Series: Labyrinth
Genre: Drama/General
Author: Aethyrial Flame
Summary: There is no black, no white, nor merely grey the world is a rich, multihued tapestry that blinds you with its incandescent potential, or becomes dim, dark and sullen, a reflection of yourself that you strain too destroy. ONESHOT
Disclaimer: I don't own the Labyrinth, Sarah, nor Jarerth in his pretty tights. Zilcho, nup, nada, NOTHING.
This is a one-shot from Sarah's point of view. My original idea was to have her pining for Jareth and brooding on her mistakes, before he comes back to her. That kinaa of still happens, but I like the way this turned out much better. If there's any mistakes please tell me, as I finished this at 12AM and decided that I wanted it up right now. I did proof read it, but I might have missed a few things.
Enjoy!
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I wanted to say something dramatic, something that shows off the inherent flair for drama that I seem to possess in unknown quantities. I wanted to make a statement, draw line; this is me, this is not.
I tried; I really did. I drew a line, but along the way… it buckled. Like a beribboned plume it swayed and twisted, turned in on itself and defied the very boundaries it set out to create. As if taking on a life of its own, the 'line' showed me something very different…
There are no absolutes. There is no black, no white, nor merely grey; the world is a rich, multi hued tapestry that at times blinds you with its incandescent potential, or becomes dim, dark and sullen, infuriating you so much that you want nothing more then to destroy the darkness that is nothing more than a reflection of yourself.
Instead of a line I found a fairytale quest, and fulfilled the role of heroine perfectly, defeating the evil villain who had been all and more that I had asked of him.
''I have re-ordered time, I have turned the world upside down… and I have done it all for you! I am exhausted from living up to your expectations of me. Isn't that generous?"
Looking back, I see all that I was- and all that I wasn't. I see the spoilt brat wishing away her little brother in a fit of pique, seeking to escape the overwhelming responsibilities piling up on her like so many dominoes waiting to fall. I see a naïve, innocent child running and hiding from the rabid disillusionment that entered her soul on the bitter-sweet eve of her thirteenth birthday, when rampant hormones changed her view of the world.
All that I wanted I had- a surly, lying, devious companion that, through my purity and inherent courage and determination, I moulded into a stalwart friend that would, if need be, die to protect me. Everything had to be perfect for the heroine, right down to my companions- the tall, burly giant that all but I feared, who was gentle and caring once I took the time too see it. The chivalrous knight living in a world of fantasy, or so it seemed, with wisdom lying thick and murky behind his dark eyes.
At every turn of my quest something helped me, hindered me, forced me to learn. I realise now how much it made me grow- but in the end, I refused its lessons right up till the end. Hindsight is such a wonderful thing, is it not? It allowed me to see that which I had denied, and opened up a thousand new realms of endless possibilities.
I was offered everything, and with the contemptuous arrogance born from ignorance, I turned it down. Unseeing eyes watched a proud and haughty man bend down and let me walk all over him in order to show me how much he cared. An uncaring mind retreated back into the litany of script, the structured lines of a structured world, that clearly defined everything that I saw, and penned everything back up into neat little boxes.
He was evil, he was handsome, he was tempting and far too cruel for his own good. He took my brother because I asked him to, he made me run the Labyrinth because I wanted to, and he let me win because there was no other way.
But… who am I, Sarah Williams, to talk about cruelty? Sometimes, and only for a moment, at least, I think that perhaps the man that said, 'woman is the embodiment of cruelty' was completely correct. But only for a moment. At a singular moment -sometimes many for some- in any lifetime, every single person who has walked this earth has been totally and utterly cruel.
Be it as a child, ignorant and uncaring of the consequences, or as an adult, hurting and bitter, lashing out at the world in an attempt to stop the pain, everyone has done it.
And it's only now that I realise just how cruel I was… and how much his words continue to haunt me. They follow me, taunt me, tease me, trail behind my every waking moment as I brood and fret and worry on what has been and can not change, and on what I could have done, should have done.
