Author's note!
This chapter is dedicated to Dawn, Deborah, Sick Little Fiend, Silver Space, and Shadow Nightshade who wrote such wonderful reviews and encouraged me to get this baby moving. This chapter would have been out yesterday, but I looked over it when I was done and was absolutely appalled with myself. I had to do it all over. I may do it again if I have another brain child, I'm not really happy with it.
Again, keep sending in those reviews! They really motivate my procrastinating self! The more reviews I get, the more I'll write for you!
***
Chapter Two; In Which there is an 'Accident' and A Journey is Begun
*Strong Language warning*
Theme music: 9 to 5 by Dolly Parton
***
Sarah stared at the Sunday Inquirer in numb shock.
"Ya should watch what ya say to that freak." Bea murmured as she gently disengaged Sarah stiffened fingers from the newspaper. The Headlines blared in big bold face print; Camco Employee Found Dead: Cause... Mummification!
Bea folded the paper in half, with the offensive streamer on the inside before cosigning it to the garbage. She shook her head disparagingly. "Can't say I disagree with him though." She said over her shoulder to Sarah, who was still sitting in the same position she'd assumed when she'd read the incriminating words. Her hands were still up in front of her grasping a phantom newspaper. Bea shook her head again.
"Jareth killed him!"
"Yeah, sugar. You know the freak of nature for seven years, why are you surprised?" Bea asked, she leaned against the counter and crossed her ankles lazily. "I'd a done the same if you'd told me what he was doin'!"
Sarah broke from her trance with an angry blush. She turned away from Bea's heated eyes. "That's why I didn't tell you!" she said. "He's... he was a nasty, subversive old son of a bitch and he deserved to go to jail, but not to die. I can't live with somebody's death on my conscience!" she left her head sink forward into her palms. Her long, now brown once more, hair fell forward to conceal her from the world around her.
A transparent cigarette appeared between Bea's long slender fingers ash she lifted them to her lips. "It ain't your fault, sugar." Bea paused to take a drag. "It ain't like you went out and -told- Jerry-baby to go turn the guy into a mummy. He read your thoughts, that means different rules."
Sarah watched Bea exhale a perfect smoke ring through her fingers. "I wish I could believe that, Bea. I really wish I could."
Bea shrugged. "Take it up with El freak-out." she grinned nastily. "I'll be in my room if you want back up.
Sarah shook her head vehemently as Bea flipped into her room off the kitchen. "No way." She told the table top. "There is no way I'm enlisting a poltergeist to help me with Jareth! That's like choosing both evils instead of the lesser one!"
"I heard that!" Bea snapped irritably.
Sarah made an innocent moue at Bea door. "I didn't mean it...ACK!" in lessening the blow for Bea, Sarah's eyes fell on the grandfather clock that had followed her when she'd moved out of her parents house. It was 8:20!
"I'm going to be late for WORK!" she shrieked.
Bea stuck the upper half of her body through the door just in time to see Sarah scramble out of the kitchen and into the main bath. "They ain't gonna open today! Crikey, your supervisor just got murdered! The police ain't even gonna let you in the building!"
Sarah emerged from the bathroom already dressed in a rose colored secretary's jacket and black sheath skirt. She had a compact in hand and was frantically trying to apply mascara and walk at the same time (a futile effort, take it from one who has tried!)
"You don't know Camco Corp." She griped. "Even the police lines around Mr. Benson's office wouldn't stop them, we'll have a new supervisor by noon today and he'll be wanting to know what our floor has been doing in the interim." Sarah had been through two changes of management, it was not unlike a coup de'tat. Right down to the amount of blood spilled!
"This is not gonna be pretty." Sarah murmured. Her desk was right by Benson's office, not a coincidence by a long shot. The police were definitely going to want to question her, which would probably take -hours- ! After that whoever was taking over the ground floor Call Center would want to know why she hadn't been at her station, and being interrogated by police offices wouldn't be a good enough reason. "And here I thought yesterday was the day from hell, it won't be anything compared to today."
"Then quit." Jareth advised her as he materialized beside her. Today he was in his more normal ensemble of dove grey pants, tight, knee high boots with equally high heels, and a loose blowing shirt of white silk that fell open to reveal his chest and his ever present crescent shaped pendant. For once, he'd lost the riding crop.
Sarah gritted her teeth. "It isn't that easy! I don't earn enough on royalties yet to support myself, and besides if I ..."
