Act III
Chekhov's Gun

Soundtrack for Ch 21:

"Law (Earthlings on Fire)" –David Bowie
"Spark"—Fitz and the Tantrums
"I'd Rather Be High"—David Bowie

Betrayed, she thought, looking at Finnvah. "You traitor," she said, fighting to get the air in her lungs to hiss the word. "You… knew." If she'd had the energy, she would have raised her hand to slap his face. But her arm wasn't working. She was stiff and cold all over, all made over in ice.

He leaned over her, close enough for a kiss, and spoke very low.

"Believe me when I tell you you're very close to death, Sarah. And I'll let you die, right here and now, unless you answer one question correctly." His breath smelled of cloves. He seemed all eyes and teeth. "Do you want to keep your promise to him, or break it?"

Everything seemed to be spinning. If I die, I won't have to kill Jareth. Not in this lifetime.

If I die, I won't be able to stop Finnvah from doing what I won't.

"He mustn't," she said. "Never."

"Never," said Finnvah. He moved away from her suddenly, and she had to close her eyes to keep the vertigo at bay. "That's a very long time, never." He rested one hand on her forehead and she felt the pressure of his other hand on her breastbone. "We'll have to talk more about your answer. You know what that means. Open your eyes," he commanded.

She knew what was coming and she squeezed her eyes tight in denial.

"Open your eyes, Sarah," he exhorted. "Or I'll pry them open."

"No," she moaned. The idea was more than she could stand. Better to just die here, than take any help from a liar. Better to die than to help Jareth die.

"Think about how hard you'll be able to hit me once you're better," he said encouragingly. "Think about how much louder you'll be able to yell. And if you freeze to death here, you'll never be able to have the last word with him, either. Open your eyes, Sarah. Now."

Damn him. He knew just what to say. She lifted her heavy eyelids and stared at him in anger until his face came into focus. Dark, golden-eyed. Those eyes became whirlpools of molten yellow, and she felt the pleasure he inevitably seemed to give when he used his Gift. The pleasure mixed with her anger in a restorative cocktail that burned out the coldness in her body, but left her exhausted.

"Rest now," he said, and added ominously, "There's nowhere you're in a hurry to go anyway, is there?" He laughed a low and bitter laugh. Sarah tried to sit up, but she was so heavy, and there seemed to be some sort of binding weight on her whole prone body. "Sleep," Finnvah said.

"Won't," Sarah croaked, mistrust shooting at him instead of her gun. "Enemy."

"Either we are or we aren't, Sarah. Enemies. But I don't kill people in their sleep." Finnvah's smile was cruel. " I'm in no rush," he said coldly. "We've only got the rest of our lives, to talk. The sooner you sleep, the sooner you wake up. Then you and I will figure out what's to be done."

"Yimmil?" she asked, at the end of her strength.

"Safe as houses," Finnvah replied. "If by houses you mean 'bag' and by safe you mean 'inside.' He's alive and kicking. Kicking quite a lot. That's something else we can negotiate when you wake up."

This much anger, in normal circumstances—and Sarah could not remember the last time she had been so helplessly and completely angry, not in her adult life—should have prevented sleep. Instead, it soaked through her, scouring her out, permeating her brain, and hung her out to dry in the first private dream she'd had in the Labyrinth, a dream in daylight.

And she dreamed that she was flying over the Labyrinth, and the Labyrinth was a mandala drawn in sand. All the colors of the world were in it, all the shapes of meaning wound and recurved round about each other in an unending pattern. It was vast, vast. To the north of the compass-rose in this complex design she saw an ankh, the symbol of eternal life. It was a fixed point, a solid symbol. She went to the eye of the needle, the looped orifice of the ankh, and threw all her childhood toys and costumes into a fire that was burning there. The fire would rip a hole in the sky, carry the smoke of the offering into eternity. And Jareth was there, and it was also Finnvah, and she tried to yell at him, scream at him, but he retreated from her faster than she could make the accusations and protests come out of her mouth. Bits and pieces. Wreck and ruin. She dreamed she had her gun in her hand, and shot Jareth.

Sarah woke with a start and tried to sit up, but she couldn't. Her bag was a pillow for her head and shoulders, but she was all cocooned by the latticed cords of the hammock she'd conjured the other day. Her eyes landed on Finnvah, who was watching her.

