Chapter Two: The Player is chosen, and the Game begins

Gareth smiled in delight upon seeing the horrified looks in the mortal's faces. They were positively terrified of him, and he in the knowledge delighted on the fear he caused on their minds, a power much greater than any common Fae trick.

"Who are you?" an annoying female voice asked suddenly and the King directed his mismatched, heated gaze towards a black-haired, exceedingly tanned girl who was holding a blue book… his book, he realized "Why are you here?"

Funny thing that you ask. You are the one that summoned me" he replied with a cool, hard voice, pointing at the book with his cane, which was completely black and was finished off by a crystal, perfectly rounded and of a translucent shade of gray, resting on one of its ends.

"No way! Not in a million years!" the girl mumbled, dropping the book as if it had burnt her. But the Dragon King simply threw his head back and laughed long, hard and icily before shaking his head.

"To late to fear the book" he said simply, smiling in a way that gave Constance a perfectly terrifying view of his vampire-like fangs, a view which sent shivers running down everyone's spine.

"What do you want of us? And who are you, anyway?" Professor Aberline dared to ask, trying to appear brave for the sake of his students, who wear in great need of a hero at that moment.

"Nothing important, really… only a piece of your soul, of your being" Gareth whispered boldly, wearing his cynic smile all the way "And as for who I am, that easy. I'm a Fae, a magical creature"

For some reason no one dared to laugh at that statement, but rather shiver. Constance, suddenly, burst out laughing, holding her sides.

"This is some kind of bad joke, right?" she said aloud, looking straight into the unblinking eyes of the Monarch "Some kind of stupid prank. And I bet that little freak Augustine put you up to this"

"Don't defy me, stupid mortal" Gareth warned, narrowing his eyes and clenching his cane with one hand, his hair flowing in the air as a gust of wind that had suddenly formed itself circled his lithe form. That was a omen, a sign for her to stop, which she didn't.

"Justin, will you let that man insult me?!" she yelled towards a tall, lanky boy with dirty-blonde hair, green eyes and baggy clothes. He looked like a cross between Brad Pitt and N'Sync. Feeling self-assured with all his muscles product of his Rugby training and all the school fights he had picked up along the years the sophomore advanced towards the King with confident steps, meaning to punch the living Hell out of the spiky silver-haired Fae who sat on the professor's desk, trying to decide whether he should be amused or angry. He settled for both.

"So you don't believe me? So you choose to defy me?" he asked quietly, holding out a hand. In its palm appeared a rounded, diaphanous object of a transparent shade of silvery-grey. His ever-present cynical smile grew wider as he tossed the crystal to Constance's boyfriend, sending him flying seven feet above the ground. He landed on the cold, hard floor with a loud thud, rubbing his sore back and looking at Gareth with a shocked expression, his entire body shaking like a leaf.

"Have I proved the veracity of what I am?" the Sovereign asked in a low voice, his hard eyes staring at Professor Aberline, who nodded.

"Don't hurt them, please" he said, positioning himself between the magical being and the kids "I beg you"

"Too late to ask for anything, I'm afraid. Specially mercy. But I'm surprised for you petition. No one has ever demanded kindness from the Damned" he paused to look at the boys and girls behind the middle-aged Professor and then shook his head "But what's said is said"

"Is there any way out of this?" the professor asked, his voice eerily calm and collected. He had accepted everything fairly well, focusing on solving the problem rather than on explaining it, which seemed impossible to do.

Gareth smiled, a chillingly pleased smile, enjoying the moment. So the mortal man wanted to know how to recover his freedom and get out of the foolish wish with his entire soul. Interesting. Always interesting.

"I don't think you really want to know, mortal, but I'll tell you anyway, for it's my duty" he drawled, twirling a crystal within his leather-clad fingers "You have to choose a champion, the cleverest, the most witty of your petty little group and the chosen will have to run my Labyrinth and solve it within thirteen hours"

Everyone remained silent, each one of them trying to digest the new information. Somebody asked rather bluntly what would happen to the rest while the 'chosen' traveled the Labyrinth.

