Waking up was profoundly satisfying; or at least, for a certain Goblin King it was. He was lying in a very awkward position, it was true, and the arm being currently used as a pillow was numbed; but all in all it was a good morning.

And Toby was beautiful.

By the harsh light of the day, Toby seemed to look even better, curled on his side and breathing deeply, still wearing his clothes from the night before. Jareth hadn't ever lied when he'd confessed to loving his elf. Whether that love would burn as bright through the long years of their lives was yet to be seen; but Jareth by nature was single-minded about love until such time as the love changed or faded. It had always been so. He didn't intend to change now.

He smiled up at the canopied ceiling. His cousin had been most amusing the night before. And better than that, Archer had been happy for them. True, Jareth sensed something between them that might prove problematic later on, but it was not something necessarily hostile or negative. He had decided to ignore it, and keep Archer's friendship any way he could.

Sound broke into his thoughts as Toby mumbled something beside him and moved closer. It was enough for Jareth to lean down. "What was that?"

"I said," the boy spoke up sleepily, "Go back to sleep!"

Jareth sighed and closed his eyes. A four-hundred-and-fifty-one-year old immortal and he had just married a sixteen-year-old human! Was he insane?

"Yes. Now go to sleep!"

Toby waited for the jumbled thoughts of his lover to die down but they didn't. And now he was awake too. And what was more, Jareth sensed that and didn't bother controlling his own mind so that now both were feeding off each other and simply making a mess through the connection. Toby growled in warning and opened one eye balefully. "It's your fault," he said thickly.

Jareth grinned and shrugged, getting out of bed and padding noiselessly into the bathroom. Toby heard the sudden splash of water and jerked upright. A bath? Why was Jareth taking a bath in the middle of the night? Or more specifically, the morning. Though… no, Toby didn't really mind Jareth bathing. The longer the half-goblin took, the better! The morning could be awkward after all and he wasn't fully conscious yet to deal with anything that Jareth might- possibly- need from him.

Especially, he decided, if he got the whole bed to himself.

Jareth came back cleaned and tidied to find his spot on the bed now occupied by a bond mate sprawled across his space. At any other time he would have stood by and watched. Since he still felt vaguely as if he'd been crushed under a large rock, he wanted to go to sleep himself.

"Toby, push over," he commanded.

"No. Comfy here."

"Which is why I want it back."

"Nope."

"Toby!" Jareth growled loud enough that Toby opened a very blue eye and smirked up at him. "Toby, I want to go back to sleep now. Please."

The mortal gave a mock grumble and moved over, letting Jareth back in. But the next second he was back, his head cushioned on the half-goblin's chest and sighing contentedly. Jareth gave up. "I should call you a minx instead of an elf," he threatened, beginning to stroke a golden shoulder. The calming movements served to push the loose shirt completely off said shoulder, sending small trickles of sensation over his fingertips. Toby squirmed on top of him.

"You could just call me Toby, you know."

"Ah, but where would be the fun in that," Jareth mocked sweetly, "Besides, I like elves. I currently like you too. So if I call you an elf, I get two things I like at once."

"Greedy," Toby commented.

"No, manipulative," Jareth corrected.

"Is there a point to this conversation?"

They lay in silence for a while more, too unused to the situation to move much. Jareth busied himself with stroking the thin shoulder, gently massaging the lithe muscle beneath his fingertips. Now that the marriage had been completed, he seemed strangely reluctant to continue in the same intimate manner he had always used with his bond mate. Almost apathetic.

Toby knew what it was, but didn't dare say so. He felt Jareth worrying and felt his own discomfort increase. He knew what Jareth would look like naked; he knew how he would taste. They had always shared that feeling of being old lovers. But the point was that they weren't. They had never done more than kiss in reality. All their knowledge came through dreams. And Toby wanted- for Jareth's sake- to make it real, but he didn't know how.

Silently, he slid his hand out from under his head and traced a sequence of circles on hard ribs. Jareth's fingers became increasingly languid, caressing skin where he had been stroking it. Toby shivered and brought his fingers higher, writing his name on cool cotton. Those white fingers fluttered maddeningly just inside the neck of his slipped shirt, tickling his arm with hints of pressure. Toby stroked his forefinger over a nipple.

