Disclaimer: The only thing I own in this story is Damien. Yeah. I made him pretty hot. If I have to claim him, I might as well make him a cutie, right?
Author's Note: I've received a number of comments about the unhealthy relationship between Jareth and Sarah in this story. To ease worried minds, I would like to state once and for all that I am a huge fan of healthy relationships – and happy endings. However, it is also important to me to stay true to characterization. It has always been my belief that had Jareth and Sarah actually become a couple that they would have had a severely difficult time adjusting. If a person looks at the characterization in the film, Sarah is portrayed as someone with a strong will who doesn't like to be told what to do. Jareth is portrayed as a dominant and possessive person – "Fear me, love me, do as I say and I will be your slave" and "Let me rule you and you can have anything you want".
I've made every effort to stay true to what I think these two people might actually have done had they been thrust together and no, it isn't pretty. That brings me to the title of my fic – "An Equal Partner". I've also chosen to stay true to my title to the letter in constructing the overall arc of my plot. Please bear with me, and sincere thanks to all who have reviewed and given me helpful criticism! Your comments are making my story better and I do appreciate them!
Solea
Credit Due: Scattered Logic is da bomb.
Chapter 23Damien was getting worried. He and Toby had been waiting for Sarah for nearly twenty minutes and she had yet to appear. He paced the room, attempting to look nonchalant as Toby shuffled and reshuffled the cards.
"Does your sister always take this long to change clothes?"
"Naw. She's never really been into that stuff," Toby replied, absently arranging the deck in different patterns.
Damien was aching to tear out of the room and go looking for Sarah. If anything awful happened to her, it would be his entire fault. He had been counting on being in the room whenever Jareth would finally manage to shake off his binding spell. He didn't think his brother would ever dream of hurting Sarah, but Jareth's wrath was a formidable thing and he hated to think that he had left her to face him alone.
"Toby, I'm just going to go knock on her door and make sure she's all right. Wait here and I'll be back in a minute."
Damien walked casually out the door, but as soon he knew he would be out of Toby's sight, he flew down the hall as fast as his legs would carry him, wishing he could use his magic to travel faster. The king had understandably placed a block on any teleportation spells except his own as far as the royal private chambers were concerned. Any desiring to see him in the royal bedroom or private study would have to walk there on foot, knock and request an audience.
After a few twists and turns, Damien came to the entrance of the master suite. He listened at the doors for a moment, hoping to hear some movement inside. When no sound greeted his ears, he knocked and called Sarah's name softly. No answer. He knew he would be opening a kettle of fish with dire consequences by letting himself into the private royal chambers without permission, but decided the safety of his sister-in-law was well worth it.
Cautiously, he cracked the door open. A few lamps were burning here and there about the room, but he saw no evidence of either Jareth or Sarah. The dress Sarah had been wearing at supper was folded over the side of a dressing screen in the corner, but no other sign of her having been there was evident. The room was neat and clean without any sign of struggle or disturbance. Still Damien could sense that something was wrong. Something was out of place. What was it?
Scanning the room one more time, he saw a small object lying next to the corner of the dressing screen. He felt his heart constrict in his chest as he picked it up.
The collar. The collar he had conjured onto Jareth at dinner.
There was no way the king could have released himself from that collar unless he had come out of the binding spell Damien had placed on him earlier. And if he had finally shrugged off the binding spell that meant that Sarah had been alone…
In a flash, he felt through the area with his magic, trying to gauge where Jareth and Sarah might be. He felt a lingering pull out in the hallway and followed it until he came to the spot where the two of them must have transported. He could tell that wherever they had gone the spell had been Jareth's. Cursing to himself for his idiocy in leaving Sarah, he broadened the scope of his search. He could feel Jareth's presence somewhere far away, and, he guessed, still inside the palace grounds if he could sense his brother's presence at all.
Damien growled in frustration when he tried to locate where Jareth had gone and couldn't. His brother must have put up a tracing block. Even though Damien could feel Jareth's magic, he couldn't pinpoint where it was coming from. Even more distressing, he couldn't feel Sarah at all.
"Sarah, hang on. I'm coming," he muttered under his breath as he racked his brains for where Jareth might have taken her. The dungeons? It was a thought. Jareth's power was so strong as ruler of the Underground that he hadn't kept a prisoner for years. There had been no need. If nothing else, the dungeons would be deserted and no one was likely to be in earshot of whatever was happening down there.
