Disclaimer: I only own the Councillor and the two Councilmen Tiana and Flynn. Technically I own the jury member too, but they're not really too important. I only borrow the others. I promise to return them when done, no worse for wear.

Author's Notes This chapter covers the twelfth hour, in all its glorious entirerity. Forseeing only two more chapters after this one—the verdict, and an epilogue. (I'm thinking of possibly writing a Harry Potter fic. It would obviously be centered in that universe, but certain characters from this fic—Sarah, Jareth, Toby, Tiana and Flynn—would all make appearances. In that way, it could be considered a companion fic. Would anyone be interested?)

LDDurham: Hmm, he does, doesn't he? Assumingly, we should all have Jareths in our lives.

Moonjava: Openings are fun.

Rain Callaway: Oh, good. I'm always worried about when and how I write Jareth.

Nugrey: Wicked? Nice! My life is complete! More flynn/tiana here too.

LabyLyrPhx: Nope, didn't forget. Just don't have internet at my apartment, so I'm at the mercy of work computers. But nope willl never forget.

dramatiks: Yah, I checked that word at least three times. Awww… yay for tiana/flynn followers! Did you really convert your friends too?

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Stars/In your multitudes/Scarce to be counted/Filling the darkness/With order and light/You are the sentinels/Silent and sure/Keeping watch in the night/eeping watch in the night/ou know your place in the skyYou hold your course and your aim/nd each in your season/Returns and returns/And is always the same… --"Stars", from the Les Miserables soundtrack

Tiana took a deep breath, and he said, "Plainly, Your Highness, you are the only one who's beginning to finally learn."

That amused smirk on Jareth's lips broadened, and he leaned slightly forward in his chair. "Really, Councilman? Please. Enlighten me."

Tiana frowned, and he shifted a disdained look. "Perhaps, I may have been wrong, after all." He echoed Flynn's earlier gesture of his hands behind his back, and he paced briefly, before he finally leaned against the very table Flynn sat at. He inched his bottom onto the table, for only a few centimeters of cloth-covered skin touched a few centimeters of wood, and he smiled softly—almost invisibly—when Flynn's fingers reached forward to loosen his two hands, Tiana's fingers linked with Flynn's, and Tiana smiled, as that was really the reason he had perched himself there. "Perhaps, Your Highness," he continued, and he did his best to ignore how Flynn's thumb rubbed the tender spot between his thumb and forefinger; how the roughness of that thumb felt against the own softness of his own skin; how warm Flynn's skin and thumb felt against the own cooler touch of his own skin, "perhaps, I was wrong this entire time."

Jareth looked beyond amused. "As I said, please, enlighten me."

"At what point did you fall in love with Sarah?"

"I suppose at that very first moment I first saw her, or more precisely, at that very first moment I first started watching her."

"In owl form?"

"Yes."

"Why did you begin to watch her, Your Highness? Did you feel she was a threat?"

"Not at the time in her life, no."

"But you did later?"

"She beat my labyrinth, Councilman."

"So wouldn't that be considered a threat?"

"In a manner of speaking, yes, it would be."

Tiana felt Flynn's thumb push higher, reaching inside the bottom cuff of tunic's sleeve, tracing circles on the underflesh of his wrist. He shivered slightly. "But you still love her?"

"Yes."

"Do you know the precise definition of that word, Your Highness?"

Jareth shifted in his seat uneasily. "Cannot say that I do, no."

"It has ten separate dictionary definitions. Ten. Do you feel –being completely honest, Your Highness—that your obvious feelings of love would fall somewhere under one of those ten definitions?"

"It would have to, wouldn't it?" Jareth's mouth curled into another smirk; he was was on familiar ground again.

"You would think that." Very gently, with a gesture almost unoticed, he shifted his hand, so that he also now had his fingers just inside Flynn's tunic, and he began to stroke the underflesh of Flynn's wrist to the same rhythm that Flynn stroked his. "Your Highness, I don't want to know why you love her. You have already stated that for the court, but what I do want to know—you mentioned before, that has the Lady Sarah Williams lost, you would have been required to keep her within your castle, lands and control as per order of the Labyrinthinian laws. You also mentioned that she would have come to hate you if you did that. So, in order to combat that, you did what you felt you had to do. Am I interpreting this correctly?"

"Yes." Jareth swallowed, and he breathed deeply. "Yes."

"For that reason you gave her the peach; for that reason you offered herher dream one last time; for that reason you sang to her, not once, not twice, but four times. Four times. If she had accepted what you offered to her, if she had taken her dreams, or she had taken you, would you still feel the same towards her?"

"Yes."

"You don't think that it might be possible that you might have come to hate her?"

"No." Jareth's hands gripped the edge of the witness stand. Tightly. And he gritted his teeth. "Never."

"You are sure about that, Your Highness?"

"Yes."

"You offered to move the stars for her. That you loved between the stars."

"Yes."

"Would you still?"

Jareth jutted his face forward, and his eyes flashed briefly, but highly dangerously. "I would."

A slow spread over Tiana's face. "You are in love, Your Highness. Completely and honestly. It's a wonderful feeling. Treasure it." Tiana squeezed Flynn's hand, and he felt more than he saw the echoing smile that spread over Flynn's face. "However, to know, how long would you wait for her?"

"Forever. I would wait for her forever." Jareth paused, and his voice caught. "Between the stars."

"Would you swear on those same stars, Jareth, Your Highness, would you swear on those same stars that you never at any point in time, tried to execute harm towards the Lady Sarah Williams, or towards her baby brother?"

"I swear," Jareth whispered. "I swear on the stars."

Tiana nodded. On shakier legs than he had used to walk to the witness stand, Jareth walked back to his seat. With regretful fingers, hands, and tingling skin, Tiana distengaled himself from Flynn's hands, and he re-took his own seat. The Councillor surveyed the room, before he finally asked, "Your next witness, Councilman Flynn?"

"I have none, Councillor."

"Councilman Tiana?"

"None, Councillor."

Inwardly, the Councillor smiled. They were running ahead of schdule. Only twelve hours had passed. Only now did they even begin the thirteenth. "At this time then, I would like to give the jury the remainign set time to reach their verdict."

The man called Garrett stood. "We do not need the time, Councillor. We have already come top our verdict."

If the Councillor was surprised, he did not show it. "Very well. Would the defendant, Jareth, King of the Goblins and Ruler of the Labyrinth, and the two Council members Coulcilman Flynn and Councilman Tiana all please rise?" The Councillor sucked in a long, slow breath. "Jareth, you have been brought here on the grounds of treason both towards the Labyrinth and the Underground, and of atrempting harm on two humans. How do you plead?"

"Not guilty." All previous traces of uncertainty had left the Goblin King's voice.

The Councillor nodded. He passed a weary hand over his eyes. He ignored the visual whispers that Tiana and Flynn hurried between themselves. Wishing and swearing on the stars indeed. "Council and jury members, your decision…"