Chapter Eight: Stormy Love

No…nobody came to rescue her. Sarah was pulled into the sodden earth and was never to be seen again. I'm sorry but not all stories have happy endings. This is sometimes the way it goes.

The rain had cleared the next day and Hoggle walked up to the heath where all the other creatures gathered around to mourn for Sarah's death. He had no idea what was going on so he asked one of the nearby goblins to explain to him why everybody was so upset. When he told Hoggle that Sarah had died the dwarf broke down into tears. This was twice that he had lost the girls he had loved, both of them taken away by rainstorms and Hoggle never got the chance to apologize to Sarah. From that day on he had to live forever with his guilt.

As for Jareth, well, no one ever saw him again. Maybe he had watched Sarah get pulled to her death but was too late to save her and so ran away from his Labyrinth because he couldn't handle the shame. But one thing we do know was that he thought about Sarah everyday of his life...

...That's what would have happened if Jareth had not come to Sarah's rescue just as she was about to be submerged into the mucky earth forever. The Goblin King came from out of nowhere and rushed over to Sarah. He reached for her hand and with ease he pulled her out of the mud. She was unconscious but at least she was breathing. He took her frail body into his arms and wiped the mud from her face. Then he stood up and carried all the way her back to his castle.


Sarah sat in the throne-room in the castle. She was still unconscious as Jareth sat next to her and tried to wake her. Her hair was wet and sticky and her clothes were still dirty. If he did have powers to make her clean he hadn't got round to doing it yet. A goblin walked up to Jareth with a drink which Jareth asked him to fetch for her in case she woke up. He looked at the mug he had brought her and sneered in disgust.

"Beadle when I said get her a drink I meant water, not a bloody cocktail. We're not trying to get her drunk you brainless swine!" yelled Jareth.

"Sorry master, I'll fetch it now" croaked the goblin as he walked away and downed the alcoholic beverage himself.

A few minutes later the goblin came back with a cup of water. Jareth was just about to take it when the goblin chucked the liquid in Sarah's unconscious face.

"What the hell are you doing!" shouted Jareth.

"I thought you meant…to wake her up" said the goblin.

"No I didn't you imbecile!"

But the goblin's stupidity had actually worked. Sarah quickly jolted awake in shock.

"Where am I?" she asked in panic.

"It's alright. I found you unconscious in the rain. You're okay now" said Jareth.

Sarah looked down at her mud-covered clothes in distress.

"What happened?" she asked, "the last thing I remember was…the rain."

"You was submerged in Quick Sludge, a death-trap used for enemies who stray about the wrong districts of the Labyrinth. You were not supposed to go there…why were you there Sarah?" he asked concernedly.

"I…I don't know. Hoggle ran away again. I was looking for him" she said, still traumatized from her near-death experience. She looked at Jareth. His face looked worn-out and his shirt was torn so that she could see his silky white skin baring through it. They gazed at each other for a few moments.

"I'm sorry" -

"I'm sorry" they both said at the same time.

Jareth let out a sharp cackle and Sarah smiled.

"What are you sorry for?" asked Jareth.

"For all the trouble I've caused since being here. I've practically ruined everyone's life" she said pitifully. "What are you sorry for?"

"I know how much Hoggle means to you and I apologise for humiliating him in front of you the other day…I should have known that he had feelings for you before I made you stay here."

Tears began to form in Sarah's eyes.

"I wish he didn't have these feelings for me. It makes things so much more complicated. I hate to think of all the trouble I could cause just by being friends with someone and misleading them to think I wanted more" she said.

Jareth softly touched her face with his gloved finger and wiped the single tear which had fallen from her eyes.

"He's not the only one who you may be misleading Sarah" said Jareth.

She looked at him. She knew what he meant, but for some reason she didn't want to tell him that he was being mislead by her. Maybe he wasn't. Maybe she wanted his feelings for her to progress.