"A little crude, don't you think?" Sarah said, wiggling, trying to work her wrists free.

"Crude, yes, but I couldn't think of anything more effective or less permanent. We need to have that conversation now."

"Set me free," Sarah commanded, eyeing him with distaste. "And we can talk about anything you like."

She wanted to take stock of her surroundings, but her instincts warned her not to look away from Finnvah, not even for even a moment. He unsheathed his short bronze sword and lowered it to her bound hands, but didn't slash through the cords. Instead, he waited, and let her saw herself free.

"He's said the same thing, to many people, many times, I'm sure," Finnvah offered, enigmatically. "Set me free."

"Cut the crap. Where's Yimmil?"

"With your friend, the dwarf," Finn said. "I'm sure everyone's looking forward to the happy reunion, but new business before old business, as John Company might say." He tilted his head to the side and regarded her curiously.

A threat? Sarah wondered. Hostages. This situation set her teeth on edge. "You're in league with the King of Winter?" Sarah asked angrily, rubbing the blood back into her wrists and hands, and unpicking the knotted cords of the hammock that held her fast from thigh to ankle.

"I swore an oath to obey my King," Finnvah said. Sarah's hand reached carefully toward her hip. "Don't bother," he said. "I've put your idiot's weapon somewhere for safekeeping." Finnvah resheathed his sword and sat down a few yards from her, crosslegged on the yellow-brown flagstone pavings. "So you see, I'm no oathbreaker, no traitor. I obey my King. He's promised me the reward of this entire Kingdom if I serve him faithfully. What boon has your King offered you if you obey him?"

"Jareth isn't my King," Sarah hissed. "He asked me to help him. He asked."

"And you intend to keep that promise?"

"Only if he forces me to. Finnvah… Finnvarrah-Vercingetorix. How could you? Don't you know… you said he was kind to you. You said he was good to you. You love him. Why are you doing this? Why?" She felt her heart beat against her ribs with rage and grief. Yes, Finnvah had aggrieved her. She flexed her fingers, trying to make them work properly, so she could summon her gun. "I saw things, on the road," Sarah said accusingly. "I saw your mother. I saw what she didn't do. I saw Jareth give you to her, and steal you away from her." His eyes widened in shock and pain, and she knew she'd landed a hit. "He didn't do it to hurt her," Sarah insisted. "He did it to save you. She was sick. She couldn't take care of you. He gave you to people who loved you and raised you to be beautiful and proud and strong. Are you horrid enough to want revenge for that?"

"If you know that, you know her name," Finnvah said. "Give it to me, if you're telling me the truth."

"Your mother was Robin Zakar, Finnvah. And I'm Sarah."

"Yes," Finnvah said.

"Different lives, different people. But Jareth stays the same. Always the same."

"Yes," Finnvah said, the edge of a smile coming back to his mouth, that compassionate smile. "You're a puzzle-solver, Sarah. Solve this puzzle. Show me what it looks like."

"I need just one clue," Sarah said. She took a deep breath. "Just answer one question for me, truthfully and completely. Just one."

"Just one. And then I get to ask you one question, Sarah Williams, according to the same terms."

"Agreed. She reached out for his hand, and they gripped each others' wrists, favours meeting in gold and silver.

"If I were to try to leave here," Sarah asked, keeping her eyes fixed on his, "with the intention of going directly to Jareth and giving him the death he craves, would you try to stop me?"

"Yes," Finnvah said. His eyes glowed with glee. "I would. Any lengths. I would not scruple to murder you, if it meant keeping him alive for one more mortal hour." He squeezed her hand so hard it hurt, but it wasn't sadism. It was something else… "And now, my question for you," Finnvah countered. "If it cost the ruination of the Labyrinth, the end of your life, and the damnation of your soul to rescue Jareth from his immortal despair, would risk it all for just one slim chance of success?"

"Yes," Sarah said. "Oh, yes. All." The tears stood out in her eyes and she didn't bother to hide them.

"I have another question," Finnvah said, his voice choking, as if he too were near tears. "I think I know the answer now, Sarah. I wasn't sure before. But tell me. Are we enemies, or allies?"

"Oh, Finnvah," Sarah said, and now the tears did come. "Oh, allies. We are. I'm so glad." She pulled him to her, and her soul recalled another memory, of cradling his man's body while it was still a child. He body remembered how he had held her at the gates of the Goblin City when she'd cried the first tears she'd shed in five years on his shoulder. Only this time, he was the one to wipe his nose on her coat.