Damien didn't hesitate and in a shimmer of light, he was gone.
Sarah whirled away from her husband and was promptly sick.
She had always had a strong stomach, but the sight that greeted her in the gloom was too much even for her.
She and Jareth were standing in the middle of what she supposed must be the bowels of the castle, judging from the lack of light and the dank, earthy smell. The floor beneath her was rough-hewn rock and slimed over with some kind of putrid sludge.
But it was the walls surrounding her that made her feel dizzyingly faint when she looked at them. Instead of earth or stone, each wall seemed to be composed of the stacked, rotting flesh of every kind of horrific monster she had ever imagined. She could make out a horn here, some claws or what had once been a set of fangs there. Every creature molded into the wall had been hideously mangled, with body parts dangling or cocked at crazy angles. Some looked charred, as if they had been smoked with powerful magic while others appeared to have been hacked into pieces.
The worst thing about the macabre spectacle wasn't the ruined bodies themselves, but the mortar between them. Where blood and fluids left off, a gray, gelatinous substance began. It appeared to be created from pure shadow and Sarah noticed the fragile illumination from Jareth's light spell was sucked into nothingness whenever it came into contact with the gray ooze. Whatever the substance was, it wove through the corpses and where it surfaced, splayed over faces and body parts like a moth-eaten veil.
Jareth saw Sarah's reaction and almost regretted his choice. He hadn't originally planned to bring Sarah here at all. In fact, he had had a lovely candlelight dessert set up in the family portrait gallery, hoping to do something romantic to woo his wife while letting her know a bit more about the history of the labyrinth.
Being turned into a dog and chained to a table had simply been too much.
While Sarah had been changing clothes, Jareth had finally managed to shake Damien's binding spell and fully comprehend the evening of humiliation that had been heaped on him. His rage had been a white, cold thing with dangerous implications. That his brother would make such a foolish mistake was one thing. That his own queen had cheerfully abetted the treatment he had been subjected to – in the dining hall in full view of any servants and staff, no less – was unforgivable. Even though his anger made him shiver hot and cold with the force of it, he knew he could never physically harm Sarah. However, he was not above frightening her within an inch of her life.
With an icy smile, Jareth decided just the lesson his lovely Sarah needed. It was high time she learned what it meant to be ruler of the Underground. He had endured living hell to bring peace to his kingdom and had been forced to deal ruthlessly with the forces that posed a threat to the sanctity of the labyrinth. His own parents had fallen to the most terrifying predator the kingdom had ever known – an eerie creature that appeared to be pure shadow, but that would eat away at anything it came into contact with until the creature or object was no more than a fragile, crystalline husk. It wasn't until Jareth had joined his magic to Damien's that they had managed to stop it – or in this case, freeze it in its tracks. What was left of it coated the bodies of the evil creatures that Jareth had defeated in the battle to secure the safety of his realm. All remained frozen in time as a gruesome testament to the war that had seared the land almost beyond repair. Sections of the labyrinth had still been in ruin when Sarah had traveled through it thirteen years ago. It had only been with a massive effort of organization and magic that he and Damien had gradually restored the kingdom to its former glory.
Sarah took a moment to recover and then slowly raised her head to look her husband in the eye.
"Why have you brought me here?" she croaked. The walls of this room were the most sickening sight she had ever encountered. Was he planning to add her to the mangled beings stacked up and rotting here?
"I have been generous with you," the king rasped, eyes flashing, "-more than generous! Twice you have wished to enter my kingdom, and twice I have granted your wish. Each time you have called on me, I have turned the world upside down just so that I could live up to YOUR expectations! You wished that I take your brother and I took him. You wished for a chance to earn him back and I gave you the chance. Years later, you wished for me to come for you and once again, I answered your call. Once you were here, you asked to see your family and I took you as my wife and my queen just so that, yet again , YOUR WISH could be granted!" As he spoke, Jareth prowled around Sarah in a circle, stalking her with a hunter's grace. "And at every turn you defy me, deny me the pleasures of my own marriage bed, and seek to humiliate me in front of my court!"