"They'll be trapped in a cage in the castle beyond Lumiara, the Dragon's City" came the cold response from the stone-hearted King, who tapped the floor with one of his feet, apparently waiting for them to choose a 'champion'.

They all started to argue about who would be the best choice, many people thinking it would be wiser to send Professor Aberline, and some people against that theory. Gareth goggled, sighing loudly and stopped the discussion by simply rising a hand.

"The wisher is the one entitled to choose" he said simply. Everyone turned to look at Constance, who suddenly enjoyed being in power (man, how thick can anyone get…?)

"Eugene is the best student" she said finally, after giving the matter some thought "Well, except from the weirdo, of course. I think she'll have no problem solving the Labyrinth"

The idea actually made sense. Mary Eugene Blooming, a sixteen-year-old sophomore with long dirty-blonde hair and brown eyes, was one of the best students of the class and, once, she had been the very best. She wasn't a nerd by any means… She belonged to the cool crowd, to Constance's world. She was a fairly respectful student, skeptic to the core and terribly bounded to reality, liking the exactitude of Math and Physics over the open-mindedness of History or Literature. She studied hard, memorized, analyzed but didn't imagine… didn't dream. It had been alright before, because no one could surpass her notes even with her narrow-mindedness until one day… Augustine had changed to the school, and the tables turned.

The little girl, with her silent air, quiet demeanor and piercing gaze had stolen her position and forced her to be second best. She hadn't been happy about it, be sure, but she had masked that anger, and no one had ever knew. And, later on, Eugene had chided herself, wondering why she had been jealous of a girl who had no life… No friends, no boyfriend… nothing? Augustine was just a poor little thing whose only purpose in life was to study and dream, nothing more and nothing else. And she passed from envying her to pitting her in a rather wicked way.

"I'll do it" Eugene said, with more bravado that she really felt, eyeing the Dragon King, and noticing (as we all have noticed with Jareth) how handsome he was. Not that it was a good moment to notice, but….

Gareth snorted gracefully, contemplating the mortal before him with a mixture of disgust and disdain. He could see just how rational she was, how by-the-book her knowledge was… and that appalled him, a lover of originality, creativity and belief.

"You are challenging my Labyrinth with THAT?" he spat, as if he felt insulted by the mere thought of Eugene traversing his precious creation "She'll never make it" he added as an afterthought.

"Why do you think so? Miss Blooming is a very capable and smart young lady" Hugh Aberline enquired, unconsciously arching an eyebrow in a very defiant way.

Gareth circled the blonde-haired girl, eyeing her critically, and shaking his head, tsking.

"She has a very strong hold in reality. That simply won't do in my Labyrinth when reality is something non-existent. She is way too 'by-the-book', has no imagination whatsoever and little belief or knowledge of the unknown…. Of fantasy, of my world. She'll loose without a doubt"

Everyone fell silent for a minute and then, though a little bit reluctant, Constance said:

"Well, the freak does live in wonderland all the time and, besides, I wouldn't want to risk one of my friend by making her run a Labyrinth"

"Who will challenge my Labyrinth, then?" the Damned asked, his patience growing thin.

"She is not here, but she'll come. Her name is Augustine…" she stuttered, almost tripping and falling to the floor because of her uncontrollable shivers.

He laughed then, a true cruel, cynical laugh that echoed in the classroom, making everyone shiver in apprehension. He made a swift movement with his wrist and another of his all-too-familiar and all-too-feared transparent grey crystals appeared on his left hand. He twirled it on his hands teasingly, preparing to throw it at the window and make his Labyrinth appear out of the Blue (a typical Fae gesture, I'm sure) when something interrupted him.

At that very moment the door quietly opened and Augustine came shyly inside the classroom, her eyes downcast. Gareth promptly hid within the shadows, making a gesture for everybody to be quiet and not tell the newcomer of his presence. Too stunned to speak, and too afraid to contradict him, everyone remained silent.

