"You're going to have to do that slower," Sarah said, still holding her crystal with both hands, holding her breath at the knowledge that the slightest movement of her fingers could make it disappear again. Before today she assumed the crystals only provided a view into what couldn't be seen at the time with one's own eyes. But according to Jareth, crystals could provide handheld weapons far deadlier than any she knew from her own world.

Sighing in frustration, his fingers let the perfect little ball roll, and right before it could shatter to the ground, he dipped his hand to catch it in his palm. She let one hand drop and repeated the process. Making a crystal appear turned out to be easy. Preparing it to be tossed at an opponent, however…

"You've stopped concentrating on it."

Sarah tried one more time, taking a deep inhale to wipe away her disgruntlement. At last she caught it in her palm, already feeling it heat up and taking on an orange glow.

"Throw it before it burns you."

Hurling it across the gardens, the crystal hit a speckled rock, the little bits of glass dashed against the hard surface turned instantly into flames. A small fire crept up into the sky only to be quelled by Hoggle and his watering can.

"Felt the flames on that one!" he shouted to her.

"Oh, my gosh! That is so cool!" She jumped, concentrating on manifesting another one. This time the crystal appeared resting right on the top of her hand. "Are they intuitive? It's like it knows what I want to do with it."

"If you concentrate hard enough they can be," Jareth said. "This time try to make it faster. You still take too long preparing it."

Sarah let the crystal roll down her fingers and back into her palm, pummeling it back at the rock with full force. A larger fire shot up into the air but soon dwindled down into nothing more than the size of a candle flame, which Hoggle delighted in stamping out with his boot. All the way on the other side of the garden, Sarah beamed at not only her growing skill, but her aim. The girls in her dorm had called her the weak link during intramural softball.

"Is this about the rate everyone learns how to use them?" she asked.

"Only a little quicker. You have some, though, that couldn't hit the rock and would take out all of Pasia's beautiful trees," he laughed. Fond memories of watching his cousins unable to…there was a human phrase for it that he liked…hit the broad side of a barn with a crystal.

"How is she coming?" Pasia called to them, exiting her castle after a second bath and in a different gown. She brought out a plate of what looked to Sarah like pieces of popcorn chicken.

"Very well," Jareth answered, allowing himself a few pieces. Waiting for everyone around her to partake, Sarah finally popped one into her mouth.

"How do you like the chicken, Sarah?" Pasia asked her.

"Very good, thank you," she said after swallowing. "I suppose it's time for me to change also?"

"With afternoon coming it would be decidedly more comfortable," Pasia said. Suppressing the sigh she felt coming on, Sarah hustled back into the castle, already repeating her fashion statements thanks to the local customs. She didn't understand how that could be any more impressive or respectful than just wearing one outfit a day, and it was out of the question to toss back on her jeans and t-shirts.

Pasia watched her go.

"A fine student?"

"Exceptional. She'll be above the most basic spells soon enough." Seeing her place the now-empty tray of food down on a table, she paused before entering the gardens. He met up with her and let her walk right beside him through the gardens. He much preferred when Pasia was straight across from him at a distance. As short as she was, he had to crane his neck just to be able to give her the decency to look her in the eye when he spoke to her. More than two feet separated them when it came to height.

"Is Sarah a standard human as far as her physicality goes?"

"I would say so. She's the average height for a female human, probably a little under the average in weight."

"I hope Faren did not frighten her last night. It's just his way," she apologized, staring down at the ground. "He does not mean to come on so strong."

"I'm sure she's forgotten about it," he lied. He noticed the weary look she gave the elfish man whenever they were in the same room. He had inferred from their conversation she was not overly used to male attention. "She seems to enjoy your company."

"Yes, she is a sweet, sweet girl," Pasia said. "Is she your confidante?"

"A ruler has no confidante," he said quickly.

"That is true, but I was wondering specifically," she said and then paused, "if she had spoken to you of me."

"Afraid we gossip about you?" he bantered. He stopped at the pained way she closed her eyes. "Is something troubling you?"

"Jareth," she said. "I, I like you."

"I like you too." He gave her as sincere a smile as he could. He did like her. He much preferred her to other dignitary with which he was forced to socialize.

"No. No." She shook her head. "We will support the goblins in the efforts against the chimeras."

"Thank you."

"So your answer will not affect that," she said, climbing atop one of the many benches placed all around her gardens. Face to face with him, she took a deep breath. "I have…romantic interest in you."

For an absurd moment, all Jareth's mind could think, "So she does have a crush on me," but he soon banished the Aboveground slang. Sarah had been right. Damn her, and damn him for not believing her until this awkward moment surfaced. Standing there stunned facing the petite little queen, he gathered his thoughts.