Regret only lasts for so long however, and slowly, I immersed myself into the flow of reality, letting the numbing normality of it soothe the raw and ragged edges of my soul, balm my mind with the utter hypocrisy that our society was based upon, and the enforcing need to catalogue everything.
In high school I was the Ice Queen, a loner with no care for anyone else, a troubled teen who frequently withdrew in an attempt to hide from the world whilst I sought to untangle the Gordian knot that my life had become. I enjoy puzzles and I still do, the intricacies of the completed parts, and the subtle mystery of the uncompleted whole. And so I detached, drifted, cut myself free, and began to untangle my life, carefully reviewing each and every possibility before I chose my path.
Before, I had never been prone to such deep philosophical thinking. Oh, I had done it, yes, because such a thing, such deep, profound thinking, takes longer than a mere jaded four years too accomplish, unless it is there from the beginning. A happy childhood of fairy tales and romance had instilled certain concepts in me, and I began to branch out as I got older.
The deep, graphic gothic novels of writers such as Alice Borchardt and Anne Rice caught and held me, complementing the intricate justification of magic in the books of Katherine Kerr. I stood alongside proud warriors as they fell over and over again, learning from them as I journeyed with Maggie Furey through Aurian's tales. The simplistic beauty of a perfectly explainable scientific world proved a base for me in the works of Anne McCaffery and her Dragons of Pern series, the major base for all of my literary tastes, and that which had lead me deeper into the world of true fantasy.
I read voraciously, seeking my escape in fantasy realms that had me learning constantly, re-defining my relationship with the world and disgrading old thoughts that no longer leant themselves to the woman that I was becoming. The legacy of my childhood abandonment still haunted me, and I admit that freely. I was clingy, needy, and it took many years for me to grow up and get over it, though the memories of that time shame me deeply.
"I've brought you a gift."
Even now, I can still hear his voice, soft and seductive, urging me to abandon my quest before it had started. Head strong and heedless with the arrogant confidence of youth, I brashly shook off the sweet temptations and plunged into an adventure. At times, I ask myself why I didn't forget; why I didn't convince myself that I was all a dream.
And for awhile, I couldn't understand why I didn't. I never told anyone about it, not even when they asked- my father and Karen knew that something had changed that day, but they simply put it down to being a teenager. But I am not, and never have been, a person to hide for very long. Oh, I know the sweet delusions of denial, and have succumbed to its soothing entreaties many a time, for no one can resist them for long.
But I am entirely too honest with myself, and I knew that I could not deny the truth of my memories. If it did not happen, how did I change so much in the space of the day? How did I drop my childish pretensions and immature self-delusions of grandeur, unless my painful experiences had been entirely too real? So I knew that I couldn't deny the hold that the Labyrinth held over me, because even now, I see its magic everywhere I look.
"It's a crystal, nothing more. But if you turn it this way and look into it…it will show you your dreams."
I truly thought that I would be paranoid. I convinced myself that seeing an owl in a park meant that I would freak out that He was watching me, I would be petrified of being sucked into a dream buy eating peaches, and merest hint of a maze would send me screaming in the opposite direction.
None of that happened.
Peaches where merely a fruit that I was obscenely addicted to, eating in lavish amounts fresh with cream, canned and preserved in sweet, tangy mango juice, and liquid manna that I drank straight from the carton.
Mazes intrigued me, held me in their sway, and became an enchanting addiction that I simply had to solve. From emotional problems to the underlying psychological reasons for certain actions, I loved figuring out the contorting twists of anything life threw at me.
Owls where nothing to me, simply birds of great wisdom as some saw them, or the agents of the devils in ignorant minds. In those large, unblinking eyes, I saw the passage of time slow and stop, breaking free of the restraints humans unknowingly placed upon it. The wild, untameable quality that the deceptively innocent and harmless birds radiated often had me smiling with wry amusement, before renewing my faith in the mysteries of the world once more.
