Author's Note: Fool's Flowers (further in the chapter) are small cup-like flowers. They are called fool's flowers because the petals have such long, pointed tips that they flop over. Like on a jester's cap. They usually come in bright colours like bright pink or red or bright yellow.
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Eloise let herself out of a narrow door at the back of the Castle, nose in the air for the servants working in the pens and outbuildings.
But her nose dropped progressively lower the closer she came to the Goblin City. Her dress was plain and dark brown, her hair bundled beneath the typical scarf for a female of her age. Eloise might have been any goblin at all as she wound her way through the crooked streets. Except in one respect- she steadfastly stayed clean and neat.
Her hair was washed; her dress was carefully brushed; she held her skirts above the muck in the streets and took care where she stepped.
The building she went to was small, with holes for windows and grubby washing drying at the window. Eloise took the staircase to the flat at the top and hesitated.
Goblins didn't knock.
It wasn't that they were rude, but they were a friendly lot. Goblin children played in the streets and those who had no regular jobs always found the time between chores to visit someone else in the same situation. A joke was shared, a mug of ale drunk- those were the customs.
Knocking was for people who didn't keep an open door and didn't want to share. That was what goblins thought, anyway.
Eloise banged once with a fist- a far cry from the discreet tap she'd perfected- and went in.
The room was smoky from burning damp wood in damp air. The mess of hunched life by the fireplace resolved itself into the hulking shape of an old goblin female prodding a two-pronged fork into a pot. The old female turned around and manoeuvred her bulk to an upright position. It was as if a lopsided jelly were uprighted.
"Hmph," she sniffed, "It's you. What do you want?"
"Came to see you, Mum," Eloise said firmly, "Just like I promised."
The jelly had legs because it moved to the other side of the room. "Y' have, have ye? What for? Got no reason to come back here, do ye?"
Her daughter ignored her and came to the table, already untying her scarf with one hand as she hefted the sack up with the other. "Brought you presents."
Her mother hmph-ed again but dived at the sack with both hands. Goblins, as a general rule, loved presents. The food was scoffed at but handled carefully as it was put away on the overcrowded shelf above the sink. The squashed bunch of bright pink fool's flowers were put instantly into a chipped mug of water. If there was anything that Eloise knew her mother liked, it was fool's flowers.
The last present was taken out and set back on the table as it were a live ember. "What's that, then?" the old goblin demanded.
"Box," Eloise answered.
Two pairs of warm brown eyes regarded the box with various degrees of wariness.
"Don't need it."
"Mum, talk sense."
"Don't need it! Bah! Fancy piece of wood and metal. Won't hold nothing useful. Got no use in this house if it's got no use."
"Mum, it's a box for your beads," Eloise persevered, "Her Ladyship sent it."
The change was over in a flash. "Her Ladyship? Lady Pandora sent this box? Don't believe a word of it."
"No call to say I'm lying, Mum. Her Ladyship wanted to send you a chain before I said you wouldn't wear none. I told her you keep your beads in a rusty tin. A box is what you need, I told her."
The old goblin clicked her tongue and chattered shrilly to herself in her native tongue about daughters who burdened all those fancy people with silly stories about her old mum. All the while she waddled to get her rusty old tin and then to carry it back to the table. Her grumbling halted abruptly when she opened up the box and saw the smooth velvet lining within. She looked almost afraid of emptying her precious collection into its pristine sanctuary. But eventually she did, concentrating in the dim light.
Eloise just watched her, a small smile upon her lips. It was good to be able to visit a few times. There was no one like her old mum for having a heart of gold and a head like a brass pot. The finer meaning of things just trickled right by her. But it was good to come back home once in a while.
Goblins were a practical people. They knew their place, they knew their jobs and usually they knew their lives. They lived and died as their parents did. Particularly since they usually muddled up whatever change was attempted by the Goblin King. Just see what happened to electricity! They kept setting their houses on fire by messing with the wires. And that robot!
Eloise silently got to her feet and picked up the kettle from its hook. She filled it up at the sink, capably pumping up the water she needed. Onto the hob and then bustle around to get clean mugs and that syrup her mother kept for special occasions.
It would be a long visit this time.
Jareth retreated quietly away from the scene in his head and grimaced to himself. The state of that room was shocking! Leaning against the frame of a narrow window and watching the Castle ready itself for Gildred's arrival gave him plenty of time to appreciate open spaces and sunlight. And to appreciate being by himself.
