Five minutes later, the door slammed open and were four thuds on the stairs and Howl flung himself to a stop outside her room. He peeked in cautiously, then bit off sulphurous swear words under his breath.
"How long has this been happening?"
"Not more than ten minutes?" Sarah had watched her bedside clock count minutes as if each measured an age of the world. "Howl, what's wrong?"
"This is what those dastardly fae do when they suck the essence of another dimension into theirs." Behind him, Sophie put her head in along with Michael, Karen and her father. Toby appeared a few moments later, trailing a blanket.
"He's not doing it consciously," Sarah said stiffly. "He passed out and this happened."
Howl nodded.
"Then he was being honest about controlling the doorways, but why is it that when we agreed to one, I see three?"
She glanced at her room and blushed.
"That's my fault," she mumbled.
"Can you close them?"
"Can you help me move Jareth, he's too heavy to lift and I don't know how safe it is for me to do magic when he's like this."
Howl pulled off his harlequin coat and used it as a buffer between himself and Jareth, and with Sarah's help lifted the Goblin King across his shoulders and staggered out of the room.
"Second time in a week, Goblin King," Howl complained as he stumped downstairs with Sophie and Toby trailing after him. He deposited Jareth onto the couch and left Sophie to see if she could do anything to wake him, then ran back to Sarah's room.
Sarah was standing in the centre of her room trying to visualise her room as it was, but the castle would simply not disengage. She gave a short scream of frustration and stamped her foot.
"Uh, uh," Howl called softly and landed his hands on her shoulders. She abruptly burst into tears.
"It's not working! It's getting bigger! I can't do it!"
"Some help?" Howl pleaded with Karen and she came over and awkwardly patted Sarah on the shoulder.
"I don't know how to reverse these sorts of spells, fae magic is not my area of expertise," Howl admitted. "I can limit it, and prevent its progress. Sarah, may I bring three cold iron horseshoes into your room?"
Sarah shuddered. The very idea of them made her ill. It jerked her out of her crying jag. She wiped her eyes.
"Only if you promise to remove them when Jareth recovers and that you never approach this house with them unless the need is dire."
Howl didn't answer her.
"Howl," she said dangerously.
"I cannot promise, I am responsible for you, and should you make poor choices will be forced by ancient treaty to use them."
"She is my daughter," Robert said, striding into the room. "I shall help you hang these horse shoes and I will take them down at her request, this is my house and I will not see you override my daughter's wishes."
"As you say," Howl said with an edge to his voice, then folded his arms across his chest. "Sarah, as my apprentice–"
"I understand; you have oaths that bind you. Get them, please."
.
Sarah didn't dare leave her room until Howl returned. She shivered as he stepped in. Something was starkly wrong with the horseshoes; Howl had definitely done something. The tiny sigils etched onto them blazed with blue fire as he took a hammer and nailed each into the wall above the opening. Sarah felt ice crawl over her skin as the purple fire shrunk down to the size of the original door. Howl stepped back and turned to her.
"You're needed downstairs," he said and strode out, tucking the bag of nails into his pocket and swinging the hammer like he would very much like to use it on her head.
Sarah trailed out feeling all of five years old. She knew she was in trouble, but how much remained to be seen.
Everyone gathered in the living room. Jareth, wrapped in Howl's coat, shivered on the couch, the pale purple fire flickering all over him.
"Can you wake him?" Howl asked, resigned.
Sarah shook her head miserably; she had been trying all she could before he arrived.
"That purple fire you see," Howl pointed, "isn't fire. It's his entire being bending this reality to his will; leeching out its essence if you will. If he keeps it up, all memory and dreams will be taken from those nearby, time and space will distort and you might find yourself walking away from him into tomorrow or three days in the past. We're going to have to contain him."
"No!" Sarah launched herself at Howl and grabbed his arms. "You can't! Iron will hurt him badly!"
