The Labyrinth: The Way Back
Author: Aviry Nolane,
Date: Nov. 18, 2002. – January 2011
Notes: That's right. It's an edit and ending project. Almost a decade yes, but I will finish this beast of a fic. For all you readers out there, thank you and enjoy!
Rating: will be about R-ish
Here's hoping!
Disclaimer: Of course they don't belong to me... They're property of Jim Henson and Co…
- The Labyrinth: The Way Back - Chapter One - Out Of Print
She could not help but think of him.
She could fight it no longer.
But where to begin?
His eyes? His hair? His disheveled but beautiful appearance? His muscular form? His sensual smile?
There was so much to take in, so much to discover.
And they had time to do it all.
Now and forever, through time itself, they had each other.
Jareth and Sarah had eternity.
An earsplitting wail was heard, and the young brunette woman was surprised to find that it had come from her own mouth.
The book soared through the air; its pages twisting and spilling about in a whirlwind of motion. The offensive beast roared, the hard material of its binding thudding against the wall with a resonating clap. It fell quickly to the floor then. Its body once again became a lifeless heap, incapable of hurting, indeed incapable of even moving toward, anyone.
But of course Sarah didn't know this. In fact, in her mind, this now seemingly dormant object was just as much a threat to her safety as the name it bore inside its final pages. She gasped, wide eyed with horror, as her stomach twisted and turned in a disgusting churn.
"Sarah and who now?" She spat. Shaking her head, the wide eyed gape of a deer caught in the headlights fell away, to be replaced by an instantaneous surge of venom that only women and vicious snakes truly understood.
Sarah, it seemed, was angry. Quite angry.
She stood, pulling herself fiercely from the tugging hold of her bed.
"No," it seemed to plead, "I'm still warm, Sarah. Warm and cozy, and full of cushions and blankets enough to last you an eternity!"
But of course Sarah did not hear this proclamation, as she didn't speak furneze, the language of the common furniture ornament, and more so - because to her mortal ears the bed was a lifeless chunk of bedroom decoration. As it was, all of the words the bed now threw in Sarah's direction she couldn't hear a single one, except perhaps for 'eternity'.
Indeed, the word was already etched firmly in her mind. All recesses of thought and conscious mind pulled towards the angry red scrawl that baited her thoughts. And even though she herself had no idea, her subconscious was consuming this new turn of events as well. Though perhaps in a different light.
"Sarah and Jareth had eternity."
Eternity.
Sarah stumbled past the bed's embrace as it whimpered its final pleas.
Her legs suddenly grappled with the idea of walking beneath her, very likely also begging her to return to bed.
But Sarah was nothing if not persistent. She pressed on, and soon she had reached the detestable object.
She stood above it, straddling her hands astride her hips and glaring down at it with a terrible sort of rage. The book saw this too, and quivered with fear. After all, it had only done what was asked of it, right? Why should a helpless romance novel suffer for someone else's devious actions?
However, to Sarah, the procession of thought went much differently in her eyes. The book was no innocent contraption; it was a messenger of evil, a conniving intruder disguised as a light read, a maggot of the Underground in harlequin's clothing. She stared on, a glint in her eye, as the thought of the book being tossed into a roaring flame entered her mind.
The book saw the meaning of this glare as well. If it had been blessed with legs and a sense of keen direction, rather than the magical curse of print that had been bestowed upon it, it is possible that it would have run straight behind the form of its awakener.
Sarah fell to her knees beside the book, decidedly still unsure pertaining to its contents. She reached down, her gaze penetrating the thick book jacket of the foe she had only a moment ago began to think of as her enemy.
Suddenly a new emotion struck her, one familiar to her in the recesses of her mind, yet not one used to the newfound regularity of her rather admittedly mundane life.
Fear.
She reached out with a trembling hand to poke at the book as the intense feeling shook her.
Was he here? Was he watching? Was he plotting?
She froze. Of course he was. He was always plotting.
Her eyes narrowed again, alert for the presence in her room that she was sure existed. She turned abruptly, spinning around on her knees to be met by - - her room.
She sighed.
Was that disappointment?
No. No, she decided. That was relief. Relaxation. A release of tension. It was... Rage. She nodded at this. It must be rage. And intense rage at that.
She reached out with her left hand and before she could stop herself, flipped the book over and turned to its last pages.
She had a good mind to...
Now and forever, through time itself, they had each other.
Sarah read and reread the line, an expression of confusion knotting up her features. She scanned the page, half expecting to see the abominable line sneak its way back onto the page, calmly typewritten, looking entirely like it belonged there.
'Which', Sarah reminded herself, 'It doesn't.'
But still... Where was it?
She fingered through the pages, turned the book over, and finally, after several tense moments of silent inspection, gave up.
She held the book out distractedly and let it fall to the ground.