Sarah tried to interrupt, but Jareth cut her off with a wave of his hand. "Not one word!" he warned. "THIS-" he said, indicating the putrid walls of flesh that surrounded them, "-is what it cost me to secure this kingdom – MY kingdom. More blood and more pain have gone into the daily survival of my realm than you can possibly imagine, and yet you dare to force me into the role of fool in my own palace!"
Jareth paused behind Sarah and slipped an arm around her waist. "I believe," he growled, his hot breath on her neck, "that you could use a lesson or two in gratitude, my dear."
Sarah snapped.
Her anger was so fierce that the force of her will outstripped her ability to think about what she was doing.
Jareth never saw her coming or he might have stood back a step or two.
Or at the very least teleported Aboveground as fast as his magic could carry him.
The next thing he knew, his arms were torn from around her and he was flung back so hard that if the walls hadn't been made of rotting flesh, his bones might have cracked. He landed against the wall with an oozing splat and shuddered as he felt the crystalline web that mortared the corpses brush up against him.
"Gratitude?" Sarah hissed. Her face flashed with an awful beauty as another bolt of magic streaked from her fingers.
Jareth managed to block part of her attack, but he was still hurting from her initial strike and grunted in pain as he was tossed back for a second time from the blow.
"Of course!" she sneered. "How could I NOT be deeply grateful to be forcibly abducted from my home?"
"YOU called to me-"
Sarah dodged to the side just in time to avoid the crystal Jareth flung at her from where he lay, panting. It hit the wall behind her, but as soon as it came into contact with the gray "mortar", it disintegrated into shadow.
"Naturally, I should be GRATEFUL to you for marrying me! Marriage to you has been SUCH a pleasure! I've never been happier than when you've dropped me into an oubliette or lashed me to our bed!" As she spoke, Sarah wove her hands in the air and Jareth was knocked to his knees as he felt invisible ropes twine tightly around his wrists and ankles, binding them together.
Jareth regarded his wife coolly as he flicked the magical restraints away with a quick counterspell. His queen had progressed further with her power than he had thought. "As I recall, after the oubliette 'incident', I gave you my solemn vow never to hurt you again. As far as that little scene in our bedroom was concerned, you didn't seem to object much as the evening wore on. Or were you moaning my name out of fury?"
Sarah flushed in humiliation and anger at the memory of that night. She hated herself for it, but she knew she had responded to him even in the midst of her rage at having been tied down.
The king sauntered closer, his voice lowering to an intimate whisper. "No love, I think you rather enjoyed our tete a tete. We'll have to explore more of this side of your nature." With that he pulled her roughly against him, searching for her lips with his own.
Sarah flung herself away so hard that she nearly landed on the floor in a heap. "Don't touch me!" she spat. "You married me to prove your 'power' over the girl who defeated your labyrinth. Fine. I can't stop you from flaunting our marriage in front of your subjects like the conquering hero, but that's ALL you get! From now on, I will sleep in my own room, in my own bed, in PEACE."
Jareth simply smiled at her and after a moment of silence said, "Try it."
Sarah snorted and turned to leave only to run into Jareth's chest. She hated it when he did that.
In a blink he had wrapped one arm around his wife and tangled the fingers of his other hand in her hair, deftly slipping it free of the pins that held it back so that it tumbled free around her shoulders. He felt her attacking magic grip him like a powerful hand, but was prepared for it this time and blocked her spell easily. Failing to free herself with magic, Sarah tried to wrench out of his arms, but they might as well have been iron bands for all the good her efforts did her.
Jareth wove his fingers gently through the silk of her hair, reaching up to caress her cheek. He paused when he felt the wetness of her tears. "Sarah, why must you always be so difficult? I'm really not that awful."
"Yes you ARE!" she cried, trying once more to escape him without success.
"I've given you everything you could possibly desire! You live a life of luxury as my queen! You see your friends from the Labyrinth as well as your family Aboveground! I have granted your every wish! What more could you possibly want from me?!" His voice had risen to a roar as he felt his tenuous hold on his temper falter.
Tears of rage spilled down Sarah's cheeks. "Every time I turn around you're tying me to something, holding me down and threatening me, or dropping me into some god-awful pit! You treat me as if…as if…I were some kind of ANIMAL or something! I only turned you into a dog so that you could see how it feels for me EVERY DAMN DAY!"