"You could have just told me," Sarah said, a few minutes later. Finn rummaged in an inner coat pocket and came up with a broad handkerchief embroidered with strawberries and used it to wipe his eyes, and hers, and, courteously, the shoulder of her jacket.

"I couldn't be sure," he said thickly. "I couldn't be sure I could trust you."

"You tricked me. You made me think you were one of John Company's agents. I might have shot you," Sarah said curtly. "Or nuked you. Idiot."

"Well, when we first met, I thought you knew what the King of the Labyrinth was asking you to do. 'Tasks and a door to open.' What was I supposed to think?"

Sarah had no apt reply to this. "Where are Yimmil and Hoggle?" she asked instead.

"I sent them both off on an errand," Finnvah said. "They're fine. I just needed to get them out of the way while I figured out what to do about you. They'll be back soon. In time for dinner, I think. Speaking of, you still need to solve the puzzle. I gave you the hint you asked for. I'll put together a meal and you sort it out, what's say?"

Finnvah stood and prized up one of the flagstones and removed several small packets and bundles from his coat. Very quickly, he had a tiny smokeless campfire going in the little hollow, and a tiny cookpot on a tiny trivet burbling with a stew made of grain and dried fruit, Sarah's next-to-last bottle of water, and a cut of bacon as thick as two thumbs.

Sarah took stock of their surroundings as he worked, letting her mind set the pieces in order.

They were in one of the odd little plazas of the Labyrinth. This precinct seemed to be made of warm yellow-brown stone, with the remnants of dead trailing plants climbing over the walls. So far away, looking like a miniature of itself, was the dome of the Castle. In the direction of the outer edge, far away and above, there was a deep red flaw in the sky, a scar, a wound. Jareth, she thought. Jareth is under that blot.

"You've known the Goblin King for years," Sarah said. "Ever since your rite of passage. Sometime after that, you swore some sort of medieval oath of fealty to him. Four years ago? Finnvah, how old are you?"

"Impolite to ask a man his age," Finnvah said. "But as it happens, I'm thirty-seven. Or thirty-eight. Not quite clear on a birthday."

"Thirty-eight!" Sarah cackled. "Bullshit! No way! You look like a… I don't know, a hirsute twenty!"

"The matter of my age aside," Finnvah said snidely. "Go on."

Sarah composed her thoughts. "So you swore to obey him, and when he summoned you, or you managed to get here on a paying basis, and commanded you to come to him and do him in, you had to obey." Sarah mused on this a moment "If the stakes weren't so high, Finnvah, I'd be tempted to find Jareth just to slap him for tricking us into this."

"You'll probably have that option," Finnvah said. "But you never swore to be obedient to him. Get to the meat of the matter, Sarah. Tell me. Tell me why he wants his death."

She paced around the tiny plaza, thinking, and idly picked off some of the dead leaves from one of the overgrown topiaries. "I've talked to a lot of people on my journey. One of them, Ark, the ferryman. He said one of Jareth's names is Judex of the Cusp. Or Brother of the Mysteries. He wasn't the judge of your rite, but he must have the right to oversee… any rite of passage that gets made for magical people. Because…" Sarah thought. "Because he's one of the rare few of his kind who have undergone the process himself. Sound accurate?"

"Accurate," Finnvah said, stirring the stew.

Sarah looked up at the wound in the sky. No, the wound in the dome. The crack. The unhealed fissure Underground. The Fisher-King. The Fissure King.

"But something went wrong with his rite. Jareth made… a mistake. Or a failure. I don't know. He went through it to claim the Labyrinth for himself, but the Labyrinth is the space between. He's in the space between. Waiting. It must be painful for him, to be not mortal, not immortal."

"Why do you say painful?"

