A/N: And somewhere along the way my posting-once-a-week habits died and were replaced by posting-once-a-month habits. I accept the flames that will burn me at the stake with expectant grace.

Disclaimer: This world isn't mine, I just distort it.

Never and Forever

Chapter Ten

Asphyxiate

You, my dear, are a flaming red rose,

and I am the shears that snip.

As yet you've avoided the black pools of sin –

But with me you should soon skinny-dip.

Thou, dear heart, are my first wedded wife,

but I am Henry the Eighth.

I'd pilot you 'cross the star-sprinkled heavens

And watch you asphyxiate.

You are the dogwood that blooms in the summer,

but I am the frost that follows.

Your passion burns like a flame in the evening,

and I am the darkness that swallows.

You, my love, are the snow-colored dove,

which jerks in the sky with a start.

And I, to my sorrow, the venomous arrow,

which has just now torn straight through your heart.

~ Dan Stahl

"Stay here." Sarah ordered, standing up from the mother cradling her unconscious daughter. Sarah had no idea what she intended to do, but she did know that they were accomplishing nothing, holding Ari and hoping that she would be all right. "Is there a doctor or someone around that can help?" Lomaria managed to tear her eyes away from Ari to stare vacantly at Sarah.

"She's been quiet all day." She whispered, not to Sarah, not Ari, not to anyone. "I should have known it. Quiet all day."

"Lomaria!" Sarah exclaimed desperately. "Lomaria, where can I go to get help?" But Lomaria acted as though she did not hear, she only turned her gaze back to her child and began to cry again. Ari's simple dress soaked up her mother's tears like a sponge, and Sarah thought she saw Ari flinch – but no. And time was wasting away.

"I'll be right back." Sarah reassured an unresponsive Lomaria, then stumbled her way out the door. She had to find someone.

The seven goblin brothers peered in around the corner of the back door, watching Sarah retreat out the front door, their mother huddling Ari and oblivious to the world.

~

Sarah had bulldozed her way through the city at an unbelievable speed, her feet making dry, flat, cracking sounds against the dirt road as she ran. Her height was an advantage that made her stand out, made the curious civilians stop and stare and part like waters for her, for the Lady Sarah that they all talked about when she was safely out of earshot.

She thundered across the drawbridge and made it shake, holding her dusty skirts up around her knees with clenched fists.

"Jareth!" She screamed. "Jareth!" She burst through the threshold and now her feet thudded and echoed and God, why didn't he hear her? "Jareth!"

The air shimmered briefly and he appeared, his eyebrows narrowed and his eyes glistening with a swiftly abating annoyance.

"What is it?" Jareth demanded, grabbing her by the forearms to prevent her from knocking him over as she skidded to a stop.

"It's Ari. Something's wrong with Ari, you have to come!" Jareth whipped around to glare at the cluster of servants that were eagerly trying to look as though they were not the least bit interested.

"Make my excuses." Jareth ordered to the whole of them. "I shall return shortly." Sarah moved to pull him down the hallway and no doubt out of the castle, but Jareth kept holding her arms tightly and the two of them disappeared.

~

Coarse dirt slammed up under Sarah's feet. Jareth flew, more than walked, to Lomaria's side and pulled Ari from her grasp. Ari hung loose and broken in his arms, and Lomaria uttered no protest as Jareth swept her away from the kitchen and into a bedroom, arranging her carefully atop the covers. Sarah steered Lomaria into a hardback chair by the bed.

"What happened here?" Jareth demanded roughly, drawing his rapidly ungloved hands down Ari's bare arms and glancing at Sarah over his shoulder.

"I don't know." Sarah almost wailed it, but the harsh clamp that had come down around her throat didn't allow more than a whisper. "She was quiet this morning, Lomaria said, then just fainted dead away in the kitchen. Is she all right? What's wrong with her?"

"Run to the market and fetch some wormswood, heather's breath – can you remember it? Have someone take you to Griffin and bring him back here. Tortures above, but I am no healer." And then his eyes snapped to hers and she saw the apprehension building behind them. "Quickly."

