Author's Note: I do not know what the hell Toby's dad's name is. I've tried researching but they never have them written anywhere. In the end I resorted to studying fanfictions. I know someone has mentioned Richard but there were more Harolds. So I picked that one.

"Sleep, child. I'll speak to them."

"Dad'll kill me, Jareth... he'll really kill me!" Toby looked like someone was already approaching him with a knife, wringing his hands and sitting so stiffly in bed that even one loud noise would probably have given him a heart-attack.

Jareth smoothed the golden hair off his face and shook his head, smiling slightly at the sight. "No one will kill you. Your father may not like it, but he cannot stop you."

"I don't want him to know!"

"Toby, how do you plan to spend the rest of your life as my spouse and not let your father know? Be reasonable! They'd notice you were gone."

"I could tell them you were taking me for a holiday and just not come back?"

Jareth sighed. He didn't want to start pulling his weight about something so ridiculous, but if Toby was going to act as an irrational child, then there was only one thing he could do. He stood, regally and coldly, eyes daring the mortal to challenge his word- "I will speak with him while you rest. Do I make myself clear?"

Toby growled and flounced back into bed. "Yeah," he muttered, "But I'm warning you- I'll get thrown out and Dad will probably take a swing at you."

"He may certainly try! He won't succeed but I suppose it's no use warning him."

The two stared speculatively at each other, not quite sure how they should part. The small room felt especially claustrophobic when it was only the two of them, seeming to force them together so hard that they almost involuntarily pulled away. Arguments between them were common in this room and the past two minutes had been no exception. Yet, weren't they now affianced? Or at least lovers in the spirit if not in the body?

Toby cleared his throat and nodded awkwardly. "So," he coughed, waving a reluctant hand, "You should probably go talk to them. I, uh, I'll see you when you're done?"

Jareth's face softened. Leaning down, he brushed a small kiss to the wide mouth, flicking the barest tip of his tongue to the crease in the centre of the lower lip before pulling away and nodding. "I will come straight to you with good news," he promised, "But you had better be asleep by then."

Toby coughed again and nodded quickly. He waited until the door was closed to sink into the pillows and press his fingers into his aching eyes. As he had suspected, the whole thing was going to descend even more into madness!

Jareth was of much the same opinion, reflectively pursing his mouth as he wandered down the stairs to find his prospective father-in-law. There was no proper way for a half-faerie Goblin King to broach peacefully the subject of marrying a mortal man's son, especially when the man was quite violently opposed to said Goblin King's very existence. "Mr. Williams," he demanded, stalking into the living room with the frown on his face that said he was uncomfortable and blamed the other male fully, "I have something to say to you. In private, please."

Harold turned, jaw stiff and tight with dislike. He had not even changed from his crumpled shirt and tie yet; the briefcase and the jacket lay propped on the couch, simple reminders that he had only just returned from a busy day to his insane family.

"What's it about?" Harold asked cautiously.

The Goblin King raised an eyebrow and glanced at Karen. "The subject is a delicate one. I would prefer talking to you alone."

"Look, I've only just got back so don't spin me any tales. Just tell me," Harold growled, a finger pointing accusingly at Jareth's nose, " You have five minutes and Karen stays."

Jareth sighed, "If you wish. It is about Toby, however, and I do not want to subject her to your expected outrage."

Karen looked surprised. Walking forward, she patted her husband's arm absently to soothe him, before motioning to the armchairs. "Sit down, Jareth. What's wrong with Toby now? Is he sick?"

"He's not sick. We spoke this morning about the future... about our future actually." There was no delicate way to say this. "Toby has agreed to return to the Underground with me as my mate."

Total silence. Two pairs of mortal eyes blinked and looked confused. The clock in the hallway was audible, ticking monotonously through the stifling tension that began to seep through the house. Jareth sat perfectly relaxed but watchful, eyes moving from one face to the next as Karen's jaw dropped and Harold's face began to turn purple.

Surprisingly enough, when the first word was spoken, Harold was very calm about it. "Your mate? What exactly is that supposed to mean?"

"It is no secret that your son and I have feelings for each other. I have proposed marriage to Toby."

"M-marriage?" Karen's voice was a bare squeak. "B- but he's just a child... and how is this possible?"

"The marriage- or formal binding- of two individuals is not restricted to gender in my Kingdom. Toby desires to return with me, so I propose to take him back as my Prince, my consort... my husband," Jareth could not resist adding that last term, just to see Harold's fingers tightened on his wife's hand.

"And Toby says yes?"