"Don't be silly. If it wasn't painful for him, he wouldn't be asking for an end. The Teind. This has something to do with the Teind. The stone giants said…" Sarah tried to recall the words exactly. "The when of the Teind is immaterial to him and to us, and is something that lies outside of your linear perception of existence. Before your birth or after your death, this thing has already come to pass. And there is little chance that you will, or have, or are able to understand how to purchase his life and cheat the fae of their rightful tithe. That's what Rephaites said. He's looking to finish the rite of the Teind with his life. It's… the only way he can escape the dance. The dance in the Fairy Ring. He's still the dancer, caught up between his previous life and his death. He needs someone to pull him out. That's why you and I are here. He thinks… the only way back to his people is by ending his life. I'll bet any amount of money that the King Over the World has the power to keep him prisoner here, lonely and trapped, unless he agrees to his death. But the fae can't die. Not on their own. Death is a gift they need to be given." Sarah sighed deeply. "Does that fit?"

"Sounds about right."

"So what do we do?"

"Do?" Finnvah's left ear twitched and he turned his head. A moment later, Sarah heard Yimmil's squeaks and Hoggle's subdued tones, and their footsteps. "We four eat a nice meal and conspire together."

"Sarah!" Hoggle said uncertainly, as if she were about to scold him for some wrongdoing. "Why didn'tcha come to me for help if you needed it 'stead of asking longshanks here?" She ran to him and threw herself on her knees, hugging him. Gentle, good, kind Hoggle. If only I had. I could have saved myself a lot of anguish. But I didn't want to. Because...

"I was ashamed," she managed to say.

"What's nice girl like you ever got to be ashamed of?" Hoggle asked, clearly baffled.

"I killed my mother," Sarah said. "She was very sick, and asked me to kill her. So I did. And I was ashamed of that. I still am."

"You still coulda called me, if you needed me," Hoggle reproached her, the hurt stark in his eyes. "I woulda come like a shot. We all woulda."

Sarah lowered her eyes, close to tears again. "I didn't deserve you. I didn't think I deserved your forgiveness. So I ran away and hid from all of you. I called on the Goblin King instead. I wanted to be punished. I didn't want anyone to forgive me. I knew he would be cruel. But he didn't come either, Hoggle. And now I'm here, and… he…" Sarah wrapped her arms around his neck and sobbed.

She heard Yimmil squeaking and plucking at her, alarmed at her hysterical distress, but she also heard Finn calling Yimmil away, letting her have her cry. After a few moments, the pleasing aroma of dinner drifted to her, piercing her sadness. Her stomach was growling and she was irritated that she could be something as mundane as hungry.

"I'm still your friend, Sarah," Hoggle said gravely. His big blue eyes held only compassion, no disgust.

"Eat this," Finnvah said, pushing bowls into their hands. "You need it. There's nothing that looks so bad that it isn't better on the other side of dinner." He turned and gave Yimmil his own bowl with a respectful nod, and took his own portion directly from the pot.

Finnvah crouched near the fire and clasped his hands between his knees as the others ate. "Yimmil's been a font of information, I can tell you. Everything up until the point when you were poisoned and left alone to freeze and follow some bad memory down the looking-glass road. He rescued you from certain death. Heroic to his bones." Yimmil looked uncertain at first, and then beamed at the praise. "He wrapped that hammock you brought around your body and dragged your dead weight for half a mile. He kept you alive and he got you out. He's the best goblin in the world, and more loyal by far to his Queen than I am to my King." Finn actually bowed his neck at Yimmil, who took it as his due.

"Which isn't saying much," Sarah said, "Considering I'm no Queen. So how long were you following me, Finnvah? After the dance in the Fairy Ring?"

"I met up with Hoggle in the Bog of Eternal Stench," Finnvah admitted. "After I got you out, we started following your trail."

"You," she said with a withering, teasing smile, "are a dick, Finnvarrah-Vercingetorix."

"Please," Finnvah said sarcastically. "I was afraid you were trying to do what I've been trying to avoid doing," he said. "I've been here for seven years, Sarah. Seven years, having the Goblin King shout in my ear every goddamned night about fulfilling my promise and demonstrating my loyalty and pretending I couldn't hear him." He pulled a miniscule teapot out of his magic coat and set it to boil on the fire. "Seven years of acting the night watchman over the Goblin City, trying to avoid obeying one command by over-performing at another. And then you come and break up my holding pattern and send me out in the Labyrinth. You've managed to do in seven days what I've tried to avoid doing for seven years. I was trying to figure out a way to slow your roll. How on Earth or Under does that make me the dick in this situation, oh Queen Bitch?"

Hoggle hemmed nervously over this exchange of friendly profanities.

