Chapter Seven: Though We're Strangers 'Til Now
He smelled surprisingly good for someone who had been hanging in a dungeon when she found him. His scent was earthier than she remembered, less refined. She had only been this close to him once, in a ballroom long ago. They had both been buried under so many layers then, but here he was, so bare he was almost bone and close enough to touch.
"Why did you come for me?" The question was suspicious, loaded with distrust.
"Because you called me", she said quietly. "I... didn't really think about it. I just came."
"After all I did?" his hair tickled her face. She could see the cracks in his lips, the half-healed cut on the bridge of his nose, the yellowing bruise under his eye.
"I thought they had Toby, at first. Then I saw the owl feathers."
Jareth rolled his shoulders and grimaced as though remembering a pain there. He leaned heavily on the wall, narrowing the space between them. He brushed her collarbone with the tips of his fingers, slipping his index and middle fingers under the collar over her shirt and pulling the feather out of her bra strap. Sarah's face flushed red and she screamed internally.
"You came for me without thinking about it." Jareth sounded as though he didn't believe the words as he said them. "Why?"
"I knew you were in pain."
"Why do you care if I'm in pain?" He stared right into her, searching, trying to pull her inside out and read her thoughts. She hoped he had more success than she did.
"I just- I just do." Was that all she could come up with? That was a terrible reason. She had hoped she had a far better explanation for why she was in a foreign land on four hours sleep to rescue a kidnapping fairy.
"Sarah..." the way he sighed her name sent goosebumps rippling down her body. "You have changed so much, moon heart, but you are still as frustratingly obtuse as you ever were."
"Why do you keep calling me that? 'Moon heart'?" she asked.
"There's such a fooled heart, beatin' so fast..." he sang softly, "I'll place the moon within your heart..."*
Memories of a crystal ballroom sprang again into her mind. He had been so close, his hand on her waist, and she had wanted to kiss him, but she had been too young to understand. She'd had more important things to think about.
She kissed him now, gently, barely brushing her salt-crusted lips against his. She pulled her face back and he followed, pressing his mouth to hers. It was soft, just an idea, a thought he didn't know whether to follow through on, then he pulled away. Sarah reached up and rubbed the salt from his lips with her thumb. His eyes looked glazed again, but in a good way, like he was dreaming.
"Jareth... we have to keep going." He nodded, eyes still foggy. She took his arm and placed it around her shoulders, pulling him up the tunnel again. Jareth twined his fingers with those of the hand she placed around his waist, turning his face to breathe in the scent of her hair as they continued their painful ascent.
At last they rounded a corner and were met with rays of yellow sun. Sarah whooped again, dragging Jareth out of the tunnel and into the light. They were on a landing sliced out from the centre of the tower, held up by short pillars. A spiral staircase in the centre connected the halves of the platform together. All around them were grey waves, but Sarah could see what remained of the cliff face in the distance to her left.
With a flurry of black feathers, four cloaked figures landed at the base of the stairs before them.
*This is a boring footnote to say that these lyrics are from As The World Falls Down from the Labyrinth soundtrack and are therefore not mine!