As with all things, my belief in magik fluctuated like the tides of the ocean, and at certain times I sought out certain books, searching for the lesson I needed to learn that were hidden within their thin-leafed confines. My powers of intuition grew stronger, as I developed the talents that had always, before, lay quiescent in the face of my childish fantasies.
I constantly sought and escape, but my one true calling, acting, quickly fell to the wayside. It was entirely too shallow, a false veneer or reality that had me acting out something that I was not. The entire practice smacked of an escape from the world and myself, of pretending to be someone else so that I didn't have to be me. So, true to the label stuck so unflatteringly to the back of my head, I became a 'freak', researching arcane texts and modern paganism.
My papers where deep and insightful, though I often fought with my teachers as I would deviate from the topic at hand, rambling off on several tangents at once as I sought to express the unwordable belief running through me.
At times, it was this belief that was all that sustained me, as His words haunted me, His face peered at me from the crowd, and His gestures had my heart lurching in my throat at the soul wrenching similarities.
"It's further than you think."
Those words ridicule me, even now, as I hear the gentle, mocking reproof that was naught but a fragile veneer concealing his cutting sarcasm. They return at the most in-opportune times, as I seek and fall, searching for something intangible, something out of reach. As with so many others I disregard religion, instead choosing to believe in myself; after all, it is so much and easier and nowhere near as expensive.
But it frightens me. It frightens me at the vivid clarity of my memories, and how easily I slip into them, reminiscing over my time in the twisting labyrinth, that I hazard a guess was only as challenging as I could possibly understand. It scares me how I can remember the way that shaggy blonde hair fell in front of his mismatched eyes, and I can still feel my heart skip a beat at the gut wrenching sorrow in his eyes in the final moments of our 'battle'.
"You say that so often. I wonder what your basis for comparison is…"
Even now, the mocking thoughtfulness behind the words makes me screw my face up, and feel like doing nothing more than stomping my foot and screaming in a fit of pique. It doesn't matter how immature the gesture would be, but the cool, reserved control I always maintain around other people -I learned the hard way how much it hurts to let them in- always shatters at the thought of him.
Sometimes, when I'm alone and frustrated, I fantasize about him. It always starts off with curiosity -like, for instance, why does he wear gloves?- and my verdant imagination takes off running. For someone reason, he has become the pivotal point of my life. I go to sleep thinking about him, and I wake up with the intention of finding out about him.
I've researched almost every legend that could be attributed to him, and I have an entire book case – wall to floor and several metres long- full of notes and books and theories and essays that I've written arguing various points.
But none of it seems to matter anymore. I sit here in my apartment, staring at my paint splattered jeans, and my snug fitting no-longer-white singlet top, and I wonder why I did it. Oh, I know such thoughts are commonly associated with depression, and believe me when I say that I'd know if that was the case.
But it isn't. I genuinely want to know…
… Why.
Out of all the people, why teach me a lesson? Was it a whim, a desire, a burning streak of curiosity? A whimsical half smile tugs at my mouth as I gaze at my blank canvas, mind racing with ideas. Unintentionally, everything that I've thought about him surges too the fore, as I trawl through half-forgotten thoughts and memory.
In a habitual gesture, one finger curls around a strand of rich dark chocolate silk, the natural curls in it easily lending themselves to my questing appendage. My eyes, I have been told, are as bright as a field of wakening grass, and as cool and mysterious as the ocean as they swell in tides of green, and riptides of darker tones. Truth be told, I actually have a thing for eyes; I love the variances and colours, and the unique patterns of flecking and striations that everyone has.
Finally, my mind begins to settle, and from the silt and dust my searching have aroused, a singular thoughts shines brilliantly from amongst them. It is old and worn, and muchly over loved, battered and frayed and thinned with age and use. I have considered it many times but always forgotten or put it off, uncertainties and doubts plaguing me until I finally push it away, reasoning that, even if I decided how to go about it, nothing would ever come about as a result.
An apology is such a simple thing.