"Pasia, I enjoy our time together…"

"Don't do that, please," she whispered, staring at the ground once again.

"I don't know what to say," he said. "It's never hurt to spurn another's advances before." He traced her temple with a gentle hand. "But that was because none of them were ever a friend before."

Pasia bit her lip. Her pink face shone in humiliation. Suddenly she looked up with a pert smile.

"Well, it simply could not have been anyway. You would have crushed me as it is," she forced a laugh. "I think I will retire until dinner. You know you always have free reign in my castle."

"Pasia," he started, but she walked right through him and faded away.

XXXXX

He walked back into the sitting room of the castle where his generals all sat with Sarah, reading what few books the Sidhe owned. Sarah sat on the floor, scribbling down her thoughts into her notebook he taught her to conjure up for herself earlier that day. Hoggle sat next to her, copying the letters she used onto his own small notebook. He really should have taught that dwarf how to read.

"Your Highness!" Aulis sprang to his feet. Lysander and Orion followed suit. Sarah stayed planted on the floor. It was in those blatant moments of disrespect he felt like being cruel to her, but he never could seem to manage it. He motioned for them to sit and took a chair for himself. Faren, once again stained by chasing after the field sprites, plopped down onto the chair next to him.

"Woodland fairies," he said, coughing out what looked like a small wing. "You'd never think they tasted so salty."

Jareth noticed Sarah look up with a disgusted look on her face.

"And yet you aren't thirsty?" He continued the chitchat.

"Oh, we have that lovely little well in the back," Faren said, pointing back to the gardens. "I just thought I'd mention it in case, oh, but I forgot goblins aren't as used to the country cooking as we."

"Cooking would imply some civilized manner of digesting your prey," Orion mumbled.

"What's that now?" Faren sat up. "You're saying I, a top-ranked official of this kingdom, and my sister, the queen of it, are uncivilized because we enjoy the fairy folk? You're a species to talk, General Orion, stealin' babies and instead of feedin' your countless poor with them, you just make 'em into more goblins! I never heard of such a ridiculous system."

"To each his own," Sarah began, but Hoggle quickly covered her mouth with his hand.

"I ought to wring your neck for such a comment." Orion stood, his nostrils flaring at the pointy-eared man with a small blood stain on his chin.

"What's the difference wringing a chicken's neck and wringing anything else's? We served you chicken, pork—all the 'acceptable' things to eat and this is the gratitude we get from guests?"

"Faren, silence," Pasia ordered, finally entering. "Our guests have been gracious." She stepped back outside without saying another word.

"Funny," Lysander said. "She usually takes a whole five minutes greeting us and asking what we need and the like. Lady Sarah, I do hope you haven't offended her. Perhaps I should escort you to her to apologize?"

"The last thing I need, General, is to hear how inappropriate my dress is for apologizing to a queen," Sarah snapped, her eyes not leaving her writings. She shut her notebook and took it up the stairs with her. Hoggle trotted along after her calling, "Sarah. You know me legs aren't as long as yours. Humans."

"Aulis," Jareth said, "Make sure no further childish behavior continues down here." He disappeared rather than walk up the stairs.

Sarah sat on her bed, just finishing the organizing of her thoughts when he entered.

"I guess that's for not knocking when I came into your room," she said.

"For all the half-day's worth of magic you know, you should still not isolate yourself." He took a seat in the rocking chair in the room, enchanted to fit the size of whoever rested upon it. "I saw you were writing. Care to enlighten me?"

"Not really. I'm too biased, I think. Aulis is above suspicion in my mind, so I begin to hate Lysander and Orion more. That's why I left."

"We will be called back down soon anyway." He paused, taking note of her forest green dress she wore for part of yesterday. "I will make sure she will know when to escort her army back to the goblin kingdom before we embark against the chimeras. I trust by then we will have sorted out this spy business. Sarah, you were right about something."

"About what?"

"Pasia wanted me alone to tell me something."

A smirk flashed across Sarah's face.

"I told you."

"Yes, saying that always helps," he snapped with sarcasm. "I need you to talk to her and see how hurt she is. She said she would not go back on her word, but I didn't mean to hurt her."

"I can't do that."

"Oh, you can't?" he said with a raised eyebrow. "Why ever not?"

"It already happened. She had a right to tell you and you had a right to reject her. To quote you, 'what's said is said.'"

"You ungrateful little human!" He stood, looming over her. "I bother to show you what no other human in the world knows and this is how you repay me? She's taken with you, has no intention whatsoever of making you tonight's main course, and would probably prefer another female to talk to, and you refuse?"