"No, it's fine. The Goblin King is looking to die, we've been working against each other from the beginning, but never mind the fact that he's asking me to murder him—" Sarah stuffed a mouthful of stew into her face, realizing just how precarious her emotional footing still was.

"It ain't no murder," Hoggle said gruffly.

The dwarf suddenly had everyone's attention.

"He's bad," Hoggle said defensively. "Jareth's bad and rotten to the core. He just sat his skinny royal duff on his throne and never cared about anything anywhere except when he wasn't being spoiled rotten with attention. Jareth wants to die and I say good. Th' fact that he's brought Sarah here to force her to do for him just proves my point." Hoggle stood and paced around the fire like a miniature bull, tossing his head and snorting. "Why don'tcha want to do it, though, Sarah? That's the part I can't figure. He's hurt you the most of anyone here."

"Wait," said Finnvah. The kettle was whistling; he moved it out of the heat. "The King of the Labyrinth didn't bring Sarah. He wasn't expecting her."

"The goblins brought me," Sarah suggested.

"Yes-Ma'am-Lady came. We no bring. Door was open, so we went to fetch you."

"So who opened the door?" Sarah asked Yimmil.

The little goblin shrugged. "Don't know. We heard you. We saw you. We came. We can't open doors."

"The Faerie King," Hoggle said with quiet certainty. "John Company. Maybe it was him."

"You know the King of Winter?" Finnvah asked. "The King over the World?"

"He's not as bad as Jareth," Hoggle defended himself weakly. "He was trying to help Jareth, he said. An' help the rest of us, too. He said to me, he said, 'Hoggle,' using my right and proper name and never making fun of me, 'Hoggle,' he says, 'The Goblin King is getting tired and frayed around the edges and would prolly like to lay it all down.' Empathetic-like. An' he never put on grand airs, or jiggled his wedding tackle in my face. He says to me, 'Tell young Jare'th I'm giving him a buyout option.' He said, 'Just so he knows the Labyrinth won't be left to rot when he goes, I can come take over in the interim.' Like between times until we got a new ruler, that's what that meant. He said 'All he has to do to die is get someone mortal to bring it to him. Someone who'll love him enough to let him go.' Death for Jareth's kind ain't like death for you or me or even that wee goblin there. It's a kind of freedom. Leastaways, that's what the King of Winter said."

"And that's what you told the King of the Labyrinth," Finnvah said, looking so bleakly angry that Hoggle shivered and took a step back. "You didn't like your King so you plotted his death? You coward."

"I just passed along the information," Hoggle said, crossing his arms over his chest. "I ain't never pretended to be nothing but what I am." He tried to stare down the taller man. "I told you I was a coward when you dragged me along on this dead-end quest of yours. I wouldn't even ha' gone if you hadn't said Sarah needed me." He looked over at Sarah and lost some of his bravado. "I ain't gonna say I did wrong unless Sarah says I did."

Oh, shit, Sarah thought. Oh, what a mess this is. "You did what you thought was right," Sarah said carefully. "But Hoggle, I need your help now, and your King does, too. I need to find a way to go back on my promise. I need to find a way to save him. Will you help me, please?"

"Help? Help you put His Nibs back on his throne where he can stomp his boot in every face that comes in strikin' distance? Why can't you just send him on his way?"

"Because I love him," Sarah said.

"You? Love him! I've seen the way he plays at love! You're all crazy, that's what you are!" Hoggle threw his hands in the air and headed toward a gap in the plaza.

"And where are you going?" Finnvah shouted after him. "You're going to miss your tea!"

"I need ta think! I'll be back later!" Grousing and threatening words filled the air above Hoggle's head like a dark cloud.

"Well then," Finnvah said, when Hoggle was quite gone. "There's another piece fallen into place." He cast a black look at Hoggle's back.

"Oh, don't," Sarah said. "Don't think too badly of him, Finnvah. Jareth's never been exactly nice to him, you know. In fact, he's been downright cruel. I think he's spent a lot of idle hours getting his jollies tormenting him, actually."

Finnvah scowled, and then gave a slight nod of his head. "I'll bow to your superior experience in the matter." Then his tone became gently serious. "So. You really do love him, then?"

"Enough to not pretend he pees rosewater," Sarah said. "We still need to make a plan, Finnvah. What do we do?"

"Save his life," Finnvah said. "Is it possible he loves you back? Enough to release you from your promise?"