She was sobbing so hard, that she could scarcely speak, but she pressed ahead. "You claim that I should be grateful to you for granting my every desire! You've never granted my desire – only twisted my words or taken advantage of me to get whatever YOU wanted! When I think that I ever believed I could love you-"
"You …love me?" Jareth's features were frozen in shock.
In his surprise, he loosened his grip and Sarah seized the moment to whirl away from him.
"No. I don't love you. I can't love a man who treats me like some kind of thing that he owns or a pet that he can discipline. Every day of our marriage has been living hell because I never know what you're going to do to me next! I've been so afraid this whole time and I'm sick of it!" Her voice caught as she became overwhelmed by her feelings. After a moment Sarah was able to calm herself enough that she thought she could speak again.
She looked up and was startled to see Jareth looking pale and stricken.
"Sarah, you must understand that as your king-"
Her sharp bark of laughter interrupted him. "My king? MY KING? Understand ME, Jareth – NEVER are you my king. You might parade me in front of your court like some kind of stupid trophy, but I will never answer to you! I may be trapped here with you, but I belong to no one but myself!"
"I AM your king and I have not fought all this," he thundered, gesturing at the carnage stacked up around them, "to be defied by own queen in my own castle!" His tone softened, " I am sorry I have frightened you, Sarah. However, I cannot tolerate the kind of defiance you have flung at me repeatedly. I rule this kingdom and have managed to keep my realm peaceful for hundreds of years. The peace all of my minions enjoy came at a great price – as you can see." He motioned again toward the piles of rot. "I cannot allow my authority to be questioned by you or anyone else and hope to maintain the stability the Underground has enjoyed for so many years. You may be upset with me from time to time, but Sarah – you WILL love me, fear me, and do as I say. You have no choice in the matter."
Sarah stared at him for a long moment. Her eyes still shone with tears, but they had taken on a frighteningly cold quality that Jareth had never seen before.
"I will never love you, Jareth. You may frighten me. You may force me to do as you say. But my hatred for you will always be my own."
The king started toward her again. Sarah wasn't certain what he planned to do, but she wasn't about to wait and find out. With the last of her strength, she flung one more spell at him. He was unprepared and gasped in pain as the lighting from her fingers seared his chest. The lapse in his concentration wasn't much, but it was enough for her to brush past him and flee through the doorway beyond.
Jareth immediately rose and teleported out to the hallway, expecting to block her as she ran. He materialized only to find an empty corridor. She couldn't have run more than twenty feet in the time it took him to transport himself. He listened carefully for her retreating footsteps but heard nothing except the whistle of the draft that ran through the halls of his dungeons.
Frowning, he tried to trace her and was rewarded with the faint residue of magic only a few feet away. Another transportation spell…but it wasn't Sarah's. In fact, he didn't think Sarah had even covered dimensional doors in her studies, so there was no way she would know how to magically travel from place to place yet. So how…
Then he knew.
He would find that meddling whelp and teach him a sound lesson. Without ceremony, the king vanished.
If Jareth had waited only a moment longer, he might have heard the slithery bump echo through the room he had just left.
But he didn't.
Sarah fled through the doorway; her only thought to put as much distance between herself and Jareth as possible before he could recover. Her flight was abruptly halted when she slammed into something hard. She felt a pair of arms close around her and gasped, expecting to see Jareth towering over her. Instead her hunted eyes met a pair of warm brown ones, gazing down on her in concern.
Damien took only one look at Sarah's frightened, tear-stained face before he transported them instantly. When they arrived in his private study, he noticed she was shaking violently. He cast about the room until his eyes landed on a blanket thrown over the arm of a chair. Gently, he wrapped it around the trembling woman and guided her over to the sofa where he held her in his arms, loaning her the heat from his body until her shivering subsided. After a moment, he settled back and then conjured a cup of hot tea that he handed over to Sarah.
They sat in silence for a few minutes before Damien spoke. "Are you all right? He didn't hurt you, did he?"
Sarah shook her head.
"Sarah, tell me what happened."
She shook her head again.
"I know that my brother brought you here against your will. I love him dearly, but I disagree with the way he's handled this entire situation. Sarah, you may feel alone, but I want you to know that you are not without friends here. Please, let me help."