"I'm not your subject. You can't make me do anything." She stayed seated, making sure her voice stayed calm. Nothing worsened a situation like bringing a third party in to mitigate, especially against royal factions.

"I think you'd find I can if I wanted," he said, a vague chill in his voice. "For all you know you still have barely scratched the surface of magic and what it can do. I can make you do things, Sarah. It is a small favor I ask."

"And since you ask it, I have the freedom to turn it down. It would only make things worse," she said.

For a moment, she let herself lock eyes with him. His eyes differed from even each other, and it took her all her strength to look away. Within seconds, he was gone from the room. Fully aware how right he'd been in the fact that she shouldn't be alone, she went back downstairs, expecting angry silence to hover around all of them.

XXXXX

Their hostess remained absent from dinner, and Sarah stayed silent while a wide variety of breads and vegetables were passed around the table, no meat in sight. The generals seemed more put off by the apparent lack of entrees, but it was actually Hoggle that felt the need to mention it.

"Afraid we'd ask if we were eating someone we knew, eh?" he asked Faren.

"My sister ordered the meal this evening, not me."

"I must apologize for what I said before, Sir Faren," Orion said, standing with a formal air. "Please forgive me."

"Of course, no matter. Sit down and we'll have a smoke afterwards," Faren stuttered out, his cerulean eyes growing larger at the unexpected comment.

"Be glad to. I have some questions about your people I'd like to know, such as your history in bronze work."

Sarah made a mental note.

"After dinner, general. After dinner."

Pasia burst through the kitchen with a maid bustling behind her, carrying a tray of something that looked like red wine.

"You must have the sangmagis," she said, taking her seat at the head of the table. "You have nothing to worry about, Sarah. It is a simple wine, not blood."

Sarah gave a nervous grin, disappointed her distaste had shown so obviously. The others all seemed used to it, even Hoggle gulping it down and pouring a little bit over his vegetables. Sarah took a small sip. It had a syrupy taste to it, with a sour aftertaste. She managed to drink down some of her water from her other glass before trying the wine again. Her tongue rolled inside her mouth, trying to hide from what it was about to be exposed to. She should have guessed the Sidhe enjoyed such sweet drinks. She sipped again, controlling the compulsion for her lips to pucker together from it.

"How do you like it?" Pasia asked.

"Very unique, nothing like what I've ever had before," she said with a smile. Pasia watched her drink it before finishing her own glass. "There is no need to finish if it is too strong for you. I presume it is much like the kind of wine you have where one must acquire a taste for it?"

"Probably," she coughed out. She saw the generals excuse themselves, and followed suit.

Blindly following them through the castle, she found Aulis had gone back into the kitchen.

"Is everything all right, my lady?" she heard him ask.

"Perfectly fine, thank you," Pasia answered him.

Sarah kept her eyes on the others, growing more and more ahead of her. She still squinted from that abysmal drink despite how little she had. Lysander and Orion stopped in a dark corner in the main hall of the castle, the moonlight just barely touching them. They stood close together. Huddling back behind the stairs, she kept still.

"You don't want to make an enemy of me, Orion."

"Always imagining the silliest things," Orion dismissed. "You can't…"

"All that talk about 'bronze work.' Don't think I don't know what you had in mind. I have half a mind to tell the king."

"You've always had half a mind," Orion laughed. "And while you're here, don't think this kind of talk absolves you of any suspicion in my mind. A keen mind suspects everyone."

"Still," Lysander said, stepping back from him. "We'll have another little chat soon. Very soon. Have a good smoke with Faren."

Orion dashed back through the dining room into the sitting room, not seeing Sarah crouched in the shadows. She summoned her notebook and let the discussion pour out onto the pages. It didn't help that each suspected the other, but there might be some clue. Yes, what Orion said was suspicious. But maybe he was just curious. Lysander definitely thought it was more than curiosity. But how did Lysander know about the key in the first place? She didn't think he'd been around when she'd mentioned it.

Just as she was thinking, she felt a tap on her shoulder.

"What are you doing here alone?" Pasia asked. "You must come in the sitting room with us."

Sarah turned back to see where Lysander was, but he was gone.

In the sitting room, everyone but Orion and Faren partook in after-dinner drinks, the cellists from last night providing some mild entertainment. She peered through the windows and saw Orion and Faren back in the distance, smoke rings lingering over their heads.

