One
The two goblins raced each other from the castle to the gardens, vying furiously for the honor of being the one to bring a message to the queen. The first goblin stuck out its scaly leg, tripping the second, which fell onto its face, its metal helmet clattering away over the flagstones. With a shriek of triumph, the first goblin dashed through the opening in the hedge, only to be accosted by yet a third goblin, who'd taken a shortcut—through the privies, by the smell of him.
Covered with dung and urine, the third goblin bore its message in triumph to Sarah.
"Such haste!" she chided, folding her arms and tapping one foot.
"My lady queen!" The goblin doffed his soiled helmet and bowed. "An envoy has arrived from the Kingdom of Aves, and awaits your displeasure."
A messenger from another kingdom? Sarah's only experience with any of the other kingdoms had been when she and Jareth had traveled through Aranea, and her memories of that adventure caused her now to have a certain degree of apprehension.
To the filthy goblin, clearly expecting some reward, Sarah told him, "Throw yourself in the moat before you go back inside the castle." He made a face, and Sarah scolded, "Clear off, before I have you hogtied and washed with soap."
If there was anything goblins hated, it was cleanliness, a preference Jareth blessedly did not share.
Surveying the herb beds, which she'd been mulching in preparation for the winter months, Sarah called out, "Wulfrun, Elfswhit!"
With alacrity, her two maids appeared. Wulfrun, the eldest, had skin the approximate color of pea soup, and a thin, hooked nose. Her eyes were like shiny black beetles, the brows curving upward, and the rat's nest of her coal-black hair suggested actual rodents might be living inside it. Elfswhit, younger and shorter, had skin like nutmeg and hair the color of dishwater. Beneath upturned brows, eyes like twin spots of mold gazed down the prodigious length of a pointed nose. Where Wulfrun was scrawny-thin, Elfswhit was almost barrel-chested. Among denizens of the Underground, debate always raged as to which sister was the most perfect example of goblin womanhood.
Incredibly, both girls were Jareth's distant cousins. His great-grandfather Octha had had a daughter, Fridmador, as well as a son, and the descendants of Fridmador had become the mayors of the Goblin City. Wulfrun and Elfswhit were the daughters of Spittledrum, the current mayor.
"Milady?" they chorused.
"Watch Elisabeth," she ordered.
"Yes, milady," they responded. Somewhere in the gardens, Sarah's three-month-old daughter was playing. The baby could sit up and crawl, but usually she preferred to levitate. The castle and its grounds, the entire Goblin City, were her fief, and she explored every corner fearlessly. Nice to have a kid you don't need to carry around everywhere, Sarah thought. Wherever she went, Elisabeth was usually shadowed by Sir Didymus, but Sarah preferred an extra pair of eyes on her daughter. She didn't want Elisabeth floating off into the Labyrinth unsupervised, and Sir Didymus might be distracted by a pigeon or a wandering dragonfly.
(ii)
Before going to the great hall, Sarah paused in a washroom on the lower floor, which she'd had installed so she could clean her hands and face after gardening. The goblins, unable to comprehend her dislike of dirt, never intruded. After tidying her hair and straightening her clothes, Sarah swept through to the great hall.
She needed a moment to register the messenger's gender: female. The young woman was pretty in a gamine, androgynous way: body trim, the boyish-girlish face smooth and pink-cheeked, the hair curly and cut short. She wore a tunic, trousers, and boots, very business-like. Sarah's eyes swept over her from head to foot: the excellent quality of the fabrics, the supple leather of boots and belt, the detail in the metal of the belt buckle. The robin's egg blue of the tunic flashed like neon in the goblin castle, and the shape of a bird was embroidered in gold thread on both shoulders.
"Yes?" asked Sarah, raising her goblin-brows.
The girl kept a neutral expression, but there was a suggestion of scorn in her voice when she said, "I have a message for Jareth the King."
"I'm Sarah the Queen. You can give the message to me."
"The King of the Goblins is not married," the girl said. Had she been told to expect trickery? Goblins were notorious for that sort of thing, after all.
"He is now." Sarah slipped a hand into the front of her blouse and drew out her amulet: a twin of Jareth's, set with a dazzling emerald that once had been a gemstone known as the Dragon's Heart.
The messenger stared at the amulet. "My lady," she said, "forgive me, but in Aves, we have received no word of Jareth's marriage."
"It hasn't been that long," Sarah told her. "We haven't gotten around to sending out announcements."
The girl still appeared doubtful, but at last she relented. "Your majesty," she said, "I am Paloma, messenger of Aves. I bring word to the Underground of the death of Queen Eucissa, our beloved sovereign of over seven centuries. Jareth the King, and of course you, his lady queen, are invited to the coronation of Eucissa's daughter and heir, the Princess Petronia. The coronation will take place on the Winter Solstice. The festivities will commence on the new moon prior to the solstice and continue until the new moon following. During that time, the Pax Deorum will be observed." With a low bow, the messenger handed a small scroll to Sarah.
"The king thanks you for this invitation," Sarah responded. "As do I. Of course, we'll be honored to attend."
"My lady, with your permission, I will convey your acceptance to the Princess."
"Permission granted," Sarah responded with an imperial wave.
The girl straightened up from her bow. She put her right hand to the bird embroidered on her left shoulder. The air around her shimmered, and she vanished from sight.