With two simple words -'I'm sorry'- a thousand unsaid things are supposed to be conveyed to smooth a growing rift, to mend a broken bridge. Of course, it never works that way -the words have long lost their magik as they are banded around as a triviality to appease those that have been angered- but for a moment, they strike my fancy.
Eyes hooded, I stare at my canvas and finally pick up a brush, condensing many years of self-growth and misery, despair and searching, and finally, resolution, into several concrete images.
It takes me a while -almost a year, in fact- and I begin to understand several things. First of all, the reason I obsess over him so much, is because I can't confine him. He isn't a solid concept in my mind; he is Fae, a wild and uncontrollable force of nature.
I can't hate him because I've grown to much for such a petty emotion to continue its association with my memories of him. Instead, I remember them fondly, before snorting at how aged I sound, like a pensioner remembering their long lost youth. Lust, maybe, but I was so young that his burning magnetism simply confused me, though I know now, that it would affect me far more deeply than perhaps the enigmatic immortal might have meant.
But then again, this is Him, and have I learnt that, if anything, never to under estimate Him. My memories have taken on a polished hue, and I've begun to dismiss the little things; like how much my legs hurt, how afraid if was, the god-awful stench… I know it's a mistake to do something, but I lived a whole year of my life constantly on guard before I left it behind, citing it as a waste of energy.
If he was here right now, my thoughts would be quite different… But he's not, and he won't ever be. This painting is my tribute, to the years of my life and the one day that began them all. It expresses everything that I've thought and felt, and maybe a little more.
I intend, once this is done, to move on, get on with my life, to fade back into normalcy as much as I can- the unseen world of mysteries that I once sought out so avidly is losing its mysterious, alluring aura, as the realities of life begin to consume me, one day at a time. At twenty five I'm already jaded and cynical, and with a profound contempt for the world around me.
However, I have no money, so I'm forced to grind myself against the rough stone of the world, wearing myself away a little bit more each time, as I struggle to survive paying my bills and rent, and complete my artistic diploma at university.
A splash of pale blue layers itself across the canvas, and I begin to work on it, subtly alerting the details and texture of the smooth acrylic paint. After an hour, my back and shoulders are killing me from hunching over, but the final details of my painting are done. A true, genuine smile lights up my face, briefly erasing the tired, drawn lines creeping around my eyes and mouth.
"Done,"
I whisper, eyes roving over my creation. A panel of fantastical beasts seems to be carved onto the canvas, the smooth wood grain containing the wild landscape within it; but such a thing is deceptive, as only to my perception do the secrets creep from beneath the carefully constructed landscape…
A castle soars far in the background, mounted on a hill; crouched at its base is a smooth, flowing Labyrinth, which slowly fades into rolling green hills dotted with tiny homesteads, and a dark and brooding forest, which continues into the foreground. Leaning casually against a proud grey charger, He stands, smirking at the viewer with a soft, mocking tilt of his mouth.
Crystal in hand, he seems to be challenging the viewer in more ways than the obvious, as he reclines against his mount, the sharp, angular lines of his face somehow kept from being harsh by the curve of his chin, the lifting corner of his mouth, and the faintest hint of a dimple. Unlike the complex costumes that I had seen him wearing -a different one for every meeting- he simply wore knee high boots, dark grey trousers, and a loose, open, ruffled poets blouse of a creamy, off-white ivory.
The dark cape flowing behind him had subtle red highlights, an indicator of the hidden menace veiled beneath his indolent pose. Above him, a flight of dragons curled through the sky, some no more than wispy, insubstantial cloud shapes, and others, such as the one that I had just finished, where more definite.
But one thing bound the entire scene of unrelated elements together- Him. In some way or another, it was all paying tribute to Him. He, who stood in the lower right corner, arm draped over the dark coloured leather saddle, crystal and shining, fragile bauble in his grasp.
It was, I know, my ultimate masterpiece. Anything after this would pale by way of comparison, but I had accepted that the moment that I had begun to paint it. In some way, this was my way of atoning for my sins, and, in a vague and hidden purpose, a subtle plea for forgiveness.
