AN: This has been an idea stewing in my mind for a while now. I had intended to start up Only In Jest after I had heard about David's passing (rest peacefully, love). But my fingers wouldn't itch a bit unless it was on this. So, this isn't the kind of fic I would have preferred be the first I publish after his passing, but it's what my mind spun. The threads were there, I just needed to pull and press them into this shape. I hope you enjoy it.
Rubatosis: The unsettling awareness of your own heartbeat.
Sarah sat in a puddle of silk and lace in a stone tower, overlooking the twisting garden (a labyrinth) below. Stone walls shifting and changing, shifting and changing, changing and shifting. Sunlight poured down onto her head as she sat upon the lone window's ledge, a spun-gold crown of thorns sat heavy on her head, glinting in the light. A few black strands of hair stood in stark contrast against the spikes jutting from the royal ornament.
There had been a time once when she would have fought against the symbol of royal office being placed on her round, round head on its stalk of neck and bone and muscle. But that had been so very long ago, long before she was captured by the Goblin King for the last time. Long before she had been forced to play mind games, and dance in masquerades of lies and dreams until her feet bled.
At some point, her brain had stopped remembering it all. There were blank spaces in time. One moment Sarah was between the labyrinth walls, counting each stone, and then the next moment she was trapped in a soft place (a bed, her mind whispers) next to a shining figure of feathers and twisted light.
This same figure, striking in the spun magic following behind him, around him, materialized as if her very thoughts had called him there. Perhaps they had.
"Precious," his voice low, slinking along the vertebrae of her back. "What are you doing up here all alone?"
Sarah gave no answer, but continued looking out the window of her stone tower. She remembered a time when she would have risen screaming, yelling, clawing at his face to let her go. She does nothing now.
"Sarah," his sibilant whisper had become firmer, reaching past her bones and into her blood, freezing it in place. She shook. "Don't make this harder than it has to be. I can be gentle, generous."
(Liar.)
"Fear me, then."
That night, her dreams are torn apart by talons slashing at her face and blood dripping like rubies from her throat. Or are they rubies from a necklace that chokes the will from her? This is one of many nightmares that visit her in the night…
His hands (like spiders) are playing with the cords tying her corset together (too tight to breathe) another time he visits. She keeps her green eyes fixed on the labyrinth (freedom).
"Sarah," his lilting voice is like honey poured into her brain, making it fuzzy and warm. "Come to bed. Don't you want to feel warm again?"
His hands brush against her skin, scalding hot. She bites her tongue to keep from screaming aloud. She bites right through the delicate skin, and a red thread of blood spills onto her chin. A tongue as hot as a brand licks it up.
She still refuses to look at him.
"Love me."
(Never.)
Her dreams are a haze of warm touches, silk sheets, and sighs (screams). She awakes panting from these dreams, an uncomfortable ache between her legs that stays the rest of the day.
The sunlight warps around him the next time he comes to her tower, as if the light did not dare to touch him.
"My Queen," he says, reverently. She ignores him, drawing symbols in the dust city that had been built seemingly overnight on her dresser (how long has it been?). "The kingdom has need of you. I need you."
Her hands start to shake as she single-mindedly destroys the city of walls and walls and walls.
"Do as I say."
(I'd rather die.)
Their meetings continue like this for so long. Winters turned into blooming springs, turned into summers, turned into frozen winters, blazing summers, and then fall.
She's watching the bloody handprints fall from the sky (leaves), when a new memory pushes forward. A memory where she used to gather these handprints into a bloody pile in front of a white square-living-space (a house, her mind whispers in anguish). There was a little not-goblin (Toby, oh god) with fluffy blond hair that launched itself into the blood pile with a shriek.
Thump.
Sarah looks around. The bed sheets are in disarray, the furniture nearly all broken save the bed, but nothing had moved in the room.
Thump.
A hand comes up to a bare chest (where are my clothes?). The thumping seems to be trapped in her chest.
Thump thump.
It sounds scared. She should free it. (No, please!) Her fingernails dig into the white flesh below her collarbone and begin to scratch.
She presents her dripping heart to the figure with her hands stained red, like the pile the not-goblin had jumped into. Her green eyes finally hold onto his face. Aquiline nose, thin lips, golden hair to match a golden crown, eyes of magic.
He's so beautiful, she thinks, a smile forming across her bruised lips.
Jareth flashes a sharp smile filled with malice and victory, his mismatched eyes glowing. "Thank you, Precious." A gloved hand reaches towards the exquisite gift.
(Silence.)