"I don't know," Sarah replied. "I told Jareth I loved him. He said some nasty things in response. But then…"

"Then what?" Finnvah poured out a miniscule splash of tea into a bone cup and gave it to her. The taste of it was hot and spicy on the tongue.

Sarah looked over at Yimmil, who had taken apart the contents of her bag and was sorting through the lot.

"Then… " Sarah blushed. "He… we… you know. We…"

Finnvah rolled his eyes. "This isn't a game of kiss-and-tell, Sarah. You need to think of me as your doctor, and his. Anything you can give me for a prognosis would be helpful." Sarah had flinched at the word 'doctor,' and her cheeks burned as bright as the coals. "So. You've made love to him. I suppose you asked him for that, too. Did it get the lust out of your system, or just make you hungry for more?"

"Skating perilously close to dick territory again, Finn," Sarah snapped, but she took a sip of her tea. It was invigorating. "No, I didn't ask him. He… initiated. He said it was… a gift. That I'd tamed him."

"That's good, Finnvah said. "That's a very good sign." He gave her a glance that Sarah only remembered seeing on a teacher who had been particularly pleased with her book report, and she blushed harder. "When the Gentry set their hearts on something, it's almost impossible to sway them. The King has wanted to die for years. But now, there's a chance, there's a very good chance, that you've interested him in something else."

"What?" Sarah asked.

"I think he loves you, Sarah. Or he could. And if you can make him admit to that, you have a chance at saving him."

"How?" she asked in frustration. "How? Saying 'I love you' to him is like asking to be slapped. He doesn't listen to me, Finnvah. He just doesn't."

"Try to see things from his perspective. No, try," he insisted when Sarah pulled a face. "He's a man without a childhood. All of his experiences leading up to his Kingship are the experiences of a god. Don't mistake the Gentry for Elves or any other classification of mortal magical being. We're talking aeons of experience, powers as formidable as an angel's or a god's. And then all of that gets somehow squeezed into a mortal but ageless body that he can't take off. If your positions were reversed, you'd be frightened and upset and a little sick at heart and looking for a way out. Show him empathy. Show him kindness. And if that doesn't work, yell at him. Wake him up, shake him up. Get his attention. Show him every beautiful thing that flesh can be. Delight him. Seduce him. Beguile him. Take him up and take him down. Change his mind."

"Why is it always me?" she asked, knowing she was whining again, but feeling entitled. "It's always me. Why couldn't it have been someone else?"

"Because you love him, Sarah. I love him too. Even the little goblin loves him. But you're going to have to be our champion. It's all up to you, now. It's you or no-one." He looked down at her. "I have faith in you, Sarah. The whole Labyrinth has faith in you. You can do this. Because we need you, and because you have to." Finnvah curled a finger round and round his goatish beard.

"I told him I loved him, before. He was incredibly cold to me after that. Until… well. That happened."

"I'd like you to know how much I respect you, Sarah," Finn said, finally taking a sip of his tea.

"I sense a 'but' coming," Sarah said. She scowled at him.

"No buts. You've kept yourself intact in the face of a very formidable member of the Gentry. You've only made him one vow, and while it's the worst one you could have made, you didn't know you were doing it. You've got a lot more wiggle room in your promise than I do. And I've followed in your footsteps. I've seen everything you've done here in the Kingdom. You're fearless, always with the right instincts, making choice after choice that takes you closer to your goal. Only you understand now that the stakes of the game are higher than you'd first thought."

"It was that way the first time, too," Sarah admitted. "It wasn't just about getting Toby back. It was about not… I don't know, losing my soul. So maybe the stakes are the same this time, too. Only the King is also my lover now, holding himself hostage. I'm frightened, Finnvah. I'm really scared. I don't know how to… I don't know what to do."

"I think… the reason he summoned me, and not you is because I'm less of a risk," Finn said solemnly, holding her hand. "Or you're the risk that matters, the one that frightens him. You could give him a choice that he's afraid to take."

"But isn't that selfish of me?" Sarah demanded. "I don't want to give him the one thing he really seems to want. I can't be Robin for him. I can't be anyone but my own self. Isn't that selfish? Isn't that the antithesis of Love?"