Ah! Now there was the catch! Jareth knew what Toby wanted and what Toby's decision was, but that had been at nine in the morning when no one else was around to make him feel guilty. It was only natural that the Willams would do all in their power to make Toby stay in the Aboveground and not marry another man. And Jareth was still not certain that Toby would not crumble so easily under than pressure. "He has," he revealed reluctantly, "However, I am not sure whether he will feel the same way tomorrow."

"What if he does?"

Harold was still being far too calm. It was getting annoying. Jareth shrugged. "I will make the preparations for the ceremony."

The mortal took his time digesting that fact. That Toby had 'feelings' for this man was obvious; he had known that with Toby's first mention of the Goblin King's name. Harold was not quite sure that he wanted to know about this. He would not mind it happening if he could simply excuse his part in the whole business as being completely ignorant of it. After all, if he didn't see anything, he could pretend it didn't exist. But he was being asked- if he was reading this right- for his acceptance. And he had no idea what to say to that.

"Jareth, Toby's a boy and he's too young to be getting married! How could you even suggest such a thing to him? For God's sake he tried to commit suicide over you and now your just making things worse," Karen yelled, on her feet and clearly upset.

Harold grasped her hand and pulled her roughly back down to him, throwing an arm around her shoulder for support. "Excuse my wife," he muttered stiffly to the annoyed half-goblin, "It's been a big strain on her."

Mismatched eyes softened somewhat, flicking to the stairs for a minute just to ensure that Toby hadn't heard it and come running down the stairs. "I can understand that," he replied, "But believe me when I say that I only have Toby's best interests at heart. I..." he hesitated for a second and then plunged on, "I love my elf. I would do nothing to hurt him. He would visit you and I can ensure that you may contact him as often as you liked."

"What more do you want from him," Karen sighed tiredly, "He stuck a knife in himself because you tried this before! What stops you from sending him back to the same thing when you're bored with him? No. I won't allow this. There's no use asking because I can't agree. I won't. Not ever."

"Karen, listen to reason,"

"What kind of mother would I be if I let him make such a mess of his life?"

"He has already agreed."

"No, Jareth, and that's final. Toby is not thinking clearly at the moment and I won't let him do such a thing."

Jareth snapped, "By all the Gods of nature, this is the only thing that will protect him!"

"Protect him? From what?" Harold's ears pricked up and he leaned forward, staring intently into the anger-darkened dual-coloured eyes that spat at him. He had known it! Something was bothering Toby and this Goblin King knew something.

No, Jareth decided, losing his temper had not been the most painless way to do this. But if it would persuade them then his hands were tied. "Toby had an unfortunate experience when he was with me in the Underground," he began, "Wait! I will tell you about it but do not interrupt until I have finished. Your son was raped. I do not know by whom, but he somehow managed to mentally link himself to Toby and has continued to torment him at frequent intervals. Toby was confused, dealing with something like that and his feelings for me, and so I sent him back here in the hope that he would find some peace."

"Sure didn't work," Harold commented, a white line around his mouth from folding his lips tight over the curses he wished to pour on the half-goblin's head.

Moon-blond hair wisped around Jareth's face, the sharp features reflecting much of the anger that the mortal felt. "It did not," he agreed, "I contacted Toby through his dreams and we shared what consolation we could through that medium. Again, it did not work. Toby turned suicidal, yes, but he would never have willingly killed himself. Except that he was attacked in the park that night and raped again. Badly."

Karen emitted a strangled gasp at the thought.

"He will not tell me what happened, and I would beg that you do not ask him just yet. It's still too fresh for him. He has, however, told me that he tried to kill himself after that. It was the rape that finally pushed him over the edge."

"Really. And how exactly will you make this better?" Now the fury was beginning to seep into Harold's voice. Jareth straightened in his seat. "How exactly do you plan to help him when it's your fault he's in this mess? You and your bonds and your freaks of nature! He was sixteen, damn it! And you let something like this happen?"

The Goblin King winced. It was horribly, terribly true and he was forced to defend himself out loud. "You forget- I didn't let any of this happen. I did not rape Toby, nor did I invite someone else to rape him. It was an unfortunate turn of events but there are those who would do such things even in the Aboveground. The only reason I speak of all this is because his marriage to me will save him from that ever happening ever again."

"How?"

