A/N: I've always loved the Labyrinth; it's been one of my favorite movies since I was a little girl. Funny thing is, I would always ask my dad, "Daddy, why didn't she stay with the Goblin King? Doesn't he love her?" And he'd always say, "Because he's the bad guy, Lainie." My six-year-old mind had accepted this answer, no matter how many times I asked and I already knew he would say he same thing. Not until I was twelve did I begin to think otherwise; now I'm fifteen, writing a fan fiction to satisfy what I always thought 'should have been.' That probably doesn't make sense, that something so little would bother me…

But it does. Now read and review, please!

DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT, and WILL NOT EVER own the Labyrinth… much to my dismay.

XXX

Chapter I: Life As She Knows It

She forbade herself to think about him.

It wasn't as though she thought about him every waking moment in her impassive life; but, she did think about him at times. And when she did, she forced her eyes shut and threw herself onto her bed to scream into her pillow. She didn't want her mind to wander off and subject herself to picture him, yet she did. Her mixed feelings when she thought of him confused her so much; then she'd think to herself: I mean, isn't he supposed to be the villain?

Oh, but she knew that wasn't the case.

On her run through the Labyrinth, she wanted him to be the villain. And because she wanted him to be the villain, he allowed himself to be the villain. He did so because she wanted it, and she knew he would give her anything she desired… he still did in his own little ways, even after she so utterly humiliated him by throwing his twisted but beautiful offer back in his face.

Sarah Williams pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration; she should be studying right now. She was currently spread on her stomach across her bed, propped up on her elbows so as to continue flipping through her Drama History book. She glanced at her study guide paper, reading the last question aloud: "What were the major effects dealt by Shakespeare's writings in his time?"

Sarah voice died at the end of her words, her eyes changing into a dazed expression. Hmm… how did he fair after everything?

"Sarah!" A voice interrupted her thoughts. Sarah glanced to the doorway, and beamed at the sight of her little brother. Seven-year-old Toby hadn't changed too much since he was two, the exception being that his golden hair had grown into a crown of curls and his light skin was adorned with a few scratches and bruises that a child endures during his horseplay. His usually mischievous eyes were very tired, Sarah noted, which was often a rare thing for the boy. He thumped his way into her room, and tugged persistently on the short sleeve of his sister's lavender nightgown. "You know the deal," He mumbled, "story before bed." The young woman arched an eyebrow at this, but nodded in humorous agreement anyways. She scribbled down a quick answer to her last question, then tossed the paper and book carelessly under her bed.

This 'deal' that Sarah and Toby had arranged was quite simple: Every time Sarah came home from the NYU for the holidays, she'd have to tell Toby a story every night she spent there… or else he'd drive their parents crazy with his nonstop crying due to her absence. So long as he heard her stories and could memorize her voice, he wouldn't shed a tear. They shook on it, and their deal had been upheld for almost fourteen months now.

As Sarah swung her legs over the ledge of her bed, Toby took the opportunity to settle himself onto her lap. She smiled endearingly as she tousled his hair, asking, "So! What story do you want to hear tonight?"

Toby grinned somewhat half-heartedly, which made Sarah frown in concern, but was forced to forget it and roll her eyes at his request. "I wanna hear the one 'bout the Goblin King!"

"Toby," she sighed, "you always want to hear that one. Why not a different one tonight?"

"You told me a different one last night, and said you would tell me about the Goblin King tonight!" He whined. Sarah's eyes shifted away in annoyance for a minute before she looked back at the child. True, she and Toby had grown unimaginably close ever since their return from the Labyrinth… but that didn't mean he couldn't still be a pain in the butt sometimes. She had learned to deal with it better rather than wish him away, though…

She looked at him, and noticed that he was dozing off. A flicker of worry brushed through her face as she lightly shook Toby, "Hey, what's wrong? Why so tired tonight? Don't you want to hear the story about… the Goblin King?" She hesitated before she voiced his title, never allowing herself to speak his name. She had never said his real name before; she knew it, but she never said it. She didn't know why exactly… even the child noticed her failure to mention the Goblin King's true name, but then she'd just shake her head and say that she couldn't remember, that she didn't know.

He yawned and snuggled into her embrace, mumbling incoherent words until she finally caught on to, "Well, aren't you going to tell it now?"

