Author's Notes: What, didn't the last chapter relieve anyone of their suspense and anxiety over the fate of the Goblin King? No? Ah... Well, read on...
Chapter Twelve: Mystery By Moonlight
It was a simple one-room cottage, with a bed on the far side of the room next to an old wooden chest. A table and single chair stood in one corner next to a small pantry, and by the front window was a writing desk. Opposite the fireplace was a large wardrobe twin to the one in her chambers at the castle. Not a single speck of dust could be seen, and the cottage looked like its owner had just stepped out and expected to return any moment.
Sarah knelt on the stone floor beside the Goblin King, wanting to touch him but not certain if she dared. Now that she was so close, she could see the slight rise and fall of his chest. He lived. For that alone, Sarah felt a rush of indescribable emotions. But just barely, she thought. Beneath his eyes were violet shadows, and smudges of dirt and dried blood ran down his cheek. His pale blond hair stuck out in bedraggled spikes, and the knuckles of his bare hands were scraped and battered, something that seemed most strangely vulnerable of all. Unable to help herself, Sarah reached out and brushed a strand of hair from the Goblin King's face and whispered his name.
His eyelashes fluttered, but he did not stir.
Sarah sat back on her heels. She couldn't leave him like this. Even in front of the fire, he was cold to the touch. Moving quickly, she rummaged through the chest on the far wall and found sturdy woolen blankets. Striping the sheets and thick coverlet off the bed, she heaped them on the floor and laid the silk over the rough wool. Sliding one corner of the pallet beneath the Goblin King's shoulder, she was able to roll him over and off the stone floor. Tucking the pillow beneath his head and wrapping the coverlet around him, she stepped back, satisfied, then went to retrieve her pack from Rumor's saddle.
Less than an hour later, the last of her water from the waterskin was bubbling in a small copper pot over the fire. Sarah stirred in some pieces of dried meat, apprehensive about her lack of cooking skills that didn't involve a microwave. She was so deeply engaged in watching to make sure the pot didn't boil over that she almost didn't hear the Goblin King stir. Turning around quickly with a wooden ladle in her hand, Sarah found two mismatched eyes gazing narrowly back at her.
"If you've come to finish the job," said the Goblin King in a rasping voice, "You've chosen a remarkably ineffective weapon."
Sarah flushed and put down the ladle. Even bundled up on the floor like an invalid, the man could still make her feel like a fool.
"You're alive."
"Disappointed?" Jareth asked with a slight sneer. "Believe me, so am I. Death would have been a welcome end after the events of the past few days. Instead, I find myself here with the very last person I desired to see."
The words were as harsh as a blow, but she shrugged them off, spooning hot broth into a small wooden bowl.
"You can't always get what you want." She set the bowl on the hearth to cool. "Not even you."
Jareth gave her a pointed look. "That much is painfully obvious."
Sarah ignored him and nodded at the bowl. "Drink this."
"No." he replied flatly.
"No?"
"Odd, this cottage never had an echo before. I said 'No', and I meant it. My circumstances might be greatly reduced, but I'll be damned if I'm lowering myself to eating goat soup."
Sarah stared at the bubbling pot in horror and disbelief. "I've been eating goat?"
"So it would seem." The Goblin King sounded tired, but a faint smile played upon his lips.
"It doesn't matter." Sarah ignored the sudden queasiness of her stomach. "It's food, and you look like you haven't eaten in days. You need this."
Jareth's eyes narrowed. "I believe I've already stated my feelings on the matter."
"You have." Sarah was calm now. "But I believe you don't have the the strength to stop me, should I decide to pour it down your throat. You can force me to test my theory, or we can skip that unpleasant charade and you can drink the soup."
The Goblin King was silent for some time, simply looking at her, and Sarah feared he might call her bluff.
"You've changed." he said mildly. With great effort, he eased himself to a sitting position.
Sarah sagged in relief. "Many things have changed."
Jareth drank slowly, his eyes never once leaving her face. When he finished, he wordlessly handed the bowl back to her, accidentally brushing his fingers against her own. The slight contact was electric, and she jerked her hand away. She looked quickly at the Goblin King, but Jareth appeared not to notice. He lay back on the pallet, arms crossed beneath his head, and Sarah once more found herself under his piercing scrutiny. She had a feeling she was about to pay for her small victory.
"Tell me, Sarah. Why are you here?"
"I want to make things right." She carefully avoided his gaze and busied herself stirring the pot. "I said some things that I didn't mean to say, and... I didn't mean to wish you away. I made a mistake."
"Just the one?" The Goblin King inquired silkily. "How generous of you to acknowledge it. But how naive of you to think you can fix so easily that which has been broken."