Sarah's feet felt like cement blocks and the thudding rang in her ears. Jareth had turned from Ari and was crouching beside Lomaria instead. Sarah twisted her head back, trying to catch the reassuring words he told the frozen mother; she wanted his reassurance too, damn it. Her cement-block feet caught around something and yanked her back, and Sarah forced her way through the seven brothers that had gathered hesitantly at the door.

Back into the Goblin City she ran, stopping every person she could grab by the shoulder.

"I need Griffin. Where is he?"

"Please, I'm looking for Griffin. Can you help me?"

"Do you know Griffin? I have to find him."

"What is all the fuss about?" A sandy haired man stepped out from a cottage with a very low doorway, making him look even taller than he was. "Is someone looking for me?" Sarah ran to him, flicking sweaty strings of hair out of her face.

"Are you Griffin?" She demanded.

"Why, yes, I am." He smiled affably. "I'm afraid I'm rather busy at the moment, but if you'd like to –"

"Jareth needs you." Sarah said, cutting him off with the only phrase she knew would be effective.

"Where to?" Griffin asked quickly, and Sarah followed him as he bustled back into the cottage and grabbed a satchel.

"Lomaria's." Sarah said, hoping that this would suffice. "And he said something about wormwood. And heather's breath." Griffin glanced at her briefly, the corners of his mouth drawn.

"This is for Lomaria?"

"No, her daughter." Griffin paled visibly but kept his features soft, which only made Sarah more nervous.

"Well, we shall not stand here running our mouths then, shall we?" He said, lightly taking Sarah's hand and the world disappeared around her once more.

~

Jareth had somehow managed to bring Lomaria to terms, for they stood on either side of Ari when Sarah and Griffin appeared, chanting in a garbled tongue together. Griffin whipped a bundle of off-white stems from his satchel, and with a wave of his hand they were crushed to a fine powder. Sarah stepped back to the doorway as he sprinkled this around the bed in a circle, then assumed position at the headboard and joined the chanting.

A white light rose from the powder like smoke, encircling the four and making Sarah's view hazy. She could see Griffin toss something in the air, and then the smoke-light changed to a brilliant orange flash, and faded. Jareth stepped away then, Griffin pausing for but a moment to take Ari's pulse and then followed suit. Lomaria knelt at the side of the bed, and took her daughter's hand to wait.

"She will be all right." Griffin announced to the brothers, who were standing a few feet behind Sarah, and she could feel their collective sigh of relief brush across her back. They weren't really so bad, after all. Jareth and Griffin began to converse in lower tones, and Sarah edged closer to hear, though she looked in Ari's direction in hopes of looking less obvious.

"It is starting, then." Jareth said to Griffin with a hard edge to his voice.

"The aftershock?" Griffin asked. "But of course. She predicted it, you know full well."

"Do not presume to chide me, Griffin."

"It will be spreading, no doubt. Excuse me, you Highness, but I have a job to do. Perhaps you should begin your own." Griffin marched precisely away from the cottage, his cloak waving back in a straight line and his boots clicking in equal measure.

"Sarah?" She turned to look at Jareth, and he was ice. "Come with me." And it was no question.

She took his hand in silence and a moment later they appeared in his vacant throne room, where he could pace and listen to the calm clack of his heels against the stone. Sarah waited as long as she could, hoping he would say something. He didn't.

"I don't understand what just happened." She said finally.

"Ari seems to have been struck with some particularly strong burst of magic. It weakened her, certainly, but she is fine."

"Where did it come from?"

"The magic? There is an old battleground; it still resonates from the power it once saw. The tides of it ebb and flow on dramatic occasions and can strike down a passing individual."

"Why Ari?"

"She was most likely playing somewhere she should not have been – she was mortal, and more susceptible to such forces." He turned to her abruptly, and offered her his arm. "To be honest, there is nothing I would rather do than to put the mess out of my mind."

