Sarah stayed up most of the night contemplating her situation.
She was in a cave under the crumbling castle at the centre of the labyrinth. She was a 'guest' of the Goblin King who had told her quite seriously that he was a vampire. He had also told her that they had unfinished business, though what that could be she couldn't think. He was also currently asleep in the spacious, but still spacially limited square of furs and padding that seemed to pass as a bed. That in itself was not what worried her- sharing it with him worried her.
He was near enough that she could lean down, shuffle forward just a smidge and he'd be close enough for her to shake his shoulder.
She didn't want to shake his shoulder but the fact was that she could. That frightened her when included in the same body of thoughts as the term 'vampire'.
She was sitting close to a vampire and his guards were outside and far more dangerous. At least Sarah knew the one she was sharing the bedding with. The others were complete strangers and that much more dangerous for it.
Not that she trusted Jareth. Even without being a vampire he was dangerous. He used magic as a tool, wielding it to hurt and destroy. She could forgive him for taking Toby perhaps because, yes, she had asked for it. And in this strange world where magic existed, it was possible that even Jareth might not have a lot of choice in the matter. She couldn't forgive him for anything else, though. Not for the cleaners, not for the peach, and not for the end.
She'd won it at the end. She'd got to the Castle and he'd still pushed her, slithered around her like the worm he was.
Sarah took a deep breathe and calmed the raging annoyance that surfaced.
But what else had he wanted from her? Had he really expected her to take the crystal and let him have Toby? Not a chance.
"Stop thinking," he said very clearly.
Sarah jerked upright, blinking rapidly and shrinking back into the wall as she noticed that his eyes were open. "I wasn't," she said quickly, though what she was denying she couldn't have said.
He propped himself up on an elbow and studied her with no trace of having been in any kind of sleep at all. "Perhaps we should take a walk," he invited, "Since you have things on your mind."
Walk. Walk where? And would there be other people on this walk? Would this walk take them somewhere isolated where a girl could be overpowered without more than a brief struggle? "I'm fine here," she said brightly.
"A walk," he decided. "In the ruins of the Labyrinth," he added.
Sarah shivered and didn't move.
He got up and began to dress again, rolling up the long stockings over his legs. The boots went on next but he ignored the jacket. "Shoes," he instructed impatiently.
Sarah unfolded slowly from her corner, cramped and more than hopeful that some miracle would prevent the excursion. But miracles seemed in short supply in her vicinity. It was possible Jareth's frown drove them away.
She stalled as she exited the room, caught by the neat row of silent, unmoving bodies laid so carefully on the ground.
"They won't wake if we are quiet," Jareth said in her ear, "You can talk. But be careful, they deserve their rest."
She nodded but chose not to say anything. The word 'vampire' was screaming in her brain and she bit her lip, edging around the minefield that Jareth walked through so easily. One wrong step and she didn't know what would happen.
And then Jareth disappeared into the dark of the corridor away from the Cathedral and she had no choice but to walk faster, trying to keep up with him. She left the cavern behind with a sigh of relief.
"Still suspicious, Sarah?"
To her admirable credit, she didn't make a sound. But Sarah attributed that to sheer fright that shot her heart up into her throat and froze her tongue. She did jump, though, and whirl around.
Jareth was leaning against the wall, hidden in dark but leaning forward into the dim light, mocking smirk curving his thin lips. He laughed and brushed passed her, beckoning her on with a toss of his blond head.
Sarah gulped. "Don't do that," she blurted out, relief bleeding into insane bravery, "The next time I'll kick. And it'll hurt."
"I don't doubt. But who it will hurt is yet to be seen."
"Where are we going?"
"Outside."
The sun, Sarah realized, was up. And shining, as a risen sun usually does during the brightness of day. Which sent her doubts seesawing through her mind once more. If Jareth was really a vampire, how was it even possible? She would catch him out, now. He would laugh at her for believing all that nonsense with vampires. After all, who said only vampires needed to… drink… blood…
Sarah didn't want to know. She ended the entire discussion with herself by almost running into Jareth's straight back as he stopped abruptly in the exit.
Her heart flew up again into her throat.
"Give me your hand," he said abruptly, turning on her, "We can't go out there."
"Why not?"
"Give me your hand."
"What's out there that's so bad?" she demanded.
He raised an eyebrow and simply held out his hand with the word, "Must I force the issue?"
Sarah reluctantly gave her hand up to his grip.
Unfortunately, he was wearing gloves. When he'd had the time to put on gloves she didn't know but her fingers only closed around cool, worn leather.
He barely gripped before he let go.