"I'm sorry professor, but I couldn't bring you the water. There was…" Augustine paused to think about what had exactly happened moments ago with the glass shattering suddenly "… an accident" she finished, not finding a better way to explain the incident in the corridors. She advanced a few steps, smiling apologetically, not knowing that there was a pair of all-too-familiar steel grey and ruby red eyes boring into her very soul.

He stared openly at the human girl that had entered moment ago, his head titled to a side and his platinum mane of hair brushing one of his shoulders gently. The dark, reddish tresses and the icy-blue eyes struck a chord in his memory, as well as her petit form. She had entered in the middle of his act and he should be mad at her for doing so but… She was simply too fragile, too damn feminine and vulnerable-looking for him to be angry with. However, he had the nagging feeling that there was more than met the eye with the girl standing in front of him, so near that if he reached with one of his hands he could easily capture one of those tempting mahogany bangs that framed her face.

"It's okay, Augustine" Professor Aberline replied, trying to find a way to make the girl get out of the classroom… Some excuse, something to ask her to go and fetch… Something, anything!

"What's going on, professor? You look worried and I'm starting to have a bad feeling about something" Augustine said aloud, frowning. Her heart started beating incredibly fast, and breathing had suddenly become a difficult thing to do. Her left hand was suddenly aching painfully and she could hear droplets of blood falling from the soaked handkerchief to the floor in a rhythmic pace.

Drip, drip, drip, drip…

And then, when she saw the book lying open in the floor, and the stunned face of Constance, who was standing next to it, she felt the world spinning around her, and everything becoming dizzy and nebulous. The voices inside her mind where whispering now, voicing worried remarks and cursing the stupid mortal that stood next to the cursed book.

"That damned book!" she said aloud eying the copy of 'Labyrinth of the Mind' with a hateful look "Tell me you didn't read the book!" she pleaded then, moving her gaze from the floor to the chocolate-brown eyes of her classmate. And what she found in their depths didn't please her at all.

"You fool! For ten years that book has hunted my dreams and plagued my days, and yet I never gave into the temptation, no matter how strong was the urge, how achingly painful was the need. And yet you… you…" she paused for a moment and then a terrorizing thought entered her mind "Did you say the words?" she breathed out, limbs trembling and eyes wide with apprehension, fear and… excitement? Desire? Yearning?

She stopped when she sensed someone just behind her. The aura of power that emanated from this being was unmistakably not human. And, suddenly, she had the answer to her own question.

"You are him, aren't you?" she whispered without even turning to meet the mismatched gaze of the Fae King "You are the Dragon King" she finished her voice almost faltering.

A strong gloved hand gripped one of her shoulders rather painfully, forcing her to twirl around and face him. Her nose brushed the silk of his shirt and she lifted her gaze to stare into his mismatched eyes and thousands of memories of events of the past and events that had yet to happen flooded into their minds. The first encounter, in the Antique shop, her little runaway act, their staring contest, her form running down the street, soaking wet… Crystal wings, an ice-blue gown… A secret, a dance, a song… heartache, pain, sorrow… Love?

"Angus's little girl" he sneered, his eyes never leaving hers and his words the only proof that he had recognized her. Without breaking eye-contact the girl lifted a hand and gently stroke his neck, where a black mark in the shape of an ancient Fae character was tattooed.

"The Damned…" she said aloud, reading the inscription in foreign language. She had seen that mark in her dreams so many times that she knew it by heart. She quickly freed herself from his iron grip in her arm and took two steps back, needing the personal space like she had never needed it before.

"Who did she wish away?" she asked breathlessly, while she backed up even more, her hips colliding with a desk and almost making her fall while his tall form hovered over her, making her grab the sides of the desk and try to bend over to avoid touching him.

"Everyone" he smirked down at her "She wished everyone away… Except you" he crooned in response.

She gulped, taking then a deep breath and asked later, trying not to sound frightened, in spite of the fact that it was obvious that she was scared to death:

"Who will run your Labyrinth?"

