Disclaimer: Something new to add this time! Not only do I still not own Labyrinth, but I also don't own anything by C. S. Lewis! Fantastic. I feel quite wonderfully unaccomplished, now.

Challenge # 61: Fairy Tale

Sarah had been plunked down in the middle of a fairy tale again.

It happened with disturbing regularity, and really, one would think she'd have gotten used to it by now, but the shock of going about her daily business and suddenly stepping into a buried fairy circle or walking through an odd mist and bam, one way ticket to Elsewhere, please, just never seemed to wear off.

Standing up, she dusted off her bottom, wishing that just once, being dropped on her ass into another realm wasn't quite so literal. This was the third call in the last ten days, and her tailbone had only just recovered from the portal in that old woman's basement. Usually she had a good month between jaunts, but apparently not this week.

She sighed, looking around to see where she'd wound up this time. Really, she should have known better than to lean so far into that wardrobe. Lucky Aslan wasn't waiting to chomp my head off. Never did like that lion. However, her current surroundings did not look like Narnia. The stone walls were uneven and clearly not man-made, but probably man-improved, and everything was abominably dusty. It was a lazy spider's wet dream – they'd never have to spin another web for the rest of their eight-legged life. Hopefully a girl spider, though, as everything was also rather sparkly. Sarah smirked. If I didn't know better, I'd say it looked like the….

She blanched.

It looked like the Labyrinth.

"Hohgod. Ohgodohgodohshitohgod." Deep breaths, remain calm, rational thinking is not aided by hyperventilating. She put a hand to her head, closing her eyes and fanning her overheating brain as she tried to think. For the last decade, she had offered her services to anyone of Elsewhere who needed her assistance, be it to recover a lost child, or settle a dispute, or to help in an escape, or to be a date to the latest ball (those were her favorites) – but everyone, everywhere, knew not to call her to the Labyrinth. It was akin to asking the abominable snow man to vacation in Jamaica, but less likely. Who would dare to call her here? Someone was so getting charged double.

Heeled footfalls rocketed her heartbeat into the danger zone, and she panicked, searching for a place to hide. Please don't be him, please don't be him!

She plastered herself to a wall, willing the shadows to stretch and darken and blend with her green pantsuit, wrap around her like a protective mother and shield her from the evils –

He turned the corner, and her knees wobbled.

Tall, lean, beautiful and devastatingly real, more so than anything she'd ever seen in her drab home world, more alive than she'd ever felt, more intense and dangerous and captivating than any one being had the right to be, he casually clicked his boots on the stone and smirked his twisted smirk at her as he dispelled all hopes of concealment with his decisive approach.

"I did wonder where you had popped in at," he said. "Didn't expect to find you in the old hidden tunnel system, but then, you always did have a tendency surprise me."

Swallowing thickly, Sarah reluctantly left her sorry excuse for a hiding place and stood tall, trying not to look like she wasn't entirely in control of her bladder.

"Jareth," she said with a nod of acknowledgment, and was quite proud of the crisp, business-like tone that belied nothing of the bone-sweating terror that currently had a firm grip around her nads, or the undertow of physical appreciation that was threatening to drag her trembly legs out from beneath her.

He smirked at her again. "Yes, my precious Sarah?"

She blinked. "It wasn't a question," she stammered. "It was a greeting. You know, like, I say "Jareth", and then you say "Sarah", and nod your head, and then we walk on by each other and get on with our business?"

Jareth cocked his head amusedly. "That seems rather counterproductive, as you are my business, at present," he said, and nodded his head mockingly. "Sarah."

She narrowed her eyes. Mocking her. That was a great start.

"And what exactly do you want with me? I've breached none of the-"

"Oh, Sarah," he interrupted, and she quite nearly spontaneously combusted at the blatant arousal in his tone. Was he allowed to talk like that? "It would take hours to cover what I want with you," he said, and slid forward like a crocodile, like a sea serpent, like a shark toward the fish it intends to devour. "However, suffice to say that at present, I require your assistance."

"Huah, whih…" Sarah snapped her malfunctioning jaw closed, cleared her throat, and tried again. "With what?" She pressed as far back as the wall would bodily allow her as he neared.

He favored her with a feral grin that did very little to help the shaky condition of her load bearing limbs. "Something has been stolen from me, and I would very dearly like it returned to me," he said, voice low and sensual and crowding her senses as he leaned an arm beside her on the wall.

Sarah tried to remember to breath. "O-oh?"

He appraised her jaw line with an art lover's appreciation. "Mm-hmm," he murmured, apparently unconcerned with the conversation and far more interested in how her throat might taste. He did something with his tongue behind his teeth. It was quite fascinating.

"And-what-would-that-be?" Sarah rushed out in a single breath. He was clearly enjoying her reaction to him, which was a tad irritating and demeaning, but damned if it did anything to dull the wildfire running loose and burning all her self control and survival instinct to cinders.

"Time," he replied, and lowered his head, bringing his lips tantalizingly close to the sensitive skin of her throat. She really had very little choice but to tilt her head to the side and close her eyes.

"How much time?" Sarah suddenly realized her hands were on his chest, doing a bit of unauthorized exploration. How long had that been going on?

"Years, precious thing…" His tongue darted out, light and butterfly quick, and some sort of surprised choke of need issued from Sarah's throat. She wondered vaguely if humans were supposed to make that noise. "Though I suspect you already know that, as it was you who did the thieving," he said. Sarah's eyes snapped open.

"Say what?"

"I've lost years thinking about you, Sarah mine," he said, nipping at her ear to successfully derail any higher brain function that had been threatening to resume. "You've consumed my thoughts for quite long enough. "

Sarah's nails were biting into the flesh of his back as he worried any skin he could easily reach on her. She convulsed as he closed his teeth over her stud earring and tongued it.

"What do you expect me to do about this?" she demanded. He groaned softly as her nails ran down his back, the vibrations buzzing through the metal in her ear and pulling a similar response from her.

"Well, expect you to give it back to me, of course. Ten years and thirteen hours of your time, but I'll settle for dinner tonight as a start."

Sarah froze. Ten years? Dinner? What?

Jareth released her ear and swiveled around to brush his lips against hers. "I'll pick you up at eight," he said, and suddenly Sarah was standing in a wardrobe, flushed and flustered and breathing far too heavily, while a doddery old lady went on about teak wood, an endless supply of teak wood that allowed her to start her own furniture business like she'd always dreamed…

Sarah wondered if she'd even had to give anything up in exchange.

AN: You know... I don't know if this one is done or not... I think the whole 'Sarah as a PI/Paladin for Otherworld' might be kinda fun.