Sarah blinked and reminded herself that his method of moving from one place to the next was never forceful. Places simply faded around him. Perplexing, perhaps, and not a little inclined to make him more egotistical than he already was, but whenever she'd seen him disappear to somewhere else, he'd just vanished. No spells, no glitter- not even a brief squint of concentration. He just went. Wherever. And this dark, dusty room was no different.
'Dark', naturally, drove all other thoughts from her head.
"The goblins ran away," he told her unexpectedly, "Scattered. Some continue to stay in the Goblin City. Others simply went elsewhere."
"Where else is there to go?"
"Lots of places," Jareth informed her, "Sit down if you'd like."
Sarah looked to the dilapidated chair he indicated and thought that it looked as though it would collapse if she sat on it. Shaking her dark head, she moved closer to a niche dug into the wall. It held an exotic statue that looked vaguely familiar.
"I see you found my dancer."
"I saw something like this in a book, once. It's Indian, isn't it? It's very pretty." She reached out a finger to touch the miniature face. "What metal is it?"
"Bronze," Jareth said. He watched her poke at it very carefully and didn't bother to tell her to be careful. The statue was old and precious, but it wasn't irreplaceable. A lot of his collection was old and precious. It lost its spark after a while.
"Alright." Sarah straightened up and turned around. "Let's talk turkey. Why am I here? What did I do this time?"
"Why, Sarah," Jareth grinned, "Do I need an excuse to bring you down here?"
"Right, you just enjoy my company," she snapped, "Come on, tell me the truth."
In answer, he narrowed his eyes and looked her dead in the eye, leaning closer as though he would hear her thoughts if he concentrated enough. "You never call me by name," he commented, "Do you realize that?"
"I might. That has nothing to do with it."
"It has quite a lot to do with everything. You don't call me by title and you don't call me by name."
She shrugged helplessly. "I don't need to. I thought it was all over. With Toby, I mean. After Toby."
"Wrong. You felt me. I know that. And you never once called me." He stopped, raising an eyebrow and smirking in that provoking way of his. He even leaned against the wall on the other side of the closed window from her, resting on a crooked elbow with the other hand planted on a cocked hip.
All angles, Sarah thought, that was what Karen called it. The description fit. From the spiked locks of hair to the clean lines of his face and figure, he was all angular.
"Why was that, Sarah?"
"I didn't need to call you," she shrugged, "The whole thing was done when I got Toby back."
"Sarah, Sarah, Sarah," he laughed, almost singing the name in his smoky voice, "You really believe it was all over with Toby. You never once expected consequences?"
"Nothing that needs me to come back here," she said firmly. An awful thought presented itself. "You're not going to take him back, are you?"
"The baby? No. Unless you wish him away again."
"What happens if I do?"
"I'm not sure," Jareth returned.
Sarah nodded and twitched at the heavy curtain between them.
"It strikes me the room is abnormally dark for your eyes," Jareth murmured, suddenly grasping the edge of the curtain.
In reflex Sarah tightened her grip but the cloth only pooled at her feet, the railing broken. Uselessly she held on, eyes wide as she stared from the torn cloth to the Goblin King.
The Goblin King in turn stared out the window, directly up into the smoke-hazed sky. "A good day for these times," he assured her, "The fires must be tiring."
"What fires?"
"The forests," Jareth said, "The fieries left their lakes in search of the girl who cheated in their game." He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. "They set fire to the dry undergrowth."
"Oh."
"The arrogance in you leaves me breathless," Jareth continued softly, "The determination to pretend that nothing else exists beyond your thoughts and dreams. You throw responsibility out the window as though it were a broken toy."
Sarah found her tongue was having a hard time forming words. "I didn't do this," she managed, joining him at the window to stare wildly out over the lands. She almost expected to see bright flames leaping and dancing red-gold in the grey sky. "You can't blame this on me! It was all an accident."
She might just as well not have spoken.
"The strange part is that little girls like you are usually contained, kept hidden in one spot where you can do no damage. But when you get loose… oh, the fireworks."
He looked down at her, upper lip curling back in a snarl and a grimace, those sharp canines somehow longer and sharper than she had ever seen them.
And the flames. They didn't dance against a grey sky but they certainly danced in those black pupils. Pinpricks of red light that flickered and pulsed as the urges themselves did.
Sarah backed away, a moan caught in her throat.
Jareth only watched her, standing proud and unaffected in the sunlight, a mocking smile on his parted lips, a knowing hunger in his face.
Sarah sank into the chair and covered her head, not wanting to see this. If she pretended hard enough, this whole world would fade away. This whole place would disappear. There would be no Underground, no goblins, and no vampires. There would be no demonic King standing there with the light of human reason guiding his quick tongue.
"The Underground is not done with you, Sarah," Jareth told her. His voice echoed eerily around her ears. "Neither am I."
When she looked up he was gone.