"I didn't say I thought it would be easy! But now that I've found you, we can go back," Sarah's eyes were wide and beseeching. "You can return to the castle and save the Labyrinth."
Jareth twisted irritably, as if he wanted to throw off the blankets. "What, the shining knight to the rescue again? Haven't you listened to a word I've said?" he snapped. "It's not that easy. All of this didn't happen overnight, it's been leeching through my kingdom like a slow poison for four years. There is nothing more I can do."
"Don't say that," she begged. "Hoggle, Sir Didymus... all the goblins. They're depending on you. You love this kingdom, I know it. You can prevent it from being destroyed."
"Ahh, Sarah." Jareth leaned back on the pillow and closed his eyes. "Still so young. You don't yet know what it is to see what you love come to ruin."
Sarah drew her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. "It must be terrible." she said quietly.
The Goblin King opened his eyes and gazed at her with a strange mixture of anger and something else... longing?
"Perhaps one day you'll find out." he said simply, turning his face away.
Sarah added another log to the fire and watched him from the corner of her eye.
"I want you to know that I never intended for all this to happen." she said softly. "I didn't want you to die just because I--"
"Made a wish?" The Goblin King still did not look at her. "Indeed not. You never intend to do any harm, as I recall. Just as you never intended to put your baby brother's life in danger all for a selfish whim. Regrettably, your good intentions aren't much protection for the people you harm."
Sarah winced and swallowed hard against the rising lump in her throat. She deserved that.
Jareth shook his head slowly and spoke to the shadows flickering on the wall. "Wishes have power here, Sarah. You still don't understand that, after all you've experienced in my Labyrinth."
"I know that now. And even though it may not be worth very much... I'm sorry." The last part was choked out and Sarah rubbed her sleeve across her eyes, glad his gaze wasn't on her. She watched him in awkward silence, then cleared her throat. "That wound... It needs washing."
At her mention of it, Jareth seemed to go cold and still as a marble statue.
"I can see that it's hurting you, and that might mean it's infected." she continued cautiously. "Hoggle gave me some medicine, it might help."
Sarah unwrapped the clumsy bandage around her hand and held out her palm for the Goblin King to see.
"I stabbed myself with a firethorn yesterday, and you can barely see it today. It doesn't even hurt at all."
It was true, the deep puncture had already become a pinkish star-shaped scar on her palm. But Jareth did not look at it. Instead, he stared at Sarah with something akin to fear in his eyes.
"You bathed it? In the river?"
"Of course." Sarah replied, a little affronted. "I do know a little something about first aid, I'm not a total idiot. And the river water was clean, I drank it with no problems."
But Jareth appeared not to hear. "Blood," he murmured under his breath, "Blood in the water. Gods..."
"What are you talking about?" Sarah asked, alarmed. Did he know something about her vision in the river?
Jareth just shook his head, tight-lipped. "Nothing you need know."
"All right, there's no need to tell me," Sarah replied in exasperation, getting to her feet and grabbing a bucket lying in the corner. "We can clean that cut out and bandage it. I'll get some more water from the lake."
"Not there! Never there." Jareth cried, dragging himself to a half-sitting position so quickly that he gasped and his hand flew to his side. "There's a spring behind the cottage, fetch all your water from it. Don't go near the pool."
Sarah's first instinct was to ask why, but Jareth collapsed back on the bed, his face white. She took a step toward him, but he shook his head, his voice strained.
"Just go. Fetch the water, and I will wash it myself."
Sarah hesitated, biting her lip. She turned and left the cottage.
"My friend, we have a rather serious problem."
Hoggle was used to hearing similar phrases from Sir Didymus by now, whose skill in art of mild understatement was newly infamous among the goblins. According to the little knight, a castle full of vomiting goblins had been "an untidy domestic situation", the out-of-control brushfire started by an errant weed-puller was "a slight grounds-keeping error" and Ludo bellowing in his sleep and nearly collapsing the north wall with his rock-calling was "a poor communications issue". He'd treated them all as minor annoyances, and sure enough, had dealt with them swiftly and effectively. If Hoggle wasn't certain of Didymus' utter sincerity, he'd swear the little knight enjoyed having one chaotic mess after another to straighten out.
But if Sir Didymus was admitting there was a serious problem, Hoggle needed to sit down and prepare for the worst. This time, however, he was taking no chances. His Acting-Majesty sat on a wobbly three-legged stool a safe distance from the throne, with a chicken crate as his desk. He sat there now and braced himself for what would assuredly be terrible news.
"All right, tell me."
Sir Didymus nodded. "Perhaps you are aware of the heatwave?"
