Wanna Live Underground
A.M. Carr
Prequel to The Silver Bough.
If you want to get to the story right away (and by-pass the note below) scroll down to the next:
Disclaimer: I only own Kiandra, and any other unrecognizable characters. The Labyrinth and all recognizable characters are owned by the estate of the genius that is Jim Henson, and probably George Lucas, Brian Froud, Terry Jones and everyone else who worked on including the actors the movie.
Please don't sue; I'm in college, so all I have of worth is a student debt, a toaster oven, and about 400 (CND.) worth of text books.
This is my first Labyrinth fan-fiction, so be honest. Comments and (constructive) criticism is welcome.
I have to sight my biggest literacy influences as PaisleyRose and Lixxle. Seriously, if you haven't read their stuff, do so. Also, on deviant art, AsheRhyder, Pika-La-Cynique, and Merculius Sorry for any typos.
Enjoy!
Chapter 1
Too Much Rejection, No Love Injection
April 5, 1987
It had been thirteen hours since Sarah Williams, now dubbed the 'Lady of the Labyrinth' by its inhabitants, had made it through the Labyrinth to the Castle beyond the Goblin City, claimed her half-brother, Toby, and broke the Goblin King's heart.
It had been thirteen hours since the impromptu celebration in Sarah's bedroom, where all the citizens of the Labyrinth eventually crowded to congratulate Lady Sarah. Every citizen but one. After briefly watching through her window, the Goblin King flew off into the night and back to the Castle beyond the Goblin City.
It had been thirteen hours since, and the Goblin King had yet to move from his throne. He sat upon it, in the same outfit that he was wearing in the Escher room, with the cape wrapped around him like a blanket. The throne room was devoid of its usual rabble of Goblins and poultry. The Castle, the Goblin City, even the Labyrinth was silent. A large goblin, by goblin standards and who was the height of the average 10-year-old mortal, entered quietly and unobtrusively. As quietly and unobtrusively as a goblin could, anyway.
"What is it?" Jareth tried to demand, but his heart just wasn't in it.
"Your Highness, you have a visitor." Right behind him, not even waiting to be summoned, entered a female imp.
"Must have been some party." She said with a mischievous grin. Human in features, what separated her from mortals was a diminutive height of about four-and-a-half-feet and a pair of gracefully pointed ears. Actually, she didn't look completely impish, containing a little mortal blood and significantly less Fae blood. But, the strangest thing was, she was dressed in the current Aboveground style.
"What do you want Kiandra?" Jareth snapped at her, not in the mood for her antics.
His comment rolled off her. "Now, now Jareth. Is that any way to greet your favourite cousin?" She dismissed the goblin with a wave of her hand. "So what happened? No wait, don't tell me. The goblins kidnapped another child without your permission."
Jareth settled into his favourite position on the throne and tapped his boot with the riding crop in a steady impatient manner. "You are aware that your second-sight makes it very irritating to try to speak to you." Finally seeing his face, his impish cousin noted how tired and drawn it looked.
"Pretty much." Kiandra replied unapologetically. Several goblins entered the room carrying between them a low chair, a small table, and a large bowl of fruit. Placing the furniture down, and the fruit bowl on the table, they left just as quietly as they had entered. "Thanks guys." She called behind them. A little one that had remained tugged on her jeans leg. Kiandra crouched down and it whispered in her ear. She nodded and dismissed him quietly. "You know," She said aloud to Jareth, "It's slightly disturbing how quiet everything is around here." Grabbing a peach from the fruit bowl, she tossed it in the air once before walking over to the throne and offering it to Jareth. "You have to eat. Squeak says you haven't eaten a thing in thirteen hours. If you don't want fruit, I can get the kitchens to-"
Jareth cut her off by grabbing the offending fruit from her hand, and taking a bite. "Thank you." He admitted. "So, do I need to tell you what happened, or did your gift fill you in?"
