Chapter One
She danced in his arms, as he sang to her. Though this time, there was no distraction; no Toby to save, no dream to get away from. His eyes, flawed and dangerous, and beautiful. The pupil in his right eye stayed small, in a permanent state of dilation. She got lost in his ocean eyes, fell away from the world in to his arms.
But then she was falling, and he was not there.
Sarah jerked awake, her eyes opening. Her dark room replaced the crowded ballroom, crickets replaced his voice. She was unmoving, for at least four minutes.
He haunted her. Though she spoke the words to him, they were full of lies. You have no power over me, she thought. She tried to whisper it, but no sound escaped her lips. She did not fall back to sleep until an hour later, and her sleep was dreamless.
Sarah woke up the next morning with her bedding and hair disheveled. After switching her lamp on, she went to her mirror. She was well aware that he could see her. But at this point, they were well past such juvenile temptations. Jareth left her alone, gave her privacy. On some days, though, she needed to know that he was still there; that she was not alone. She never called to him. She only stared at herself in the mirror, imagining what he saw.
Every morning, he saw her rumpled hair, her out-of-bed sleep-filled blue eyes. Although, he did not linger. He looked away immediately, and carried on his dutiful will in his kingdom. He watched her age. He saw her with someone, and he watched her broken-hearted when she couldn't stand the boy any longer. But he never lingered.
She lived, constantly comparing. How could she dare to see anyone as more than him? No one could stand as tall as him; no one had the same effect as he did. He was the only one she saw in her dreams.
He'd been there all her life. Whether she saw him or not, he was there, and she had always known it.
Toby would never remember what had happened. For a while, she had wondered whether it had been real at all, or just some sort of dream she had created. She saw no one from the labyrinth anymore. She had stopped seeing them after a few days. But she had seen him. Out her window, she looked one lonely night, as she oft did. He sat atop the tree branch, staring at her. He left once she comprehended him. And since then, he had watched through the mirror, only visiting her in her hallucinations as she slept.
It drove her crazier than she'd ever been. Sarah spent most of her waking life thinking about the labyrinth. He had no power over her, but in reality, he had all the power.