The white hand rose to tangle in thick golden hair and Jareth gently lifted his head for a kiss. It was delicate and chaste, like the brush of a butterfly's wing across the sensitive lines of Toby's mouth. It could have gone on forever or never happened at all. And that was all that Jareth asked for.

Pulling away, the Goblin King sat up and stretched leisurely. "Are you getting up?" he asked casually.

Toby looked apprehensive, as if he'd been struck.

So Jareth sat on the edge and caressed his face, gently suppressed all the warring thoughts in his head. "Tonight," he murmured, "I do not want you to feel pressured. We have a day to come to terms with all of this and we will take it. Tonight is soon enough for me."

Toby nodded and climbed off the rumpled sheets, stopping to drop a quick kiss on Jareth's cheek before pulling random clothes out of the closet and going to get ready in the bathroom. The Goblin King stared at the closed door for a long moment, contemplating following him and showing him just how much he really desired him. But no, that would only serve to scare the child. And he had been right- the coming night would come soon and Jareth could wait that long. He would be quite happy for it himself. Weddings always disturbed his peace of mind, never mind his own wedding.

By the time their stomachs drove them out of the bedchamber it was late morning or early afternoon- neither were sure which. Toby, however, was having a hard time concentrating on anything Jareth said, preferring to retreat into his thoughts as if he were trying to disappear into himself. Jareth said nothing at first, even though he felt something that seemed very close to shame and wretchedness infiltrate his bones from his bond mate's direction.

They set off down the bare halls in silence, occasionally meeting a stray goblin servant who would giggle nervously and leave with numerous bows. It made the mortal very uncomfortable to be wondered about. Particularly since he'd overheard Jareth tell Harold that the staff in the Castle might know his tormentor. It terrified him to think that the mystery man could be watching him.

He didn't notice the hard sideways glance from the corner of Jareth's eye. Or that the hand that had twitched towards him was restrained and clenched close to a tan-clothed thigh. But he did sidle closer towards the warmth of his lover, suddenly cold in the sunlight and relaxing only when the cool white fingers wrapped tight around his.

"I won't let him hurt you," the Goblin King whispered, neither turning his head nor giving the least sign of holding a serious conversation. "He can no longer enter your mind because I will know it. He will not be permitted close enough to see you, let alone touch you."

Toby nodded absently, not troubling to tell Jareth that the man had promised he could always find him. It didn't count, he knew, but the man had told him that. He shuddered to think of what would happen now. And as Archer had said, his tormentor would never stop until he was dead or worse. Which was fine because that would be all that would remain when Jareth finally tired of him as he was bound to do.

'Your Jareth wants no part of you, not after what I've done to you... poisoned being... unclean... worthless and unworthy...'

The words were screamed in his head, thrown in an inner rage to that wide-open door in his head that connected him to his bond mate, shrieking to Jareth to see what he was now bound now.

'Monster... does Jareth know that? That his tragic angel is a monster? Oh, but how you've deceived him...'

Jareth gasped and stumbled, whipping around to stare at Toby as if actually seeing him for the first time. Toby cringed away, his eyes on the floor, wishing that the half-goblin would hurry and send him away in disgrace. His heart was breaking and it hurt so much that if Jareth didn't hurry, there would be nothing of him left to send away.

Jareth's mind whirled, staggering under the weight of what Toby had been replaying in his mind for countless days, worn into a particular groove, running in a circle that spoke of long habit and acquaintance. The very hiss of the words sickened him and he couldn't understand why Toby hadn't said anything before. Thinking quickly, he apparated them both down to his garden.

Toby still wouldn't look at him, moving away when he tried to touch him, turning away when he asked him to look up.

Jareth was very fast reaching his wit's end, and his temper was remaining by a very thin thread. "Tell me you do not believe that," he finally asked.

Toby hunched even more, trying to huddle physically into that corner of his mind that he always retreated to when he remembered. The healed scar on his stomach burned like acid eating at his skin.