"You could still come underground." Jareth offered. "I'm still more than open to the suggestion."
Sarah whirled on him. "Come to the Labyrinth and do what? Run the Maze again? Or maybe just live there and harass whoever you deign to toss in there? That may work for Hoggle and Ludo but I..."
Jareth held up a hand in a preemptory gesture and Sarah's voice died... literally. "Actually I had a different idea in mind. You , me, and a Castle at the center of the Labyrinth beyond the Goblin City filled with little blonde and black haired children." When he noted the telling look on Sarah face he shrugged. "It was an idea... an alternative is that we play another game."
Sarah gave an inelegant snort... which turned to icy dread as Bea coalesced between her and Jareth. Sarah quickly moved through Bea to make sure she didn't do anything hasty... like call up a psychic storm or start throwing furniture around. The furniture was always churlish for weeks after that happened and Sarah had enough on her plate without soothing sulky furniture.
Bea shivered. "You have no idea how -repugnant- that is!"
Sarah made a sharp gesture in the air, translated as. "No fighting!"
Jareth shrugged and summoned a crystal. He slid it back and forth over his fingers and knuckles in that physics defying manner of his. There was a glimmer and Sarah recovered the use of her voice. "I am merely providing an alternative to spending a day being alternately harassed by your employers and the local constabulary..."
"Police, Jareth." Sarah corrected irritably. "We aren't in the eighteenth century anymore. Modernize!"
A small blush gathered over Jareth's pale cheeks. He muttered something about throttling someone, notably not Sarah. He banished the crystal and his riding crop appeared in its place. "As I was saying, maybe you would care for a small sporting wager..."
Sarah lifted an eyebrow and Jareth coughed discreetly.
"...ah... well, There are other puzzles in the Underground than my Labyrinth. The Forest of Leihaedrielle for one." He paused with a dazzling grin. "Are you in the mood for a small treasure hunt?"
"Not really," Sarah said sharply. "I have to go to wo..."
-bringggggggg!-
Sarah glared at the phone.
"That would be your boss telling you not to come into work today."
Sarah shook her head. "No, they wouldn't close just for Mr. Benson..."
"... there was also the small incident of that fire." Jareth drawled.
Sarah froze. "What fire!"
Jareth shrugged. "The fire I set, of course!"
Bea stifled a chuckle. "Now why didn't I think of that?"
"Who's side are you on!" Sarah cried.
Bea sobered. "Your side, sugar." She said quietly. "but, as much as I hate to agree with the Faerie, he's right. Ya need to get out of all this, one day ain't gonna hurt ya. If they fire you, so what? Thangs ain't as bad as you're letting yourself think. Go, have an adventure. Ya need it, really bad."
Sarah let her shoulders slump. "Et tu, Brute?" she murmured sarcastically. She sighed. "Fine! I'm outnumbered! I know when to quit!" she turned fully on Jareth. "what are the rules?"
Jareth grinned. "The rules are most simple. You can use any resource at your disposal, you'll have several tools to use you can call on me for help out of a dangerous situation, and you may summon me for three hints. You will follow a trail of clues though the forest until you reach the treasure. If you get to the treasure without giving up you win, if you give up, I win. No time limits."
"And the stakes?" Bea asked sharply.
Jareth nodded. "That stakes are, if you win I'll set up a residence for you in the Underground. I'll even transport the furniture and your specter. You will never have to deal with the humdrum of the Aboveground again. I'll even grant you the ability to move back and forth through the worlds so you may visit your family."
"That's not..." Sarah snapped down her mouth before she uttered the forbidden phrase. "That's exactly what you WANT!" she accused instead.
"No really." Jareth chortled. "you haven't heard what will happen if I win!" he leaned forward so that no more than a breathe of air separated him from Sarah. "If I win, I'll do every thing I promised before, only you won't have your own private home. You'll be in the Castle beyond the Goblin City. You'll be my Queen."
Sarah's voice died in her throat once more, although this time it had nothing to do with Jareth's influence.
"Sarah..." Bea fluttered down close to her ear. "Remember this for me, 'what's the point in living if you can't feel like you're alive?'"
Sarah's decision was made. "Agreed."
The world wrenched sideways.
***
Sarah blinked, and blinked, and then blinked again.