Aves. Eucissa. So that was the meaning of the vision in Sarah's mirror. She allowed herself a few moments of undiluted pleasure: she possessed powers of genuine clairvoyance. With time, she would hone that ability into a skill to be wielded at will.
The new moon before the Winter Solstice—about six weeks, Sarah calculated. She whirled on her heel and strode back out to the gardens, calling for Wulfrun and Elfswhit. There was much to plan, and not much time.
(iii)
"You told her what?"
"I told her we'd come to the coronation."
Jareth lounged in his large chair at the head of the table. He'd been out all day inspecting a tin mine, and he plainly wasn't pleased at the decision Sarah had made in his absence.
"Aves," he grumped. "Petronia. A ginger pig, stuffed into a satin frock."
"She can't be any worse than Portia."
"Not by much." Jareth snagged a slice of fruit from a platter on the table: autumn pears, glazed with honey, coated with cinnamon and crushed almonds, baked golden. His favorite dessert—since her coronation, Sarah had been cracking the whip (sometimes literally) in the castle kitchens. She had waited until the sweets before breaking the news. "And everyone will know about Aranea by now," he said. "Questions will be asked. They'll all be watching everyone else, wondering what they know."
"So, we keep our mouths shut," Sarah shrugged. "Nobody can prove anything, can they?"
Jareth pointed a long finger at Sarah's amulet. "Best keep that out of sight."
"Will anyone recognize it?"
A thin smile creased his face. "I'm sure you remember King Theridion."
"I can't exactly forget him." Sarah had killed King Theridion of Aranea when he'd attempted to throttle Jareth to death. In the same skirmish, she'd killed Queen Portia, Theridion's powerful wife. Both monarchs had been heartless monsters, and Sarah felt no remorse for killing them, but she did wonder—and worry—what justice she might have to face if anyone in the other realms learned what she'd done.
"Theridion is—was—Petronia's brother. Even in its new aspect, she might recognize the Dragon's Heart."
"I'll keep it in my shirt." Sarah spoke with more bravado than she in all honesty felt.
Jareth's one blue eye dilated slightly at the thought of other things inside Sarah's shirt. She favored him with a smoldering expression, letting a few moments slide past.
"Don't you want to go?" she asked. For all her curiosity to see other realms, Sarah now felt small spasms of anxiety that she and Jareth might get into some kind of trouble for their role in the destruction of Aranea.
He grunted. "One entire month, flouncing about the court of Aves, simpering and cooing over that wretched termagant. The politics, the flattery, the tricks and deceit—"
"Sounds like you'd be right at home, then."
"And the Pax Deorum—do you know what that is?"
"Peace of the Gods?" Sarah frowned. "So, what, is no fighting allowed?"
"No fighting," said Jareth. "No magic."
"None?" Sarah echoed, dismayed that she would lose a month's practice time.
"None—it's been the law for eons, to prevent mass murder whenever the rulers of the Seven Kingdoms come together for a wedding or a coronation."
Sarah nodded. She could imagine it easily—all those long-lived beings, the magic they wielded, and the feuds that must have percolated over the centuries.
"We can come home right after the coronation, if it's too unbearable," she offered. Maybe they could put in an appearance, schmooze for a bit, and then leave.
Jareth burst into open-throated laughter, and Sarah gave him a small kick under the table.
"For such a clever one, you're rather not understanding," he teased.
"Everyone uses magic to travel," Sarah realized. "So, we'd be stuck there for the entire month?" Her stomach dropped a couple of inches.
"Now the truth dawns. All those nobles, cooped up together for twenty-eight days. Oh, dear, what have you gotten us into?"
Lowering her voice, Sarah said, "Don't you want to travel? See the other realms?"
"Not particularly." Jareth traced his fingertips along the inside of her wrist. He grew more serious. "Are you so bored already, Sarah?"
"Never," she vowed. But with a smile, she added, "Sometimes it can be fun to see new places… we're sure to have the best accommodations… sleep in a different bed. Or two."
Sarah watched Jareth's expression change as he considered this. She had been introducing him to the concept of sexual novelty, something he so far seemed to quite enjoy.
"Aah," he said. Then his hand curled around Sarah's, fingers entwining with hers. "There are bound to be questions. About you. Where you came from."
"I can be mysterious." Her smile widened. "Let them wonder." Now that she'd gone and accepted the invitation, pulling out would be bound to raise even more questions and suspicions. Sarah felt a surge of confidence, a recklessness that she'd come to recognize as part of her goblin nature. She'd solved the Labyrinth and outwitted Jareth at 15; she'd taken on Theridion and Portia at 21 and defeated them as well. Surely she could navigate a royal court, a coronation, and curiosity about her own origins.
Hell, I survived American public schools, she thought with a wry inward smile. I can survive anything.
"It's freezing there in winter," Jareth grumbled. "They have the worst winters of the Seven Kingdoms."
"I lived in upstate New York," Sarah told him. "It's winter there ten months out of the year."
"I'm not getting out of this, am I?" Jareth sighed.
Sarah lifted his hand to her mouth, kissed it. Her green eyes were dancing. "Not on your life," she said.
(iv)
"Stop," Sarah ordered, and the two tiny goblins ceased their running inside the metal wheel. She raised the needle on her sewing machine and drew out the sleeve, examining the finished result with pleasure. She was making a new jacket for Jareth, which she intended him to wear to the coronation ceremony. He had a vast store-room for fabric, bolts and trunks full, to which Sarah had helped herself liberally. She snipped the thread and turned the sleeve right-side out, comparing it to its mate, to assure herself the length on both was the same. The sleeves flared at the cuff, and she'd lined the black velvet with burgundy silk. Now she brought the sleeves over to Wulfrun.