"Toby, say something."

The mortal shook his head, letting his fears timidly touch Jareth's mind. He couldn't speak; he really couldn't! What if the man was watching for him, waiting for him? He had married Jareth against everything and what would happen now- he would be hurt even worse even though there was no possible way to top the last time he had seen him. "You don't know," since when had his mouth been open, "You haven't felt."

"I know what it is to be hurt," Jareth retorted, "My first time was not particularly pleasant either. My..." something slammed shut in Jareth's mind, making Toby jump, "The one I was with overlooked my inexperience and ended up injuring me. I can understand a bit of your pain."

"No," Toby snapped shakily, "You've never been raped. You've experienced only a bit, a tiny bit. Yeah, he tore me open. He took me without- without even bothering whether it hurt. No, scratch that; he deliberately made sure it hurt! Do you know what that's like? I may be worthless; I may be dirt, but- but he made me that way. He- he took me and ravaged me and- and made me do things..."

Jareth caught the slender body as it feel, soothing away the hurt by pouring as much as he had inside him into Toby, letting the care and comfort wash over them both for as long as the sickness spread its poison.

"I want to tell you what happened that night," Toby said clearly.

Jareth looked doubtful. Toby had not even liked to mention that night, let alone tell him what had occurred. Anything connected to violence or knives or blood sent the mortal into a semi-trance that took forever to break through. Talking about it meant reliving it, and Jareth was not quite certain that either were ready.

"I thought I was safe..."

"Toby, you don't need to do this."

"I thought I was safe," Toby repeated with a determined glint in his blue eyes, "So I went for a walk to the park. I used to play there. I used to love the place and it- it reminded me of you. I was just sitting there, doing nothing when he came. I didn't even see him at first; I just felt something touch the back of my neck. But I was leaning against a tree and I thought- you know- ants or something. I made to stand and then next thing I know, a hand reached into my pocket, pulled out your knife and held it to my throat. I tried to fight, Jareth, I swear it. He's bigger than me and he had the knife even though he didn't use it then. I fought harder that day. That's why I was so broken up; he wouldn't stop hitting me. Again and again until I was spitting blood. But not in the face. He said I had to keep looking good for him."

The desperate voice cracked at the last word, plainly terrified as his eyes widened at the sight of something Jareth would never see except in a nightmare.

"He put the knife to my throat again. He said I had a choice- I could get my throat slit first and die with him raping me, or I could let him rape me and die after that."

"What did you tell him?" Jareth asked quietly, almost light-headed with the effort to keep the sanity within both their minds, battling the terror and depression from his bond mate at the same time.

Toby clung tight and buried his face against his hands. "I told him that if he didn't kill me I would do anything for him." Toby had never hated himself more than at this point, sitting before his bond mate and husband guilty of offering himself to another. "I- I said that I would please him, that all he had to do was ask and that he didn't need to force me. I was so frightened, Jareth. I- I just wanted him to stop. I'm sorry."

Jareth silently pulled the child closer. He'd forgotten just how very young Toby was. "You were in danger," he reasoned, "You tried to save yourself. There is nothing to forgive."

"He just laughed," Toby burst out, "Said he didn't give a toss about my consent because he wanted- he wanted to see me bleeding and begging. He called me a whore and said he would treat me like one."

Jareth flinched at the crude term spat out in such bitter hatred, but he pulled Toby even closer if that were possible. Toby didn't seem conscious of where or how he was.

"He made me strip, right there in the park. I was coughing up blood, but he didn't care. I could barely move, my ribs hurt so bad. He- he pushed me against a tree and- and used me. I was hurting so much, but then I was naked in a public park and being raped, Jareth. I was so ashamed! He was in me, infecting me, and all I could think of was that it felt like I was falling down a black hole and I wondered if someone would catch me. But no one did and I was hurting. And to tell my parents!"

"It's over," Jareth urged, "He's gone."

Toby ignored the statement. "Do you know what happened next?"

"Good God, there's more?" Jareth had known it was bad, but never this bad.

Toby looked around at the peaceful pleasantness of the garden, admiring the greenery and the dappled light filtering through between the feathery trees. It seemed so very sacrilegious to disturb it with his misery.

