HI EVERYONE! Okay, so this is a belated Christmas gift for my best friend whose name I have changed to protect, Sng2sr. I had had this idea rolling around in my head anyways and when I told her about it she agreed it would be awesome! For those of you waiting for an update of Of Cobwebs and Crystals I'm working on it. But between work, midterms projects and exams and life in general it's been pretty hard to find a quiet moment to write. Also, hardcore Potter heads please have mercy on me since it's been a very long time since I read the first Harry Potter book, which is the time setting of this story. I do hope I got everyone's character down right but if I didn't I apologize in advance. That being said, please enjoy this little oneshot.
Disclaimer: I own neither Labyrinth or Harry Potter
They were all celebrating. Celebrating his defeat at the hands of a mere mortal girl. No, she was more than a mere mortal. A mere mortal could have never summoned him in the first place. Not him, not the goblins. The world now was a shadow of its former splendor, and all at the hands of human beings. They had all once believed, and so he'd been allowed to come and go between the planes at least once a week.
Now, now they had all discounted it as silly nonsense easily explained by natural phenomena. Science had destroyed magic. The owl shook his head. Such a pity, he thought, too many children nowadays were forced to become adults much before their time. Hardship had been present in the past ages, but not to this violent degree. The invention of new technologies, new weapons had advented the coming of a world plagued by death. And yet, through it all one mortal girl had held the strength, the belief to call across the veils and reach him. He bristled as he remembered her rejection of all he had offered her, all that he was.
Her will as strong, her kingdom as great. Now he would be doomed to watching her afar for the rest of her days, watch as she grew and aged, and ultimately died. Her lifespan would be longer than others of her ilk, as was the norm with those who had been touched. His heart already broke at the thought that she would outlast her offspring, her family, and that eventually she would be forgotten and no one would mourn her grave. No one that was, except him.
A sudden familiar tug at his soul stirred him from his melancholy thoughts. A summons? But, nothing was ever this strong. He felt it amplified, like someone was shouting in his ear. Getting one last look at the party he fled his branch and flew off into the moon, into the night.
His muscles burned like they hadn't in years. He was frantic as the magic woven through his soul at the time of his unavoidable coronation as monarch of the goblin realm pulled at him. Urging him on, faster, faster. The call was blaring through his body as he flew. Flew over cities and towns, over state lines and eventually over the coast of the continent. He flew over the ocean and the call once more reverberated around him. The amplification puzzled him though; even when his champion had called it had never been this strong. His senses picked up something; there was the normal frustration evident when his name was invoked, but something else. It was laced with fear, fear and hope.
Hope? He remembered, unbidden, the times when disgraced women, ones who had been raped and thrown out on the streets by their parents for being compromised –only found out when they were found to be with child- had called to him in their time of need, asking him to take the child and raise it as they knew they could not.
He came upon a small apartment complex in Little Whinging, Surrey. Thankfully, they had windows, one of which was open on that hot summer night. He could hear yelling and crying. He silently swooped in and found the source.
Two little boys, no older than five or six years of age. One standing tall and confident, the other curled into a ball. The standing one was laughing and taunting the other. He was fat, with flat dull hair and a chubby face. He reminded Jareth of a dwarf, only far too cruel to be one. The little boy had untamable ebony locks, and a set of glasses that appeared to have been broken, though whether accidentally of purposefully he wasn't sure.
"Please, please don't wish me away to the goblins!" the dark haired child cried, but Jareth sensed the hope that belied his words. For whatever reason, the boy wanted to be taken away.
"Too late!" the older boy sneered. "Once you say the words there's no going back you twit." His laughter, sounding like the braying of a mule, echoed throughout the room. "Of course, it would if goblins actually existed."
The little boy looked up at his tormentor. "Don't they?"
"Of course not! Are you daft as well as stupid? And a baby too!"
"I am not!"
"Only babies believe in goblins and fairies."
"Not so!"
"Bloody baby still believes in fairies!" the chubby one taunted. The smaller one bickered, though his voice was unintelligible over the other's shouting.
Suddenly, a grown fat man slammed open the door. "Oi, what's with all this ruckus!"
