Author's Note: The characters of Jareth, Sarah, Toby, Hoggle, Ludo, Didymus, etc. belong to the wonderful Jim Henson company, and I claim no rights to them. The goblins are another story, but any resemblance to any real goblins, living or (while improbable) dead, is purely coincidental and unintentional... except for Shove, because he wouldn't leave me alone until I put him in the story.

Concentrating at work was difficult. She would be in the middle of a lecture on Shakespearean comedies, and suddenly find herself staring out the window, and the students all whispering and eyeing her as if she'd suddenly grown a second head. Every time it happened, she'd laugh a little, and blush and turn back to the lesson, firmly reminding herself to pay attention. In the halls and the bathrooms, in the notes passed between classes and under desks, in the teacher's lounge and the administration offices, the rumor spread: Miss Williams was in love. There was speculation about who the gentleman (or lady--claimed those who pointed out that they'd never seen her with a man) was, and many of the single male teachers suddenly found themselves being eyed carefully when they were around her. But they never talked to her for long, for despite how pretty she was, something about her made men very uncomfortable, as though a large linebacker was looming just behind him the entire time he was talking to her, waiting to plant a fist in his skull.

Sarah, herself, was mostly oblivious to the rumors. But the goblins heard and whispered among themselves, and what they whispered traveled both aboveground and under, and eventually it reached the ears of her friends, who were concerned.

"Sarah," said Hoggle, his bushy eyebrows drawn into a frown, "the goblins are saying you're in love with the King."

"Nonsense," she said, but she blushed a little. "I just asked him to be my friend. That's all."

"Why would you want to go and do a thing like that? This is Jareth, we're talking about. His royal wretchedness isn't the friendly sort, Sarah."

"Indeed, milady," Didymus said, "Why wouldst a fair maiden wish to befriend such a loathsome villain?"

"He's not loathsome," she said sternly. "He's just lonely. And he might be a villain, but that doesn't mean he doesn't deserve to have a friend."

"Sarah good," Ludo said, nodding his great shaggy head. "Friend good." She smiled.

"I know it's hard to understand, but, I need him, too, Hoggle."

"What, we're not good enough anymore?" He said, turning away.

"It's not that," she said. "But we're bound together, in some way, by what happened. Isn't it better to be friends rather than enemies?"

"Wisely spoken, milady," Didymus agreed, "but art thou sure of him?"

"No," she admitted. "But I'm willing to try. I think he needs me, even more than I need him. And I turned away from him once. I won't hurt him again." Hoggle only snorted. He still feared the King. But Didymus seemed content.

"Thou art as wise as thou art beautiful, fair maiden," he said, and tactfully changed the subject.

At night she still dreamed, and in her dreams she wandered the Labyrinth, exploring hedge mazes, and long corridors with invisible turnings. She wandered through sandy tunnels lined with giant stone faces, and through lush forests that glittered in the dappled light. In all of her dreams, she walked unhurried, following whichever path seemed most likely, but not much caring where she went. Along her path, goblins peered out of cracks and over walls and through leaves at her, and sometimes they bowed to her, as if she were someone worth bowing to. Then she would glance around and see him standing off to the side, or a little ways behind her, or just in the shadow of a tree. His eyes watched her curiously, but he did not speak, and she didn't break the silence either.

One night, as she wandered through the forest, she paused and saw him standing a little way ahead of her, leaning against a tree, with his arms folded. For the first time, she walked up to him and when he made no move to speak, she reached out and took his hand. The cool leather of his glove was soft in her palm, and he allowed her to pull him forward a little, until he was walking beside her. She did not let go of his hand, for fear that he would stop, or break the dream, and he did not try to pull away. Together they walked through the forest, her soft shoes making no noise, and the long tails of his coat rustling a bit over the fallen leaves. Neither of them spoke, but after a time she found that he was leading her, and she was following, and then she would see something that she wanted to look at more closely and she'd tug on his hand a little and he'd follow her.

The light in the forest began to grow dim, and little twinkling lights began to flit among the trees. He stopped, and she stopped with him, and they stood there for a long time, as the woods filled with fairies. They flickered among the trees and through the grass, and Sarah thought it was one of the most beautiful things she'd ever seen, until she glanced up at his face to find him watching her in the fairy light. His eyes were very dark, and his face unreadable, and she was suddenly terribly aware of his presence beside her, and of every point of contact between them. Her breath came more quickly, and she felt her heartbeat speed up. He turned her hand over in his, so he could study her palm, and the gloved fingers smoothed over her wrist, sending shivers up her spine. The fairy lights spun around them, growing brighter and brighter, and he lifted her upturned hand to his mouth, smiled a secret little smile, and kissed her palm.