Kiandra tossed him a non-descript sketch book, took a seat on the low chair and grabbed an apple. He cracked it open and looked at the first picture. It was quite a good likeness of Toby surrounded by the goblins. "First page: a wished-away male toddler-"
"Toby." Jareth recalled with a slight feeling of parental nurturing. He turned to the next one. It was Sarah, the 2-d version of herself, staring off the page at him, defiant as always. There were smaller pictures around the main one, her falling into the shaft of Helping Hands, her walking across the risen stones in the bog, her with Hoggle. Different emotions swirled around in Jareth.
"Very well, Toby. The runner is a young, female, teenage relative-"
"Sarah. His 15-year-old half-sister." He turned to the page after, careful not to smudge the charcoal. It was the perfect image of them in the Crystal Ballroom, just before she saw that damnable clock.
"Jareth, you wanker, you are unbelievable." Kiandra laughed. He glared at her obvious amusement at his situation. "Stop pouting. It's your own fault."
"I'm not. And I know." He turned to the next page, the image was of them facing off in the Escher room. He shrugged gloomily. "I'm paying for it now. She hates me."
Kiandra rose and paced in front of him, "Of course she hates you. You were, for lack of a better word, the 'villain'. I don't know how things worked when you were my age but, seriously, stealing a girl's brother isn't going to get you into her good books." She stopped, and with her arms akimbo, said, "You loved her, didn't you?"
Jareth sighed, "Yes."
"Jareth, I'm surprised at you, losing your head over a girl." The imp said with a smile. He winced as she pretty well repeated what he had told that dwarf gardener hours earlier. She sat back down in the wooden chair. "So she runs the Labyrinth." Kiandra said, and finally takes a bite of the apple she had been holding.
"And she reaches the center." The imp chokes a little on her bite of apple.
"She beat it? In thirteen hours?"
"Actually, I'm not sure she did beat it. And it was only ten hours."
"Jareth, you bloody idiot!"
The arrogant Goblin King returned as Jareth stood and turned to Kiandra. "Listen imp, while you are exiled from the Sídhe, you are technically a denizen of the Labyrinth during the times you have been allowed to visit. That makes me your monarch. And you will show me the respect I deserve."
"And the rest of the time, I am a denizen of the Aboveground, and you can't tell me to do squat. This isn't even my monthly visit, you royal pain in the arse."
"Then why are you here?" Jareth demanded.
Kiandra shrugged, "The goblins contacted me through my bedroom mirror. You need to teach them a little something about privacy. Anyway, from what I could piece together, you're going through some sort of breakdown."
"I rule a city of near indestructible imbeciles. A breakdown would not be a stretch with what I have to deal with on a daily basis. I didn't even want this post."
"But you're doing so well, the Labyrinth is thriving. And don't blame me; you got this post, before I was born, might I add, because you upset the High Queen. What in the Underground did you do, anyway?"
"I was born. Anyway, my step-mother and I never saw eye-to-eye." Two goblins entered with a clay pitcher, being led by Squeak, who was carrying two goblets.
"So, you're not sure. At least I know what I did. I still think Tatiana over-reacted. It was just a prank, no-one got hurt. I'm an imp, it's in my nature. What do you think?" She asked as she helped the two goblin place the heavy pitcher on the table.
"I would have done worse that exile you to the Aboveground for twenty years. Just ask the goblins." The imp filled the goblets as he spoke.
Knowing what they were referring too, Tuck the goblin shook his head and said quietly, "Poor Vlod." The goblins filed out.
Rolling her eyes, Kiandra scolded as she handed one of the goblets to Jareth, "You're still punishing him? If I didn't know better, I'd think Tatiana was you mother. Speaking of punishments, where's the girl now? Bog? Oubliette?"
"Home, with her family."
" . . . ." A momentary silence, then Kiandra said, "You're going soft, aren't you?"
"It was out of my hands." He tried to explain through his clenched teeth.
"All right, start from the beginning." He sighed and tossed her a crystal, hoping she didn't notice the momentary dizziness that plagued that usually simple action.
"It will show you what you need to know. Oh, and Kiandra?"
"Yeah?"
"Say hello to the false alarms for me, will you?" The Goblin King snapped his fingers with a smirk, and she disappeared from the throne room.