"Jareth I…" she began to say but he put his finger to her lips so she could say no more. Then he leant in towards her and kissed her fully on the lips. She needed it as much as he did. In the past they always felt like lost souls who were forever searching for someone to love them. Now they had found each other.

Now, once could easily be dismissed as a coincidence but getting caught twice surely cannot happen by chance. That's right, Hoggle was there again spying on the couple from a high-up ledge as they embraced. This time he didn't look upset, he looked enraged. Jareth had stolen his girl and he wasn't going to let him get away with it. He cared about Sarah, certainly, but if he were to accept her falling in love with somebody other than him then Jareth is the last person he would want that to be.


When Sarah arrived back at the hut Hoggle wasn't there. She hoped that he had just gone for a walk and not gone to the bar to get even more drunk. It was horrible to think about the heartbreak that Hoggle had to go through. When she had first met him she just thought he was a careless dwarf who didn't have very deep feelings. How wrong was she? She hoped that one day they'd forget about all that has happened and would be back to being friends again.

So she climbed into the small, unkempt bed that she had been staying in for the past week and closed her eyes. She knew that she was worried about Hoggle but thoughts of Jareth were also preoccupied her mind. He gave her feelings that she had never felt before. It was all so exhilarating and new. Even though she knew he was a Goblin King with a very mysterious past and she was just a human being who was at least half his age, there was an exciting kind of spark that flickered between them every time their eyes met. Eventually she dozed off with dreams of Jareth on her mind.

But while Sarah lay fast asleep a dwarf named Hoggle stood in the doorway as a dark shadow covered most of his face. He was staring at her strangely, as if he was about to do something regretful. It appeared that he was holding a bottle in his hand filled with green slime. It looked awfully familiar to the love potion that Alfred had given Sarah before. He slowly walked towards her and gazed at her face, which looked rather beautiful as she slept. Then he opened the bottle, his eyes still fixated on Sarah. He took it to her lips and began to pour a little bit of the liquid in her mouth. Even though she was asleep she still managed to swallow the potion. Hoggle took the bottle away from her and then watched her for a moment. He became a little startled when he saw that she opened her eyes. The potion must have awakened her.

"Hoggle" she said with a soft happy tone, looking glad that he was okay.

"Yes Sarah I'm here" he said. "You go back to sleep now."

Sarah gave him a warm smile then closed her eyes. Hoggle wondered if the potion had actually worked yet or if it needed more time. Only tomorrow would tell.


When tomorrow came Sarah did not wake up in the stillness of the surrounding forest like she was used to. Instead she was jolted awake by a deafening thunder and the trembling unsteadiness of the ground. Her eyes darted around with panic.

"What's happening?!" she cried. "Hoggle?!"

But Hoggle was not there. She soon learned that the hut she slept in had been torn apart by a destructive earthquake. Only half of it was there! The half where Hoggle had been sleeping was no where in sight. The roof had been blown off and there was a large gap on the other side of it where Sarah could see out into the open air. Only, she couldn't see anything because the air was filled with a strong grey heavy wind that shook the cabin so it rocked from side to side. Sarah stood up out of her bed to look where she was but the hut toppled to one side and thrust her to the back of it so that she fell to the floor with a sharp blow. She stood up again but this time she held on to the rails of the bed for support. She walked over to the end of the hut where it had been torn off and peered out into the Labyrinth. Her eyes looked a little strange and dazed. The howling winds swept her hair from her face and blew grains of ashes and dust in her eyes. She had no idea where abouts in the Labyrinth she was or even if she was in the Labyrinth at all! Then she looked down. She saw the cabin was being propped up by a large tree which seemed like it would snap at any minute. Look even further down made her heart beat even faster than it already was. She gasped when she caught sight of a vast black hole of oblivion that the hut would fall in to if the tree shook any greater. It looked kind of like the Oubliette but much deeper and much darker. She was sure that nothing unpleasant could be found inside the hole and she didn't want to stay around to find out.

"Hoggle! Help!" she screamed but the winds seemed to cry louder than she did.

But Hoggle didn't come. There was only one hope for Sarah now.