She was standing on a grassy slope overlooking a dark forest. The sky overhead was a deep inky black and was dotted with a thousand tiny lights. Her savvy business lady suit was gone and replaced with form fitting black leather trousers and knee high black lace up boots with sensible low heels. She wore a deep green blouse under a woven leather vest. There was a black rucksack at her feet with a black bow beside it . When she moved she felt a quiver bounce on her hip. Apparently her archery lessons had not gone unnoticed by Jareth.
On closer inspection of herself she found a pair of thick leather gloves, also black, tucked into her chunky belt. The belt was covered in small pouches and such, when she touched them she felt the tingle of Jareth's magic. There was also a bowie knife (no pun intended) strapped to her leg.
Inside the pouches there were sturdy carved wood bottle containing medicinal herbs with precise instructions inscribed on their sides. The was also a large amount of gold, silver, and copper coins secreted about herself.
"Well, he's thorough. I gotta give him that." she murmured. "I better see what her packed for me."
Sarah fell into an easy lotus, courtesy of her numerous tai-bo lessons. She'd originally started the lessons as a free trial, and found she'd liked them so much that she kept going even after she was too advanced to do much more than spar with her former sensei.
The rucksack had a bedroll and some sort of... tarpaulin rolled up on top of it that needed to be removed before opening the sack. Sarah carefully set them aside for further investigation later before moving onto the contents of her bag.
There was the regular provisions that she usually gave her own fantasy characters. Dried jerky, small, single serving sections of cheese sealed in wax, a few travelers loaves, (gag me, I've eaten that stuff. It's hard as a rock with about just as much flavor)... all in all, about a weeks supplies. Two if she was prudent.
There was also two spare knives, one of which went on her belt along with the first. Further examination found a small pouch of arrow heads, about sixty. Presumably they were for if she failed to recover her arrows and needed new ones.
Sarah found two more green shirts, one blue, and another black shirt. The black one was beaded and fringed with slitted bell sleeves. There was another set of trousers, a pair of light cloth half boots with decorative buckles, and another enameled belt.
"Of course Jareth would never consider himself prepared unless he was ready to dress up at a moments notice." Sarah mused. "Why would he do differently for me?" Apparently it hadn't occurred to Jareth that Sarah was not nearly so vain as himself, still. It would have been a dress...
Sarah carefully returned the things to the rucksack, she made sure to pack the food so it wouldn't be damaged. When she was re-tying the bedroll and tarpaulin (cape she realized later) she noticed Jareth's riding crop laying on the ground with a small white scroll tied to the handle.
"Subtle, Jareth." Sarah muttered as she tucked the crop into her belt and opened the scroll.
"Here is your first clue (. Look for a white horse."
Sarah folded the paper and tucked it into one of the pouches. "If you want to ride, don't ride the white horse..." she warbled off an old eighties song. Suddenly she blinked and wrestled the rucksack around... sure enough, there was symbol of Aquarius embossed onto the flap on the bag. "What the hell is that? Jareth's symbol or something... no..." Jareth's symbol was the sign of eternity, or looked at another way, an owl's eyes. So what was the symbol doing there? Sarah was an Aries (if you haven't noticed by now.)
Sarah shook her head, she'd figure it our as she came to it. She wouldn't solve Jareth's puzzles by sitting out side the forest. Leihaedrielle's forest beckoned. It was time to go.
***
Not as far away as you might think, Jareth sat in his throne room watching Sarah forge valiantly ahead towards the forest. A small smile turned up the edges of his mouth and he watched his future queen.
"Well, she IS a looker. Isn't she?"
Jareth banished the crystal and shot a glare at the speaker that should have reduced him into a small greasy spot on the immaculate marbled floor. He must have missed. "She is and she's mine."
The speaker held up his hands. "And I am to make sure she survives, I understand completely my liege." He swept into what by anyone else would have been a humble bow. 'Had he been anyone else' is the key phrase.
"I am trusting you, Gawain. Don't make me regret it." Jareth cautioned. "there are worse things than the bog of eternal stench in the underground. Don't forget that."
Gawain nodded. "The Lady Sarah's life shall come before my own in all things, I swear it upon my very name." ... too much depends on this one woman's life for me to do otherwise. He thought silently, I wonder if King Jareth knows just how high the stakes we're playing for -really- are?
***
End chapter two
***
AU- Gawain's gonna be fun. He'll be almost more annoying than Jareth is!