Because I was lonely and wanted real magik in my life, not the faded, washed out mysteries that where all that still existed upon the upper surface of the Earth. Because in a dim, dusty corner of my heart, a vague hope lay buried, that spoke of perhaps summoning him through this. Everything that I could think of by way of magik had gone into it, and I felt drained, tired, from all the effort.
Yawning and stretching, only just noticing that the sky outside was lightening towards dawn, -'A time for new beginnings,' I thought absently- I wriggled my jeans down from my hips, tossing them over the back of a chair as I walked from my studio. The tall arching doorway lead straight into my lounge room, and from here, I had several choices. Directly to my left was the small kitchen, with its door a little further on, and the breakfast bar blocking most of the access into it, and containing its space. Directly beyond that was the doorway which lead onto a very short hallway, which had my bedroom on the left, the bathroom, and then the laundry. On my left were a window seat, and a small door which lead out onto my cramped balcony.
Rolling my shoulders to ease the ache in them, I padded into the bathroom, stripping down till I was naked as I went. Blasting the water on fast in order to heat it up, I didn't even bother jigging from foot to foot as I waited for it to become an acceptable temperature.
The lack of sleep didn't bother me much, because I'd been in a sort of half trance the entire time, and besides, I'd woken up at around 3am too finished the damn thing- I'd gone to bed really early the night before, so I had my minimum six hours of sleep under my non-existent belt. Muffling an expansive yawn, I ducked into the shower, wiping a wet hand across my face. Not wanting to get my hair wet and have it smack me in the face, I fixed it into a messy bun with a nearby scrunchie.
Simply standing beneath the heat water, I let myself relax, as the sounds of a waking city intruded on my consciousness. I resented the intrusion for a moment or two before I shrugged and let it go, turning on the spot to heat up my extremities. In fact, I was so focused on ignoring everything but the heated water running over my skin, and the body wash that I was lathering between my palms, that I almost missed that faint sound of a footstep.
Suspicious, I eased back the sliding metal door of the shower, stepped over the tiled step, and poked my head out of the bathroom door. I glanced up and down the hallway and out into the lounge room, listening intently.
When nothing caught my attention I shrugged and got back in the shower, smoothing the cinnamon-scented bubbly froth over my body. Enjoying the pressure of water against my skin, I turned around several times, stretching and sighing with pleasure as, minutely my muscles began too loosen slightly.
"I need a massage,"
I murmured, before rolling my shoulders once more and stepping from the shower, twisting the taps off as I went. The utter stillness of my apartment didn't bother me, as the heat of the shower had refreshed my mind, but left me with a warm content glow that wanted to curl up in bed. More than willing to oblige, I wrapped a thick towel around myself after I had dried off, and padded next door to my bedroom.
The soft scrape of china against china had me freezing and clutching my towel against myself before I groaned, deciding that it was my imagination. But well ingrained survival instincts had awoken, and clamoured for me to check it out. Strangely enough, His words drifted back to me at that point, as I cautiously shuffled into the lounge room, clad in nothing but a fluffy towel- which I absently realized was one of my smaller ones-, my wet skin, and the scrunchie holding up my messy hair.
But they weren't so much his words, as a half-heard song that haunted me at night, the wistful tones leaving me longing for something that I could see but couldn't reach, which I knew who taunt me forever.
"There's such a sad love deep in your eyes, …pale jewel, … I'll place the sky…"
Shoulders drooping slightly when I realised that no one was there, I shifted the towel against my skin from where it was knotted firmly in one fist under my left shoulder, and muttered bitterly,
"Have I gotten so pathetic and lonely that I want there to be someone here for company?"
Snorting at the foolish direction of my thoughts, I tossed my head angrily, shivering as a ghostly wind gently teased fingers through my hair, and I belatedly saw the half opened window. Not wanting to bother with it, I shrugged helplessly, before my gaze was drawn to my studio once more.