Sarah lowered her head into her hands. After a deep, shuddering sigh, she finally spoke. "Damien, I'm so frightened and so tired. At every turn, he's always forcing me to do something I don't want to do. I just…I'm starting to really hate him."
Sarah's story came out in rush. It had been so long since she'd felt she had anyone she could talk to.
Damien sat quiet, simply listening as the queen's version of events poured forth. Once in awhile, he would reach over and squeeze her hand reassuringly. He knew such behavior was unbelievably forward since the woman sitting next to him was one of the high rulers of the Underground, but he didn't think she would mind. She looked so small and lonely. His heart filled with sympathy at the terror she must have been subjected to. Apparently absolute power had made his brother a bit of an ass. Damien knew that Jareth was hopelessly in love with his queen and would never truly harm even so much as a hair on her head, but the dolt had taken a "no holds barred" approach to frightening her silly. Damien was more than a little tempted to run off and sock him in the nose, but he didn't think an action like that would contribute much to solving the situation.
When Sarah reached the part of her tale that had just occurred in the room filled with desiccated corpses, Damien snapped to attention. "Sarah, did Jareth tell you why he had brought you there?"
She looked up, startled at the intensity of Damien's tone. "Well, he said that he wanted me to see what it had taken to secure the safety of the kingdom. I think he was trying to make a point about how cruel he could be or something. Honestly, I was so angry that I wasn't really listening."
Damien's brow furrowed. "That's all he told you?"
"That's all. But why am I getting the distinct feeling there's more that I should know?"
"There is. Much more. Would you be willing to allow me to transport you to our family portrait gallery?"
Touched that someone had actually ASKED her if she would allow herself to be transported, Sarah gave him a shy smile and held out her hand. He grasped it and in a blink they were standing in a shadowy hallway. Damien conjured some light and Sarah sucked in her breath at the sight that surrounded them.
The walls were covered from floor to ceiling with enormous paintings and intricate tapestries. Sarah knew she was gawking like a six-year-old at the county fair, but she couldn't help it. Underground "paintings" were an entirely different thing than the paintings of the Aboveworld. Yes, each work was still comprised of paint and canvas – but the colors! She was glad she was still holding on to Damien's hand since the effect of all that intense color was nearly dizzying.
Damien chuckled beside her. "It's a little much if you're not used to it."
Sarah nodded. But it was more than just the colors. Each picture looked so…REAL. Not real in the manner of Aboveground photographs, but rather, the portraits surrounding them seemed to carry a piece of the essence of each person they depicted. As she looked up into the wizened features of the old man in the portrait on her left, his eyes twinkled at her mischievously. She had no idea who he was, but she liked him immediately.
"That's our great grandfather," Damien murmured from beside her. "He chose to join himself to the Underground about twenty thousand years ago. While he reigned, our realm experienced a period of exceptional peace and prosperity. He had a reputation for being a bit of joker though and sometimes one of his pranks would go wrong. He is personally responsible for the creation of the Bog of Eternal Stench."
Sarah's brows shot up.
"Yes," Damien continued. "His wife was forever complaining about how little help he was when it came to diaper-changing time for their little ones. She mocked him incessantly for thinking himself a hardened warrior when he couldn't even stand the smell of good, clean shit. He created the Bog as a surprise for her when he took her picnicking one day and then found that he couldn't get rid of it."
Sarah chucked her amusement. "And who was his wife?" she asked. This was a queen she had to see.
"Over there," Damien grinned, pointing across the hallway to the painting directly opposite that of the old king. "Her name was Emmeline."
Sarah looked over and couldn't help but smile to herself. The woman in the portrait may have had snow-white hair, but her lovely face was ageless. The eyes looking out of the picture were sharp but kind, and Sarah wished with all her heart that the woman were still alive so that she could talk to her. She got the strong sense that Emmeline would have had no trouble handling a man like Jareth. If he had been responsible for that infernal Bog, then Emmeline's husband must have been quite the handful himself. As she peered closer, Sarah could have sworn that the two portraits situated on opposite sides of the hall were looking at each other affectionately.
Damien saw her gazing back and forth and smiled. "They were very much in love," he said a little sadly. "The Underground has rarely seen such a time of joy and prosperity as when those two were ruling together."
The queen looked over at her brother-in-law in confusion. "Of course a happy marriage is a good thing, but what would their relationship have had to do with the peace of the Underground?"