"When you're done with Lizzie's dress, you can trim these. Burgundy silk ribbon around the cuff." Once trimmed, Sarah would attach the sleeves to the body of the jacket. She had already given the collar to Elfswhit, who sat attaching ribbon to it with tiny, exact stitches, the needle flashing in her clever goblin fingers.
Sarah returned to the sewing machine and basted together the panels of the jacket, the pieces lined with yet more silk. The completed jacket, she thought, would look magnificent. She opened the running wheel to release the two goblins. "Back in an hour, or I'll dump you in an oubliette," she threatened.
The machine was Sarah's innovation. She had found the dusty antique in one of the castle's many rooms—God only knew how it had gotten there—and had had it brought to the workroom in her suite, where she'd cleaned it and rigged up the running wheel. Not quite as efficient as an electric sewing machine, but until she could get her magic working more consistently, it was easier than constantly pumping the large manual foot pedal.
Until now, Sarah hadn't given much thought to clothes, but she and Jareth and Lizzie were going to be in Aves for a month, attending very formal ceremonies, so Sarah and her maids had been working nonstop for almost four weeks. She'd also sent orders to a woodworker in the Goblin City to make a set of new traveling trunks, since most of the trunks in the castle were ancient, filthy, and beyond anything but a bonfire. As the trunks came in, Sarah filled them with clothes, everyday garments as well as the more elegant gowns and jackets. A cobbler in the Goblin City was working furiously to fill her orders for extra pairs of boots and shoes. Since they'd be travelling during the depths of winter, everything had to be warm—velvets and woolens, boots lined with fleece, cloaks trimmed with fur.
Until now, most of Sarah's wardrobe had consisted of gowns designed for pregnancy and nursing, but Lizzie was weaned, and Sarah's figure had returned to its pre-baby proportions. During the day, she wore a feminine version of Jareth's habitual garb—gray skirts, white full-sleeved blouses, her bust supported by bodices of supple black leather instead of the vests worn by Jareth. She kept her crazy hair bundled into a net at the back of her neck. For dinner, they usually changed, Jareth wearing one of his jackets, Sarah donning a simple gown and pinning up her hair. None of their everyday clothes, she realized, would suit a royal coronation. In addition to clothes, they would need under-linen and accessories—shifts and petticoats for Sarah, hose for Jareth. From the odds and ends of fabric, Sarah was also creating a small wardrobe for Lizzie.
While there was still daylight, Sarah sat near a window, trimming one of Jareth's shirts with lace at the cuffs. He would have a lace jabot as well. She worked very quickly, her small, thin needle darting into and out of the fabric. She'd made these shirts for him by the dozen.
Jareth had mainly tried to avoid this flurry of preparations, but he'd been up to the treasury in the north tower, where the royal jewels were kept. The staircase to the tower was hidden behind what appeared to be a blank wall, and only the king and queen knew the spell that would reveal the door. Jareth had been selecting things for both of them, the glittering treasures packed into nests of velvet and locked into strong boxes. Until they left for Aves, these boxes would be protected by fearsome curses, afterwards by locks with diabolical mechanisms.
Wulfrun brought over Lizzie's dress for Sarah's inspection. Sarah nodded, and Wulfrun added the dress to the pile in Lizzie's trunk. Sarah finished trimming the cuffs of Jareth's shirt and tossed it aside with a sigh. She had one major project left, now—her own dress for the coronation. Sarah had designed it herself, gold-embroidered burgundy damask, with long, trailing sleeves and a short train. The dress would be trimmed with black velvet, to coordinate with Jareth's outfit.
The late autumn light was beginning to fade; the gong summoning the castle to dinner would ring within an hour. Sarah decided to tackle her own dress the next day. In the meanwhile, she would work on sewing warm nightgowns for her daughter, sweet little garments made from the softest lamb's wool and lined with silk.
(v)
The night before their departure, Jareth and Sarah walked the paths of the Labyrinth, enjoying their last evening at home. Lizzie flitted about overhead, bubbling happily to herself. In the castle, the large trunks were packed and ready to go. Sarah had met with the castle servants, giving them instructions for her absence. Jareth had had a series of meetings with Spittledrum, who would serve as regent in the king's absence.
Their breath came out in frosty clouds, and underfoot, the ground had frozen solid. The sun had set, leaving the sky a lovely cream color, streaked with dusky rose and lavender. Icy white and silver edged the leaves of the tall hedges. In the sky, a thin sickle of the waning moon appeared, like a reluctant ghost. Tomorrow would be the last day before the new moon, the last day traveling to Aves would be possible. Jareth and Sarah planned to leave with Lizzie in the morning.
Sarah had already spoken with Sir Didymus, telling him to keep his eyes on the goblins, Spittledrum in particular. "Don't be afraid to call in Ludo if you need reinforcements," she said.
"Never fear, good lady," Sir Didymus had responded. "That rapscallion mayor shall not exceed the limits of his office!"
Now, as Sarah relayed this conversation Jareth, she said, "Which probably means Sir Didymus will be locked in Spittledrum's dungeon within two days."
