Underground
It's troubling me, grating me
and twisting me around…
Oh, I'm endlessly caving in
and turning inside out…!
'Cause I want it now—
I want it now—
give me your heart and your soul!
And I'm not breaking down—
I'm breaking out—
Last chance to lose control…
The Goblin King could hear the angry tapping of her infamous ebony cane on the stone floors of his fortress long before she burst into his throne room: her wide, flashing hazel eyes blazing with anger…
Slowly turning his head on his neck—with his typical graceful economy of movement, languid and nonchalant and completely unaffected by her icy rage—he looked into her face, taking note of the rigidness of her posture, and the two spots of crimson on her high cheekbones.
Yes: she was quite unhappy with him.
"Madame…" he drawled, in an indifferent greeting.
Without even an ounce of respect for her presence, he turned his face away from her and going back to his activity of the moment before—which was idly flicking little bits of magic from his slender, sensitive mage's fingertips, and then shooting them up at the beautifully-painted, vaulted ceiling of the massive throne chamber. The irate elven woman's mouth thinned into a severe and rather dangerous dark red line, and her eyes gleamed with a menacing light that would have terrified a cave troll.
"Milord!"
Her voice rang out, piercing in the silence, and his eyes narrowed even more dangerously than hers behind the stark, ominous black mask that he wore. It covered almost all of his face—the mask—leaving only his lips and chin and a little bit of his forehead showing; and its smooth, gleaming darkness made his mismatched eyes seem to glow with a preternatural inner fire.
He only wore it, she knew, when he was in an exceptionally dark or temperamental mood.
And as he stood up—the lean, elegant lines of his perfect body slowly and gracefully unfolding and elongating before her very eyes—she took an involuntary step back, moving away from him…not that putting any amount of distance between oneself and the Goblin King guaranteed one any safety, however. No, the Goblin King's powers were far-reaching, and rightly to be feared. He had always very much reminded her of an exotic but terrifyingly lethal cobra that she had once seen: driven into a corner, where it rested coiled and hissing in its rage, its fathomless black eyes glittering as it prepared to unsheathe its fangs and deadly poison.
The Goblin King was a prince of the immortal, unblemished and beauty-loving fae people, and he had been exiled to the lost world of the Labyrinth many ages before, as punishment for having been born with an accursed face.
Now he was the veritable fount of power in his world—or rather, the magnetism of his person drew all of the Labyrinth's power to him. He could manipulate the vast maze and its inhabitants at will. With a flick of his wrist, the Labyrinth could change from night to day; its corridors and pathways would twist at his whim, becoming unrecognizable within seconds if he so willed it. He was a most powerful mage—an enchanter of deadly caliber, and not one to waste time considering the fate of anything or anyone who might get in his way.
She had to watch her step.
At that very moment, his bizarre, cursed eyes were staring straight at her: lancing into her mind, and splicing her soul into pieces. She had no time to recoil.
"Why have you come here?"
That was all he asked. There were merely five simple words in his question, yet there was more, so much more, in his tone. She inhaled—slowly! slowly! he mustn't see!—and lowered her chin slightly, letting her imperious stance grow infinitesimally more submissive.
When one threatened the Goblin King, one invited him to snatch one's own fate into his gloved hands. And it was no well-known myth that the Goblin King had a very dark sense of humor indeed, especially when it came to idly toying with the very lives of those who dared to cross him. It was best to mind her level of respect.
"I…"
She hesitated, and gathered her words, moistening her lips slightly before she spoke. The air in the throne room was cold, and tasted faintly of copper.
A shiver ran over her skin.
"I…thought…that I saw…the girl…she had a book: a very old, beautiful book that was bound in leather and inlaid with gold—and—its name was…"
But she scarcely dared say it.
The Goblin King smirked at her confusion behind his abominable black mask, stepping to one side of his massive, curving ebony throne. She cursed him for wearing the mask. She could never see his expression within it.
Oh yes, it was quite true: the Goblin King reveled in being an unfathomable and malevolent enigma. Like a young boy, he liked to play games with the world—and, after all, it was his world. He could play games with it if he liked.
"Did you give the book to her?"
She finally asked the question that was burning deep inside her soul: using a low, low tone of voice so that he would not feel confronted. His eyes never left her as he moved behind the throne, with deliberate and dispassionate laziness. The fingertips of his right hand: encased in the glove of black leather that fit him so snugly that it was like a second skin, skimmed lightly along the raised horn-like curves of its headrest, dragging that hand after him as he walked.
Step—step—step—step—halt.
He came to stand at the top of the dais that the throne rested upon, and his darkly gleaming eyes peered down at her through the flickering torch-lit shadows. She felt small and insignificant, being held at the mercy of his sinister and twisted humor, and was irritated with him. He might indeed be the Goblin King—but she would be blasted thrice over before she let him bully her into leaving without having her questions answered. Then he surprised her.
He answered her question.
"No: I did not 'give' it to her…per se…no, I merely left it where I was certain that she would find it—but that is all. I did not break the rules, Anrenielle."
"But you will, and soon." she remarked.
And she folded her arms and looked up at the tall man who stood far above her on the dais, looming in the dark. Finally, though, she did allow her severe frown to soften somewhat, becoming an expression of both exasperation and pity—
—For it had to be understood that, within the world of the Labyrinth, the Goblin King had all of the power, all of the riches, all of the control that could be imagined by the finite mind, yet it was really nothing more than an elaborate prison for him.