"Everything. Of course this is one point where Jareth and I disagree."
"Oh?"
"Every child in the Underground must study the history of the land, just as you do in your world. However, since our realm is one where magic reigns over the physical laws of your Aboveground science, our history is expressed differently. Yes, we have books that chronicle wars and the birth of cities, but the records of the beginnings of our world are couched in myth and legend."
Sarah smiled. "It's not so different Aboveground – really." How many times had she been forced to suffer through the "Epic of Gilgamesh"?
Damien continued, "One legend in particular seems to have proven itself true throughout the ages – the legend of the 'Conqueror of the Labyrinth'. In a nutshell, the story states that the peace of the Underground is directly related to the happiness of its reigning king and queen. Magic is woven into the fibers of everything in our realm – so much so that even emotions like love and hate take on an independent sentience and significance as their own kind of 'magic'. According to the myth, when a king and queen 'Rule in Love, no Shadow may Invade the Shining Borders of Their Kingdom', but a 'Rift of the Heart Rends the Strength of the Wall'".
Damien smirked as Sarah winced at the awful poetry of the legend. At least she and Jareth had one thing in common.
"But why is the legend called 'The Conqueror of the Labyrinth'?"
"Well, that's where you come in," Damien sighed.
Crap. She knew it.
"You may have noticed that you have an impressive bit of magical power at your disposal."
Sarah looked at him askance. Did she? She had no idea how her powers might stack up against those of other magic users. She had been able to defend herself from Jareth in the dungeons, but the effort had been so taxing that she had nearly fainted into Damien's arms when he had caught her in the hallway.
"Sarah," he said patiently, "most mortals who become Fae scarcely have enough magic to warm a bowl of porridge. You have even more power than I do. The only one in this realm whose power is equal to your own is King Jareth himself."
She digested this bit of information before asking, "So if I have all this power, what does that have to do with your legend?"
"The labyrinth chose you to rule – well, specifically to 'Rule in Love' with its king."
Sarah burst out laughing in disbelief.
Damien's brow darkened at her reaction. He needed to convince her of the seriousness of the situation.
"I actually brought you here so I could show you this portrait," he said, offering her his arm and leading her further down the corridor.
They stopped in front of a picture of two people who Sarah supposed must also have once been a king and queen. Unlike Damien's great-grandparents, the people in the picture seemed visibly at odds. The man's eyes were distantly imposing and his hand rested on the shoulder of the woman with a heavy possessiveness that seemed more controlling than loving. The woman was leaning slightly away from the man with an expression of ill-concealed loathing dusting her beautiful features. Her pallor looked unhealthy and Sarah could see the traces of circles under her eyes.
"These are our parents," Damien stated.
Sarah's eyes widened.
"Their reign was brief and violent, their marriage an arranged one and unhappy. Both Jareth and I are the product of rape," Damien spat distastefully. "Our father was a cruel and brutish man, and our mother suffered the worst of it. I would have felt sorry for her if she had ever shown even so much as a scrap of care for either Jareth or myself; but she was far more likely to strike us if we came within her sight than even offer us polite disdain. I think she hated us because of the manner in which we were conceived and also because we were a part of HIM," he waved a hand at the image of his father. "He was unbelievably cruel to her, but she was a vain and selfish woman. Our kingdom was nearly destroyed under their rule."
Sarah looked back to Damien in a mixture of sympathy and curiosity.
Damien guessed her thoughts. "I suppose, in a way, Jareth and I were lucky to have absentee parents. Our nursemaid and weapons master – two of the kindest and wisest people who have ever lived, raised us. They were concerned for the future of the realm, and did everything they could to prepare Jareth and myself to rule peacefully and well."
"How was your kingdom nearly destroyed?"
"I mentioned that love and hate take on their own brand of power in this world. Just when Jareth had reached an age where he was a powerful warrior and magic-user in his own right, our borders were invaded by what appeared to be no more than a shadow. At first none of us noticed it. The days seemed a little dimmer than they had before, the walls of the labyrinth darker and more closed-in. Then we started finding the first corpses. Some looked as if they had been torn apart by beasts, others as if they had had the blood drained from them. Most frightening were the ones that appeared nearly normal, as if they were sleeping, until you touched them and they fell to dust under your hand. Both the life and the magic had been drained out of them until they were no more than crystallized shells. Our parents met their ends at the hands of such a horror, but not before our entire kingdom had been ravaged by it - by it and the creatures that practiced dark magicks."
