This is all an experiment that came to mind one day. I've been wanting badly to write Labyrinth fanfiction for awhile now, but was too intimidated of the fantastic writers out in that archive presently. This idea came to me through a few youtube videos of the famous J/S pairing, and I had to write it down. I always wondered what would happen if, instead of Sarah accidentally being sent back to the Underground under unknown terms or either willingly going back to save Jareth, she came back for the opposite. What if she had lost all things once held dear to her, if she had been inwardly wounded from this loss, and eventually was brought to corruption against the Underground. This is the experiment. Read, review, enjoy! Poetry credit goes to Hopkins; I own none of the characters of the Labyrinth, but I do own Oriyn and future characters created from my mind.
Ah! As the heart grows older
It will come to such sights colder
By and by, nor spare a sigh
Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;
And yet you will weep and know why. –Hopkins
A disturbing hush spread its deceitful wings, stretching and unfurling across the darkened room. Voices whispering in low distortion and varied by several languages of the Underground flitted through the atmosphere of excitement that grew progressively into a dull roar. The time when all would change drew nearer. The flaming candles quickly lost their vigor and strength by each second, the glow illuminating diversely grotesque creatures alike now casting their faces into the shadows. He was coming: the Unseelie King. Boots out of audible hearing over a minute ago now echoed the halls outside the doors of the circular room. All chatter, all talk of the imminent darkness forthcoming the Underground was quieted… for now. He stormed in like a wildfire blazing violently in the rain—unstoppable and unable to be put out unless gripped at its vital source. Following in pursuit was the King's messenger, commonly prepared to announce the suffocating presence of their King consuming all trace of oxygen in the room.
"His Majesty, Lord of the Unseelie, High King of the Fallen, Oriyn." All rose to their highest heights, bowing until they either lost balance or reached the base of their ankles.
"Everyone may be seated," the husky tenor of Oriyn's voice barreled off the walls. He seated himself into a throne woven of rose vines and fallen, contorted tree limbs of the blackest ebony, watching in satisfaction as his court followed command and sank to half of their heights. In exchange, he rose to his full height for the fateful conversation, waving a hand in a circular direction to ignite all flames extinguished with his entrance.
Upon first laying sight on the Unseelie King, one would have a glimpse at the creature beneath the surface of such a beautiful face. Those viewing would be warned at that first gaze of his treachery and lies—lies that built his kingdom block-by-block and limb-by-limb. But of that momentary foretaste, the outcast Fae trickery is gone, the creature starving for battle behind lidded eyes is gone. Oriyn is seen primarily as the devil is seen by naïve souls: handsome and tempting in his wiles of unspoken pleasure and even lustier dreams. To his subjects, he is deemed frightening, creatures always plagued with the threat of death upon disobeying. In this present situation, both demeanors chose to walk hand-in-hand.
Every goblin, dwarf, troll, wicked Fae, and other lost creatures alike fell into Oriyn's silence. The King's eyes radiated an unearthly purple, tips of his hair standing at attention and outwardly blending into the blackness of the heavily-incensed room. The time was now to act. To corrupt the one precious frailty that could bring down the heir to the Seelie throne and his Kingdom of Illusions.
Sarah. Precious Sarah.
Not so precious and magic-loving now, he thought with a victorious smirk.
"For years we have all been wandering aimlessly outside the Seelie Court. More than half of our wars have left our population severed. But not now. Not anymore." Oriyn growled. His fist clenched so tight that all color was vacant in his skin and began to pace. A conquering smile pulled at the corners of his mouth. "We have watched for years to find a crack in the wall, a born destroyer we could use to crumble that wall and seize the Seelie Kingdom for ourselves. Half a decade ago, a dreamer of the Aboveground wished her brother to the Goblin King." An unrestrained awe settled over his listeners, for they knew as well as he did of that prophecy. "Jareth had fallen in love with this girl as it had been foretold five centuries ago. She fought to retrieve her brother, and won. And the heir to becoming High King of the Seelie throne was completely smitten, that he offered her own dreams in exchange.
"She crushed them without knowing the consequences." Pointed teeth surfaced through Oriyn's lips, a vicious smile imminent. "This is where we come to pick up the pieces of her shattered life, and blacken them. We wouldn't want the future High Queen to ascend her title, now would we?"
Preoccupation was only a momentary skill acquired in order to maintain a special type of sanity for offensive thoughts. This skill had been acquired by the time Sarah reached her senior year of high school, and at times like these, preoccupation came secondary as a blanketing cover to past memories. Was she willing to take down that mask? No. She continued to scrub away at these influential memories that forever remain unclean—all dreams that once seemed attainable and within her own grasping reach.
It's been five years now and Sarah was twenty, the age of crossroads. Stardom had never befallen her as she hoped it would, no matter the effort made to achieve it. College was of her own fortune: she studied hard to accept that benefit and it was well-received. Acting, however, lost its spark the second she left the Underground and its Goblin King behind.
The Goblin King. Jareth, Sarah thought.
She proceeded to clean the plates once holding their afternoon lunch on Karen's request, pushing away unprecedented thoughts perturbing her concentration. Summer had spun her bright webs around Sarah's life again—needless to say no school, responsibility, or social obligations to live up to in the world she felt she had no place in. Her only duties required watching over a spontaneous Toby when her stepmother and father had nights out. This, she now came to understand what she had not five years ago. Life gave no breaks; no easy ways past work or parenting that teenagers came to believe existed. When an occasion arrived for any type of break on strenuous working hours, it was most likely seized when offered. The Labyrinth helped her understand this: work to keep what you have alive, because chances are, you won't have it in the future.
Like her dreams.
Tears came to the surface then, but she refused to let them escape her moist eyes. Keep working, and you will forget.. The dreams offered to her at that tender age, she realized, were not supposed to be shattered. She had always thought they were childish fantasies contained inside the crystal, not all of the lifelong achievements she could have held onto, if she accepted his offer. He didn't want her to keep searching for thin air, he wanted her to clutch to the possible that is now impossible. Sarah slammed the roughened sponge on the counter in familiar grief. She turned everything away selfishly and childishly. If only he could understand that fifteen years in mortal years was not enough to make firm decisions at.
At twenty years she could have made the right choice. She didn't. Time ran a long enough course that her aspirations and wishes transformed themselves into a form of bitterness, blooming even deeper when nightly visions were of his kingdom and the quiet promises laying behind castle doors. For once, she can admit it.
Sarah Williams lost her dreams.
The everlasting sunlight shone into the kitchen with an ethereal brightness to its rays. Toby would be playing in the backyard right about now. She let a small smile replace the frown, watching her little brother run his tiny feet across the grass in order to keep pace with Merlin. She may have relinquished all claims on achieving a brighter future than the one set in stone for her, but laying eyes on Toby, Sarah knew that he had a promising comfort ahead of him. He had parents who adored him; his little blond ringlets, the open blue contrasting her enigmatic green eyes. Toby had over a decade to work for greatness. She surpassed all exceptions.
"If only…" she whispered. A breeze swept through the window and entered her sinuses with the sweetest smell of spice in the air. The air shifted heavily, bathing the skin on her arms into a light sweat. "If only I hadn't been that young when I entered the Labyrinth. Maybe things would have been different."
Sarah averted her attention from Toby in the window to the dishes a second time, picking up the sponge and scrubbing her wishes away. There are no if only's. A tear fell for the first time in three years—for her forgotten friends, for her dreams, for a kingdom that altered her perception forever, and for Jareth.
For the future that never happened and never will happen.