Dear Readers and Reviewers:
Some of you have been expressing some concerns for Sarah's depression and inability to battle her disease with her usual vigor in this story. The cancer she has been diagnosed with is pancreatic cancer, where tumors spread along the pancreas and so on through the body. This particular cancer is to this day the most deadly and painful of cancers. Its survival rate is slim to none and even those who make it into remission don't last another five years of life. In Sarah's time, the nineties, these survival rates were worse and the disease more painful, though not much has changed up to 2011. Chemotherapy and radiation also have poor results for patients which is why Sarah hesitates and doesn't want to go to the hospital. I hope now her attitude makes a little more sense. I chose this cancer for her for a particular reason, and I hope you understand soon. Meanwhile, enjoy the story, this chapter is a bit of an emotional roller coaster, but I felt it was needed. Please review! Thank you all!
~Virgin Queen 15
P.S. - the alternate ending suggested was lovely, but not what I had originally intended for this story. However, if enough of you want it I will write an ending different then the original that will correlate with the suggestion.
Chapter 6: In which very raw emotion is exposed
"Talk?" Sarah tried to squirm her way free, but it was impossible to escape his hold.
"Yes." He said and drew her suddenly into a hug. It was an odd feeling, the simple platonic hug; she was lined up with him, heart beating against his. Life thrumming against another life. A tear escaped her eye without her noticing until it was running down her cheek. She realized then the sparks of energy running through her, the odd life that she could feel flowing into her. Is it Jareth's? His hold on her was tight, though warm as it was there was a chilliness about him that was comforting. His hands on her back weren't annoying hot or clammy, they were cool and gentle on her. Her own skin, she could now feel was searing wretchedly.
"Your highness…" She said, "Please let go of me."
Sighing he did so and she fell back into the dimness, trying to roll onto her haunches and scrunch up in a ball. Jareth was, though a bit more graceful mirrored her position. In the light, which could hardly be called light for it was only emanating from broken shards of crystal about the ground, he looked skeletal, like a lithe human that should have been born a creature of the sky. The glow only shone on the angles of his face, which were all sharp and lined as though planned by a sculptor, and rather then accentuate the broadness of his shape the light slimmed it out until only a strip of light ran down his chest and twin segments for the legs were the only indication of his lower half. For a moment, it reminded Sarah vaguely of the Grim Reaper. Elegantly enveloped in the darkness, the image made her tears spill wildly.
"Sarah?"
In his eyes the light was playing tricks on her image too; having the same slimming effect only on her it was more abstract. With her dark hair barely lit, only a few strands on show, her face looked skull-like in its sunken way, her eyes dark holes in her head. When she began to cry and her body shook with the force of her swallowed sobs Jareth could no longer stand it.
"Damn this light!" He slammed his fist down on the ground and the crystals went dark all at once.
Strange as it was Sarah felt herself relax immediately in the darkness, to the point where even the pain in her abdomen was forgotten and she could lay back on the ground and relax. Jareth, during this time relaxed as well, listening to her sigh and change her position, smooth her hair away from her face; such trivial little sounds he found treasuring.
"Sarah?"
"Yes?"
"What is cancer?"
"You can't say you haven't heard of it?" She said, amused. "You travel to Aboveground all the time."
"To fetch younglings and threaten runners. I haven't vacationed there since that damn bubonic plague came about." He answered.
He did not understand why this made Sarah laugh. Calmed down, she reached forward in the blackness, which her eyes were not getting used to, and found his hand. It was cool and smooth to her touch and pleasing to feel.
"Cancer is a sickness, a disease really and it comes in many different forms," she said. "It's bad cells spreading over an organ or bone, or even skin. The cells are called tumors. They spread throughout the body if left unchecked and poison other cells. There are hundreds of different kinds of cancers, but nearly all of them are fatal and impossible to cure. I have pancreatic cancer." It felt like a painful confession as though she was admitting to a great sin. "It is a cancer that is rare for people my age and incredibly deadly. Even if we can stop the cells from spreading I'm too far along, the third stage, and I won't live another five years of life even if we can stop the cancer."
"Where could she be?" Linda whispered. Robert's eyes were worn and swollen with tears. Karen was much the same, curled up on the couch with tiny Toby in her arms. The child was so confused and lonely, he wanted Sary. He just didn't know what to do with the adults behaving the way that they were. Sary's mommy, Auntie Linda, was as pale as his own Mommy and she wouldn't stop biting her nails nervously. Toby sat up and crawled out of his mothers arms. He was not going to sit here anymore amid all the tears and confusion. He went to his sister's room and pulled himself up into her vanity chair. Looking in the mirror he murmured in a little voice; "I need you Sary."
The five year old waited, hoping that somehow she would appear to him. But she didn't.
It was though in the darkness Sarah could see everything. Her eye had adjusted and Jareth was beside her, his eyes clamped shut while she explained as much as she could to him. It was mostly a game of repeating scraps of information and having Jareth fume about his confusion.
"Explain it again." He demanded.
"Well, you see pancreatic cancer is rare in someone as young as me, the only real reason for me getting it at this age is because of my genetics, meaning my family bloodline. When we discovered that I had the cancer I was already so far into it that the tumor had spread from my pancreas into my body. Radiation was out of the question and a pancreaticoduodenectomy wouldn't work either."