It had been designed to be a gilded cage.
They had thought that his every want, his every desire and need, was contained within the Labyrinth. They knew nothing. The Goblin King knew why he had been exiled to the Labyrinth from his own world—he knew, and the Labyrinth would never be anything more than a boundless jail cell to him.
"Your highness…"
And she took a step towards him, stretching one hand out to him, as he came down the staircase—walking away from her, and at a decidedly determined angle. He was not in a mind, then, she decided, to listen to her now.
Plead with him, then.
"The girl—she is so young!"
She followed him persistently, the hem of her black silken gown making a shh-ing noise as it swept over the stone floor behind her. The Goblin King would not stop to hear her, however. She tried to blend reason with her begging.
"You know that her father's death is still a fresh grief to her heart—she has no need for goblins and shadows, nor should she be torn from her life as it is now! She should have the chance to grow up…as other girls do! She needs to live—"
"She is alone in that world, Anrenielle!"
And with those snarled words the lord of the Underground whirled around to face her. His sapphire and emerald eyes were blazing angrily behind his mask, his fury causing their gem-tones to burn with a white-green flame. She fell back, cowed by his anger, as he leaned forward, viciously snapping his next words at her.
"Do not tell me that you have not heard her—that you have not seen her—as she weeps herself to sleep every night!" he hissed. "Do not tell me that you have not taken note of the sadness that is ever present in her eyes! She is alone—she has no one to love her as she ought to be loved! There is not a soul in that world to care for her!"
"She will find her way."
With an incredulous, angered scoffing noise, he whirled: turning his back on her and stalking away. She continued hastily, fearing that he would disappear in a swirl of his cloak and not hear any more from her.
"She is young—she has yet to live. She will grow up soon, and then she will realize that being alone is necessary for her kind, sometimes. She will grow stronger. The world will not defeat her, my lord—even now it sees her only as another of her age and situation and people…and she will rise above her struggles. Taking her away…"
"Don't you see?"
He breathed his question softly in the shadows.
"Anrenielle…can't you see it at all…? She is not like any of the others! I have seen it in her eyes—she has more in her spirit. She needs more!"
I can give her more…were his unspoken words.
But the elven woman shook her head, slowly.
It could not be so.
"What would you do then, your Eminence? Bring her here, and let your goblins frighten her? What would you say to her, once she is petrified by fear? Will you tell her that you brought her away from the world she knew because she belongs here—because she is the missing half of your soul, for which you have been searching for centuries?"
"I will tell her only what I wish for her to hear."
"You would deceive her, then?"
"If she comes here, it will be of her own doing. I do not take anything but that which is freely offered or given to me, Anrenielle! If she comes here, it will be because she has wished herself to me. I know the rules of my world well enough!"
A bitter laugh accompanied this.
"I know that I cannot touch her but through words—until she wishes for me to come to her. She has already dreamed of me for long enough, Madame…once, her father told her stories of me, when she was young…very, very young. They have known of me for ages in that world—my machinations there have grown amazingly well-circulated! I tell one story of my magic, of my world, and to a mere handful of wandering gypsies...and within a hundred years, I am a legend in many lands! She knows of me—and though I may yet be only a figure of legend in her storybooks, she does believe in me. She may not see that the truth is in her mind yet…but her heart knows me. Her heart will know me."
She hesitated.
It was clear that he would argue no further with her on the subject—but she did not wish to leave their discussion where it was. Too much rested on both his determination, and hers. She knew that if he—the Goblin King—was to cross into the other world, and whisk away the beautiful young girl whom they spoke of—
Too much was at risk.
"Your Highness…" she tried, one last time.
"I will say no more," was his dark reply from within the shadows.
In a moment, her elven ears were able to perceive the faintest sound of magic shimmering on the air. Then there was only silence, dreadful as the tolling of a death bell—and within the blink of an eye, Mme. Giry stood alone, once again, just outside the doors of the ballet dormitory.
She listened, with a tired, sad expression on her pale face—her eyes tainted dark with worry and uncertainty—as, within the room beyond, Christine Daae took the center of the group of ballet girls and began to tell them the story of the mysterious Goblin King, and his Labyrinth…
Meanwhile, within the Labyrinth itself, the very much alive and also listening Goblin King stood again over his enchanted mirror, and watched the shimmering changes come over his beloved's face as she, unknowing at all of him and his world, continued to laugh and talk with her friends.
Softly, under his breath, he sang—
It's holding me, morphing me,
and forcing me to strive…
to be endlessly cold within,
and dreaming I'm alive…
'Cause I want it now—
I want it now!
Give me your heart and your soul!
And I'm not breaking down—
I'm breaking out!
Last chance to lose control…
And I want you now—
I want you now…
I'll feel my heart implode…
And I'm breaking out—
Escaping now—
Feeling my faith erode…
A note from the authoress: The lyrics of the very Phantom-y and Erik-esque song 'Hysteria' are copyright of Muse.
Oh…and "Anrenielle", in case you hadn't already guessed, is also Mme. Antoinette Giry. How, you ask? You shall learn.
Mme. Giry: Miranda Richardson
The Goblin King: Haha, I'm not telling you:P But I think you'll be able to guess who he is clearly enough by reading my descriptions of him in this chapter...