This chapter is dedicated to Dawn, Deborah, Sick Little Fiend, Silver Space, and Shadow Nightshade who wrote such wonderful reviews and encouraged me to get this baby moving. This chapter would have been out yesterday, but I looked over it when I was done and was absolutely appalled with myself. I had to do it all over. I may do it again if I have another brain child, I'm not really happy with it.
Again, keep sending in those reviews! They really motivate my procrastinating self! The more reviews I get, the more I'll write for you!
***
Chapter Two; In Which there is an 'Accident' and A Journey is Begun
*Strong Language warning*
Theme music: 9 to 5 by Dolly Parton
***
Sarah stared at the Sunday Inquirer in numb shock.
"Ya should watch what ya say to that freak." Bea murmured as she gently disengaged Sarah stiffened fingers from the newspaper. The Headlines blared in big bold face print; Camco Employee Found Dead: Cause... Mummification!
Bea folded the paper in half, with the offensive streamer on the inside before cosigning it to the garbage. She shook her head disparagingly. "Can't say I disagree with him though." She said over her shoulder to Sarah, who was still sitting in the same position she'd assumed when she'd read the incriminating words. Her hands were still up in front of her grasping a phantom newspaper. Bea shook her head again.
"Jareth killed him!"
"Yeah, sugar. You know the freak of nature for seven years, why are you surprised?" Bea asked, she leaned against the counter and crossed her ankles lazily. "I'd a done the same if you'd told me what he was doin'!"
Sarah broke from her trance with an angry blush. She turned away from Bea's heated eyes. "That's why I didn't tell you!" she said. "He's... he was a nasty, subversive old son of a bitch and he deserved to go to jail, but not to die. I can't live with somebody's death on my conscience!" she left her head sink forward into her palms. Her long, now brown once more, hair fell forward to conceal her from the world around her.
A transparent cigarette appeared between Bea's long slender fingers ash she lifted them to her lips. "It ain't your fault, sugar." Bea paused to take a drag. "It ain't like you went out and -told- Jerry-baby to go turn the guy into a mummy. He read your thoughts, that means different rules."
Sarah watched Bea exhale a perfect smoke ring through her fingers. "I wish I could believe that, Bea. I really wish I could."
Bea shrugged. "Take it up with El freak-out." she grinned nastily. "I'll be in my room if you want back up.
Sarah shook her head vehemently as Bea flipped into her room off the kitchen. "No way." She told the table top. "There is no way I'm enlisting a poltergeist to help me with Jareth! That's like choosing both evils instead of the lesser one!"
"I heard that!" Bea snapped irritably.
Sarah made an innocent moue at Bea door. "I didn't mean it...ACK!" in lessening the blow for Bea, Sarah's eyes fell on the grandfather clock that had followed her when she'd moved out of her parents house. It was 8:20!
"I'm going to be late for WORK!" she shrieked.
Bea stuck the upper half of her body through the door just in time to see Sarah scramble out of the kitchen and into the main bath. "They ain't gonna open today! Crikey, your supervisor just got murdered! The police ain't even gonna let you in the building!"
Sarah emerged from the bathroom already dressed in a rose colored secretary's jacket and black sheath skirt. She had a compact in hand and was frantically trying to apply mascara and walk at the same time (a futile effort, take it from one who has tried!)
"You don't know Camco Corp." She griped. "Even the police lines around Mr. Benson's office wouldn't stop them, we'll have a new supervisor by noon today and he'll be wanting to know what our floor has been doing in the interim." Sarah had been through two changes of management, it was not unlike a coup de'tat. Right down to the amount of blood spilled!
"This is not gonna be pretty." Sarah murmured. Her desk was right by Benson's office, not a coincidence by a long shot. The police were definitely going to want to question her, which would probably take -hours- ! After that whoever was taking over the ground floor Call Center would want to know why she hadn't been at her station, and being interrogated by police offices wouldn't be a good enough reason. "And here I thought yesterday was the day from hell, it won't be anything compared to today."
"Then quit." Jareth advised her as he materialized beside her. Today he was in his more normal ensemble of dove grey pants, tight, knee high boots with equally high heels, and a loose blowing shirt of white silk that fell open to reveal his chest and his ever present crescent shaped pendant. For once, he'd lost the riding crop.
Sarah gritted her teeth. "It isn't that easy! I don't earn enough on royalties yet to support myself, and besides if I ..."