"Master! Master!" one of Jareth's white-bearded servants cried as he ran toward him. Jareth was sitting casually on his throne

"What? Can't you see I'm very busy" he said, even though it didn't look like he was doing anything other than thinking to himself.

"Haven't you seen it?"

"Seen what?" he said impatiently.

"The tempest. It's right outside. It's effected the entire the Labyrinth apart from the castle. Everything's ruined.

Without saying anything Jareth shot up from his throne and rushed to the doors of the Goblin City. When he opened them he was taken aback by the colossal thunderstorm that surrounded the whole Labyrinth like it had declared war on Jareth's kingdom. The sky was filled with dark grey clouds which swept over the land. The tempest seemed to cover everything apart from Jareth's castle which was completely untouched.

"What about Sarah?" Jareth asked.

"We don't know Sire" said the servant.

"Well haven't you sent the goblins out to look for her?!"

The servant bowed his head.

"The goblins have…perished Sire. It appears that the Goblin City was the place that suffered the worst" he said sorrowfully.

Jareth tried to console his distress. His entire empire had been destroyed.

"All of them?" he asked, lowering his voice to show his grief.

"No. There were three that were spared because they had snuck into the castle to steal some more ale."

Jareth glanced behind him. Stood at the back of the room were three guilty-looking goblins who looked about as useful as an umbrella would be in the tempest. What's more, they were all drunk! One of them waved at their king, the other belched and the last one just stood their smiling with his goofy teeth and large stone eyes. Jareth rolled his eyes.

"Out of all the goblins that could have been spared I got left with these three buffoons" he stated. "Now come on, we need to go out there and find the girl!" he said.

Then he threw one of his crystals into the storm so that it formed a gap of clear air which he and the goblins began to walk through.


Unfortunately for Sarah, the earthquake had began to start up again. The shattered cabin started to rock wildly back and forth. The tree that supported it shook rowdily, almost as if it was trying to shake the cabin off. Sarah tried to grab hold of anything she could reach but it was no use, the whole cabin was going to fall into the black void below. She screamed as the hut collapsed. Like the Titanic, it tipped sideways before plunging into the depths of the void. Quickly Sarah's hands reached for a branch on the tree and gripped it tightly as Hoggle's home feel from underneath her feet. She watched it fall down into the black hole until she could no longer see it. It took a while before she heard a great big crash! A lump choked her throat when she realised that if she let go of the branch she'd be history! How would her parents know if she was dead? What about her friends and her brother? Oh, why did Jareth have to keep such horrible death-traps in the Labyrinth? The wind began to blow more violently. The tree shuddered again. Sarah could hardly keep her grip. She looked at where the tree began. It's trunk was situated on a rocky crag which was too far for Sarah to jump to. She could try swing across it but the risk of her slipping and falling into the darkness below was too great.

"Hoggle!" she screamed, desperately wishing the dwarf would turn up like a gallant knight and rescue her.

"Sarah!" she heard a voice call from the distance.

For a moment her eyes lit up. Who was that? Was it Hoggle?

But when Jareth emerged on the rock face above her she frowned in disappointment. The three remaining goblins stood behind him looking clueless and fidgety like they were children from the school that Sarah worked at before she got herself fired.

"Sarah, it's alright. I'm going to save you" he said as he elegantly pulled a crystal ball from his gloved hand and braced to throw it her way.

"No!" Sarah screamed. Jareth held back in surprise. "I want Hoggle to rescue me."

"What? Sarah this is no time for games" said Jareth as he prepared to throw the crystal again. But he stopped himself when he saw that Sarah was about to let go of the tree.

"I mean it Jareth. If you don't put that crystal down I'll let go!". She was serious. She was actually going to let go if Hoggle didn't come to save her.


Author's Note: Dreadfully sorry about the beginning bit - I just couldn't resist. Not sure how this chap is going to be percieved so I'll just have to wait and see!

Reviews please x

Next (and final) chapter - Topsy-Turvy Love