Jareth snorted, "He'll emerge from prison after a month with a volume of epic poetry written. And insist on a recitation of the entire thing. To us. At dinner."
Sarah laughed, reminding Jareth, "If he wasn't so dauntless, you'd be dead now."
Jareth grunted in his throat; he hated the idea of being in anyone's debt, even one as good-hearted as Sir Didymus.
Sarah ran her gloved fingertips across the hedges as they walked, disturbing a little fairy, which squawked a shrill protest, beating its tiny wings and trying to bite Sarah's hand. She sent it flying with one flick of her finger, causing Jareth to rumble with laughter.
"I hate fairies," she complained.
"At least they're not Aranea's fairies," he said.
"God, I hope those monsters aren't coming to the coronation."
"With Portia and Theridion dead, not a chance."
"Good. So I can leave my longbow at home."
"Now, that's a pity." Jareth loved to watch Sarah with her longbow.
"Do you think anyone has been there?" she asked. "Or tried?" Upon the death of its queen and king, the royal city of Aranea—its citizens all dead from a combination of radiation poisoning and starvation—had been crushed beneath a massive glacier. The other regions of Aranea had survived, as far as Jareth knew, but only fairies and giant spiders remained alive.
"Anyone with magic would have felt the kingdom die," said Jareth. From the hedge he plucked a holly berry, rolling it between forefinger and thumb. "They all know what happened."
Sarah frowned, "I hope this coronation isn't, I don't know, a ruse, some kind of trick to get everyone together and give us the third degree about Aranea. Or trip us up into saying what we know."
"Petronia's as thick as a plank," Jareth scoffed. "If she ever did something so devious, I would be impressed."
Sarah grinned. "So, you've met her?"
"Just once. When my father was trying to arrange my marriage."
He'd been fifteen at the time, Sarah knew. She smiled, imagining Jareth being taken around to all the kingdoms, shown off by his father. Raedwald, the previous king, had tried to broker Jareth's marriage with Theridion and Portia's two daughters. But typical Goblin greed and trickery had gotten Raedwald murdered, Jareth sent home in disgrace. He had been invested as the new king right away, after which his mother had committed suicide. Sarah knew this tragedy was a grief Jareth carried with him always, a secret corner of himself that he kept largely hidden. After a year of marriage, Sarah had yet to learn his mother's name.
She wondered how her own impressions of Petronia—and the rulers of the other kingdoms—would differ from the opinion that fifteen-year-old Jareth had formed. No wonder he hates them all, she thought.
He tossed away the holly berry and slipped his arm around Sarah, pulling her closer. She already felt a small pang of homesickness. It's only a month, she told herself, but the Underground, the Labyrinth, the Goblin City were her home now, and she hated the thought of being anywhere else.
(vi)
The two children played along the riverbank, the slowly coursing water sparkling under the sunlight. One of them, a girl, pointed to a dark shape bobbing along the surface. The second child, a boy, grabbed a long pole and reached out, tugging the object toward the shore. Their faces briefly registered revulsion, then astonishment.
Sarah blinked awake, staring up at the canopy of her daybed. Outside the tower windows, pre-dawn light had turned the eastern sky from ink black to slate gray. What a strange dream. She rubbed her forearm across her eyes, trying to bring back detail. The two children had been dressed in bright clothes of multi-colored fabric, puffy sleeves and breeches, distinctive caps. As Sarah's goblin nature had deepened, so had her new gifts. The clairvoyance was so odd, so maddeningly beyond her control. She could spend hours trying to prompt visions through her seeing mirror, with no success, and then she would have a dream like this—a glimpse of an unknown place and time, whose significance she had yet to learn.
She sat. Maybe it was the effect of the waning moon. Her monthly courses tended to come on at this time, and hopefully by today, the bleeding would have stopped. Along with everything else, her cycles had changed. As a goblin—or a part-goblin anyway—the bleeding was much lighter, and rarely lasted more than three days. Even after giving birth to Lizzie, there had only been a week of it. Sarah was glad of less mess, less worry, less fuss. Still, she preferred to sleep separately from Jareth for those two or three nights, and when she did, she often had those inexplicable dreams.
Well, I'm going to live long enough, she thought. Who knows, I might have centuries to figure out magic and get the visions under control. Sarah still wasn't used to the idea of living so long. Her main hope was that she would live more or less as long as Jareth. The thought of dying centuries before him was too heartbreaking.
Sarah tossed aside the covers and hopped out of the bed, all melancholy banished. Today was the day they left for Aves. She snapped the fingers of both hands, and the kindling that had been laid in the fireplace the previous evening burst into a cheerful blaze. Sarah grinned. Raising fire—an admittedly more simple form of magic—why did this come so easily, while the workings of her own mind were still such a mystery?
Because your mind's more complicated, she told herself, then laughed out loud. God only knows, that's always been true. She snapped her fingers again, and dozens of candles in the room also sparked to life. She pulled the rope to summon Wulfrun and Elfswhit, then went into her bathroom to start the water running.
(vii)
"By the sixty-seven moons of Jupiter." Jareth stared around the great hall at the three dozen massive trunks, all locked and strapped and ready to travel. "Whatever is inside them?"
Sarah slipped her right arm through his, Lizzie held in her left arm. "Clothes maketh the man, Jareth. And the woman."
"In that case, we'll be the best-made monarchs at the coronation."
"Was there ever any doubt?" she teased.