"You could still come underground." Jareth offered. "I'm still more than open to the suggestion."
Sarah whirled on him. "Come to the Labyrinth and do what? Run the Maze again? Or maybe just live there and harass whoever you deign to toss in there? That may work for Hoggle and Ludo but I..."
Jareth held up a hand in a preemptory gesture and Sarah's voice died... literally. "Actually I had a different idea in mind. You , me, and a Castle at the center of the Labyrinth beyond the Goblin City filled with little blonde and black haired children." When he noted the telling look on Sarah face he shrugged. "It was an idea... an alternative is that we play another game."
Sarah gave an inelegant snort... which turned to icy dread as Bea coalesced between her and Jareth. Sarah quickly moved through Bea to make sure she didn't do anything hasty... like call up a psychic storm or start throwing furniture around. The furniture was always churlish for weeks after that happened and Sarah had enough on her plate without soothing sulky furniture.
Bea shivered. "You have no idea how -repugnant- that is!"
Sarah made a sharp gesture in the air, translated as. "No fighting!"
Jareth shrugged and summoned a crystal. He slid it back and forth over his fingers and knuckles in that physics defying manner of his. There was a glimmer and Sarah recovered the use of her voice. "I am merely providing an alternative to spending a day being alternately harassed by your employers and the local constabulary..."
"Police, Jareth." Sarah corrected irritably. "We aren't in the eighteenth century anymore. Modernize!"
A small blush gathered over Jareth's pale cheeks. He muttered something about throttling someone, notably not Sarah. He banished the crystal and his riding crop appeared in its place. "As I was saying, maybe you would care for a small sporting wager..."
Sarah lifted an eyebrow and Jareth coughed discreetly.
"...ah... well, There are other puzzles in the Underground than my Labyrinth. The Forest of Leihaedrielle for one." He paused with a dazzling grin. "Are you in the mood for a small treasure hunt?"
"Not really," Sarah said sharply. "I have to go to wo..."
-bringggggggg!-
Sarah glared at the phone.
"That would be your boss telling you not to come into work today."
Sarah shook her head. "No, they wouldn't close just for Mr. Benson..."
"... there was also the small incident of that fire." Jareth drawled.
Sarah froze. "What fire!"
Jareth shrugged. "The fire I set, of course!"
Bea stifled a chuckle. "Now why didn't I think of that?"
"Who's side are you on!" Sarah cried.
Bea sobered. "Your side, sugar." She said quietly. "but, as much as I hate to agree with the Faerie, he's right. Ya need to get out of all this, one day ain't gonna hurt ya. If they fire you, so what? Thangs ain't as bad as you're letting yourself think. Go, have an adventure. Ya need it, really bad."
Sarah let her shoulders slump. "Et tu, Brute?" she murmured sarcastically. She sighed. "Fine! I'm outnumbered! I know when to quit!" she turned fully on Jareth. "what are the rules?"
Jareth grinned. "The rules are most simple. You can use any resource at your disposal, you'll have several tools to use you can call on me for help out of a dangerous situation, and you may summon me for three hints. You will follow a trail of clues though the forest until you reach the treasure. If you get to the treasure without giving up you win, if you give up, I win. No time limits."
"And the stakes?" Bea asked sharply.
Jareth nodded. "That stakes are, if you win I'll set up a residence for you in the Underground. I'll even transport the furniture and your specter. You will never have to deal with the humdrum of the Aboveground again. I'll even grant you the ability to move back and forth through the worlds so you may visit your family."
"That's not..." Sarah snapped down her mouth before she uttered the forbidden phrase. "That's exactly what you WANT!" she accused instead.
"No really." Jareth chortled. "you haven't heard what will happen if I win!" he leaned forward so that no more than a breathe of air separated him from Sarah. "If I win, I'll do every thing I promised before, only you won't have your own private home. You'll be in the Castle beyond the Goblin City. You'll be my Queen."
Sarah's voice died in her throat once more, although this time it had nothing to do with Jareth's influence.
"Sarah..." Bea fluttered down close to her ear. "Remember this for me, 'what's the point in living if you can't feel like you're alive?'"
Sarah's decision was made. "Agreed."
The world wrenched sideways.
***
Sarah blinked, and blinked, and then blinked again.