Kiandra landed hard on her bottom next to a False Alarm. "Go no further!" It boomed.
"Oh, will you just shut up!" She snapped, pushing her dark hair out of her face.
"I'm only doing my job." It pouted, and sniffled. The imp rolled her eyes, there was nothing sadder, nor more disturbing, that a crying rock face.
She sighed. "C'mon luv, stiff upper lip," She tried to cheer it up, chuckling quietly at the pun.
"Oh, all right." It admitted. Kiandra walked down through the tunnel, to where it intersected another, and turned the corner. A horrible grinding noise came from behind her. She turned and, almost bored, faced the cleaner hurtling towards her. Grabbing a stone from the tunnel floor, she chucked it at the metal contraption. With an echoing clunk, the machine grinded to a stop, just inches away from her, and collapsed upon itself.
Arms crossed and her foot tapping, Kiandra glared at the two goblins propelling the cleaner. The smaller one screeched and skittered away in the opposite direction. "I know where you live!" She hollered after it. The larger one tried to hide within the wreckage by burrowing into it. She grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and said in an icy voice, "I have a message for your king." She whispered her message into his ear and placed the contrite goblin on the floor.
He took off the other way, hollering to his companion, "Wait for me!" Kiandra chuckled, walked up the tunnel, and ascended the ladder to the Wiseman's Garden. It was one of her favourite places in the Labyrinth. She got comfortable in the shade, and looked into the crystal.
"Show me what I need to see." Instead of the entire thirteen hours, the crystal showed the important events in a less long 101 minute version. Kiandra made notes. As the crystal finished showing the events that had taken place, the Wiseman shuffled into her sight, his hat squawking away. "Wiseman, hat. You spoke to the runner who came through here?"
"Yes, we did." The Wiseman finally replied. The hat started chattering about Sarah, and the Wiseman interrupted gruffly, "Will you stop interrupting me!" They started arguing.
Kiandra sighed, rolled her eyes and gave a little growl. "Oi! Answer yes or no. So, you told her, 'The way forward is sometimes the way back.'"
"Yes." The man and his hat said in unison.
"So does that mean that sometimes that the way back is the way forward?"
"I guess it does." The Wiseman acknowledged.
"What are you talking about?!" The hat squawked, "That doesn't make sense!" They started arguing, again. Kiandra growled; her patience was wearing thin.
"Do you two mind!" That silenced both of them. She pulled two gold coins from her pocket. "Here, one for the information, one for the ring in the contribution box." The Wiseman handed her the ring and she threw the two coins into the box. "Thank-you." She turned and left, stuffing the ring into her pocket.
"There really is a sucker born every minute." The hat squawked. Over-hearing it, Kiandra smirked, she agreed.
Descending back into the tunnel, she walked through the busted gate, hung a left, walked for ten minutes down the tunnel, and ascended a stone staircase. Through a wooden door was a lower part of the castle, near the kitchens, and was where Kiandra found the goblin she had given the message too. "Did you tell him what I told you?" She asked.
"Uhhh . . . no." It admitted.
"There had better be a good reason."
Up in the Goblin King's chambers, which were far more elegant, and far cleaner, than the rest of the castle, Jareth awoke. He sat up in bed, and at the moment his chamber door burst open. He jumped in shock. "Did you have to do that?" He demanded.
"That's for poofing me out of the throne room! The goblins said you collapsed after doing that. Serves you right." Kiandra crossed her arms and sat down heavily on the end of Jareth's bed.
"Please, take a seat." He told her flatly.
"I watched the crystal."
There was a minute of silence before Jareth coaxed, "And?"
"Well, first of all, you told her that she 'starved and near-exhausted you', which is true, you are magic starved, and now, because of your little stunt, you have exhausted yourself. Lucky, not as much as when you brought her home and you had to take your owl form. Which begs the question, were you jealous when everyone else was at her victory celebration?" Jareth's blue eyes narrowed dangerously. She chuckled nervously, "Moving on. Let's see, she had help, you know."