"I think you'll need ever resource you've got to win at his game," Finnvah said. "Even your selfishness. Even your aggravating bitchery." Carefully, he leaned forward and kissed her brow. He kept his face close, and spoke to her softly, as if afraid of being overheard. "It's going to be you, and not me, Sarah. I'm obedient. A known quantity, bought and paid for. You're the risk he might be tempted to take. Do you understand what you'll have to do?"

"I understand, but I don't know. I can't see it," she said, just as quietly. "Please. Be my teacher. Tell me what I need to do."

Finnvah took both of her hands in his. As he spoke, his eyes glowed golden in his dark face. "This is still the dance in the Fairy Ring," he said. "And he's the dancer who's trapped. An end to the life he has now is one way to pull him out. He thinks death is the only route away from a lonely and self-destructive immortality. But you've got to show him that the road leads out in two directions. It's the story of Janet and Tam-Lin all over again."

"That's the third time someone has brought up that story to me," Sarah said, letting go and finishing her tea. Finnvah promptly refilled her cup. "And Jareth was furious when I mentioned it to him. He said it was just one of Winter's lies. I know it, vaguely, but apparently the things I think I know are what've gotten me into trouble from the beginning. So why don't you tell me the story, Finnvah?"

Finn thought for a moment. "It's not a lie. It's a story, and a fairly new one. Maybe three, four hundred years old? Tam-Lin was supposed to be a knight in service to the Faerie Queen. She stole him from the mortal world and kept him, ageless, in her court for a century. And one day this high-stepping young woman, Janet, came to the crossroads where he lurked. It's vague, in the ballad, whether he raped her or they made love. But Janet went back home, and everybody figured out in a few months that she was pregnant. So she went back to the crossroads, intending to make Tam-Lin face up to his responsibilities."

"It's like Maury Povich," Sarah said, pursing her lips. "You are the baby-daddy, Tam-Lin."

"The world changes and changes, and nothing changes," Finnvah said in agreement. "So Tam-Lin says to Janet, 'Why are you here digging up abortifacient herbs, Janet? Do you want to kill my baby?' Or the equivalent. He was apparently pleased with his paternity. It proved something, or made something possible for him. And he told her, if she wanted him around to raise their child, she needed to come back to the crossroads again at midnight on Halloween." Finnvah thought for a moment. "The Gentry were going to use Tam-Lin to pay the Teind, the tax to Hell. And since he was so beautiful, he knew what was coming. So Janet had to come and claim him. She was the only other person in the world who could make a claim on him. He told her how to win him away from them…I think I have this part memorized," he said.

'They'll turn me in thy arms, lady,
An adder and a snake;
But hold me fast, don't let me go,
To be your worldly mate.

'They'll turn me in your arms, lady,
A lion, spare and stern;
But hold me fast, don't let me go,
The father of your bairn.

'They'll turn me in your arms, lady,
A red hot rod of iron;
Then hold me fast, don't be afraid,
I'll do to you no harm.

'They'll turn me in your arms, lady,
A mother-naked man;
Cast your green kirtle over me,
To keep me from the rain.

"In other words," Finnvah said, "Janet had to face fear and pain and the danger of death to win Tam-Lin over to mortality." He looked at her solemnly and took her hands again. "You'll have to do the same thing. You are to go to him, and love him. Take him in. Bring him into you by whatever means. And if there's any way to manage it, you should be pregnant with his child when you make the attempt."

"He said that was impossible," Sarah protested.

"We're here, in this place, and you say impossible? He's gifted you his favour and given you his body and showed you his Kingdom and you say impossible? I say possible. No, be quiet," he said, as she readied another protest. "He's not fully fae and not fully human. It's possible. He may think it's impossible, he may have been told it's impossible, but even the King of the Labyrinth is entitled to be wrong once in a while."

"I wont!" Sarah shouted at him. Her temper was a wild animal looking to claw his face. "I won't! I won't be like my mother! It's not fair!"

"Not fair?" He shook her by the shoulders so her teeth clicked. "Don't talk to me about fair! I'd do anything for him, but I can't do that because I'm a boy! And you can, and you say you won't because it's not fair?" Finnvah's tirade was briefly interrupted by Yimmil, who pounced on Finnvah with an angry screech, cussing and scratching.

"You be nice to Yes-Ma'am-Lady!" Yimmil yelled. It took some doing for Sarah to calm him down, but eventually he did, watching over the two of them carefully when Finnvah resumed talking. Sarah was glad Yimmil had intervened. She had been tempted to do the same thing to him herself.

