Chapter 10

Well, I do nothing in the world but lie, and lie in my throat. (Love's Labours Lost, )

Kissing her had been a mistake. A lovely, highly enjoyable mistake-on both occasions-but a mistake nevertheless. If it weren't for the fact that she had most definitely enjoyed it as well, he would have wished-ha-it had never happened. Too bad he didn't learn from his mistakes as quickly as he should. Still, it was a mistake he didn't intend to make again-if-and here a gusty breath escaped his lips-if he could at all help it. The thing was, with Sarah he didn't seem to be able to help it.

In one day, she had added an indefinable spice to his life. He enjoyed teasing her and making her blush. That way she had of looking at him, wide-eyed and naïve, full of shocked innocence . . . He grinned. She hadn't changed much, despite the sharper edge to her tongue. His perpetual boredom, he realized, had dissipated as soon as he had felt her summons.

She was damn irritating though. Getting herself stuck in the snake pit and needing to be rescued. Too bad he couldn't have sent Hoggle again, but he hadn't wanted to take the time to locate him. Of course, she hadn't been in any real danger, since the snakes had abandoned that particular lair some time previously, but she didn't need to know that. At least, she had had the grace to be ashamed and had even apologized for not taking his advice.

He recalled once again the way she had nestled into his arms in her bed. She really was a darling. He could feel the beginnings of the emotions he had endeavoured to suppress all these years trying to slide their way out from the mental oubliette where he had stuffed them. Damn, he was getting soft. The Goblin King avoided the tenderer emotions-only hard cynicism and mockery for him. He wasn't opposed to a seduction, but only if it were a one-sided affair and he the winner.

Strangely, however, he didn't want that kind of thing with Sarah. He wanted her smiling sleepily in his arms, her hair dark again his pillow. With a slam, he was filled an overwhelming sense of guilt. How dare she-no, he had to admit. She wasn't to blame. How could she possibly make him feel guilty for thinking something she didn't even know he was thinking? It was his own choice to deceive her. He hadn't even the pretence of a real hold on her.

He pinched the bridge of his nose in attempt to quell his misgivings.

She just. . . made him feel things. Feel. That was not a word he had used in-he didn't want to think about how long it had been. No, actually he knew exactly when he had used it last. All that time ago when a whining teenager had wished her baby brother away and then tried to renege on her wish. She had looked at him with her frank green eyes and said the words which had somehow exacerbated his loneliness. You have no power over me.

He hadn't realized until then what her victory would mean for him. He had wanted her to win. Had engineered it so that it would be dead easy. All she had to do was follow the script-she knew it almost word for word, after all-and she would win her brother back. He had been the Goblin King in her little book. Fit her expectations to the letter.

All except the crystal dream. That had been his own insertion. He had yearned for human contact and the dream had seemed like a good idea at the time. It was one thing which made the whole bearable and yet unbearable afterward. It had haunted him. The memory of holding her, promising her-foolishly-everything. He could have ruined everything with that little stunt. If she hadn't been so stubbornly focused on saving Toby, he probably would have.

The contrast Sarah made with so many of the runners he had encountered was stark. Take this last who had so inconveniently interrupted their kiss. The child's mother hadn't even bothered to hesitate before accepting his crystal, the crystal that would ensure she forgot her child had ever existed. That was her dream. To forget her little boy. The child hadn't deserved to be transformed into a goblin. Most of them did not. There was the occasional child who had been all the better for becoming a goblin, but truly horrid children were really few and far between.

Losing Sarah this time. . . He didn't want to think about it. However, could he somehow persuade her to stay? The way she had kissed him-but that was not enough. She was a rational woman and eminently practical beneath the veneer of absentminded dawdling. She would never choose lust over love. He had seen her interactions with the various men she had dated. None of their blandishments had succeeded in persuading her to do anything she didn't choose.

Thirteen days.

Jareth sighed and dropped his head into his hands in flat despair.