"He made me get on my knees with the knife at my throat and touch myself. He said if I didn't, then he would take me again. I was already bleeding. I was in pain. I tried to do what he wanted but I was so scared. I made myself think of you, think of your hands touching me. It shouldn't have worked. I didn't expect it to. And then it did. But I said your name when I- you know- and he didn't like that. He got so angry. He said things."

Jareth could hear a few of them in his head. "Is that when he made you believe I stopped wanting you? Those words were what he said to you?"

Toby nodded, his eyes squeezing shut on tears. He refused to cry any more over the bastard. He had sworn never to do so again. No matter what happened, he would not cry for him if he could help it.

"He- he said I was a worthless bitch; that I had only one use- to be someone's plaything. He said I was poison to everyone I touched. He told me he should kill me as a public service. He kept saying things, really soft. I couldn't understand it. He raped me again. He said he wouldn't but he did. I don't know what happened, but afterwards, when he was finished, he threw the knife at me and said that I was too pathetic to kill. He said I was worse than dead already. Why did he say that, Jareth? Did I do something wrong? Am I poison?"

"You're not poison; you couldn't be. I told you- clean and bright as the sunlight you descend from. He is no one to you, Toby. Never think that again. You are not poison, luv. You aren't; I swear it."

Jareth could only hold him tight and rock him, feeling the weight of the weary head nestled between his neck and shoulder, the cold shudders wracking a body that had been riddled with pain for far too long.

Archer was taking a simple stroll through the grounds of the Castle. He'd been called the Heir to the Goblin King ever since it looked as if Jareth would never produce heirs. Well, so he would not be the heir anymore, because Jareth had Toby and everyone knew they were bound to- "Gods above, what happened?"

Jareth looked up at the exclamation. Toby only had time to wipe his eyes before Archer was upon them, soft brown eyes anxious and worried as he knelt beside his cousin.

"Never tell me there was another attack?" he demanded, looking over Toby's body with a quick eye.

"No attack," Jareth reassured, "We were just talking. Archer, if you could find your way to somewhere that is not here?"

"Of course. I crave your pardon, cousin," Archer answered instantly, standing with a nod and turning to go.

"No, no, it's all right," Toby called out, looking up and struggling to his feet, "Jareth, I'm going to go find Sarah or my parents. I think a talk with them will do me good. You and Archer can probably do with a conversation yourselves. I'll- I'll see you later?"

"We weren't done."

Toby shook his head and deliberately wouldn't look at Archer.

Jareth relented somewhat. "I still don't like letting you walk anywhere alone," Jareth frowned, "Especially in the condition you are in."

"Jareth, I keep telling you- don't call it a condition! You make it sound like I'm pregnant or suffering from double pneumonia," Toby shouted, stamping his foot. The quick sting of hurt distinctively seeped through their new link, forcing the traumatized mortal to slump and grip his skull in his hands for a moment. "I'm sorry," he sighed thickly, "I'm just really mad, I think. You talk to Archer. If I need you, I'll call, okay?"

Jareth nodded. But once Toby's back was turned, he sent a crystal rolling after him. Archer raised an enquiring eyebrow. "Tracking devise," the half-goblin explained succinctly.

The Goblin King got to his feet and magicked the grass stains off his grey leggings. His boots getting muddy were one thing, but actual clothing? Never!

"May I lend an ear to aid your thoughts?" Archer asked, folding his arms and staring intently at his cousin's face, "You look as if you would like to murder someone."

"Toby just told me what happened to him the last time," Jareth growled, "He gave a general description a few weeks ago, but this was far too detailed for my peace of mind- what that bastard said and did to him!"

"If I can ask..." Archer suggested delicately.

"He beat him!" Jareth was so enraged he was making miniature earthquakes all around the Labyrinth, "So badly he broke bones. The child was coughing blood when he raped him against a tree. He humiliated him. If that was not enough, he forced a masturbation on him!"

"Toby had to touch him?" Archer was confused.