"Either you love him or you don't, Sarah," Finnvah said, nursing a cut over his eyebrow. "Either you're willing to risk everything, or nothing. There's too much in-between here already. It's time to break open this ring and pull the prisoners out. There are rules to these things, and one of the rules of this type of redemption game is a pregnant lover."

"That's barbaric and patriarchal," Sarah said angrily.

"I don't deny it. Maybe things will be different for your children." He patted her shoulder, even though it made Yimmil hiss at him. "All I know is that he's bound by the old rules. A pregnant lover may not even be necessary, but it seems to follow the pattern he's set in. You've got to stack the odds in your favor. That is, if you're serious about redeeming him. Are you?"

"You know I am," Sarah said bitterly. "But this is a lot to ask. Whoever made the rules has a lot to answer for."

He opened his arms for her. She leaned into him and he held her. She felt like weeping but was dry of tears. Yimmil sidled close, suspicious of Finn, but calmed when she patted him.

As afternoon wore on to evening, waiting for Hoggle, they occupied themselves together in the plaza. Finnvah was a jack-of-all-day-trades, it seemed, and had ideas about pruning the vegetation. Some of the shapeless topiaries, under his shortsword, began to take on some vitality. One or two put out stained-glass flowers moments after he'd finished. Sarah and Yimmil worked with him, or under him, trying to keep busy. Sarah, in particular, wanted something to occupy her mind and her hands.

An hour before twilight, Finnvah discovered that one of the circular lips of stone in the plaza was meant to be a fountain. He fiddled with it a while, occasionally borrowing one of Sarah's smaller camera-oriented tools. When Finnvah pronounced the fountain repaired, they waited for something to happen. It was Sarah, borrowing Finnvah's lighter, who discovered (almost at cost of her eyebrows) that this fountain was meant to spume fire, not water. The fountain cascaded upward in silver and gold and pearlescent sparks, reflecting off the new flowers and the waiting walls. All three of them made quiet noises of awe. It was the prettiest thing Sarah had seen in the Labyrinth yet, and the most ephemeral. After a few moments, the fire-fountain guttered and died out. The walls were stone, and the flowers were dull in the dimming light.

It was then that Hoggle came back. He looked very solemn as he approached Sarah.

"I forgive you," Hoggle said quietly. "I think it's the wrong thing, still. But Sarah, I'll help you if it's what you want."

Sarah bent down on one knee and kissed Hoggle's hand. "Yes. Thank you, Hoggle. Thank you."

"So what does help from you entail, dwarf?" Finnvah asked.

"As it so happens," Hoggle said, puffed with pride, "I know a shortcut, out of the whole Labyrinth from here."

Next… Chapter 22: "The Borderland Wall"

You thought Finnvah was going to be an unexpected villain, but he's always the unexpected hero. Bless him.

Quoted herein is version 39A of the Child Ballads: "Tam Lin."

Fanny: The pleasure is mine. Thank you for all your work. You and Nyllewell both are just so wonderful to me. Lovely beta pair!
Gwineveve301: Finnvah's a great mender of all things broken. You can borrow him if you want.
Kilikina12: Thank you!
TheRealEatsShootsAndLeaves: Yes, it IS very interesting, isn't it? Foreshadowing interesting, even? Hmmmm!
Lyssa: I hope you feel better soon, you poor dear. You could borrow Finnvah when Gwin's done? It's not like he's busy now or anything.
Jalen: I wonder myself if it goes back even before Janet and Tam-Lin.
Cassie: Oh, don't cry. Don't cry! What can I promise you to keep you from crying?
Aleta: Yes.
Zayide: It's a race to the finish, and you're winning!
J Luc Pitard: No shame in that; that story is grue. But I like the idea that we can screw up in one lifetime and still manage to save the day in another—not because we're set in a destiny, but because we can change our destiny.
Jade: You get your butt back inside before you get hurt! And naturally, anyone who wants to come is invited to this happenin' do. Let's go make the scene.
Jetredgirl: Sarah's definitely her own person, and thank all gods Above and Under for that.
irgroomer: Finnvah is a fountain of expository information. Naughty, tricksy Finnvah. Or rather, poor Finnvah, who's destined to play a supporting role in this story, and not the romantic lead.