If it had been audible to the human ear, the sigh of relief that ensued from the object would have astounded Sarah. But she had already been astounded enough. She sat for a moment quietly contemplating her circumstances. She was not a child any longer, and she would be adult about this if it killed her. 'Preferably if it kills him' she scoffed silently.
A pause.
She shook her head. Thinking like that wasn't going to get her anywhere for the moment, as much as she'd like to indulge herself with the thought that Jareth's interest in her had suddenly perked after 8 years ( but who was counting? ) she had to consider other alternatives.
Had she imagined it?
It seemed the most likely cause of her distress. She nodded to herself. She had been very stressed lately, what with her mother's plans of remarriage, the restaurant opening just a week away, the unexpected proposal from Bill. She sighed, leaning back against the wall. 'Of course. The proposal from Bill.' She nodded again, it was beginning to feel quite worrisome to her that she had to keep physically assuring herself that she wasn't going crazy, and she made a mental note to check herself for any future indication that she continuously nodded to keep her inner meandering comments in check. "Bill," She sighed rolling her head back to rest on the chilly wall. Of course the unexpected proposal had to be the reason for the ... altercation that had just occurred.
After all - if it had been Jar - The cold blooded and evil Goblin King's doing, he would be here by now, gloating, no doubt.
And there was certainly no sign of that was there? No, her room was blessedly Goblin King free.
She smiled. She really felt much better now that she had convinced herself that the world was in fact not out to get her, but rather that she just had an overzealous imagination. She rose, picked up the poor tattered object beside her, and made her way back to bed.
Never mind the question of just exactly why her mind would jump to thinking about Jareth romantically at a moment of severe stress and domestic uncertainty. Never mind the fact that her dreams had finally managed to go relatively Jareth-free for the past few years. Never mind the fact that she had, even if only for a moment, felt his looming presence nearby. Never mind.
For all her good qualities, nobody had ever really thought of Sarah as dazzlingly brilliant. Hers was a most logical and concise decision that positively reeked of human rational, and left a bit of an aftertaste that felt distinctly that of a defense mechanism.
She smiled, content with her ability to rationalize the situation away. She settled back into the wall of pillows which supported her back and sunk her way into the peach colored down comforter. After all the commotion she really hadn't the faintest memory of what she had just read, and reading always helped her to get to sleep. Raising the book back up to her eye level, she read on...
Damien reached out to her with his words and offered her everything. "Only fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave," pleaded the Goblin King. His heart lay before her, held out to her like a precious jewel.
The charade was over. There was no way that she was going to be able to rationalize this one away, no matter how she tried, and she knew it. Sarah tossed the book angrily toward the wall, knocking her lamp over with her outburst.
A dangerous feeling rose up inside her as the room went dark, and she bellowed, leaving nothing to the imagination, exactly what she thought of the Goblin King at this moment.
"Jareth!" She screamed.
Suddenly the silence was eerie. She was left to the darkness with nothing but her labored breathing and the clenching of her fists into the comforter around her. She shuddered, a chill overtaking her, and was rewarded with a resounding tap on her left shoulder.
She turned out of reflex before she could think better of it. And there, illuminated with a few bars of evening light that had managed to sneak through her blinds, was the unmistakable form of the loathsome Goblin King.
His pale face was visible only in gaps that seemed to be strategically placed for his benefit. The high cheekbones that sloped down to his haughty chin proudly displayed his arrogant expression. The tightly pursed lips that produced a resonating sneer throughout the room, with just the faintest hint of an impish humor.
Finally Sarah allowed herself to be led where she had first intended not to gaze, back up to his sinister, glinting eyes which reflected more than just the opaque moonlight.
He didn't move for what seemed like hours, and she had begun to wonder if perhaps he was just a part of the decor she had never really paid much attention to before now. She had just about convinced herself of this fact when she took notice of the slight heaving and falling of his chest that signified breathing - which traditionally, the decor took no fancy in.
She gasped, unable to will a single rational thought to rise above the surface of her clouded mind.
Shocked as though she was, she was not about to be left alone and defenseless against the Goblin King in a darkened room in the middle of the night. She scrambled quickly out of her comforter and leaned over to the second lamp by her bedside, not so secretly hoping that if she illuminated her bedroom, the ghost white form of the King would be gone with the shadows like a girlish nightmare.
The light snapped on beneath her fingertips.
She had no such stroke of luck.
If anything, it seemed things had taken a turn for the worst. She was now able to clarify that he was indeed a solid, quite real, non-figment of her imagination. And he was standing rather close to her.
He had remained reclining, poised against the door frame of her bathroom. The halo of glitter that surrounded him transformed her bedroom into an almost otherworldly place, and a nearly regal one at that. At once, he crossed his arms around his chest, his fingers idly toying with the ever present crystal ball.
She didn't move, and breathing seemed almost entirely out of the question. She supposed that this must be what dying felt like, as all resolve to inhale suddenly left her.
He raised a brow in her direction. "You called?"