"Dark magicks?"
"Creatures like vampires, wargs, and trolls."
Oh. That explained the pile of bodies in the basement then.
"So how did you save your kingdom? Why does Jareth have all those corpses stacked up in the dungeons?"
"Jareth and I joined our magical powers to defeat that darkness that threatened to engulf the Underground, but he and I are in disagreement as to exactly how our kingdom was saved. Jareth has never put any stock in the myth, and he believes that the force of our combined magic was the determining factor in our eventual victory. I think otherwise. He is my brother and has been my strength and solace through the most difficult of times. He's my family, Sarah, and I love him with all of my heart." Damien felt awkward talking about something so close to him to a woman he had only known a few days, but the urgency of the situation drew him onward. "I know that the love that Jareth and I bear for each other as brothers had everything to do with rescuing our land from ruin. What else could stop a creature so clearly born from hate?"
"So what does this have to do with me? If your kingdom were ever threatened again, surely you and Jareth could defeat your enemies together?"
"It's not that simple. The labyrinth chose YOU to 'Rule in Love' at Jareth's side. Your relationship with him is now the key to our safety."
"You've got to be kidding. Jareth doesn't even love me. He only married me to prove his power over the only one to have defeated his labyrinth – he told me so himself."
Damien smacked his forehead and let out a string of curses. His brother was an ASS. No, make that a STUPID ass. "And what of your feelings for him?"
Sarah blushed. She wasn't certain how much she should confide in her brother-in-law. She supposed he now counted as "family" and he seemed sympathetic to her plight, but she also knew he was completely loyal to Jareth. "Damien, I can't love a man who insists on being my master."
"He is your king."
"And I am his queen. Not a subject, not a servant, not a thing to be owned and controlled."
Damien sighed. He knew Sarah was right. "Your highness, Jareth nearly lost his life fighting the evil that threatened us so long ago. He was forced to be ruthless to preserve us all. Since then no one has ever dared challenge his authority, and truly, our kingdom has been so prosperous and peaceful that few have wanted to. I think the things that have made my brother strong as a king have made him…clumsy…as a man. He doesn't mean to be cruel, but, Sarah, he has never known another person whom he viewed as his equal in every respect. I may be his brother, but I am also his subject."
Sarah sighed and tried to steer the conversation onto another topic. "How can he lose his life? For that matter, how can any of you lose your lives. Aren't Fae immortal?"
"Nearly immortal. There comes a time for every Fae when he or she chooses to give up individual essence to become part of the greater whole. It's a little like…a bath with bubbles in it. We're all 'bubbles' made up of the same magic, but each of us is part of the greater magical 'bath', if you will. We don't exactly die, but we no longer exist as separate individuals."
"So Jareth was really only risking a change of 'being' when he fought whatever was threatening your kingdom."
"No. The shadow creature sucked the magic as well as the life from its victims. Jareth would truly have ceased to exist. There would have been no magical essence left to join with the Underground if the shadow had destroyed him."
"Oh."
"And don't try to avoid the subject – Sarah, Jareth has been breathtakingly stupid, but I do believe he cares for you, and that right deeply."
As Damien finished his declaration, the two of them felt a light breeze ruffle over them, stirring their hair and clothes.
"What on earth-" Damien mumbled, peering around the corner where the breeze was coming from.
Sarah followed and exclaimed in admiration. Framed in the doors of a tiny balcony sat a table with places for two. Candles lit the corners of the alcove and the table was beautifully spread with wine and dessert. She spied a small object resting on one of the chairs and walked over to see what it was. She picked up a red velvet box, decorated with a gold ribbon. Slipped under the ribbon was a piece of paper with her name written clearly on the top.
Sarah was surprised and held the box up so that Damien could see it. "It has my name on it," she said uncertainly.
"Then I'm certain it should be fine for you to open it."
With trembling fingers, Sarah broke the seal on the note and read it.