He laughed. For this journey, they wore new travel clothes of deep blue and gray, sensible warm things. Sarah didn't know whether they'd arrive in Aves inside or outside the palace, and she thought it best to be prepared for cold weather.
In addition to the trunks, a small retinue of goblins who would travel with them had assembled in the great hall, preening with self-importance. Wulfrun and Elfswhit were scrubbed clean, their hair untangled for perhaps the first time in decades, and they wore dresses Sarah had sewn herself. Neither of them appeared terribly happy. Jareth's antediluvian manservant, Cyneric, waited as well, plucking at threads on his new jacket and grumbling beneath his breath. Around the perimeter of the room, Sir Didymus rode on Ambrosius, keeping the goblins in line.
A crystal sphere appeared in Jareth's right hand, and he cast it out, where it enveloped the servants and the luggage. He uttered the travel incantation, ending with "Aves." The sphere filled with swirling light, and in a heartbeat, the entire entourage had vanished.
"Shall we?" Jareth smiled.
"Let me do it," Sarah begged.
"If you get the spell wrong, we could be cast out into the Void and lost forever."
"Did I ever tell you what I got on my SATs?"
"I do hope that was some measure of magical ability." But Jareth produced a second crystal and handed it to Sarah, who gave him Lizzie in return. The girl was squirming with excitement, clearly realizing the momentous nature of this day.
"Goodbye, Sir Didymus!" Sarah called. "We're relying on you."
"Farewell, Your Majesties!" Sir Didymus responded. "The Goblin City will be safe in my care."
Sarah tossed the crystal into the air and willed it to expand, which it did satisfactorily, enveloping her and Jareth and Lizzie. She repeated the incantation Jareth had used, and the sphere filled with that same shimmering light. The last time they'd traveled this way, they'd been going to Aranea, into unknown danger, and the travel had lasted unusually long, due to a time distortion that was affecting all the Seven Kingdoms. But now, the travel was over in a flash, which she had to admit disappointed her—in spite of her success with the spell. In moments, the sphere evaporated, and they stood directly before a high wall built of fine-textured light brown stone. Heavy doors, wood reinforced with steel, stood open, guarded by two strong young women in woolen garb and light armor. Each woman bore a tall spear, and their serious expressions suggested they would not be trifled with.
When the goblin trio appeared before them, though, they blinked in obvious surprise.
"My lord?" one of them said, baffled. "My lady?"
Jareth said, "Given the immanent coronation, one would assume the city guards would be expecting guests."
"Royal guests," added Sarah.
Both guards bowed. "Of course," they said. "Welcome to Phoebetria, the royal city of Aves, Your Majesties."
Jareth and Sarah swept through the gates and into a tunnel with an arched ceiling. Sarah glanced up at the stone in appreciation. The outer wall of the city appeared thick enough to withstand a herd of stampeding elephants.
"So much for the welcoming committee," Sarah said under her breath. With each word, her breath puffed out into a dense fog. "You weren't kidding about the cold."
They emerged from the tunnel into daylight, an avenue stretching to their right and left, curving in the distance in either direction. Directly ahead loomed another high wall of pale brown stone, the two walls enclosing the avenue in a canyon of stone. Beyond the far wall, Sarah could see a row of rooftops. This road must run in a circle around the outer perimeter of the entire city. The shade created by the walls made the air seem even colder.
Two more sentries stood guard at the inner gate, and looking up, Sarah glimpsed the wickedly pointed spikes of a formidable portcullis. There was another one inside the outer gates, she realized, glancing back over her shoulder. The royal city was well-fortified. Directly across from the gate, at the base of the inner wall, sat a small, sturdy building. Smoke drifted up from its chimney. Sarah guessed this might be a guardhouse.
These two sentries also seemed astonished to see royal guests in this precinct, and one of them said, "Forgive me, my lord and lady, have you lost your way?"
"We're guests for the coronation," Sarah said in her most grand voice.
"Guests are being accommodated in the palace, which is at the center of the city," the sentry told her. "This is the Outer Boulevard. You'll need to go through the Market Circle and the Queen's Yards to reach the palace. The nearest gate to the Market Circle is that way." She pointed left. "About a quarter-circle around the city. It's a brisk walk from here."
The second sentry offered, "Would Your Graces prefer to wait here, while I summon an escort?"
Sarah had no idea how long that would take, and she didn't fancy standing around in the freezing cold, trying to make small talk with these solemn women.
"We can walk," she said with a tiny smile.
The two sentries bowed. "As you wish."
Jareth and Sarah went left. As they rounded the curve in the road, out of sight of the two sentries, a series of huts lining the inner and outer walls of the avenue came into view. None of the huts was any bigger than the guardhouse, or as well-constructed. A dense pall of fetid smoke hung in the air, which grew worse the closer they got to the huts.
"Ew," Sarah said, wrinkling her nose. "Are they burning what I think they're burning?"
Jareth's nostrils flared. "Dung."
A woman emerged from one of the huts, and Sarah could not stop herself from staring. The woman wore plain, dun-colored clothes, which caused her practically to vanish into the walls surrounding her. The fabric of her tunic and trousers was very worn, and her boots were held together with strips of rags. Despite the cold, she wore only an insubstantial shawl. But her body shocked Sarah the most: she was bent forward, almost in half, as if she'd spent her entire life carrying loads of rocks on her back. The woman clutched a pail, and Sarah could see two fingers missing on one hand, three on the other, the remaining digits worn out little stubs.
