You know."
He did not bother to deny it.
"I am what I am, and she was destroyed."
"Your elder sister?"
"She did not die, Barnabas. She was destroyed and rebuilt."
"Half-built."
"She is complete."
"Are we looking at the same goldfish?" It had left the owl and was now scratching its back against one of the hands of the painted clock.
"If she were fractured, I would feel it. That would call to me."
"But you would not answer."
"No." The reply came quickly.
The dog looked again at the broken city in the painting.
"He must be quite important to you."
"A friend. That's rare enough. An ally. He understood my ways, and appreciated my art."
"Your paintings?"
"Other creations. I did not always limit myself to paint."
"You were saying something about anchors."
"Yes... we change. Not always as dramatically as your mistress, but we do. Constantly, in small or large ways, depending on how we are seen, how we are perceived. Sometimes, when we are pleased with what we are, we do not wish to change. We find an anchor."
"To remember you..."
"To remember is not enough. The anchor must have weight to face the waves of countless other perceptions, without in turn being swayed by them. The Goblin King is an admirable anchor."
"Why give him up?"
"I knew I'd walk another path." Destruction picked a napkin off the table and began to twist it into loops. "We met at neutral ground - the sunken city of Atlantis. All of us took part in her fall, and we return there whenever we need to work together."
"I thought you said this Goblin King brought his kingdom with him."
"He did. A spider in his web; that's what he reminds me of. Jareth is at the centre of his own world - the geography of his land reflects that. A castle forms about him, surrounded by a maze."
"Sounds uncomfortable."
"It does not move as often as you might believe. For our discussion, it did. It had to. My Brother and Sibling needed to see it. If the patronship were to be transferred, his kingdom could have no foothold in my realm."
He wore a Selkie's costume to the meeting. He had a right to it, on his mother's side, though for him the seal-skin was merely ornamental. His breeches were of naga scale, and his waistcoat threaded silver. His shirt...
You're right, Barnabas. You don't care much for clothes. I mention them so that you'll know the impression he made on his prospective patrons.
He was shining. Radiant. Desire wanted him for itself, and Dream was intrigued. There was no hiding that. For all we're family of sorts, those two are rivals - that each wanted the prize only made it the more attractive.
Jareth and I had a chance to speak privately before the audience.
I explained the choice he had to make. When I say his kingdom could have no foothold in mine, I mean that in the strictest terms. If he took another patron and forsook me, he would never again be capable of destruction. Such was the price of our bond.
I hinted at what lay in my future. I did not tell it him explicitly, but I think he understood - that even if he did not leave me, that I would leave him.
The audience took place in what had been the royal hall. It was magnificent. I'd spared it my caress, because of that. Imagine a long corridor of greenstone and lapis lazuli, with pearl mosaics on the walls and stained-glass windows in the patterns of the ocean.
Oh. Quite right. I apologize, Barnabas. I'd forgotten your kind does not see colour.
Morpheus arrived dressed in the shifting seas - it is the dream of the merfolk, although they avoid Atlantis as haunted. His bones were coral and his eyes were pearls, and a death-knell followed his footfalls.
Why? I forget that you've not visited the sea-folk. Sirens dine on sailors. A toll on the ocean warns of a burial at sea - the mermaids take it for a dinner-bell. Their great desire is human flesh. They dream of an un-struggling treat bound in canvas.
No, it isn't wasted. They make their clothing from the shrouds.
That is why my Sibling appeared as it did. Long, silky hair strewn with shells to look like stars in blackest night. A face smooth and beautiful on either sex, with skin like a fish's underbelly and the eyes of a shark. All above the waist was covered in an elaborate shirt made of sack-cloth and rope. Long cuffs showed off smooth hands with nails as long and sharp as they were polished and of beautiful proportion.
Below the waist-
No, I'm not trying to make you hungry, Barnabas. It's just that I don't have an audience very often, and I've been wanting to tell this story for-
All right, I'll be faster and less... succulent, as you put it.
My Sibling wore a fish's tail, with elaborate fins and patterned scales.
You see? That was fast. Its fins where razor-sharp; the merfolk value that. Difficult to eat, and useful in battle.