"A what?"
"Surgery to remove the tumor," She explained shortly. "My only other option is Chemotherapy. But that is not something I want to do. Karen and my Dad are keen on me getting it, even though my gut is telling me it won't work. The deal we struck was that I could live for about a month on my own, and then they would take me away, stuff me in a hospital bed and make all my hair fall out." She didn't mean to yell the last bit, but it came out loud and angry.
Jareth was stiff, but he didn't say a word, how could he? Sarah shuffled away in the blackness and reached forward into it, as though to grasp the life that was slipping away from her.
"You know," She said and her voice was so soft and so weak. "I thought that one day when I had lived a human life for a few years I would come back to this place, but I never thought it would be under these circumstances." She hitched a breath and a hand went up to clutch her abdomen and she sighed. When she glanced at Jareth through the dark his face was pained.
"You…" She bit her lip. "You really aren't a monster are you?"
His expression was helpless, he held out a hand to her as if pleading for her consent for his magic to destroy her tumor.
"No, sire." She said and shook her head. "I really cannot let you; your pity is not worth my life."
"It isn't pity." He said.
"Then what is it?" She moved a step toward him, her throat thick with an onslaught of sobs that she suffered to contain.
"I…" Jareth stared at her, his heart beating faster then ever. "I… I don't know…" His hand dropped and suddenly the sobs died in her throat and Sarah could be angry again.
"Then I think it's only pity, you want to save me because I'm your favorite pet, am I right? You want me to live so you can watch me like the sick bastard you are through your little crystals." She took a dangerous step toward him, but he did not retreat. "You want to save me so you can toy with me, dress me up and dance me into insanity! Well, I am sorry to burst your bubble Jareth but I'm not going to be treated like an animal! It's not fair and even though I love you I can't let you do that to me anymore!" She was about to turn and burst from the room when the meaning of her words hit her. Oops. But her regret didn't last long and suddenly she was snatched up into a warm embrace and soft lips met hers and she was lost. She whimpered against his mouth, a pleading sound for release but it only drove him into deeper insanity and he turned his head slightly to kiss her deeper. She tried to push against him, tried to push him away but he was stronger then her and she really did not want to push him away. She realized that, in an instant and for a moment drowned in the epiphany of it all. Then she started to kiss him back, rough and hungry and he made a sound like a laugh in his throat before pulling away from her lips and looking down at her.
"You do want to live…" He murmured and smiled a sweet gentle smile that made Sarah smile back.
"I suppose… I suppose I do."
"Suppose!" He grinned. "What cheek you have! Such a stubborn child…" He smoothed her hair, taking a stray strand and lifting it to his lips.
As though angered her tumor flamed inside and she bent over, her vision obscured, though being in the darkness meant that didn't matter.
Jareth lifted her up in his arms. The room lit up in an instant and Sarah was blinded by it. Above her, once her sight came clear, she saw a stained glass ceiling, the image of a barn owl of a sweet honey color. It's brown wings were wrapped around a snow owl with green-grey eyes that glinted in the light. The entire room was circular, the walls made of shelves were filled with books and crystals and same statues of goblins and fairies. There was one wall that stood out from the others it was blank and stood as the back to a large desk that was covered in documents and feathered pens and bottles of silver ink. Sarah peered around the room curiously and looked to Jareth for an answer.
"I did ask that those documents from the High Council be removed before you arrived, but goblins are not good housekeepers." Jareth said.
"Wait, you mean this room is for me?" Sarah asked.
Nodding, he gestured to the books elegantly. "My private study is yours." He smiled and Sarah struggled out of his arms. He watched in delight as she dashed to the books, fingering the spins as she read the titles. Her smile was luminous.
She turned to him, his heart fluttered as her smile glowed.
"Jareth." She said. "Thank you." Her smiled lessoned in depth and she looked at the book her finger had stopped on. Her expression grew worrisome. Jareth, concerned, moved to her side, placing a gloved hand on her shoulder.
"What is it?" He asked. "Is there something you want?"
"No!" She said. "I couldn't want for anything now. But, if you help me…what are your terms for payment?"
"Payment…" He sighed, thinking.
Then he took her in his arms again and buried his face in her neck.
"Your life is payment enough." He whispered and began to lay small kisses on her neck, quick little touches that made her shiver.
"That couldn't be all you want."
"Of course not," He said. "But it's enough."
"Liar. I won't ask for such a thing if you don't let me pay you back in full." She said.
"Ugh!" He said. "You're so stubborn. But fine then! If you insist."
He turned her to face him, his hands holding her arms firmly. "I ask that you spend a night here in Underground, with me, not as a girl indebted to me, as a friend. A dear friend."
"That's it?" She asked. Tears had begun to well in her eyes, a reaction she didn't understand. "Jareth I would owe you my life!"
"So?"
"I only have one life! You're giving it back to me and you just want a night to spend with me and then I'm free?"
His face darkened. He sighed. "Sarah… in saving you there is a price you will pay, but not to me. I cannot save you without changing you into one of my kind. In doing this… you wont be able to go to Aboveground ever again. You're family will forget you. You will be trapped as an immortal in Underground."