At first impression, Sarah took the woman to be perhaps sixty or seventy years old. When she and Jareth passed closer, she realized the woman was no older than thirty. Her skin was in horrific condition, full of tiny round scars, as if it had been repeatedly sandblasted. Her nose was large, full of broken capillaries. She stared at the royal couple with a blank expression that suggested all life and animation had leeched out of her body and mind. Still clutching the pail, the woman made an awkward attempt to bow.
Sarah had no idea how to respond to this grotesque obeisance, so she gave the woman a brief nod and kept walking.
The huts continued on either side of the road. The dwellings were dismal, plain, lacking in even the simplest decoration. The windows were very narrow, little more than slits, and from stunted chimneys clouds of that foul smoke emanated. Sarah could see a scummy layer of residue coating the insides of the Boulevard's walls, a mix of soot and burnt feces. Lovely.
Here and there, behind doors held slightly ajar, Sarah glimpsed curious eyes staring out at her and Jareth and Lizzie. Only once did they encounter children, a gaggle ranging in age from five or six to about thirteen; in the older children, Sarah could see the beginnings of that bent-backed posture. None of the children wore clothing that looked even adequate: they lacked hats, gloves, coats. Their garments bore signs of too-frequent patching and repair, their boots in deplorable condition. Sarah, in her velvet dress and fur-trimmed woolen cloak, her fine gloves and fur hat, felt very self-conscious.
The children stopped their play, scurried to one side of the road, and bowed. The door of the nearest hut opened and a man appeared, his body bowed forward, face ravaged, and gestured the children inside. The children moved with a furtive alacrity that suggested they expected to be beaten at any moment.
Further down the road, a man trying to make repairs to one of the huts paused in his work. He lacked proper tools, and was using a large block of wood to hammer a nail, the work made more difficult by his damaged fingers. Sarah caught a flash of resentment on his face before he lowered his gaze and bowed. His face and ears were red from the cold. He wasn't quite as bent over as the other adults, but getting there, and when Sarah drew closer, she saw that he was young, perhaps eighteen or twenty, but aged prematurely, his mouth drawn into a tight, hard, downturned line. Sarah shifted Lizzie in her arms, tightening her grip on the girl. She was stuck not only by the depredations of hard labor in these people's faces and bodies, the meagerness of their accommodations, but their ugliness as well. Not one person would she have considered remotely attractive.
From the corner of her eye, she glanced at Jareth, to gauge his reaction to all this. He wore an expression of studied boredom; God only knew what lay behind it.
Sarah found the people's quietness most unsettling. There were neither cheers nor jeers, no muttered remarks, just those mute, staring eyes.
Up ahead, a stone archway extended across the boulevard from wall to wall, creating a boundary of sorts. When Jareth and Sarah passed beneath this arch, they came into a neighborhood of huts in better condition than those they'd just seen. More people milled about outdoors here, their faces ugly and careworn, their hands stained reddish-brown, but most of them still possessed their digits, and they lacked that horrible bent-over posture. If they didn't appear cheerful, at least they weren't so haggard. Sarah exhaled, and Lizzie relaxed in her arms. Even the mask of Jareth's face shifted, letting some warmth show through.
The brown-handed people leaped aside and bowed, and after Jareth and Sarah had passed, began to murmur in low, excited voices amongst themselves. Sarah filed everything she'd seen into a back drawer of her mind, planning to inquire about these people when she could do so with discretion. Up ahead on the right stood two more sentries, flanking a gate in the inner wall. The women registered that same astonishment when Jareth and Sarah came into view.
"My lady, my lord—have you been misdirected?" one of them inquired, a mild note of panic in her voice.
"Not at all," Sarah assured her. "Is this the gate to the Market Circle?"
"Yes, my lady."
The women bowed. Jareth and Sarah passed through an archway in another thick wall. Sarah noted the same heavy doors, the same iron portcullis at either end of the tunnel. And then they were outside in the light of day, a wide-open avenue so full of color and sound and movement and voices that Sarah felt as though she'd surfaced into clean, sunlit air after a plunge into murky, deep, frigid water.
Like the Outer Boulevard, this avenue ran in a circle, with structures built along the walls. These, then, were the houses whose roofs Sarah had glimpsed. But the avenue itself was much wider, enabling both pedestrian traffic and carts drawn by mules and small ponies. Here, the people looked happy, prosperous, well-fed, warmly dressed in layers of wool, fine leather boots on their feet. Across the avenue ran a second row of dwellings, most of them two or three stories high, and behind these houses rose another wall. Sarah realized Phoebetria must be arranged in concentric rings, with the Outer Boulevard surrounding the Market Circle, and the Market Circle surrounding the Queen's Yards. She squinted, but could not see anything beyond the high inner wall except the occasional line of a rooftop.
Two more sentries were posted on the inside of the gate, and one of them said, "Go left here, and this road will take you down to the West Market Square. You'll see the gate into the Queen's Yards. From there, you can enter the palace from either the north or south gate."
"Thank you," Sarah nodded. She and Jareth proceeded on their way.