Dawn was painting the world in such beautiful colours… surely… surely it wouldn't hurt just to have a look; after all, if the magik hadn't worked by now, it wouldn't ever work. Unable to help but feel incredibly saddened by the thought, I sucked in a deep breath and expelled it in a sigh before padding into my studio.
Like a priceless jewel nestled in velvet, the painting glowed and sparked with inner fire, and I imagined that tiny fireflies of rosy gold light where dancing and crawling around it, filling the air with thick, heavy, tense anticipation. Twitching the skin across my shoulders as a faint curl of uneasiness wound up within me, I reached forward with my right hand, a wistful smile curving my mouth, as a finger gently traced the lines of the face of one who had haunted me for so long.
"Oh Jareth… If only it could have been different… I know now what you offered, but ten years isn't enough to understand it. But still… I wish…"
Halting abruptly I froze, aware of the danger of those words. But- no. I was closing the door, and it didn't matter if I wished, because unless I said the Words, he couldn't come. Shuddering faintly with remembered fear and a tense thrill of excitement, I continued on, eyes fluttering close.
"I wish that I wasn't so lonely…"
I knew that my voice had cracked on the words, knew that all my broken-hearted longing was contained within those simple words, but it just felt so right…
Curling my fingers against the painting, a mischievous smile quirked up my mouth as I replied with a flash of the old fire that was slowly reviving within me,
"Besides, I need a massage right now, and I'm sure that you could give a good one."
Throwing my head back, I laughed in utter abandon, twirling on the spot as helpless giggles consumed me. Everything seemed to make so much sense now, and as the sun rose further, I could feel a new hope flaring to life within me as well. A secret smile hooding my gaze, I added,
"Wonder if you'd be a good bed warmer?"
Sniggering at the thought the mighty Fae Prince doing such a thing, I turned around to walk out of my studio and get dressed, no longer craving sleep as I had done so for so long, I bumped into something solid. Clutching my towel as it slipped dangerously low- 'There's no one here anyway,' I thought with a streak of rebellious irritation- I backed away, shaking my head.
"There isn't a wall there,"
I grumbled, flicking long chocolate strands from my vision as I lifted my gaze to view the obstruction. And felt my heart stop when two devastatingly familiar mismatched eyes glinted from behind a curtain of shaggy blonde hair, that tempting mouth curled up in a sensuous smirk.
"Well, Sarah, I believe I might take you up on that offer…"
His arm snaked around my waist, warm and reassuring, and most importantly, real. A hysterical giggle escaped me before I laughed once more and buried my head in his chest, silent tears trickling down my face as my shoulders shook with the force of my repressed emotions. I didn't feel shocked, I didn't try to deny it, I didn't do any of the expected things.
Instead, I reached up on tiptoes and wound my arms around his neck, completely not caring about the way my towel was covering considerably less of my body than I was usually comfortable with. Standing on tiptoe to reach eye-level with him, I grinned and replied,
"I accept… but first, I want to do something that I've wanted to do since I first met you."
I could feel the laughter building in his throat, knew that his heart was as constricted with conflicting emotions as mine was, and I revelled in it. Shaking my hair back from my face again, I leant closer, breath fanning across his cheeks as my eyes slid close and I titled the angle my face was on, silencing his words before he could take breath to utter them.
A giddy, utterly euphoric feeling exploded within me, and I instinctively knew what it was- completion and freedom bound together as one. Allowing him to pull me closer, I ignored the clamour of logistical denial in my mind, and did something that I hadn't allowed to happen for far too long.
I let go of my control, and I decided to live for the moment. I didn't think of the consequences, and in fact, I didn't even bother thinking beyond the fact that he was here, with me in my apartment, and we where alone. Grinning, I inched away and lead him to my bedroom, informing him in an arch tone at his amused demand as to what I was doing,
"Getting ready for my massage."
Never had it felt so good to let go, and as the sun finally rose above the horizon, I knew that my hope had been revived along with it. Magik did exist…
… because it was kissing me with passionate abandon.
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