The chubby boy plastered on a wounded expression. "Dad, he won't do his chores, he's too busy day dreaming about the goblins and fairies!" he whined.
"I-" the other boy started to protest.
"Not a word out of you!" the grown man hissed. "You get your chores done and then head to your cupboard! Now!" he stormed out of the room, the door banging shut behind him.
The man's son looked at the little boy. "You heard him baby! Get back to work!" he turned to make his way out of the room but paused. "And don't forget, my mates and I are going to play your favorite game later."
"Skipping stones?" the boy asked hopefully.
The boy in the doorway gave an evil smile. "Oh, my mistake. We're not playing your favorite game. We're playing our favorite game. Try to find a better hiding spot this time, if we catch you too quickly it spoils all the fun!" his braying laughter sounded as he left the room.
The little boy with the inky hair stood unseeing at the spot the other had left empty, his knees gave out after his attempt at bravery and he started to sob.
Jareth watched from his vantage point. Typical protocol for a wished away child was to offer the aggressor their dreams in exchange, but he wasn't about to reward that snot nosed little brat for that sort of behavior. He transformed and crouched by the boy.
"Are you alright?" he asked softly.
The boy's hiccupping sobs turned to a mixed gasp of fear and awe at the sound of his voice. He stared at the Goblin King, scooting away backwards all the while.
"Who, who are you? Why are you here?" he stuttered.
Jareth cocked a brow. "Who do you think I am? Why do you think I'm here?" he asked in response.
The little boy gazed at him a moment, pensive as can be. Finally he said, "Are you the Goblin King?"
"Yes," Jareth replied.
"Are you here to take me away?"
"Did you make the wish?"
"No, Dudley did."
"The little brute taunting you about believing?"
"Ye- yes."
"Do you think it's a bad thing now that I'm here?"
"No, are you going to take me and turn me into a goblin?"
"Now why would I do that?"
"That's what the stories say. When you come to take a child the child gets turned into a goblin."
"Now that's absurd. I have plenty of goblins already, I don't need more."
"Oh," the little boy's face turned sullen. "So you're going back then?"
"Well, not without you of course, but yes."
"But, you just said you didn't need anymore goblins."
"That doesn't mean I'm going to leave you here. You were wished away; by magical law that allows me to take you. But only if you want to, or would you rather stay?"
"I want to go!" the little boy pleaded in earnest, his emerald eyes wide.
Jareth smiled, "Well then, we're off. Come here." When the little boy came close he picked him up and held him. "What's your name?" he asked.
"Harry," the little boy replied. "Harry Potter."
"Well then Harry, let's go home." With a swirl of fabric from his cape, they were gone.
They returned to the castle, still practically deserted since nearly all his subjects were celebrating with his Champion. Jareth set little Harry down on his feet, and he looked around.
"This is where you live?" he asked in wonder.
"You forget; this is where you live now too."
Harry's face widened with a disbelieving grin. "You mean I get to live here too?"
"But of course. Come, I'll show you to your rooms." Jareth grabbed his hand and led him up through the corridors of the edifice. Through winding staircases and up into one of the towers. "Here," he said as he opened one half of a set of double doors into a suit of rooms, the first being a large parlor.
"You mean I get to stay in this big room?" Harry asked as he looked around. "But, there's no bed."
"Your bedroom is through that door there." Jareth pointed to another set of double doors.
"Wow! I've never had more than my little cupboard before!" Harry exclaimed. "This is incredible! It's, it's"
"Magical?" Jareth supplied.
Harry looked at him for a moment. "Yeah! It's magical!" he threw himself at the king's legs in a hug as big as he could muster. "Thank you, so much!" he whispered.
"You're quite welcome." Jareth replied. "Now if you'll excuse me I have some other business to attend to."
"Other business?" Harry asked.
"Yes, since you're going to be living here, I need to make sure that those you left behind won't remember you. Your parents and brother and such."
"You don't have to worry about that." Harry protested.
"Of course I do, otherwise they'll be looking for you and-"
"No they won't." Harry cut in.
"But they are your family are they not?"
"They're my relatives, but I wouldn't call them family." Harry muttered.