Hoggle mopped his brow. In the past few days it had grown unbearably hot, hotter than the oldest goblin had ever remembered it getting since the year-of-the-broken-umbrella. The sun was scorching, baking the earth until it resembled an overdone loaf of bread. Hoggle wrung out his handkerchief into a bucket by the side of his stool and wiped his forehead again. In contrast, Sir Didymus looked cooler than an iced turnip, with not a hair out of place.
"Go on."
"Clearing up the minor grounds-keeping issue we discussed earlier required a great deal of water," began Sir Didymus. "But we were fortunate enough to save The Goat and Potato."
Inwardly, Hoggle groaned. The Goat and Potato was a goblin tavern near the junkyard below the castle, difficult to distinguish from the junkyard itself except that it smelled even worse. Quite frankly, he'd rather it burned to the ground, although he supposed that open flames near a stockpile of rhum would've yielded truly calamitous results.
"Thank goodness," he said out loud. "What is it then?"
"Using so much water has caused the level of the wells to drop considerably." said Sir Didymus with regret. "And with no rain, I fear our water supply may soon run dry."
Hoggle cursed. He hadn't even thought of that. "Well, what can be done about it?"
"Verily, I have given it much thought. The remaining water can be rationed carefully to last, and the goblins can be given extra rhum."
"And how is the supply of rhum?"
"Ample," replied Sir Didymus, "For the time being. We must gamble that the rains will replenish the wells before it runs out."
Hoggle shuddered. A castle full of hot, cranky goblins and no rhum would be anarchy, and it would be every dwarf for himself.
"Ration the water," he said to Sir Didymus, "And put out the fires. We can't have more accidents like yesterday's now, we can't afford to use the last of our water."
"Excellent decree, Acting-Majesty." said the knight approvingly. "I will see that it is done. We can but hope for our luck to change, and perhaps my lady will return with the King."
Hoggle thought of the thorn-vine. Without the goblins burning it off, it would be mere days before it took over again.
"If he does return, he might not have a kingdom to rule." he said grimly. "We'd better all hope for rain, instead."
He didn't know how those words would come back to haunt him.
The spring gushed clear and cold from a gap between two large boulders, first spilling into a shallow stone shelf worn gently concave by the water's passing, then further down into a small pool. Moss grew like deep green velvet, softening the edges of the rock surrounding the water with clusters of purple and white violets and occasionally, the bold scarlet and yellow flash of wild columbine. Sarah filled her bucket, then quickly splashed her face and hands in the cool water. She looked longingly at the pool below the spring. It seemed like ages since she'd had a proper bath. As soon as she could, she'd have one, cold water or not.
When she returned with the water, Jareth lay quiet with his eyes closed, but she could tell from his breathing that he did not sleep. Sarah moved the soup pot off to the side and poured some water in a larger kettle to warm. She poured the rest in a shallow washtub and placed it near the Goblin King's pallet along with a clean handkerchief from her pack.
"There's bread and cheese in the pantry if you're hungry." He spoke so suddenly that Sarah jumped a little.
"There wasn't anything there when I looked earlier." she said hesitatingly, not wanting to contradict him in his uncertain temper.
"Look again."
Sure enough, now there was a fat little wheel of cheese and a loaf of brown bread. Sarah glanced back at the Goblin King, who still hadn't moved.
"How did you do that?"
"I didn't."
"Then how--"
"It's the cottage itself." Jareth braced himself with both hands and sat up, pushing the coverlets to one side. "It tries to anticipate your needs."
Sarah took the bread in both hands. It certainly felt and smelled real. She tore off a chunk and sliced into the cheese, which oozed from its hard rind like butter. Smearing it over the bread, Sarah ate hungrily.
"Like my chambers at the castle." she said after a while. "It knows what I want?"
"Nobody could anticipate that." replied the Goblin King testily. "You don't even know it yourself. It knows what you need, that's entirely different. You may express whatever desire you like, but the spell has its limits."
Sarah had her back half-turned to him, and now she could hear the tentative splashing of water. At least he was talking to her again. Although, she was quick to correct herself, she didn't see why she should care.
"That's useful." she ventured.
"Quite."
Jareth scrubbed several days' worth of dirt off his face and neck, then surveyed the ruins of his shirt. It was little more than rags, but some of the shreds of silk were molded to his back with sweat and blood. Removing them would be painful, but it had to be done. Only he couldn't possibly do it himself. He glanced over at Sarah, who was feigning deep interest in the loaf of bread and edging nervously toward the door. The Goblin King gritted his teeth. He hated this part.
