Introduction
This story attempts to answer the questions: Where did Jareth come from and why did he build the Labyrinth?
This is my first attempt at writing a fan fiction. I wrote this story in sort of a Grimm's fairy-tale style, where the descriptions are short and the narrative reads almost like it's been translated from another language. The ending has been left open so other people's fan fictions can compliment it.
4/27/05 Update: I reworked the ending. I prefer Jareth to have a slightly wicked side when it comes to Sarah and my original ending was a little too soft and cuddly.
Origins
The world was once ruled by magic. Sorcerers and witches were commonplace. Fairies and goblins were household pests. In a world where everyone and anyone can perform magic it ceases to be magical. It is simply the status quo. To live in a world without magic, now there was something to dream about.
In the beginning only a brave few dared turn their backs on magic. Shunned by the masses, they lived in the outlands fending for themselves. Without magic to aid their livelihoods they learned to farm and to hunt. In time their numbers grew. Small communities of Commoners began to form. It was by no means a utopia in the Common world. Those who held greater power in the Magical world still did so in the Common. Great sorcerers traded their magic for politics and war. The Common world saw cities and kingdoms form. Slowly but surely the Commoners began to outnumber the Magical. As the population shifted so too did the hold on the natural world. Commoners believed in rules and order. Since they outnumbered the Magical, their collective will imposed rules over nature. The sun rose in the east and set in the west. Time was constant and unwavering. Nature behaved in predictable ways. The Commoners views soon made them blind to the Magical world that they coexisted with. The only time in the day when that veil was lifted from the Commoner's eyes was in the thirteenth hour; the hour of twilight. It was then that the Magical world came back to haunt them. Ghosts and goblins; dragons and fairies; witches and warlocks---all that was Magical could be seen during the thirteenth hour.
It was during this time of transition that the boy Jareth was born into the Magical world. The son of the great sorcerer Tiernan, Jareth was shielded from any knowledge of the Common world. His father hated all that was Common and wanted his son's childhood to be filled only with memories of the Magical. Jareth was tutored by the strongest and most powerful of the remaining magicians. He was happy in his studies and blind to the severe cruelty of his father. Tiernan's anger towards the Common world spilled into every facet of his life. He was especially cruel to his young wife Lillia. Lillia was not a great magician and this angered Tiernan as it reminded him of the Commoners. Lillia could do nothing to shield herself from her husband's abuse. She dreamed of escaping to the Common world but feared leaving her son. As Jareth's magical skills grew Lillia become more confident in his ability to fend for himself.
Jareth was a mischievous little imp and saw nothing wrong with secretly following his mother on the night of her exodus. He hid behind the trees and watched her escape. Jareth saw nothing of great interest along the way and was getting quite bored. When his mother entered a dirty looking inn at the end of the road Jareth became confused. He peered inside though an open window and caught his first whiff of the Common folk. The people inside were dirty, shabbily dressed and the smelled worse than anything Jareth had ever smelled before. Why his mother should want to converse with such disgusting creatures he did not understand. As the sun began to rise he lost interest in this game and ran back to his father's castle. Jareth thought he would have a stern talk with his mother about the smelly creatures when she returned. She never did.
Lillia's flight from the Magical world infuriated Tiernan. To leave him for another sorcerer was one thing, but to run off to the Common world was quite another. It was the ultimate insult to him. He sent out every spell imaginable to punish her, but his magic could not breach the wall that divided the Magical from the Common. Tiernan took out his frustration on his subjects. Every day more and more of his subjects flocked to the Common world to escape his cruelty. Tiernan's kingdom became empty and barren. The more subjects he lost the weaker his magical powers became. It was then that he discovered the true source of his power. Tiernan was nothing more than a Magical parasite feeding off of other people's magic. With no one else around he was weakening.
Jareth began to learn of the Common world through his father's rages. He pieced together roughly what it was and who lived there. It bothered him to know his mother was vulnerable in the Common world with no magic to help her. Jareth decided he would go and find her, but the more he learned of the Commoners the more he feared them. He was still but a boy of twelve and the only world he had ever known was his father's kingdom. Jareth searched all of his magical texts to find a protection spell to shield him from the Commoners. His skills were still inexperienced and crude. The best he was able to conjure was an amulet to wear round his neck. On it he placed a protection spell used by the messengers of war. The spell allowed the wearer to pass unharmed through any kingdom.
With the amulet round his neck, Jareth attempted to find his way back to the Common world. At first he could not find it. Day and night he walked along the same path his mother had taken on the night of her escape. Try as he might he could never find the smelly inn. Jareth strained to remember the details of that night. He remembered that the clock had chimed. It was in the thirteenth hour that his mother had left. It was in the thirteenth hour that he would find her.