He knew she had listened to what Griffin had said. She could tell from the way he was eyeing her, a sharp mix of annoyance and curiosity and something else. She knew he was trying to sway her from the subject, and she took his arm and allowed herself to be swayed. If Ari was all right, then she could stand to put off the explanations if Jareth wanted it.

She'd never felt so mature.

~

He gave her a "formal" tour of the castle. Sarah had thought that she had been mostly everywhere, but she was startlingly wrong. From one grand room to another, past dozens of tapestries all full of fae, strangely enough. Wars and marriages and town life covered several walls, but no there were no goblins. Gargoyles leered from steep ceilings, leaves swirled round fanciful pillars and they all blurred together in Sarah's mind, but she didn't care. She enjoyed the feel of Jareth's arm beneath her hand, and the idea that she could provide some sort of solace from what seemed to upset him. She ignored the fact that he hadn't explained anything to her, not really, and wondered briefly if anyone ever knew what he was thinking – if she might ever be privileged enough to know.

They stopped in front of a heavy wood door, with the seal of Jareth's necklace emblazoned on the front.

"We must talk." Jareth said, before opening the door.

"I know." She had felt the tension in the air between them, caught the sidelong glances he had shot her, as though he was measuring her up for something. Sarah was beginning to suspect that this was a conversation she did not want to have.

They had all but just stepped in the room when a large-nosed goblin scrabbled in after them, bowing briefly in front of Jareth and attempting to catch his breath.

"Seven more case have been reported, Highness." He said, and took a large gasp of air before continuing. "They're all children. Changelings."

"Go." Sarah said, before Jareth could hesitate. Only, Jareth would never hesitate. Rather before Jareth could make a decision Sarah wouldn't like. "Go, because they need you. You really are a king."

"King of the Goblins." Jareth said softly, running a hand through Sarah's hair. "Will you wait?"

"Of course," Sarah answered, a bit surprised. Jareth transformed gracefully to owl form, swiftly swooping after the scurrying goblin. "Of course," Sarah repeated to the empty room. Where else would she go? What else was there to do, when time was meaningless now? She felt like a stranger wandering around in her own life. She loved the way tremors shook her spine whenever Jareth appeared, she did, and the lovely adventurous, medieval feel of the Underground. But was that all there was? Would she spend the rest of her life trading sexual innuendos with the Goblin King?

Sarah took to walking a slow circle around the sitting room, running her hand against the wood so dark it was almost black, and the carvings it bore. Aboveground she had had goals. A plan, of sorts. Finish high school. Finish college. Become a Hollywood starlet, an actress supreme. Marry the man of her dreams. Have a couple of darling children, win an Oscar or two, and retire to the elegant countryside. Not that her plan had been perfect, certainly no, because though Sarah wanted all those things, she still found it rather faulty – there was no thrill. Now, her life was all thrill and mystery, but no end place in sight.

"This is fairly creepy." Sarah said, suddenly focusing on the décor of the room and hoping to relieve the eerie silence by the sound of her own voice. Her voice came out high and strangled, though, and bounced off the thick walls with a whisper of an echo.

Fae were carved into the walls. But not ones like in the rest of the castle. Twisted ones, tormented and sprawled on the ground. Retching and flailing and crying tiny black wood tears. It was a fae city, covering the walls. A city of fae, mutating to goblins. Oh God, what was this?

Sarah's stomach was trying to punch it's way out of her throat, and she ran out of the room through the nearest door, past a painting of a castle in flames. She slammed the door behind her and turned the key that was in the lock, as though she could lock out the images imprinted in her mind. She turned away from the door and her breath caught in her throat. Oh, she had been here before.

These were Jareth's chambers.

The past room must have been his anteroom, what a horrifying place. Sarah had been here days ago, in a fury over Jareth's refusal to send her home. She was surprised to find comfort here, comfort from the living nightmares in the other room – what in the world could have possessed him to decorate that room so? Even so, there was a distinct I-shouldn't-be-here feeling Sarah got from standing in his chambers, but she couldn't go back and wait in the sitting room. She crossed the room to leave by another door, but froze when the glitter caught her eye.