She was standing on a grassy slope overlooking a dark forest. The sky overhead was a deep inky black and was dotted with a thousand tiny lights. Her savvy business lady suit was gone and replaced with form fitting black leather trousers and knee high black lace up boots with sensible low heels. She wore a deep green blouse under a woven leather vest. There was a black rucksack at her feet with a black bow beside it . When she moved she felt a quiver bounce on her hip. Apparently her archery lessons had not gone unnoticed by Jareth.
On closer inspection of herself she found a pair of thick leather gloves, also black, tucked into her chunky belt. The belt was covered in small pouches and such, when she touched them she felt the tingle of Jareth's magic. There was also a bowie knife (no pun intended) strapped to her leg.
Inside the pouches there were sturdy carved wood bottle containing medicinal herbs with precise instructions inscribed on their sides. The was also a large amount of gold, silver, and copper coins secreted about herself.
"Well, he's thorough. I gotta give him that." she murmured. "I better see what her packed for me."
Sarah fell into an easy lotus, courtesy of her numerous tai-bo lessons. She'd originally started the lessons as a free trial, and found she'd liked them so much that she kept going even after she was too advanced to do much more than spar with her former sensei.
The rucksack had a bedroll and some sort of... tarpaulin rolled up on top of it that needed to be removed before opening the sack. Sarah carefully set them aside for further investigation later before moving onto the contents of her bag.
There was the regular provisions that she usually gave her own fantasy characters. Dried jerky, small, single serving sections of cheese sealed in wax, a few travelers loaves, (gag me, I've eaten that stuff. It's hard as a rock with about just as much flavor)... all in all, about a weeks supplies. Two if she was prudent.
There was also two spare knives, one of which went on her belt along with the first. Further examination found a small pouch of arrow heads, about sixty. Presumably they were for if she failed to recover her arrows and needed new ones.
Sarah found two more green shirts, one blue, and another black shirt. The black one was beaded and fringed with slitted bell sleeves. There was another set of trousers, a pair of light cloth half boots with decorative buckles, and another enameled belt.
"Of course Jareth would never consider himself prepared unless he was ready to dress up at a moments notice." Sarah mused. "Why would he do differently for me?" Apparently it hadn't occurred to Jareth that Sarah was not nearly so vain as himself, still. It would have been a dress...
Sarah carefully returned the things to the rucksack, she made sure to pack the food so it wouldn't be damaged. When she was re-tying the bedroll and tarpaulin (cape she realized later) she noticed Jareth's riding crop laying on the ground with a small white scroll tied to the handle.
"Subtle, Jareth." Sarah muttered as she tucked the crop into her belt and opened the scroll.
"Here is your first clue (. Look for a white horse."
Sarah folded the paper and tucked it into one of the pouches. "If you want to ride, don't ride the white horse..." she warbled off an old eighties song. Suddenly she blinked and wrestled the rucksack around... sure enough, there was symbol of Aquarius embossed onto the flap on the bag. "What the hell is that? Jareth's symbol or something... no..." Jareth's symbol was the sign of eternity, or looked at another way, an owl's eyes. So what was the symbol doing there? Sarah was an Aries (if you haven't noticed by now.)
Sarah shook her head, she'd figure it our as she came to it. She wouldn't solve Jareth's puzzles by sitting out side the forest. Leihaedrielle's forest beckoned. It was time to go.
***
Not as far away as you might think, Jareth sat in his throne room watching Sarah forge valiantly ahead towards the forest. A small smile turned up the edges of his mouth and he watched his future queen.
"Well, she IS a looker. Isn't she?"
Jareth banished the crystal and shot a glare at the speaker that should have reduced him into a small greasy spot on the immaculate marbled floor. He must have missed. "She is and she's mine."
The speaker held up his hands. "And I am to make sure she survives, I understand completely my liege." He swept into what by anyone else would have been a humble bow. 'Had he been anyone else' is the key phrase.
"I am trusting you, Gawain. Don't make me regret it." Jareth cautioned. "there are worse things than the bog of eternal stench in the underground. Don't forget that."
Gawain nodded. "The Lady Sarah's life shall come before my own in all things, I swear it upon my very name." ... too much depends on this one woman's life for me to do otherwise. He thought silently, I wonder if King Jareth knows just how high the stakes we're playing for -really- are?
***
End chapter two
***
AU- Gawain's gonna be fun. He'll be almost more annoying than Jareth is!