The inn was as revolting as it was before, but Lillia was not there. The stench of the Commoners made Jareth gag and he stumbled hurriedly away from it. Walking beyond the inn, deeper into the Common world, Jareth strained his senses to find his mother. On the wind he caught her sweet scent. It was fainter than he remembered it, but the stench of the Commoners had not yet enveloped her. She was not far from the inn. Jareth found his mother in a strange stone building filled with modestly dressed women. Each one wore a black and white outfit and knelt before statutes. They all seemed to be mumbling to themselves. The twilight was fading and Jareth did not want to be caught in the Common world. He ran back to the castle without speaking to his mother. At least he knew where to find her.
Tiernan soon tired of his unfulfilled vengeance towards Lillia. It was time to take a new wife. For his second bride Tiernan chose the witch Scatha, a woman of immense power whose hatred of the Common rivaled his own. While Jareth was not a Commoner, his mother was and it tainted the boy. Scatha could smell the stench of the Common world on Jareth and forbade him ever to come near her. She would just assume kill the boy, but until she could give birth to another heir, Jareth was held under the protection of Tiernan. It was not long before Scatha discovered the source of Jareth's stench; his secret visits to the Common world. It was powerful information she would use soon enough.
Scatha was with child and soon gave birth to a healthy son. When she was well enough to emerge from her chambers, she told Tiernan of Jareth's treasonous trips to the Common world. Tiernan was furious and banished Jareth from the kingdom, disowning him as rightful heir. He told the boy to go live with his mother in the Common world for he would never be King.
After his banishment, Jareth went to the Common world and attempted to speak to his mother. She did not remember him. By giving up her memories of the Magical she also gave up her memories of him. Jareth did not have a home with Lillia in the Common world. He was alone. Jareth made his new home in the Magical woods beyond Tiernan's kingdom. He did not have to scavenge for food or drink, for even the most stupid magician can create such meager needs. While he could take care of himself in the woods, loneliness consumed him. Jareth began to think of nothing but the baby boy who had usurped him. He began to plot revenge.
It was naïve of Jareth to think the baby would not be protected by numerous spells. As he stole into the nursery and began his spells, it became readily apparent that Jareth could not kill the baby boy. Jareth tried every spell he could think of but each one bounced off harmlessly. Only one was able to penetrate the cradle. Jareth was able to curse the baby to remain an infant. The spell would not last forever, but Jareth hoped it would last long enough for him to mature into a man and develop greater powers. It took several days before Scatha discovered Jareth had breached the nursery and placed the spell on her child. Despite her best efforts she could not lift the spell from the infant and simply had to wait it out. Her fury and frustration knew no bounds. Unable to find Jareth she killed Tiernan instead, desperate to punish someone for Jareth's trickery.
Jareth heard of his father's death and knew it was only a matter of time before Scatha would kill him too. He would not be safe in the Magical woods forever. Jareth knew that he had to find more magical powers but he did not know where to look. Jareth's visits the Common world had made him hypersensitive to the smells around him. As he sat in the woods, a fog rolled in around him. The chime of the bells in the distance marked the thirteenth hour. He inhaled deeply taking in the moist air. His body tingled and he sneezed. A series of sparks flew out from Jareth's nose in an array of misfired magic. Jareth was puzzled by what had just happened. It took him several reenactments to realize what he had discovered. In the thirteenth hour, when the veil between the Magical and the Common was lifted, a fog rolled in from the Common world into the Magical. It was no ordinary fog. It was a fog that contained all of the discarded magic from the Common world. All the magic he would ever need was in that fog.
Jareth's first attempts to capture the fog were futile. Jareth could not breath in enough. He could not capture it in a jar. He could not freeze it. He needed the magic but could not get at it. It was some time before he first began to form the bubbles. They were beautiful, but fragile. Every time he tried to touch one it would pop. With patience and persistence he finally began to form the fog into crystal balls. They were delicate but he could make them dance upon his fingers. With these crystal balls he had all the magic he would ever need.
Tired of living alone in the woods, Jareth set his mind to building his own kingdom. In the barren wastelands to the north he began forming swamps and forests. He erected walls and a castle. To punish trespassers he created the Bog of Eternal Stench and made it smell even worse than the Commoners. Into his kingdom he invited all the unwanted and disliked magical creatures. The singing Fireys would live in his forest. The pesky little garden fairies would roam his outer wall. All were welcome in his new kingdom, even the ugly little goblins. This became quite the joke amongst all the other Magical kingdoms. No one liked goblins and so they dubbed Jareth "The Goblin King" as an insult. He took the title proudly. He did not mind being the ruler of misfits and disliked creatures. He saw himself as one of them.