After a long moment, she put it down and then opened the clasp on the box. Damien's brows shot up as she lifted out a necklace so delicate the metal appeared to shimmer like liquid. Tiny crystals hung from the necklace at different points, giving it the appearance of dew hanging off of a spider web. Damien noticed that the necklace was reminiscent of the decoration on Sarah's wedding gown, only unlike the glass beads that had trimmed the gown, the crystals on the necklace seemed to flicker and dance with magic like tiny stars.
Sarah remained silent, but she clasped the necklace between hands that were shaking.
"May I?" asked Damien, indicating the note.
She nodded her permission and he read it once, then blinked and read it again.
"Dearest Sarah,
I love you.
Jareth"
Toby had grown impatient. What the heck could Sarah be doing that would take so long and where had Damien disappeared to? Sighing, he dropped the deck of cards he'd been playing with and decided to do a little exploring of his own. Uncle Jar had promised to re-order time for him so that he could be back home for school on Monday but still spend a week with his sister in the Underground. Until this minute, he had always had someone with him during his visit to show him around and guide him from place to place. The castle was its own labyrinth and he thought a solo adventure might be fun. He'd waited long enough for his sister and Damien. Besides, they could always track him down with magic, right?
The king often kept a crystal close by that showed him what Sarah was doing when he wasn't in the same room with her. When Toby had asked him about it, Jareth had said that he was responsible for Sarah's safety and comfort and that keeping a watch on her through his crystals was the easiest way to ensure her protection. Toby had accepted Jareth's explanation as a regular part of palace life, and he supposed that either Damien or Sarah was doing the same thing for him just so he wouldn't get lost.
He walked out of the door and then stopped. He could go straight, but he had already come that way when he and Damien had walked to the study. So which way? Left or right? He could see some sort of pale illumination shining far down the hallway to his left. Left then. Without further hesitation, he strode down the hallway toward the light.
Where would he have taken her? Jareth had traveled to the royal chambers, the solar, the library – even the kitchens – and had found no trace of either Damien or Sarah. On a hunch, he had even broken protocol and transported himself to Damien's private study, but while he was rewarded with the discovery of the residue of recent magic, it was obvious that Damien and Sarah hadn't stayed there long. His brother was a careful bastard. He'd also placed a tracing block on their second transportation spell.
Jareth was bordering on livid. It was true that he had asked for his brother's advice, but it was far outside of Damien's station to actively meddle in the private affairs of the king.
Muttering curses, Jareth decided to transport himself to the family portrait gallery. Sarah certainly wouldn't be gracing him with her company for dessert this night. He felt a painful weight on his chest when he thought about the surprise he had so carefully prepared for her. Although he had practically heard his fingers creaking as he had let go of his pride, he had decided to take Damien's advice and be honest with Sarah about his feelings in the hope of repairing all the damage he had done.
Thinking about their exchange in the dungeon was enough to make him want to zap some hapless goblin into oblivion. She had said she had once thought she could LOVE him. And now-
Jareth cut off his own thoughts of with a sharp sigh of exasperation. He didn't know what he was going to do now, but he might as well remove the candlelit table from the gallery before something burned down. If nothing else, Sarah would be safe with Damien and it was probably for the best if he allowed his fury just a few minutes to cool before he did any of the drastic things he felt like doing right at that moment.
In a shower of stardust, he appeared in the portrait gallery. He turned toward the alcove and instantly froze when he saw Sarah sitting at the table he had prepared earlier, head bowed into her hands. Damien was standing a little off to the side, as if he wished to keep a respectful distance from something too intimate for him to intrude on. In the back of his mind, it occurred to Jareth that it might be nice to conjure Damien straight into the Bog, but his attention was riveted on the beautiful woman in front of him, sable hair falling so that her face was hidden.
Jareth saw a glimmer of something twined between her fingers and then realized that she held the necklace he had had made especially for her. If she had found the necklace then that meant…oh gods. He desperately wanted her to know, but not now and not like this.
He breathed her name and Sarah looked up, eyes widening in surprise. She arose hastily, as if to flee and then stopped herself. With measured steps she walked slowly toward him, holding out the note.
"Is it true?" she asked, voice breaking on the last.
He looked into her eyes and found that he couldn't speak. Never had he felt so utterly naked in front of another human being.
Wordlessly, he reached out his hand to her.
Sarah remained still, staring at him as if she had never seen him before.
All of three of them heard the scream, thin and terrified, ring throughout the palace.
"Toby!" she cried, whirling away and down the hall.