There were, after all, quite a few political consideration to be made. The annual clean-up of the City had to be soon. The recent splash of rain had left everything a little damp and smelly. Well, anything goblin, he clarified. It was probable that the elves, the forest sprites, the water sprites and the merfolk had all celebrated the change of weather.
But the mountain sprites were another matter. They were a hostile group as it was and they were clamouring for his blood again. Trouble enough that had been when he'd taken the throne; then there had been that other trouble with their rebellion. Officially over, naturally. Jareth was ignoring them this time in favour of watching and waiting. He was still hoping that they would do nothing stupid.
The problem was, as scholars always ended, that the Goblin King had given Gildred the quarries. Large mining pits had closed. The expert teams of mountain sprites had found themselves out of work and out of their field of knowledge.
Personally, Jareth didn't sympathize. It wasn't logical to him for the sprites to be whining about the loss of a miserable tradition that had plagued the race for generations when they now had the opportunity to leave that miserable tradition behind and try something new. Of course, it had been it his unguarded recital of just that sentiment that had had the mountain sprites retreating back to their ancient stronghold in rocky territory.
Jareth's reaction to such rebellion?
He scandalized the Council by questioning out loud why the sprites hadn't just locked themselves away in their self-contained ancient city in the first place. It was their territory. It was lavish with tradition. It was self-contained. It had plenty of space for all of them.
"It would have saved me a lot of time and effort," he had pointed out, "And it would have let them get on with whatever blinkered existence they seem to want. Council dismissed; I refuse to discuss this further."
Eventually a battalion of representatives from the other races persuaded the Goblin King that it 'wasn't right'. It helped that the Goblin King was suddenly enraptured and felled by a human girl of fifteen just a week before they descended upon him. He'd agreed quickly to the moral wrongness of it all- albeit with a puzzled and reluctant air- and apparated straight into the stone city. He'd charmed and cajoled and promised blindly in decadent sweeps of imagination, so completely agreeable that the mountain sprites had found themselves agreeing to remain members of the Underground and its Council, even if they still officially refused to acknowledge him as King.
It was alright. Jareth didn't need the title. He had another by birthright and whether they hailed him as King or Lord, they made no decision without his nod of approval. He had his contacts, his spies, and his means of being both himself.
And as a contact and spy, he found it highly ironic that the mountain sprites were convinced that he had caused the rain only to inconvenience them and damage their stone dwellings with a vicious curtain of water.
As said, Jareth was waiting and watching.
On the other hand, there were more pleasurable ways to spend an afternoon than in dull practically.
He swept back out in his mind, probing idly around the land to check on old acquaintances and old rivals. Buttress, the old merman, was engaged in a lively game of chase with his little niece. Jareth thought the child would grow up to be rather striking and left it at that. Elban was engaged, surprisingly enough, in a serious argument with his butler over why there was no paper left anywhere in the near vicinity. The littered scraps of discarded sheets spoke more eloquently than words. Jareth left him to it. Merilin was somewhere Jareth never expected.
The Goblin King's head dipped lower as he frowned in absorption. That looked like the cliff above the Safety Road. An ill-conceived name, considering it bordered its outlawed neighbour, but then it was from days gone by when the no one wanted to use the Labyrinth as a means of transport.
Merilin, though, was off his mount and idling his time away with his back to the steep cliff. Clearly waiting for someone; the unopened flash had three glasses beside it.
Why three glasses?
Jareth's mind did an unexpected twist. His concentration broke when the door slammed open. Jervohl was standing a little way into the way, ashen and trembling and begging to be allowed to leave the palace before Gildred arrived.
Jareth couldn't abide tears. He also held similar views on hysterical females. His abrupt answer- formulated from his irritation with her behaviour and annoyance at her interruption- was to pluck the powerstone ring from her finger and lock her into her room.
He gave the ring to the first goblin he found and ordered it taken to Gonzo, who was to put it in his study. Preferably where he would never again find it.
As a last thought, he had three guards posted outside the door of his sister's prison and had the guards in the grounds doubled and placed on high alert.
The only good thing about Merilin's three glasses was that Jareth now knew exactly where Madigh and Luka would be for two days. Unfortunately, if an assassin from the Outlaw Lands with not much magical power was to slip unseen into the Underground… Jareth could not be certain he would know.