"Toby had to touch himself. In that state! He was expected to find pleasure with a knife at his throat! By the Gods, but I will kill him! Everything he did to Toby will be nothing to what I'll do to him." Jareth's last oath contained so much power that he levelled four trees in one fell swoop.

"Calm yourself, Jareth," Archer admonished, "I know it is terrible, but there is no point destroying the Kingdom for the sake of a rage."

"What care I for the Kingdom," Jareth snarled, "You know as well as I do that it does not matter to me either way if I were King or not."

"Perhaps you should step down then," Archer joked, trying to take Jareth's mind off the information he had just received. "It would give you more time to devote to you new family."

The Goblin King snorted. "I am chaining Toby to my wrist whether he likes it or not and whether I am King or not. The rest of that family is Aboveground and will be perfectly fine on their own. I do not intend to get involved with them."

Archer blinked in shock before taking his cousin's arm and compassionately motioning for him to sit down on the nearest seat. The Goblin King looked suspicious but evidently decided to wait it out. "Cousin, in all your studies, you know male-to-male bonding is rare for the ruling classes," Archer began slowly.

Jareth nodded.

"A formal binding is even more rare. Indeed, it has happened but once before and no evidence exists of that except legend, at which scholars scoff for the poetic exaggerations of the minstrels. Are you aware of that?"

Jareth nodded again.

"But it is not as rare amongst the common people, be it goblin or fairy."

"Archer, what is the point?"

"The point is that according to the standards set by the common people, male couples who are bonded and formally bound to each other are capable of raising a family of their own."

Jareth simply looked confused and rather irritable.

"Jareth, don't you remember what can happen with a bond and binding combination?"

Jareth couldn't think clearly. He really couldn't. He could still hear his lover and Toby wasn't anywhere near his family. He was somewhere alone, reliving the torment he had been through, all on his own. He shouldn't be alone, the Goblin King thought savagely, he shouldn't be left on his own at all. But Toby needed the time to himself. He was talking to himself, reasoning it out, facing a few demons on his own. So Jareth shook his head distractedly.

"Your Toby might- even now- be carrying your child," Archer concluded with a sigh.

Jareth was tempted to laugh but it didn't sound quite so funny. Then he was tempted to disbelieve every word but Archer had never yet lied to him and the Fairy Lord's face promised this was no joke. Besides, he remembered telling Archer himself when he'd first found out. And he had been suitably sceptical at the time. But now it seemed too disturbingly possible.

"Toby and I... I mean, Toby will... Toby might..." Jareth ended by swearing.

"I take it you are not pleased."

"Toby is certainly not carrying my child as yet, of that I am sure. He was not ready for it, you see. But if we were... if I were to... this is bloody ridiculous!"

"I had thought it would please you," Archer pointed out whimsically, "I should not have mentioned it?"

"No, no, thank the Gods you did," Jareth muttered fervently, "I had completely forgotten. I might have acted as with any other man." Absently he conjured a set of crystals and began to twirl them in his hand, watching them dance under the guidance of his dexterous fingers.

"But Jareth, you would be a father. And you would still beget heirs for the Kingdom- strong sons or daughters to protect your people and guide them." Archer could not understand this hesitation against what was essentially good news. True, he knew not if it would truly occur, but if the chance were there, surely Jareth should be glad of it?

"Archer, think! How could I rush a pregnancy on a sixteen-year-old mortal boy who has been repeatedly raped and tormented for six months? And he has barely settled it in his mind that he is married to another male. I don't even know if he can tolerate being lovers. If I tell him this... it's unthinkable. He will kill me!"

"What's unthinkable?" Sarah asked, popping her head around a tree and jumping over a fallen one to join the two men, "And why will Toby kill you?"

Archer respectfully relinquished his seat to a lady. Jareth was still too shocked to register anything except that Sarah was now a part of this conspiracy against him.

"Jareth has just received some astonishing news," Archer explained. "No, it does not include harm to your brother, Lady Sarah."

Jareth snorted derisively and kept staring intently at a single rose on a bush a few feet away. Without warning, the innocent flower suddenly exploded into a thousand shreds of soft red petals, scattering forlornly over the bush and the grass below.