Yes, I know you swallow chicken bones regularly. It's different. Really.
Jareth sat on the Atlantean throne, chin on hand, and waited for the bidding to begin. He juggled bubbles with his other hand. Very clever of him. He offered to teach me, once. I wish I'd taken him up on it.
I? I was the power behind the throne, quite literally. My shape then glowed with sunlight.
Desire was the first to speak.
No, I don't remember its exact words. That's my Sibling's way. You hear what you wish to, and then forget the details the minute you turn your head.
In point of fact, yes, it WAS very difficult growing up with my family.
I do remember the gist of it, though. If you're patient and hear me out, I'll show you my OTHER recent paintings. And make more beef stew.
Desire swam before the throne. Jareth had enough of the Selkie about him that he could breathe the water when he chose to.
My Sibling made its case.
It was well known, it said, that Jareth was a King of great desires. Conquests, kingdoms, children, riches, even the odd lady fair, though these would leave him bored in weeks.
Less well known was what Desire itself was privy to: the finest foods were ashen in his mouth, for he had tried them all. The flattery of courtiers now was only flat, for he knew well his charms and did not need them told him. Each conquest, land or lady-love, now blended with the rest. His silken sheets were thistle-burrs, his armies broken toys.
Desire would give him what he wished, before he knew he wished it. Women, perfect for his needs, who'd vanish just before he rued them. Kingdoms begging for his rule, seceding if they bored him. Food from times and places never tasted yet on Earth.
Dream smiled his quizzical thin smile, and bade his time.
Jareth tapped his cheekbone with his forefinger. He listened, bubbles shifting in his hand reflecting thoughts considered in his head.
Desire continued, listing triumphs from the past: Helen was its creature, Troy's a war so beautiful the poem yet survived. Alexander'd had its favour - dying young, but much fulfilled. Temujin, the Mongol Khan, had but to beckon at what he desired.
The Goblin King was tempted. He could not do other but succumb. My Sibling is temptation. It had long been his ambition to bring war to all of Faerie; to repay Titania's slights with better governance than hers.
Before he could say 'yes', my brother raised his palm.
He asked Desire about the women that it planned to send. Would they be mindless, or have feelings of their own?
The Goblin King shot up his eyebrows. He likes... spice.
My Sibling, knowing this, said that they would have their own minds, if somewhat nudged toward the right direction by its touch.
And when they left him? asked Dream.
That, replied Desire, was no one's business but its own.
My brother's smile was wider here, and we could see his mouth was filled with shark teeth. They were his business - shattered dreams, the fractured hopes of those who Jareth loved and left. This would destroy their private worlds.
Destruction, which was now forbidden by our patron's pact.
My Sibling may be beautiful, but it was always more impulsive than planning or thoughtful.
Kingdoms, argued Morpheus, would be the same. A revolution or secession all would bring destruction. All would be forbidden.
No more could Jareth conquer, no more could he abandon. His only path was loyalty and faithfulness - which everyone assembled knew he shunned.
Desire tried one last gamble. It could yet make the Goblin King content, it countered, by manipulating its desires - by making Jareth glad of only that he had. Content to live within his maze, alone, without an army.
This would not do. The Goblin King said 'no' - a gentle word of power. He would rather face Despair than be unchanging, rather die than nevermore find joy in novelty.
He made Desire his foe, that moment. And he paid for it, quite bitterly, in later years.
Dream had now to plead his case - no more competing with Desire, but with no patron and the anger of Despair.
Yes, I'm quite sure there is enough beef for another pot of beef stew. It's in the freezer; that's why you can't smell it.
Now, if you'll just listen - I'm almost done.
And it IS a good story. I read it once in the library of unwritten tales.
Now, where... ah, yes. My Brother's appeal.
He told the Goblin King that he would offer him no women, and no kingdoms, and that this itself was a gift. His realm would share its nature with the Dreaming - have its share of visitors, who shaped the land according to their taste and nature, with little regard for his. The visitors would never stay. They would pass through, as dreamers do, though in their journeys they'd be wide awake, and truly there.
It would be unpredictable, chaotic, shifting, driven by his whims and those who wandered there through proper spells or accident. And he himself would dream most vivid dreams...