Her lips parted slightly as the vivid image of the Goblin King painted itself in her mind, and she closed her eyes as she began: "Once, there was a girl who was forced to stay at home with her baby brother all the time, while her parents went out to extravagant parties. One night, her stepmother's cruel words had hurt her, and she was fed up with babysitting. She thought that words were just words, and without really thinking of all the bad things that could come out of it, she wished the King of the Goblin's would come and take her little brother away…"

Sarah paused, looking around her room just to check for… well, whatever she should check for. She had been much more careful with her words concerning the Goblin King throughout the past five years, fearing that if she said the 'right' words, he or his goblin subjects would appear again. This was just one of the many reasons she was reluctant to tell Toby of this tale, but the child had always innocently insisted, never knowing why his older sister hesitated when it came to his favorite story. Satisfied that her words had not caused any malfunction or summoning, she continued: "But what no one knew was, that the King of the Goblins had fallen in love with the girl…"

It would be about this time in the story where Toby would have scrunched up his nose in distaste and jeered, "Ewww!" But not tonight. Tonight, he was fast asleep on Sarah's lap, which left the young woman both relieved and disappointed. There were, in fact, nights where she enjoyed telling him the tale of the Goblin King.

Carefully, she propped his head at her collar bone, arms wrapped safely around his dangling body as she carried him to his room. He had gotten his own room a little over two years ago, relishing in having his own space where he could draw and pin up as many of his colorful and fantasy-filled pictures as he wanted. Karen had been more than upset to learn that her son had followed in his older half-sister's footsteps, equipped with an overactive imagination and a knack for collecting things that she only saw as junk. It didn't bother Robert so much, so long as he behaved well enough to earn all his posters, toys, and books.

Sarah gently lowered the boy onto his bed, tucking him in. She gave him a quick peck on the forehead, and turned back to the doorway. She froze immediately, her eyes widening in astonishment: a dark silhouette stood at the door frame, and Sarah could've sworn she could see traces of midnight blue glitter floating around a black cape. She opened her mouth to scream, but no sound came. Instead, a choking sensation lodged itself in her throat before she heard her stepmother's voice whisper, "Sarah?"

The young woman gagged in relief, placing a hand on her brother's dresser to keep her balanced on her feet. "K-Karen!" She wheezed.

Mrs. Williams frowned, grabbing Sarah none-too gently by the elbow and leading her out of Toby's room. "What's the matter with you? You want to wake up your brother by scaring him to death!? You know he hasn't been feeling very well lately, Sarah."

The young woman's temper flared slightly, and she felt her childish fifteen-year-old self emerging from within herself once more. "No Karen, you didn't tell me how Toby has been feeling lately. Even dad failed to mention it."

Karen rolled her eyes and sighed. "Come now Sarah, no need to get so fussy with me. I'm just concerned, is all--"

"What's wrong with Toby?" Sarah rudely interjected, passing over their small argument for what her father hadn't told her since she had flown in from New York yesterday afternoon.

For a moment Karen looked downcast as she replied, "He's been acting this way for over a month now. He's always saying he's tired, and he gets these bruises on his body that he can't explain. I thought he was faking it so he could stay home from school, but--"

"That's it, Karen. His bruises are just from playing around too roughly with other kids, and he's a growing boy with energy being burned out from him everyday. No wonder he's so tired now! But he can't be tired all the time, so he has to be faking it." The young woman stated as though her explanation answered everything.

Karen just shook her head, lightly touching her forehead with her fingertips. "I just don't know, but your father and I are taking Toby to the doctor's tomorrow morning, early. We don't expect you to come, so you'll have the house to yourself probably until the afternoon or so. We'll call you as soon as the check-up is over with." Sarah simply shrugged and yawned, walking past Karen as though she weren't there, and went into her room. She closed the door without so much as saying good night.

Sarah closed her eyes and leaned back against her door. Try as she might, Sarah still couldn't bring herself to recognize Karen as a respectable adult, and sadly, her father knew this as well. He still tried now and then to get them spend time together, but both women made it very difficult to do so.

The girl allowed herself to open her beautiful peridot-colored eyes to survey her room, and sighed in content. The very next day after she had returned from the Labyrinth, she grabbed large trunks and boxes from the attic, and somewhat angrily packed away all her fantastic belongings. Her books, her teddy bears, costumes, her dramatic make-up, her figurines and dolls, pictures… everything that reminded her of him, she hid away in the storage boxes.

"It's like she grew up over night!" Her father had joked with Linda, her true mother, over the phone. He was startled by her sudden change in behavior, and confided in Linda about it.

"She's a teenager, Bobby." She still used his old, endearing nickname, "You never know when they change, or how long it will take." Sarah still talked to her mother as often as she could via telephone and sometimes through e-mail, but they had not seen each other in years. Living a busy, popular, and fashionable life in LA could do that to family relationships, but Sarah learned not to mind it so much as she had when she was younger.

Sarah resumed back to examining her near to empty room. She remembered that once everything had finished being cleared out, she felt alien to the blank walls and spotless tops to her dressers; it didn't feel like her room at all. In time she grew accustomed to it, but there was always that sense of emptiness that presented itself to her. A shimmer of glitter caught her eye at the base of her dresser, placed right by her mirror: the one thing she couldn't bring herself to hide away in the attic.