"Yes, I am aware that the dwarf, the monster and Sir Didymus helped her reach the center."
"The other two have names too. Where are they now?"
"Either back to their lives or, if they're smart, hiding."
"Why? They just offered aid to a runner."
"It was treason." The Goblin King said darkly.
Kiandra rolled her eyes. "Drama king. I saw the collateral damage inflicted on the Labyrinth as well. That's going to take some cleaning."
"You're right." Jareth started to rise.
"Where do you think you're going? You're magically starved and you are not leaving these chambers." Kiandra pushed him down against the mattress.
"Last time I checked, I was the ruler here." Jareth reminded her, testily. As weak as he was, his arrogance was still in good health. She didn't release him. "Kiandra. Don't defy me."
"Oh, puh-lease Jareth, that only works on little goblins and little kids." There were two things she wanted to bring up, but instead she offered, "Let me take care of the clean-up. Just until, you're your old self. Magically, I mean."
"Fine, you are in charge for the next thirteen hours." Kiandra gave him an odd look. "What?"
"Why is it always 13 with you?"
"What's wrong with 13?" Kiandra rolled her eyes, "Doesn't matter, thirteen hours; remove the rocks from and fix the Goblin City, repair Humongous, the Escher room, and the bridge in the Bog. The brownies are handling the marks on the cobblestone, so that's taken care of. Oh, and find, and if possible, punish the three traitors."
"With what?"
"You're creative, think of something. Their ship is going down. The rest is up to you."
"Got it, metaphorical ship is sinking, no lifeboats. You probably want me to take care of the other little things too: the tunnel ladder and the stone wall bordering the Bog."
"That will be fine."
"What about the Crystal Ballroom?"
"Leave it for now." Jareth said quietly. Kiandra started to leave as her messenger Goblin entered with a tray of food.
"I had the kitchens send up something to eat. Finish it." The imp turned to the Goblin. "Tell him." She reminded under her breath.
"Uh, Lady Kiandra says that you are an over-dressed fairy despot and that if you poof her like that again she'll kick your butt so hard you'll taste shoe leather." It nervously squeaked. The imp chuckled, her brown eyes glittering mischievously.
"WHAT?!" Jareth sat straight up, angrily, and she took that as her cue to leave.
Thirteen hours had passed and Kiandra returned. Jareth wasn't in his chambers or in the throne room. She finally found him in the shattered remains of the Crystal Ballroom, sitting in the pillow pit. "You want to talk about it?"
"Later. How goes the repairs?"
"The Goblin city is inhabitable now. And there are plans for a new bridge, a stone one this time. Which reminds me, when the service warranty says 1000 years, they mean 1000 years. Especially when it's made of wood."
"And the traitors?"
"Found and punished." She said proudly.
"How?"
"They're fixing everything that was damaged. With Goblin help, of course. I'm not entirely cruel."
"What! You're punishing treason with community service! What happened to no lifeboats?!" The Goblin King rose and stood over her, menacingly.
"What lifeboats?! Those three are going to be building and repairing until Litha! Probably longer! It was the worse thing I could think of!" As an imp, it actually was the worse thing Kiandra could think of. Lively, mischievous creatures, imps perceive menial labour as a punishment worse than death.
Jareth sighed, and sat down in the pillow pit. "Fine. I'll handle their punishments later."
"If the Labyrinth lets you." Jareth growled softly. Kiandra sat down next to him. "You know, it's later. Talk to me." He looked away. "Fine, I'll talk. Do you know she knows your name?"
He stiffened and turned to face Kiandra, eyes wide, "H-how? I never . . . did I?"
"No, you didn't tell her. It was . . . someone else. Accidentally." She failed to mention it was Hoggle, and that he said the name four times.
"She never said it."
"Of course not. Using someone's given name implies familiarity. You were the 'villain'." Jareth was understandably cagey. Knowing a Fae's name gave a person a degree of power over that Fae. She chuckled nervously, "Brings a whole new dimension to the 'I will be your slave', now don't it?"
"That's not funny."
Kiandra shrugged. "So, a peach. Why?"