Jareth grew into manhood. While he stayed mostly within the confines of his own castle he did venture out into the other kingdoms to learn from them. Handsome and tall he became quite popular in the Kingdom of the Phantoms, where Jareth attended lavish Masquerade balls. It was in this kingdom that Jareth learned about music and became an accomplished singer. The Phantoms taught him to indulge in vices such as wine and women. It was here that he learned of lust. Jareth became one of the most sought after lovers in the Magical world. Quite consumed with this newly discovered talent, Jareth all but forgot his vendetta against Scatha and her infant. While Jareth was now a man, his half-brother still lay in his cradle.
The baby had been cared for by a succession of maids, but all grew tired of him. The baby himself had a sense that he had been an infant for far too long. As the years passed by his crying simply grew louder and his wails longer. There were many that just wanted to kill the boy and be done with it. The latest maid to watch over the boy was tired and frustrated by his constant crying. She threatened the baby with stories of the Goblin King, telling him that Jareth would steal him away and turn him into a goblin. The baby simply cried. The maid snapped back with the words,
"I wish the Goblin King would come and take you away…right now." The air cooled around the maid and the nursery grew silent. The maid had done something that no other had been able to do before. She made a crack in the protection spells. The boy was in her care yet she did not want him. Nothing was more powerful than a wish and she had carelessly given Jareth the power to grant it.
The words rang in Jareth's ear and he flew to the castle as fast as he could. He grabbed the child just as Scatha entered the room. She too had heard the maid's words and realized the effect they would have on her protection spells. Scatha killed the maid instantly for her stupidity. She cast evil spells towards Jareth but all bounced off. Her magic could not harm her own child and the infant shielded Jareth from her wrath. Jareth chastised Scatha saying he now had a rightful claim to the boy. She demanded the boy back, but Jareth denied her. Unsatisfied by such a simple ending to their war, Jareth challenged Scatha. He told her she had until the thirteenth hour to reach his castle before he would turn the child into a goblin.
Jareth retuned to his castle and quickly set obstacles in Scatha's way. In an instant he created the Labyrinth. He placed puzzles, creatures, and oubliettes throughout. Scatha found the Labyrinth to be more challenging than she would have imagined. Little did she know that Jareth was continually changing the pattern. Scatha was too late when she finally reached the castle. Jareth turned the baby into a goblin before her eyes and it scurried off into the distance. As punishment for Sactha's own treachery and the murder of Tiernan, he banished her to the Common world, a place she so thoroughly despised.
Scatha spent her final days in the Common world telling the story of the Labyrinth and of the Goblin King. She made money from doing so, but mostly she wished to scare the little Common children she hated so much. The story of the Goblin King was a popular one and it spread. First it was told orally by firesides and hearths. Then it was set to paper and passed along as a book. In time, impetuous little children wished their own baby brothers and sisters would be taken by the Goblin King. Jareth enjoyed the game with the Commoners and granted their wishes. No one had ever succeeded in besting him or his Labyrinth but he liked to see them try. The children he turned into goblins became so numerous that a Goblin City had to be erected.
Time marched on in the Common world. Jareth began to tire of the Labyrinth. He wished for a challenge. He wished someone would be brave enough to beat him at his own game. A girl named Sarah finally granted Jareth's one and only wish. She was the first person to conquer the Labyrinth. He begged her to reconsider taking back her brother, but she refused. Sarah left Jareth and returned to her own world. He sulked for a moment after loosing, but his petulance gave way to respect. Jareth had finally found a worthy opponent. Sarah was unique. She did not think like the Magical,and yet she was not as naïve as the other Common folk. Her mind seemed to straddle the two worlds, much like his own. But Sarah was still a puzzle to him. They did not think exactly alike. Jareth had miscalculated Sarah's capacity for compassion when it came to her stepbrother Toby. Kindness towards an unwanted sibling was something Jareth did not understand. He had not been so kind to his own brother nor had he seen that kindness displayed in any of the other Commoners who had wished themselves into the Labyrinth. To choose her brother over her dreams was the cleverest bit of intellectual magic Jareth had ever seen. The Magical folk were raised to think only of self-preservation and advancement, not empathy and self-sacrifice. Sarah had won this round and he would deny her nothing as her prize. Not even her crying little baby brother.
The game however, was afoot. Jareth was bored with his own magical creations and set his mind to playing an eternal game of wits with Sarah. All that was needed to begin again was a single wish. Sarah's wishes remained silent for years. She never spoke them, knowing full well that Jareth was in the twilight listening for them. While she had won their original match she knew deep-down that the Goblin King would not give up so easily. Sarah remained silent and Jareth remained watchful. Each one waited for the other to make their move. Neither knew when it would come, but Jareth was sure it would happen in the thirteenth hour. The bells began to chime. Sarah had carelessly let her tongue slip….