Two months after her drastic decision to rid herself of the beautiful decorations, Sarah's longing to keep a part of what had once been her majestic room had begun to eat away at her. On a lazy afternoon, when everyone was tending to their own business, Sarah crept up the attic stairs and opened one of her boxes. She rummaged through the objects for a while, each one closing and opening again as she was desperate to find one thing that could sum up the beauty of what her room had lost. She came to the second to the last of boxes, reaching through the mass of colors and cottons of her stuffed toys… until her fingers brushed against something.

She wrapped her hand around the familiar object, little by little bringing it up out of the box. Her hand emerged, miniature doll in hand; the doll whose silver gown she had worn that haunting night in the glass ballroom, the doll that twirled in repeated circles to the soft melody of enchanting song he had sung to her that night as they danced together. She chewed on her lower lip for quite some time before coming to the decision that this was, in fact, the object she desired to remain in her room. Right or wrong, she wanted it in her room.

Toby had questioned her about it a few times, but she'd just say that she thought it was too pretty to put away with all the other stuff in the attic. Then she'd laugh as his eyes would widen and twinkle with glee at the thought of more things he could collect and arrange in his fantasy-fed room. She didn't mind when he wanted certain things that once belonged to her; she gave them to him, but only a certain amount so as not to have Karen complain that he already had too much stuff in his room, and he didn't need anymore.

Sarah walked over to her dresser, plucking the doll from its place. She turned it over and over in her hands, as though she were trying to find something out of place with it. She found nothing but the tiny knob at the side of the silver casing the doll was in, and not really thinking about it, she turned it backwards. This was the first time in five years she had turned the knob back; before she had always been conscious to the fact that this one little thing could trigger something related to the Goblin King, but her mind was too cloudy to acknowledge just exactly what she had done.

The young woman set the doll down, staring at it as though she were waiting for it to talk. But no; the doll just kept spinning in slow circles to the lovely music. The doll couldn't stop from spinning, and Sarah couldn't stop herself from singing the words of a song that she had tried so hard to forget:

There's such a sad love

Deep in your eyes

A kind of pale jewel

Open and closed within your eyes

I'll place the sky

Within your eyes…

Sarah seemed to be under a kind of trance, until she caught herself at the next verse. Not knowing why she suddenly felt dizzy, she quickly backed away from her dresser, only to have her back bump into something solid. She remained leaned against the solidity, fearing that if she moved, she would certainly faint. She had been looking down at the beige coloring of her carpet, dreading to look into her mirror that stood on her dresser. She had begun to tremble violently, yet the solidity did not move at all.

Breathing. A taught chest rising, then falling again as they took in breath, then exhaled. The solidity stood a full head taller than herself, so that his calm breathing pattern stirred the strands of her hair ever so wispily. She dared to move her hand in the slightest manner, brushing against what she already knew would be there: leather and the unimaginably soft cloth of a cloak. Still shaking, she forced herself to look into the mirror.

Her peridot eyes locked with his mismatched ones, a clash of icy blue and auburn brown. His unreadable expression quickly changed to a wild cat's grin before he tears into his prey, flashing slightly pointed pearly teeth, reminding her that he was definitely not human. In that moment, her legs seemed to turn into instant jelly. Her back pressed firmly to his front, her legs were beginning to give out on her and she began to slide down his body. His hands were quick stop the suggestiveness, and it seemed he was the only thing that was holding Sarah together.

The young woman's uncharted eyes never at one moment left his face. Had he always been this beautiful? He probably had been, but her immature fifteen year old past-self never truly recognized it she figured. His delving eyes were set atop high cheekbones, an elegant set of nose and lips and brows only adding to his mystifying beauty. His shock of blonde locks reached just past his shoulders, a white poet's shirt flowing through his black leather jacket and midnight blue cloak.

Her gaze fell back down to the carpet; she couldn't look at him anymore. He wasn't really here, was he? Of course not. She had defeated him at his own game. She had rejected him. She had humiliated him. Why on Earth would he just… show up?

"Sarah."

Whatever doubts she had about his not truly being there vanished as soon as her name was spoken from his graceful lips. Slowly, ever so slowly, she turned her whole body to face him, and forced herself to look up into his eyes. Her lips parted, and she felt a wave of emotion sweep through her as she watched his elegant eyebrow lift up in expectancy.

"Well, Sarah… how has life treated you these past years? Fair, I hope."

Then, Sarah could do the only thing she had really felt like doing since the moment her back bumped into his front.

She fainted.

XXX

A/N: So I'm sitting here at 4:54 in the fucking morning, because I felt that I couldn't sleep without completing this. I hope the reader's appreciate my sense of… generosity. You know, I was thinking about making this a one-shot… but, I'll just have to put that decision on hold for now. It all depends on the flow of reviews. I'll also start working on longer chapters if I'm satisfied with the reviews.

Until next time!