"I said contain, not imprison. I owe him and would not willingly see him harmed," Howl told her gently. "As he cannot help his nature, we're going to have to do what we can to limit the damage. Do you own a car, Robert?" Howl asked.
"Er, yes? What does that have to do with it?" Robert asked cautiously.
"It'll be easier to transport him that way. We're going to take him to Sarah's cottage, the back yard has wards set about it which should help considerably. Sarah, you and I will ride with him, Robert if you'd drive? Sophie, could you see that everyone else gets there?"
The old woman nodded and Howl took a sharp breath and then handed the hammer and nails to Michael before lifting Jareth onto his shoulders again with a grunt.
.
Sarah ended up in the back seat with Jareth's head on her lap. She leaned over and stroked his hair out of his eyes. She poked his cheek then wiped it as a tear splashed on his face.
"Wake up, please," she whispered. "I wish the Goblin King would wake up," she felt even sicker when the purple fire flickered at that but nothing happened.
Her father and Howl lugged him like a sack of potatoes around to the garden at the back. Sarah ran for the house, snatched the quilt off her bed and sprinted back out. She laid it out on the grass and they settled him on top of it.
"Stay here," Howl straightened and rolled his shoulders to relieve the stiffness, "I'll need you to judge how close I can approach with the iron so I know where to place it."
Sarah shivered miserably.
Her father crouched down at Jareth's feet and stared as she sat stroking the fae's blond hair.
"Sarah," he said quietly, "the way you and Howl are acting, this is a very dangerous thing."
"It is. This was Howl's chief concern about Jareth, actually. It's my fault, as usual."
"That's enough," he interrupted any self-incriminatory misery, "what was Howl's concern?"
"It's what the fae were banished for, this ability of theirs to use other dimensions, or aspects of them to accrue more power. I'm allowed to open doorways, but only if I close them after myself. Jareth was teaching me how. I messed up and now I can't fix it." She slumped. "The last time I made him so ill he was in bed for two days!"
"Is that where you were?" Robert asked sharply. "Nursing him back to health?"
Sarah nodded, feeling even worse. Jareth, she knew, hadn't truly recovered from her first mishap. Perhaps it would be better if she wasn't around him at all.
"Tell us the truth next time," Robert said tiredly. "We may not be able to help with the fallout of magical mistakes, but we do like to know where you are and if you're well. Jareth too, now that he is to become my son in law."
Sarah couldn't speak, and sat there blinking back tears as she nodded her thanks.
Howl returned with Sophie and Karen. Toby and Michael both carried sleeping bags and Karen pointed to the edge of the broad kitchen garden veranda. They very reluctantly set up their beds beside the stairs and lay on top of the sleeping bags to watch. Howl set the crate down at the edge of the wards.
"Sarah," he called, "I will approach with one piece at a time. Tell me when I get too close."
She nodded and wiped her eyes on her sleeve.
She shivered the moment he crossed the wards to the back yard and waited until he was perhaps five feet away and she could feel the discomfort from the cold the etched metal radiated and held up her hand. Howl placed it on the grass and it glowed a faint blue. He repeated the act until twenty seven pieces glowed in a wide circle around them. Robert stood and waved his hands through the air then walked over and examined one of them.
"Are these safe to touch?"
"They won't do anything to a human," Howl said absently as he walked around the outer perimeter inspecting each piece of iron, some were large nails that looked like railway pegs, others were horseshoes, and still others a miscellany of objects, old irons, a poker, weights from a scale, and they all glowed with the peculiar sigils etched onto them.
"What do they do to fae?"
"Drain their magic," Howl said absently, "or more truly, limit their use of their ability to access two plains simultaneously." He finished his circuit as Sophie and Karen seated themselves on the steps to watch the proceedings. Robert stood just outside the circle as Howl stepped within and approached them. He sat down on the edge of the quilt.
"Now that it's contained as best as we can for the moment, tell me what happened. Every word."
Sarah straightened her back and began her retelling. She was getting better at that sort of thing, as Howl seemed to expect it of her in any magic she managed to perform.