"What's wrong with a peach?"
"You just chose it randomly? It had nothing to do with the fact the peach is a symbol of wishes, and love. And marriage." Jareth was silent. "I also noticed that her ballroom dress was white. Should I assume it has nothing to do with the fact that white is a popular colour for mortal wedding dresses in Western society since the Victorian era?"
"It was silver." He muttered.
Kiandra ignored him and continued. "You introduced her to the Sídhe court, whose members actually ended up scaring her off. And I'm a little miffed that you didn't invite me, by the way. It's like you practically announced your betrothal to her."
"Enough! She rejected me! Is that enough for you?" Kiandra patted his shoulder sympathetically. "How long will it hurt?"
"A broken heart or a shattered ego?" She shrugged. "It's only forever, not long at all." The imp sang softly.
"You dare mock me?"
"Pretty much. Hey, look at it this way; she's only fifteen, practically a child. Too old to turn, too young to keep-"
"Damn her innocent eyes."
"Then, why did you Fae-mark her?" He had no answer. "I did a little research."
"What did you find?"
"You probably should have done this in the first place but, let's see: full name is Sarah Jennifer Williams, age 15, born March 21, 1972, to Robert Marcus Williams and Linda Isabella Williams nee McDermott, who are now divorced. Her father is a lawyer and her mother is a rather famous actress, who is out of the picture most of the time. Her father is currently married to one Karen Irene Williams nee Quinn. Her mother is dating the aspiring actor Jeremy Eden. She's in the ninth grade at St. Cecelia's.
"Her only sibling is her half-brother Tobias 'Toby' Anthony Williams, age 18 months, born October 31, 1985 to Robert and Karen. According to Celtic tree mythology, she's an Alder, which symbolizes a Trailblazer." Jareth's eyebrow quirked. "Which kind of explains a lot. You didn't stand a chance." Kiandra snickered. Jareth gave her a cold glare, and she cleared her throat nervously. "Right. Anyway, she probably had no idea what you were offering her."
"Well, what should I do now?" He asked, sinking into depression. Kiandra pulled out the blue prints to the new bridge, rolled them up and whacked Jareth upside his blonde head several times. "Hey!"
"First of all, you're going to stop angsting like this is a bad teenage fan-fiction! Good Lor' man! You are a man! You are more than a man! You are the Goblin King! Sarah is a woman! You are going to remind her that you are a man! And you are going to remind her that you remember that she is a woman!"
"You're right!"
"Of course I am!" Jareth rose from the pillow pit and started walking to the door. "Whoa there, boyo! Where do you think you're going?" Kiandra grabbed a handful of cape and dragged him back to the pit.
"To do what you said."
The imp groaned quietly. "Let me rephrase, you are going to wait until she's no longer a minor, then you're going to remind her. That's in 2 years and eleven months." Jareth sat back down.
"You didn't say that the first time."
"An oversight on my part. But, we really need to have these conversations more often. I do enjoy them."
"Would it have anything to do with the fact that you pummel me when we do?"
"Yeah, that's pretty great." Jareth gave her a face that clearly said, 'I am not amused'. "Sorry." She apologized. "Oh, but I have something for you." She pulled Sarah's ring from her pocket. "Your girlfriend paid the Wiseman with it."
"How did you . . . I'm almost afraid to ask." Kiandra grinned broadly. Jareth sighed and pulled out a crystal. Instead of showing when the imp paid the Wiseman, it showed a couple hours later when he and his hat realized they had been duped.
Reflected in the crystal's surface, two dried leaves were pulled from the contribution box. "Fairy gold!" The hat screeched. Kiandra chuckled, recognizing that her payment had turned into foliage.
"Who's the sucker now?" She asked the crystal. "I should probably get out of here before they make it to the castle. See you soon. And don't worry, I have a feeling she will call on you again." Kiandra concentrated and asked the Labyrinth to send her Aboveground, but in a moment. "By the way Jareth, in the Escher room, you went down like a shmuck." She disappeared before he could even react, leaving behind a trace of glitter and an invisible giggle.
"That little brat!"