"How sad that after tonight we must all go to war," Pasia sighed, sitting next to Sarah. "My armies will be assembled first thing in the morning and we shall escort you back to the goblin kingdom where we can charge from there. We are a little people, Sarah, but with our arrows in one hand and our clubs in the other, we can make short work of our enemies."

"Perhaps Sarah would like to know some of your history," Jareth spoke up, although with a quiet voice. Sarah scoffed at the meagerness of his peace offering.

"Oh, I'm sure she's not interested in academia tonight," Pasia laughed. "But another night I would certainly like to have you here for questions and answers. I'd be as enlightened to know about your world as you would be to know mine."

Sarah nodded in thanks, but felt her temples pounding. She kept looking over at Jareth, unable to stop looking him all over. Her chest began to heave at how near…and yet how far he was from her. He should be the one next to her, the one touching her, the one inside her.

She shook her head, placing her hand over her heart, feeling each rapid spasm. When he stopped looking at the window and finally made eye contact with her, finally, it felt like too much.

"How did you like dinner?" she heard Pasia, but it seemed off in the distance.

"All of it was very good, thank you," she whispered, afraid she'd let out a moan. Parts of her ached with a longing she had not felt for anyone for a long time. Come save me, Jareth, she thought. Take me outside, take me upstairs. The sensible part of her even begged just for him to send her to her room to be alone and let the strange sensation pass.

"We grow our own vegetables and the wheat fields of the Sidhe are legendary." Why wouldn't she just shut up, Sarah thought. Pasia's voice felt like a heavy weight on top of her head.

"And the sangmagis? Did you like the sangmagis?"

"A little too strong for my taste," Sarah said, feeling sweat under her hair on the back of her neck, just from looking at him. Imagining how he could make her feel if he touched her, those hands on her—she held up her head with her hand to control the, the, she couldn't even put it into words. She'd been aroused before, turned on before, but never like this. Seeing Jareth head towards the stairs sent her heart crashing to the ground.

"It serves a purpose," Pasia said, seeing Sarah's anguish. "It lowers our inhibitions, much like your wine does. But instead of lowering all of them, it only breaks down the barriers of the one thing we keep from ourselves the most. Sometimes it's anger, sometimes it's tears, sometimes it's lust. We've all grown up with it, so it was a small experiment to see how it would be for someone so new to it."

"What are you doing?" Sarah whispered, gasping for breath.

"Just bringing out what it is you want. I'm just at a loss to know whether it's taken effect yet."

Sarah could listen no longer. She picked herself up and sprinted to the stairs.

Pasia watched her go, a saddened look on her face. So her suspicions were true. She brought her knees up to her chest and held them. In spite of it all, she liked the human, really did. But it still hurt. Go on and have what I cannot, Sarah, she thought. Refusing to pity herself over her heartbreak any longer, she joined her brother outside. There will be others, she thought.

XXXXX

Jareth stepped up on the first stair, not sure why he couldn't stay down there. He wanted to be alone. This visit was so prolonged even though it had hardly spanned a full two days. He only wanted to be able to breathe, away from the politics and the war. He only wanted…

He felt himself being pulled back, arms over his shoulders, dragging him back. Turning, fully prepared to fight, he had no time to react to Sarah throwing her arms around his neck and slamming her lips onto his.

He closed his eyes, joining her, cupping her face to hold her to him. He had feared what would happen if she ever gave him the chance. Their kiss deepened at the bottom of the stairs. His hands slid back to her head, stroking her long hair he'd wanted to be smothered in for so long, down to her waist. He tore himself away from her lips only to let his lips feel her jaw, her chin, her neck, all the way to the soft, smooth dip where her neck met her shoulder.

Listening to her shallow breaths excited him more. He leaned into her, letting her feel what she was doing to him. A primitive purr cascaded out of her mouth while he went back to her lips, savoring it this time, tasting it all. Sarah's hand glided up through his hair.

"So beautiful, Sarah," he moaned, breaking away only for a breath before crashing into her again.

"Upstairs," she gasped, burrowing herself into him. He almost lost control then and there. Just about to send them both to his room, he heard a third voice.

"I wish the goblins would come and take me away."

Damn! He cursed at the sensation of fading away from her, leaving her just when he knew she wanted him. There would be no kindness he could show whoever wished those words, perhaps no bargaining at all. This child would stay, thrown to whatever couple was next on the list for adoption. He had no time for it now, not while his very essence was throbbing the way it was.

He stood in a boy's bedroom with thunder booming from outside the window. He peered down at the little form in front of him.

It was Toby.

A/N: I do not own the Labyrinth characters. I do not own any of the crazy Muppets. I'm just happy I have my husband right now. If you'll excuse me...