Jareth's fingers smoothed the worn material of the armchair, skimming casually over the rough material. "The bond is a tricky thing. With it, Toby and I should have had an emotional awareness of each other, an understanding that is closer than any other relationship. But we do not; for one because he is a mortal, and another because he was just an infant when it was forged. But with the combination of the bond and of a formal binding, the connection between us will grow to a full ability to feel each other. We would know each other's emotions and opinions. There have been such cases with a bond and marriage combination where the couple have been able to mind-speak with each other. With that, I can be forever able to protect him at the first sign of trouble. Or at the least, Toby will share my power and can protect himself. I would not take him back down there if this were not true. And I only take him back if I can marry him."

Mother and Father sat in silence, glancing to each other to better decide. Jareth was not actually asking their permission, but they knew just as well as Jareth how they could influence their son's feelings on this matter. And it would be so much simpler to persuade him not to go.

"He loves you," Karen commented, turning things over in his mind, "I think that's fairly obvious. He wants to be with you. But I don't like it."

"What don't you like, Karen?" Jareth invited. "Tell me. If you can come up with one good reason why this shouldn't take place, I'll be the first to tell Toby that I won't marry him."

"I don't know. But Toby's never been… I mean he's never seemed interested in men. Why now? How is it possible?"

Jareth sighed and tilted his head. "Have you considered that he isn't gay?" From the look on Karen's face, she hadn't. "I'm sure you'll find that he's just as interested in girls as before. If he ever was."

"He had a girlfriend," Karen said tartly.

"I'm sure he did. But consider that he has also been bonded to another person since he was a year old. From the little I understand about bonds," Jareth couldn't help being ironic, "From the little I understand, that would have compromised his abilities to relate to anyone else to a marked degree. Add to that that the bond was so unguided that it included all aspects of relations… no, I calculate that he would have liked the girl well enough, but never very much. He wouldn't have been capable of it."

Harold huffed and dismissed it immediately as being some more of that magical theory he couldn't bring himself to believe in. That a Goblin King could exist was fine. That a bond might be real was stretching it. That this bond could be responsible for his son's reticence in meeting other people was beyond what he could listen to. Karen, however, seemed to experience no difficulty in accepting this. Perhaps because she had been the one to scold him and cajole him into bringing friends home, or been the one to see that the relationship hadn't worked with that nice Elaine Harris because of Toby's complete lack of interest.

"Okay," she said reluctantly, "But he's a mortal. You can't take him away from a world he knows to some wild land like the Underground."

Like Karen, Jareth admitted the truth- the Underground was certainly a wild land. Still very feudal. Still very passionate. "His life will be linked with mine when he marries me," Jareth argued, "How long exactly he will live is beyond me to predict but it will be long enough that he won't be mortal. In any case, he will never age. Or he will, but the Faerie Effect in me is strong enough that he should reach his peak age and then refrain from growing older in any way except the mind. And you have to take into account that the bond having been in place since his infancy would have actually made him predisposed to a magical environment rather than a non-magical environment."

Karen blinked. "Are you saying he'll be more comfortable in your world than his own?" she demanded.

"Yes."

Karen and Harold shared a mutually resigned look. Harold still looked sulky, but even more than his wife he could already see how things would pan out. Jareth was one of those people who could justify anything he took it into his head to do. And he meant to take Toby away. Harold actually preferred it if Toby was to be taken away in something- God help them all!- something approaching an honourable position.

"Would you treat him well?" Karen asked.

"He would be a Prince in my Kingdom. As my husband he would rule at my side."

Harold grimaced at that term. "Husband," he echoed, "More like someone's wife! Geez... I can't believe this is happening." He ran his free hand through his hair. "You'll protect him?"

"I will. He will be well looked after."

Karen was intending to say yes, she really was. But the entire concept filled her with dread. What could such a life hold for Toby? What kind of life would it be? How could she explain this to anyone else? "I don't know, Jareth. It- it seems so wrong somehow."

Jareth had had quite enough by now. They were dithering, unable to make up their minds on whether or not their son's happiness and safety was more important that the perceived shame of his sexual preference! He rose lightly to his feet, lips tightened and muscles bunched with restrained emotion. "Perhaps you would do well to consider the wrong-doing in light of prejudice," he spat, "Toby is mine! Whether you'd like to know that or not! And if you cannot act to save him from the hell he has fallen into, then I do it without your help."

He left then, taking the stairs in his inherent bad temper, more regal than any figurehead mortal monarchy in his absolute power. That he was annoyed was not something either of them took lightly; he had a bad habit of being brutally honest when he was in that mood.

Harold sighed and patted Karen's hand. "What did you tell me to do about Toby's new boyfriend, sweetheart?"

Karen's blue eyes looked resigned as well. "I told you to accept him."

"Exactly." Harold got to his feet and stretched. "Think you can accept your son's new husband as well?"