"Sarah," he said in as casual of a tone as he could manage, "I believe I require your help."
The process was tedious and long. Sarah gingerly soaked the remains of the shirt on Jareth's back with warm water until they could be pulled away from the skin in strips. Sitting in a chair by the light of the window, he bore it stoically, although Sarah wondered how he could. Bruises and bloodied weals criss-crossed his pale back and each one had to be painstakingly washed out and Hoggle's ointment applied. Jareth did as much as he could, and then it was time to deal with the gash on his side. He gritted his teeth and scrubbed at it with the warm water and soap, flushing it out well with clean water. The pain was like tearing his flesh anew, and when he was done, he wiped the sweat from his face with shaking hands.
"The cuts and scratches will heal quickly, but that's a bad cut." said Sarah in a low voice. Something sparked in her memory, the ringing of steel against steel. "What happened to you?"
The Goblin King's face took on a dark, shuttered expression. "It's no one's concern but my own."
"I'm sorry," she said apologetically, "I don't mean to pry. It's... It just seems like it's something I should know."
"Once again, you are wrong." Jareth bandaged his side with tight, angry motions. He raised himself from the chair and opened the wardrobe, pulling out a fresh shirt. From a small drawer he took out a pair of leather gloves, which he quickly drew on before picking up a clean pair of breeches. He turned and gave Sarah a look of amused irritation.
"I believe that according to your custom Aboveground, some privacy is in order. Your choice, of course."
Sarah blushed and quickly whirled around. There was more splashing of water, and she tried not to think of what might be going on behind her back.
"You might think of a bath yourself," said the Goblin King, with more than a hint of dark amusement in his voice. "I promise you, I'm in no condition to spy upon you."
Glad to have an excuse, Sarah grabbed the soap and ran.
The pool by the spring was cold, but Sarah didn't mind. After making sure there were no eyes upon her, Goblin King's or otherwise, she stripped off her traveling clothes and stepped into the water. Pulling up handfuls of mint, she lathered soap and scrubbed her hair, combing out the wet strands with her fingers. It was a relief to be clean again, and she hated having to pull on her old clothes to walk back to the cottage in the fading light.
Thankfully, the Goblin King was fully dressed and rummaging through the wardrobe. He tossed her a white shirt and loose silk breeches. "A bit large, but it will have to do."
Sarah waited until he'd turned his back, and dressed hastily by the fire. A fine-toothed comb of ivory lay on the hearth, carved with birds and flowers. She sat and worked out the tangles from her hair as Jareth watched her disquietingly from a dark corner.
"It's funny you said that earlier," said Sarah, drying her hair by the fire. She glanced at Jareth from the corner of her eye. "Blood in the water. After the firethorn got me, I had a strange day dream..."
The Goblin King visibly stiffened, but kept his voice nonchalant. "Do tell."
Sarah told him of her vision in the reflection of the Merandanon while she put away the kettle and bundled up the ragged remains of the shirt into a corner. She described the sapphire crown, and the man whose face was in shadow. She even told him of the strange nightmares she'd had at home, of an endlessly flowing river and the hall of bones.
Jareth was silent for a long time.
"A dream," he said, gazing into the fire. "Nothing more."
He walked to the window, favoring his bandaged left side and leaning heavily on the sill for support. The moonlight on his face revealed a man exhausted, shadows once more beneath his eyes.
"The hour grows late." He turned from the window. "Take the bed. I will sleep by the fire."
Wrapped in an extra blanket, Sarah curled up on the down mattress. The moon slipped through the front windows, a cool silver beam of light across the cottage floor. In the hearth, the dying embers of the fire glowed red and black, and the Goblin King turned restlessly on his pallet. He did know something, Sarah was sure of it. She'd watched his face as she described what she'd seen, and there was something like fear, then resignation. Those images held only mystery for her, but they meant something to Jareth.
Nothing more than a dream, thought Sarah.
She didn't believe him.
Author's Note: White raven, I'm honored that you think my story worthwhile to link to in your LJ. Thank you, and I hope the rest of it so far hasn't disappointed your high expectations.
And on a related note, thanks to everyone who gave the story a chance even if it didn't sound particularly exciting. I don't think it covers much new Labyrinth fanfic ground myself, but it doesn't mean a writer can't try to cover familiar territory in their own fashion. I appreciate all your comments, which persuade me to believe I am succeeding in some small measure.
I've also been doing pretty well about updating every week/week-and-a-half or so, and don't foresee any hiatus in writing for the future, for the reviewer who expressed concern about that. Working on this story is a little treat to myself at the end of the day, and I cannot give it up. You are stuck with me until this is done.
Comments/reviews welcome.