She came awake in a blaze of desire, to find her bed empty, her sheets tangled around her legs, and her palm tingling like mad. She flopped back against the pillows, frustrated, and ran her other hand through her hair. Light was streaming through her windows, and it was with a groan of frustration she remembered that today she was to drive up to visit Toby and her folks.

"Damn it, Jareth," she muttered, and got up and turned the shower on, cold.

Toby was nearly ten, and he was as mischievous as ever, but he'd stopped talking about his invisible friends. She wondered about it, at first, until her stepmother had left to finish dinner and her father had retreated to his office and it was just the two of them, sitting on the couch. Toby glanced around, then looked up at her seriously and a little nervously.

"Do you see Deeb anywhere?" He asked. And Sarah glanced around to find Deeb sitting on the back of an armchair, picking apart one of her stepmother's furniture throws.

"Get down from there," she told Deeb, and he grinned and stuck out his tongue, but he did get down and scurried over to sit on the floor at her feet.

He looked up at Toby, cocked his head to the side and said, "We play?"

Toby looked relieved. "Yeah," he said, "in a minute." He turned to Sarah, "I was worried that you couldn't see them, that you'd just been making it up. But you DO see them, don't you?"

"All the time," she said and smiled down at his earnest little face.

"Why doesn't anyone else see them?" He asked, and she hesitated for a minute.

"Because," she said, finally, "we're special."

"But why?" Toby said.

"King likes you, he does," said Deeb, surprising them both. Deeb nodded his head frantically, his ears flapping. "King likes you. King gave present. See us folk. For you, Toby."

"But why can Sarah see them?" Toby asked.

"Because what nobody know," said Sludge, crawling out from under the couch to join his friend. "What nobody know is King loved the girl, and gave her powers."

Sarah's heart skipped a beat and she went a little pale. Toby looked at her curiously, then made a face. "Love, yuck. Let's go play." He said, and the three of them whooped their way out of the house and into the yard.

In the kitchen, her stepmother was making a pie. She motioned Sarah to sit and put a bowl in front of her, filled with peaches.

"Can you peel and slice these for me?" she asked and handed her a knife. The peaches were ripe and in the sunlight they looked golden and decadent. Sarah picked one up and put the knife to it, and only then noticed how badly her hand was trembling.

"Sarah?" her stepmother said, " are you alright?"

"I'm... fine. I just don't care for peaches," she said and put the knife down. The peach mocked her.

"Oh for heaven's sakes, girl," her stepmother said and took the bowl away and handed her a bowl of peas instead. "I take it you don't have any prejudices against shelling peas?" Sarah smiled wanly.

"Not at all," she said, and set to work.

"Will you be coming to the Halloween party?"

"Party?"

"The Masquerade Ball your father's company is throwing. It's a strictly formal affair, not that you'd mind that of course, you're always dying for a reason to get dressed up in a fancy gown." Sarah bit her tongue to keep herself from retorting that she hadn't worn a "fancy gown" in years. "But you'll need a date. It just wouldn't do for you to come alone. There's this nice boy who works in your father's office that's single and about your age, I'm sure if I talked to him--"

"I have a date," she said, without thinking, and then immediately regretted it.

"You do? I knew you'd met someone! Leslie, down at the supermarket, told me that she'd talked to Ruth, she teaches History at the school, you know Ruth, and she said she'd heard a rumor that you were seeing someone at the school. Oh, who is it? Is he handsome?" Sarah wanted to sink through the floor. She hated being talked about, and it bothered her that a rumor had reached her stepmother. She heard a noise and glanced over by the refrigerator in time to see Sludge nudging the bowl of peaches towards the edge of the counter. The bowl was bigger than he was, and filled with peaches it was much heavier, but that never deterred goblins. He pushed steadily, and as if in a trance, Sarah found herself answering her stepmother.

"Yes, he's very handsome," she said.

"Well, what does he look like? Honestly, Sarah, you're like a steel trap with secrets."

"He's tall, blonde..." Sludge had gotten the bowl to the edge of the counter and was straining against it.

"And does Mr. Mysterious have a name?" A little further.

"Jareth," she said, and then with a mighty heave the bowl fell over the edge of the counter, shattering on the floor and splattering peach juice all over the tile.