Sarah nodded slowly. "If this is about Toby, I'd like to know."

"Toby might bear my children."

"I'm sorry, I thought you said Toby was going to get pregnant with you."

Mismatched eyes looked tiredly to her and a dark brow quirked in affirmation.

"What? Jareth, he's a guy! He's incapable of having children!"

"What's going on here?" Karen called out gaily, rounding a hedge and dragging her husband behind her.

"Toby," Sarah said in a daze, still sitting like a statue and staring at another rose in her line of vision. Luckily, she didn't have the power to make hers explode. "He can't have children."

"Of course, Sarah," Harold sighed, "He's a man!"

"There are exceptions in the Underground," Archer informed him.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I have cast no slur upon your son, Mr. Williams. I have said there are exceptions in the Underground to men birthing children by other men."

"Bloody hell! My son is pregnant?"

"Hush, Harold! Jareth, this is all some mistake, isn't it? A misunderstanding?"

"I can't believe it," Sarah broke in, muttering as she wrung her hands in her lap, "Toby's having a baby! My little brother is going to give birth!"

Archer was convinced that the mortal family was mad. "Nothing has been confirmed," he soothed.

"Jareth?" Karen repeated, "How is it biologically possible for Toby to have your child? For one thing, you're both males! It's impossible for you to impregnate him!"

"Mortals," Archer sighed mournfully, "So concerned with possibilities. Mrs. Williams, a male couple can raise a family if they are bonded and formally bound. It is a rare phenomenon but if the couple are close enough."

"You're not that close, right?" Harold put in hopefully.

"Of course not," Sarah sighed morosely, "They only spend every moment together. Oh God, how will Toby give birth? He has no... well, I suppose they could do a C-section."

"It grows in," Archer provided helpfully.

"He'll have terrible back pain," Karen added, caught up in the thought, "He's so small that he'll probably have to stay in bed for the last few months. Oh, and his contractions! His hips are far too narrow for birthing; it will have to be a C-section or he will suffer the pain terribly. Better let him take the drugs."

"They might not have them here," Harold reminded her, "And why are we discussing this? It won't happen. My son is not going to give birth!"

Jareth stopped staring at the rose bush and stood up. "Toby is not pregnant," he snapped, "He has had no means to become so as of now. Whether he ever will be is a concept beyond my knowledge. Now quiet! I've had enough of the lot of you."

So saying, he left, deep in thought about Toby being forced to suffer all kinds of agony because of a stupid pregnancy that he had knowingly forced on him. He had never even wanted to be a father. He shuddered at the thought of his own. Oh, he would never be that to his son, should he have one. How would he do? What would he do? How would the poor child cope with two traumatized males as parents?

Toby had made his way to the lake and was sitting on some rocks on the banks, content to let the peace and stillness settle his pounding head. He had come to some level of understanding: yes, it had hurt. Yes, he'd been terrified, humiliated and tormented. But that was over now; he no longer had to worry about any of that. Besides, even if it did happen again, there were so many reasons to forget it and not stick a knife in himself. He was married and he was loved and if anyone tried to hurt him again, he could either call Jareth or draw on his magic to protect himself.

"Toby?" Jareth.

"Here."

"May I join you?"

"It's a free country," Toby answered thoughtlessly, "Or not, seeing as how you rule it."

"Why is everyone so concerned about my Kingship today," Jareth wondered aloud, sitting on a rock next to his bond mate, "I am quite well aware of it, thank you."

"All right, all right. Don't get snippy."

Jareth looked to Toby, Toby looked back, and then they both stared at the lake. It wasn't so much that they had nothing to say but that they had too much. And everything they did have to say seemed unimportant.

How long they sat there neither ever remembered. But it had been interesting to sit side by side and just feel each other, feel what they were feeling and feel what they were thinking. The lake itself seemed to invite them to hold a shimmering kind of calm as sacred.

So there they sat, side-by-side, sharing nothing and everything while the rest of the Kingdom either recovered from hangovers or from the news that their Goblin King might just have not messed up as badly as they had thought. After all, they concluded, there might be heirs yet.