The almost inaudible 'drip, drip' of the blood drops continued, going unnoticed by everyone except Augustine, who was starting to feel really stressed out. Blame it all on the blood loss or on the fact that she was having a little chit-chat with a book character, you choose.

He smiled upon hearing her soft-spoken question and brought his face closer to her, till his mouth was inches apart from her left ear. She could practically sense his leer as he whispered softly the answer, his breath warm against her sensitive skin:

"You"

It was more than she could take in at that time. She felt light-headed, almost unreal, and the world around her twirled, and the voices in her head grew louder and louder

'It was your destiny after all, mistress. No matter how hard we tried to protect you, fate wanted you on the Underground' one whispered.

'But if she goes there what lies within her, what we tried hard to protect and preserve will wake!' another voice interjected.

'It's destiny… We can't fight it' a third voice spoke softly, ending the argument.

And it suddenly was too much for the girl. She took some steps back, freeing herself from the prison the King had created with his arms, his body and the desk, closed her eyes and simply fainted.

"Augustine!" huge Aberline shouted, worried. He ran to her, but Gareth was faster and caught the girl with easiness and gracefulness that only a true Fae could display. He lay her down on the professor's desk, which was the largest one, and then noticed the handkerchief.

"My, my, what do we have here?" he taunted softly, removing the soaking piece of cloth from her hand. Instantly he saw the peeled knuckles, the blood dripping from them and, when he inspected closely he noticed another cuts, bruises and scratches all over her body.

"You'll tell me what happened…" he whispered, kissing each one of her knuckles and making the scratches disappear "Not now, but later" he smiled down at her, not a nice, tender smile but a cynical one "Now" he added, making a movement with his wrist and trapping everyone except for himself and the girl lying on the desk in a huge crystal sphere "It's time to play"

He scooped her up in his arms and they both disappeared from the now dessert classroom to appear in the top of a hill. His Labyrinth could be seen from there, twisting and turning like a Devil's snake, and also the city beyond it and the Castle farther away, rising imposing against the midnight-blue night sky. Some nature dragons, their bright, glowing eyes shinning with curiosity, approached the pair, trying to take a peek at the red-haired girl their Monarch was holding coldly yet… tenderly? Cautiously? In his arms.

"Who is she?" one of them, whose eyes were yellow and who had a red birthmark in his back asked to his friend, who was of a darker shade of green.

"I have no idea, Thyme. Why would I know?" answered the mentioned dragon, named Ivy. Their monarch eyed them with a scowl in his face and ushered them away, waving his hands. Then he took one last look at the woman-child he had placed gently on the blue-green grass and sighed.

"Let the games begin" he whispered softly, disappearing with a flash of light and leaving a faint cloud of glitter hanging in the air as the only proof he had been there at all. And, near Augustine, a silvery-white clock started counting the thirteen hours of her journey, while she slept peacefully, unaware that the time was slipping slowly from her hands.




Author's Note: Hi, it's me again (sorry for the ones who were waiting for the Easter Bunny…). Anyway, this is their second encounter! And, just as the first one… it didn't go well! But there is certain chemistry between them that is undeniable! Of course, I can't have those two realizing this yet, can I? What do you think of the story so far? Do you want to hug me, hate me, throw tomatoes at me, tip me head first into some bog (that would ruin what's left of my social life- which ain't much- so please think twice before doing that)?

Well, read and review people, please! I want to know if the story, in spite of the fact that ins0t centered in Sarah and Jareth it's a good story and if people are reading. Anyway, the people that will be in the Labyrinth waiting to help or mislead will be totally unexpected and sometimes you'll wonder in what mental hospital I am, but it will be fun, I'll promise.

Well, gotta go. You know the deal: read, review, I post and everyone happy! Hugs and peaches from your favorite author (it's wishful thinking, I know, but follow my lead here)

Sabi (and my muse, whom I'll accuse of being a slave-driver if she keeps treating me like this!)