"Why not?"
"I've seen people treat their dogs better than the Dursleys treated me. But I suppose being treated like a servant is better than being treated like an animal."
"Regardless, I still need to erase their memories of you."
"Trust me, they'll so that on their own. They never like me, but my aunt was my mum's sister so they took me in."
"What happened to your mother?"
"She and my dad died in a car accident, or so I've been told. I was the only one who survived, with this scar." He brushed up his bangs to reveal a lightning bolt scar on his forehead.
"How did one auto accident leave you with only a scar like that?"
"I don't know, all I can seem to remember is screaming and a green light." Harry replied.
"Well, if you say they never cared enough about you I suppose I don't have to erase their memories, yet. I'll have to keep an eye on the mortal world. If anyone suspects your disappearance action will have to be taken."
"Alright," Harry agreed.
And so it went, Harry Potter grew up within the walls of the Goblin Kingdom and under the protection of the Underground. The entire land grew to know him as Prince of the Labyrinth and heir to the Goblin Throne. Jareth showed him many things about magic; carefully though for sensing the boy was not like other mortals, not even similar to his precious Sarah. Then again, no one was like his Sarah.
However, in the Wizarding World, things were in uproar. Because of the blood protections caused by the familial blood running through Petunia Dusrsley's veins, the magical signature showed that Harry Potter still lived with them. However, when it came time to send out the Hogwarts acceptance letters Harry's was immediately burned, unopened. When sending letters became inefficient Rubeus Hagrid was sent to bring the boy back himself. His journey was fruitless, as the Dursleys explained the one night Harry had simply vanished and they had thought that the previous threat had been firmly put to rest and Harry had been taken back to the Wizarding world, where he and other "freaks" like him belonged.
Chaos soon ensued as search parties were sent far and wide looking for the boy. Suspicious character were caught and questioned under veritaserum about their knowledge of his whereabouts. All replied they knew nothing.
Meanwhile several crystals Jareth had set up as a network of knowing whether or not the boy was being searched for began to trip as the Wizarding World's search swept into the Muggle one. Jareth was called away from playing a game with the young princeling to see what the cause of this commotion was about. His crystals revealed all. He saw that Harry was being searched for, not by human mortals. But by witches and wizards, the society that had shunned their roots eons before. That explained a lot about his unofficially adopted son: his love for magic, his way of easily getting on with the menagerie of mythical creatures that made their homes in his domain, his few instances of starting out in one part of the kingdom, and ending up on the opposite side in but a few hours time. Harry was a wizard.
With a troubled expression he returned to the boy, now eleven mortal years of age.
"What's wrong?" Harry asked him.
"Do you recall all those years ago when I said that if people were to start searching for you action would have to be taken?"
"Yes?" Harry replied, unsure of where his surrogate father was going with all of this.
"Well I'm afraid that day has come."
"so, you'll just erase all their memories right?"
"I'm afraid it isn't so simple as that anymore my boy."
"What do you mean?"
"Fae law dictates that any human child wished away becomes a ward, or in your case citizen, of the Goblin Kingdom. Any memory of said child is erased upon arrival into care of the Underground. However Harry, it would seem you are a special case indeed."
"Why? I'm a human child and I was wished away."
"It would seem you are far more than a mere human Harry."
"What?"
"Apparently unbeknownst to us both, you are a possessor of magical abilities." At his puzzled look Jareth elaborated. "You're a wizard Harry."
"I'm a wizard?"
"Yes, and as a wizard you technically belong to a whole world that exists within the mortal one. Harry," Jareth pulled a letter the network had picked up and held it out to him. "You may stay here, if you like. This will always be your home. However, there is a great deal of people searching for you. And though I may be able to train you, your powers as a human will differ greatly than mine as a Fae. Besides, I'm assuming your parents came from this world, the people there will be able to educate you about them far better than I. The choice is yours my boy."
Harry's eyes darted between the letter and the man holding it for a few endless moments. Finally, taking a deep breath, Harry reached for the letter, and tore the seal.
So yay me! Btw, this will only continue if my friend wants me too as it is part of her Christmas gift. But please leave a review anyways!