The walls surrounding the Market Circle were placed widely enough to allow sunlight, which felt blessedly warm on Sarah's face. Inside her fleece-lined boots, her feet had begun to burn and tingle from the cold. The avenue teemed with citizens bustling about their morning errands, and when Jareth and Sarah passed by, people would pause to remove caps, bow, or curtsey, their eyes wide with astonishment. In the Outer Boulevard, everyone had dressed uniformly in those shabby dun-colored tunics and trousers; here, people dressed in a multitude of colors, and many of the women wore dresses. Shawls, coats, and cloaks kept people warm, and they enjoyed the luxuries of hats, mitts, scarves, and gloves. Some of the structures were clearly people's homes, often with a business occupying the first floor. Through glass windows, Sarah spied tailors, cobblers, book-sellers, fabric-sellers. There was an apothecary, a potter, a glass-blower, even a maker of eye-glasses. Here and there, a dwelling rose to three or four stories, like an exclamation point in the middle of a sentence. The smell of burning dung did not intrude into the Market Circle; instead, a pungent, earthy scent wafted over the rooftops.
"Peat?" Sarah wondered out loud, and Jareth nodded.
A flash of color caught her eye, and Sarah turned her head to the left. A family with young children had paused to bow. The children's garb caused Sarah's breath to catch for a moment: blousy, knee-length trousers, tucked into boots, jackets with similarly puffy sleeves, neat caps. In Sarah's dream, the children had been barefoot, without mittens—a summertime version of the clothes she saw now? The dream-children's garb had been predominantly yellow and green; these children's clothes were dark red and warm brown, perhaps reflecting either a regional or a seasonal variation.
One of the little boys eyed Sarah with a star-struck expression; she favored him with a smile and a nod, watching him turn red in response.
"Heartbreaker," Jareth murmured under his breath.
"Right back at you," she teased. More than one woman was giving Jareth second and third looks. As she viewed the faces of the people in the Market Circle, Sarah noted their comely appearance—maybe nothing more than the result of adequate food, clothing, and shelter.
The thoroughfare eventually widened out into a thriving market square. Here were the stalls of bakers and grocers, cheesemakers and vintners, butchers and fishmongers. A tinker peddled her wares from a cart. In the center of the square, a large sundial rose above a pool; empty now, but a fountain might bubble here when the weather was warm. Around the edges of the stone basin, images of birds had been carved.
Sarah heard music, and her gaze followed Jareth's to a large storefront, where a family sold instruments of every variety. Jareth let out an involuntary sigh.
"We should do some shopping later," Sarah told him.
"They're playing a harp," Jareth responded, his keen ear analyzing the sound. "Excellent tone. Aves is known for its master craftswomen."
"Is this where your lyre comes from?" asked Sarah. A small bird, a lark, was etched into the wood of the instrument. Funny how she'd never before thought to wonder where the lyre had come from.
"A gift from Eucissa," Jareth said under his breath.
"During your matrimonial tour of the kingdoms?" Sarah kept her voice very quiet.
"A token of Eucissa's hospitality. Goblins didn't merit an extravagance."
They worked their way through the throngs of people, who stepped aside and bowed. Sarah longed to explore the marketplace and the rest of the Market Circle, but she suspected it would be rude to spend the day shopping without at least announcing themselves at the palace. Besides, she was freezing. Sarah had grown so accustomed to regulating her body temperature, she'd almost forgotten how uncomfortable extremes of hot and cold could feel. Her goblin blood did provide some protection, but icy fingers nevertheless crept their way under her clothes, a light breeze making the air feel that much colder. She could only imagine how freezing it would seem if she were still thoroughly human.
The gate into the Queen's Yards was easy enough to spot: another large archway in the wall, guarded by armed sentries. Sarah wondered how long the women had to stand there, how many hours their shifts on duty lasted. Both guards bowed and gestured the royal couple through the gates and into the tunnel. The noise of the market square faded. Jareth and Sarah emerged onto a street paved with smooth, flat stones. Here, a quiet pervaded, not the sullen hostile silence of the Outer Boulevard, but the peaceful hush of privilege, broken only by birdsong and the occasional muffled voice.
"It's lovely," Sarah breathed, unable to stop a reflexive response of pleasure and delight.
One of the sentries posted inside the wall said, "In this precinct live many of the queen's extended family. Are you here for the coronation, my lady?"
"We've come from the Underground."
The guard was too well-trained to show any shock at the sight of the three goblins. "The Princess Petronia will be honored by your presence. Would you like an escort to the palace?"
"No, thank you; we're quite enjoying our tour of the city," Sarah told her.
"If you take this avenue from here and then go left at the first major intersection, that road will take you straight to the north gate of the palace."
"Thank you."
Jareth and Sarah ambled down the boulevard. Sarah would dearly have loved to see the Queen's Yards at the height of summer. This section of the city was beautifully laid out, large houses rising to six or seven stories, interspersed with gardens and parks, through which wound stone pathways. The trees were bare now, of course, the flower beds and shrubs bedded down for winter, but birds still flitted about feeders filled with seeds and suet. Sarah admired the houses, many of which had been built from a warm, rosy-golden stone that seemed to absorb the sunlight and give it off as a warm glow. Cunningly painted wooden shutters covered the windows, though some of the shutters had been opened to allow daylight.
From chimneys drifted the scent of fragrant wood smoke: no dung or peat burned here. Sarah heard a quiet clop-clop of hooves and through the trees, she glimpsed a splendid horse being led by a young woman to a stable. A blanket embroidered with the image of a sea bird covered the animal.