The glitter from a small box, set upon a desk and basking in the sunlight. Sarah's mouth came together in a tiny oh, though no sound escaped her lips. She picked the box up with light fingers and took in the beautiful sight of thin strands of gold woven together into a tiny circle, inset with flakes of diamonds. The oh turned to a grin, and she carefully set the box back where she found it. She kept grinning as she went back to the door she had come in through, kept grinning as she unlocked the door, and closed her eyes and let the image of the engagement ring paint itself against her eyelids and she felt her way through the grotesque sitting room with little problem.

~

Jareth strode down the hall, engrossed in a heated discussion with long-legged Griffin, who had no trouble keeping up with the King but every problem staying in line.

" – if you refuse to hear it from me, than who will you listen to? The truth is, Jareth, that if this continues, a simple treaty may not suffice – "

"Sarah." Jareth turned from Griffin as though he thought he was finished talking. Perhaps as far as Jareth was concerned, Sarah thought, he was done. "Why are you smiling?" He asked, looking at her with a bemused light in his eyes as she leaned against the door to the sitting room. Sarah was doing her best not to grin like lunatic, but failing miserably.

"No reason." She said lightly, stepping up so close to him she almost stood on his toes and sliding one hand on either cheek to pull him down for a kiss. When she pulled back a slight smile was tugging at the ends of Jareth's mouth – good, she had made him feel better.

"Ari's awake." He said softly, silencing Griffin's frustrated sighs with a glance. "Go and see her." That only made Sarah smile wider, if at all possible, and whatever had happened to all those fears and melancholy she'd had minutes ago? "Dinner?" Jareth asked, in a tone that made the question something more of an assumption. Griffin and the damned Erl King could go hang themselves for all he cared. Some things took precedence over politics.

"But of course." Sarah said with a mock curtsey. Would he give her the ring tonight, perhaps?

~

Sarah slowed her run through the Goblin City to a walk. She should bring Lomaria and Ari flowers, or something. She had no idea what kind of Underground customs there were in regard to get-well cards, but on a couple of occasions she'd passed a poorer looking goblin family selling simple bouquets on her sojourns through the city. She could go and barter something away, help them out… But what?

She paused and glanced down at herself. A beautiful cinnamon coloured gown with an empress waistline and silver-flecked lace at the neckline – she'd spent enough time running around the city in her undergarments, and didn't want to do that again – matching shoes, which she could spare but doubted would be much help to the tiny-footed family, or very valuable… Finally she pulled off the pearl clasp that held up her pile of dark waves – an elfish-type maid had put it in her hair this morning, no doubt courtesy of Jareth, but, well, he would understand.

Sarah found the mother, father and youngest daughter in the center of the square, the girl splashing in the fountain that decorated the goblin city.

"Hello there," Sarah smiled to the child. "I was wondering if I could buy some of your pretty flowers." The girl turned to Sarah and put her fingers to her lips.

"Shhhh. Mommy and Daddy are having a deescussion."

Sarah's curiosity was piqued, but she was going to let it well enough alone. Until she heard her name.

She sat on the fountain's edge, almost leaning in the parents' direction in order to hear what they were saying.

"How is it our business what his Majesty chooses to do with the mortal Lady Sarah?" The husband had asked.
"King Jareth's requested we supply the flowers for the ceremony." The wife replied with a sigh, folding her tiny arms against her chest.

"Saints below, he is a wondrous king." The husband breathed, and Sarah silently agreed.

"Yes, but wondrous or no, if his entanglement with the lady gets in the way with his marriage to the elf princess, why, we'll lose our job and our children could be the next afflicted."

Sarah couldn't breathe.

Her heart exploded into tiny shards and her fingers wound round the fabric at her chest and she gasped a long silent gasp.

No. No, no, no, she'd heard them wrong, she had.

"He's the King, Alana," the husband was scolding, "he knows enough not to jeopardize the politically frail relationship with the Erl King. He's agreed to marry the elf's daughter, and he won't back down now."

No. No, no, no.