It might seem dangerous, to one who valued stable selves. But Jareth, Morpheus thought, was different. All thoughts, of guests, or his, would change his realm, which would change him. He'd never stagnate, never be the same. All that Dream asked was that the core, the one true constant of his kingdom, be his memory - an anchor's only duty.
The Goblin King again was tempted, though he worried on one count. His realm would leave the lands of Faerie. This would help relations with Titania, true - but if he had no lands, if his kingdom shared a nature with the Dreaming - how would visitors stumble into it? How could they by accident cross worlds?
My Brother guaranteed a border with the Dreaming, and a steady stream of dreamers with the proper mind-set. Those with magic, those who wrote, those who chance had blessed with ways of finding things. The paperwork would, of course, have to be settled by their respective seneschals. Dream trusted that the Goblin King had a passport office.
In addition, he would guarantee that at least one poet a generation would write a work with the proper words of invocation. The summoning, dismissal, and even the crib-robber's song that Jareth pressed on all his subjects. They would not be forgotten.
This was over-generous of Dream, and unasked for - but he was anxious to have such an anchor. The Goblin King in residence adjacent to his lands, with reason to think always of his benefactor. Times were changing, and the dreams of men, and Morpheus was ever one to shun such changes in himself that he did not control completely.
Nothing would be destroyed, he promised. Only transformed. I nodded at this, for I knew it to be true. The kingdom would be vast, but immaterial, and have no power over that which truly was.
Desire had one last parting blow, and these words, I remember:
"But sometimes dreams come true, dear Brother. The truth of what's desired will bring Despair."
It was a prophecy. My Sibling would fulfil it at the earliest opportunity - it never has lost well.
A dream fulfilled is a powerful thing, and that power, more often than not, would be used for destruction. Forbidden destruction, in this case. It happens even with your kind, I'm sure. You dream of a mate, then you meet her, and the clash of your dream and reality destroys a part of your lives, a part of the relationship that could have been. Cervantes wrote about it very well - I'll have to read his work to you some day.
No, that's not a threat. It's meant to be a treat, Barnabas.
I wasn't going to let that happen to my... well, my friend. He was, and is, although we can't see each other now. We write. And he has broadband.
I gave my most solemn oath that I would not allow his dreams to come true. Should it ever threaten to happen, I'd shatter his kingdom myself before he could perform his own act of destruction.
And I did.
Though it took much longer to happen than I thought it would.
This is the twentieth anniversary of my one quick return from retirement.
Of course I was worried. You know what has happened in the last three centuries; I did not want to see my realm. More to the point, I did not want it to see me.
Somehow, I managed. There for the blink of an eye.
I traveled first as memory, then out as the words of a young woman, and on my way back here, laid waste to what he'd built so carefully for centuries.
He thanks me for it now. Now. It took ten years, and Daniel.
Why, yes. You hadn't guessed? I told you this story was important.
I shattered the power base of his anchor, bound by an ancient promise made on the sea-floor.
Without the Goblin King's memories and all they brought, Morpheus was forced to change, after centuries of luxurious stability.
He made Jareth's choice. They were very alike, the two of them. The old Jareth and ancient Dream.
My new Brother reminds me of the white owl.
"Well, that's the story." Destruction leaned over the finished painting and carefully picked up the goldfish. He placed it carefully on the dog's back. The fish seemed happy at the arrangement, and relaxed against the fur with no concern for air or gravity.
"She's tickling me."
"I'm sorry, but you have to be the one to return her to my Sister. After delivering the painting, of course. I don't think Delirium would appreciate my way of bringing it back to her."
"Quite right. She's very protective of them."
The artist wrapped the painting in a protective cover and put it in a plastic bag with a handle just the right size for Barnabas to carry in his jaws.
"There you go, then. Give my best to Jareth. Remember it's the castle beyond the goblin city that you want. And watch for cranes. They've been rebuilding." Barnabas picked up the bag and waited. "Goblin king, goblin king, wherever you may be, I wish you would take this... talking dog, goldfish and carefully-wrapped painting away, right now."
And he did.
END