Each house was a marvel of architecture, designed with ornamentation, elegant windows, double doors of stained or painted wood, arched porticoes on the lower levels, balconies on the upper. Tall chimneys assured that smoke would ventilate away from the houses. Flocks of birds congregated in many a garden, and Sarah saw that a multitude of wooden birdhouses had been provided for them. In one back yard, a young man in servant's clothes broke the ice in a birdbath. Sarah couldn't help thinking that the birds were better housed and fed than the people in the Outer Boulevard. She also wondered if the thick walls dividing the city circles from each other were more to keep the castes of Phoebetria separate than to discourage any would-be foreign invaders.
At a small intersection she and Jareth discovered a park with another fountain. Here, the broad, shallow pool had not been drained, but had been allowed to freeze over, and two adorable young children were taking a skating lesson. They wore the same garb Sarah had seen on the children in the Market Circle—the same as from her dream—but in rich, luxurious fabrics: instead of wool, these children wore damask, their jackets and hats of velvet trimmed with fur. The young man who taught them was very handsome, bordering on pretty, with tousled golden curls and pink cheeks. His clothing was equally as sumptuous, but in a more adult style. All three wore leather boots with steel blades strapped to the soles.
The youth nudged the two children when he spotted Jareth and Sarah. He and the little boy doffed their caps, making elegant bows, while the little girl, scarcely more than a toddler, dropped a curtsey. Both children had white-blond hair and blue eyes; both looked as though they'd never wanted for a thing in their lives.
Jareth and Sarah continued until they reached a wide crossroads, where they turned left.
"This must be the intersection…" Sarah remarked, then broke off in open-mouthed astonishment. Gazing down the road, they could see in the distance another high wall, and for the first time, the royal palace itself, not a single building, but many buildings of varying designs, clustered together. Soaring above all the rooftops rose a high tower, pointing toward the sky like a long, thin needle. Sarah peered up at the tiny windows near the tower's roof. From that vantage point, one must be able to see all over the countryside.
"Fantastic!" she breathed. She almost said, It's even more fabulous than Aranea, but she kept that observation to herself.
Jareth only chuckled. "They always have to have the biggest palace, the highest watchtower, the best and most extravagant of everything. They can't abide being outdone. Every time the queens of Aves have traveled to other kingdoms, they've come back and added onto that monstrosity they call home."
They strolled down the avenue toward the palace, which seemed to loom larger and larger the closer they got to it. On either side of the road, the houses also became bigger and grander, as if their status increased with proximity to the royal residence. The wind's bite felt worse here, on the north side of the palace, and Lizzie hid her face in Sarah's shoulder. Sarah adjusted the girl's fur hat and drew a fold of her own cloak about the small, shivering body. Looking about, Sarah realized that in spite of the lung-burning chill, the ground lay brown and bare.
No snow—yet, she thought.
She and Jareth quickened their footsteps until they reached the high wall with its massive gate. Unlike the sand-colored walls of the outer rings, this wall was constructed from the same rosy-golden stone that had been used to build the houses in the Queen's Yards. Nothing but the best, Sarah thought. Jareth hadn't been exaggerating.
The two women who stood guarding the gate wore the distinctive robin's egg blue tunics Sarah remembered from the messenger who'd brought the invitation.
The sentries bowed. One of them said, "My lord Jareth, you and your lady queen have been expected. Please come inside. Our most profound apologies that you've been needlessly inconvenienced."
"Not at all," Sarah assured them. "We've been thoroughly enjoying your lovely city." She kept her tone light, but placed an ironic stress on lovely.
The first guard led them through the gateway, set into the thick outer wall of the building. At the far end of the tunnel, they came to a small room: stone floor, stone walls, sparsely furnished with some good wooden pieces. A large doorway opened to a corridor that must lead into the palace itself. In a fireplace along one wall, a substantial blaze crackled, and three young women in guard's uniforms stood at a nearby brazier, warming their hands. They all bowed when the royal trio entered.
"Aellenia's been sent for," one of the three said to the guard who'd escorted Jareth and Sarah. "She's on her way." Looking apologetic, she told the two goblins, "Guests have been arriving at the south gate, where their hosts for the coronation are greeting them and taking them directly to their quarters. We received word from some of the city guards that you appear to have been misdirected…?" She let the question trail off on a discreet note; it would be rude to imply to royal guests that they didn't know their way around, or that they weren't welcome to tour the city at their leisure.
"Not misdirected at all," Sarah offered. So she'd made a slight miscalculation in performing the travel spell, but really, how was she to have known where they were supposed to arrive? It wasn't like their invitation had included specific instructions. "Phoebetria is a fascinating city, and we saw it the best way possible: on foot." In truth, she was so happy to be inside, out of the damned cold that she could have sat in front of the fire and not moved for days.
The guard nodded, relieved to learn that no faux pas had been committed. "Aellenia of the Clade Tinamotus will be your hostess and guide for the month of the coronation," she said. "She's the daughter of Jacama, the Princess Petronia's sister-in-law, so she's now the queen's niece."
Sarah nodded, filing away this information.
Her keen ears detected the tap-tap-tapping of light, swift footsteps, and a moment later, a lovely, diminutive young woman swept into the guardroom, bringing with her a delicate whiff of something floral: freesia.
"Your Majesties," she said, dropping an elegant curtsey. "Forgive me for missing your arrival in Phoebetria. My name is Aellenia." She rose up from her curtsey and favored the royal pair to a dazzling smile. "Please feel free to call me Lenia."
To be continued…
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