Such a small thing, Jareth thought, and yet so important. He watched Sarah through a crystal as emotions played across her face. First fear and confusion, then a kind of wild determination. He watched her dash toward the basement steps, and he knew what she was looking for. He smiled, tracing his fingers over the book that he had stolen just hours earlier. Its worn leather binding reminded him of a summer long ago, and a small girl who had claimed power over a king.
His eyes flashed and he tossed the crystal into midair, watching it disintegrate like a soap bubble as it touched the open air. Jareth stalked over to his throne, and grabbed two goblins who had alighted there, drop kicking them across the room. He lounged in the elaborately decorated chair, gaining comfort from its familiarity. After such a long absence, the games were beginning again. He couldn't hide the giddy excitement that was welling up inside him, demanding that he play the part of the goblin king once more.
There was another reason why Jareth wanted to re-enter Sarah's life. Other than the obvious reason; he had fallen in love with her from the moment he had heard her name. Perhaps this was his chance to escape from the underground and his unfulfilling life as guardian of the labyrinth. The gloominess, the constant bitter chill, the unintelligent beings that were his subjects; all grated on his nerves as they had for the past twenty-five years, and as he was sure it had for the rulers that had come before him. He needed change. He refused to fall into the same patterns as his predecessors, meekly accepting the role that was necessary for him to play. He was the goblin king, and that meant that he was strong. Strong enough to fight the past.
Oh, he wouldn't leave forever, of course. Just long enough to seduce the woman he loved and gain insight into both of their worlds. Perhaps learning about Sarah's world would serve him as he ruled in the underground. Ruled what, his mind asked him, a run-down and creepy old maze and a bunch of smelly creatures who don't know up from down? Where's the challenge in that?
After Sarah had published her book, there had been several children who had called out to him to take away their crying siblings. Until Sarah, there had been none; no one left to believe in the old stories. One woman had reawakened the idea of the underground, but only for a short time. In a few months the requests became fewer and fewer, and no children were left to run the labyrinth. Of course, no one but Sarah had ever made it through; not that he ever really kept the children he had stolen. Usually the wisher would learn his or her lesson and, sobbing, return home afraid but none the worse for the experience.
At any rate, the requests had stopped completely. Children would watch television; follow the lives of animated creatures that had never existed instead of losing themselves in books and imagination. Jareth had become bored, despite his magic. Even the children who couldn't make it through his maze had offered some entertainment, especially since he knew it was his Sarah who had enticed them to call upon him. Watching Sarah through his crystals was something he looked forward to each day, but it only caused his heart to ache since he knew she had a life of her own far away from him and his labyrinth.
He needed to give her time. Time to remember him, and to think about the possibility that he was still in love with her. The waiting, however, was torturous. He needed something to distract him, to get his mind off the fact that the woman he loved was thinking about him at that very moment. Perhaps his magic would give him just the escape he needed. He lifted a crystal, waved a hand over it, and threw it into the air.
The Goblin King, dressed in a sapphire blue costume with a horned mask, was weaving in and out of gaily dressed partygoers, who were also bearing grotesque masks. Lilting music played from somewhere distant, and he caught a glimpse of the girl he had come to see. She was looking around, confused, for a familiar face. Her eyes met his and he disappeared, forcing her to follow him. She chased his image for a few minutes, until she looked frustrated enough to run right out the door. That's when Jareth appeared behind her. He couldn't help singing the song that played in his head and heart as he took her into his arms.
The original plan had been to distract her so that she did not think of the quest which lay before her. But as they danced, Jareth found that he was the one who was distracted. Her innocent eyes gazed up into his mismatched ones, searching for her dreams within them. The masks did not frighten her; she held his hand as they danced and seemed to trust him completely. And why shouldn't she? She knew that he was in love with her, didn't she? Was she too young to understand his feelings? But he had been young as well, unable to communicate what he had felt for her. What he still felt for her, and what had developed from infatuation into this painful separation.
Too soon, he felt the image of Sarah gaining consciousness of the situation, seeing the clock, and looking for an escape from the dreamlike ballroom. Before going through the shattering loss again, Jareth snapped his fingers and the crystal and magic dissolved again into the air. Sighing, the king looked around his throne room and saw the same thing he always saw; ugly goblins crawling all over everything, wreaking their own kind of havoc amongst each other.
Waving a hand in the air, Jareth summoned another crystal, again with Sarah's image. This was the present day Sarah once more, who had given up on the basement and was now staring out the window at the snow accumulating in the yard. She held something between her fingers and was twirling it back and forth as she pondered the situation. As he looked closely, Jareth could see that it was an owl feather, white, with edges doused in silver.
"Hedgewort!" Jareth called, pacing the floor in front of his throne. A dwarf entered the room, trembling slightly at the tone in the monarch's voice.
"It's…Hoggle….and what can I do, your highness?"
"Hoggle, I have important matters to attend to in the Aboveground. As usual, I will be relinquishing the caretaking of my kingdom to you in my absence. I may be gone longer than usual this time; I will be paying a little visit to a certain human friend of yours." Hoggle's eyes lit up with excitement.
"Sarah?" Jareth smirked at the dwarf's reaction.
"Do you have OTHER human friends that I don't know about, Higgle?"
"Of course not, your majesty. I only meant—"
"As I said, I may be gone longer than usual. Can you handle my duties while I'm gone?" Jareth was impatient to see the object of his affection. Honestly, sometimes he didn't know what Sarah saw in the cowardly dwarf.
"Yes, your majesty. I will take care of everything while you're gone." With a bowed head, Hoggle disappeared into the recesses of the castle to make sure things were in order.
Jareth closed his eyes briefly, before striding out to a balcony on the second floor of his castle. Leaping into the air, he transformed from the imposing goblin ruler into a shimmering white owl. Circling a turret of his castle once, he flew off in the direction of the division between two worlds.
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OK, a quick note because I know someone's going to call me on it. Yep, I only have Jareth being 25 in this story. I know that most people have him being like 500 years old or more… but I just couldn't see Sarah falling at 16 for a guy as old as David Bowie. SO my explanation is that Jareth was about 19 when he met Sarah, and of course that Jim guy took liberties with the characters' ages when he made the movie of Sarah's book. Hey, it's my fan fiction; I get to come up with whatever explanations I want, no matter how silly. ;-) Anyways, hope you enjoyed chapter 2, more to come soon when I get my creative shoes on again.
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