Authors Note: This story came to me yesterday (Well, technically 28 hours ago) after being inspired with a plot bunny that struck me while reading one of Fangamerbowiexteme's stories, "To Forgive a Stolen Heart". Go read it, it is a lovely story. And I am ever grateful to my beta, Greenchimes, for taking the time to edit this story so quickly tonight and having me add things to it; she makes me see things I wouldn't have noticed, so I am so thankful to her. I should be writing on my other WIPS, but I had to get this one started since it came on so strongly. Shout out to the tribe at the LFFL. Please leave a comment, I'd love to know what you think!


Prologue

Two bodies lay still as death side by side on a bed in the Infirmary of the Castle at the Center of the Labyrinth. Two healers worked frantically to do all they could to remove the dark curse that was coursing through their veins. One anxious monarch looked on, waiting to see what could be done to save them.

"They are dying." The voice that spoke was bleak, but honest, as if there was nothing else to be said.

Another, higher pitched voice shrieked out, "The magic is moving too fast!"

Panic clenched the heart of the Labyrinth's monarch at hearing the words of the strongest healers the realm had ever known. The elder of the two had said there was only one way to save the ones being attacked by the dark magic; a sacrifice any decent person would agree to if the choice was between saving themselves or the ones they loved.

With a resolute nod, the monarch tried to not let the tremor of fear they felt be heard in their voice. "Do what you must. I will not lose them."

"But, Your Majesty, you'll lose everything. You won't remember anything, not even yourself." The younger of the healers whined.

"But they will live." The ruler snapped at the healers. "Do it."

"There will be pain unlike anything you've ever experienced. In fact, for you…you may not survive."

"I understand that. I don't matter. They are what matter. They…they will keep the kingdom strong. They don't need me."

"Your majesty…" The elder healer placed a calming hand on his sovereign's arm, "You matter. If it wasn't for you…"

"Yes, if it wasn't for me, they wouldn't even be in this situation, now would they? So, get on with it."

With a nod of his head, the elder healer turned to the shelf cabinet holding herbs, potions and other alchemies and poured the contents from a jar into a goblet of wine he conjured with a thought. He turned and held out the substance that would destroy a person he had come to respect. "You know it isn't true. You didn't cause this. Do not let that lie permeate your soul."

There were no tears in the ruler's eyes, just a sad acceptance and glint of denial. "No, this is because of me, and I will end it."

With no hesitation, the selfless sovereign of the Labyrinth placed the goblet against their lips and downed the contents in one gulp. The healers stood on either side of their ruler, then grasped their hands together and began to chant ancient words. Nearly as soon as the words began to be uttered, a hazy cloud of brown smoke began to hover over the head of the monarch, who began to squeeze the hands of the healers as they felt the effects of the potion they had drunk. Soon, an ear piercing scream filled the room, but the healers kept saying the words to the spell that would complete their task of erasing the monarch's existence from the lives of the ones they cherished the most. When the healers uttered the last words of the enchantment, the room went silent. When the haze cleared, their monarch promptly collapsed lifeless to the floor and the two bodies who had been lying on the bed began stirring.


Chapter 1: Going In Blind

To be startled awake by a baby whimpering at your breast is quite shocking, especially when you never remembered giving birth, being pregnant or doing any activities that would have caused said pregnancy to begin with. Yet the baby calmed once it latched itself to her nipple and began nursing. Nursing. Sure enough, when she grazed her fingers against where the child was attached, wetness dripped along the edges. She tested the roundness of the breast the baby wasn't using, and sure enough it was full and leaking. She was lactating. How was that possible?

She didn't know what to do. But she wasn't going to just cast the infant aside; she wasn't cruel. It was obviously hungry. Breastfeeding was something she was probably going to do someday in her life anyway when she had her own kids. It felt strange, but in a good way, like a soreness one felt in their muscles after a long run. A necessary pain, yet unfamiliar. She just needed to find out how she got in this situation.

But she couldn't see anything.

The room was too dark for her to see anything. In fact, all she could do was feel the softness of the mattress beneath her and the warmth of the baby on her chest.

Despite the panic of the manner she was awoken, she felt an odd calming effect at holding the child, being needed by the child for nourishment-as strange as it was to do when it wasn't her child and she shouldn't be lactating. She needed to know how she came to be in this room-it didn't smell right, too musty and dusty for her liking. She needed to get this child back to its mother.

Feeling the baby's mouth go lax after it's taken its fill, she placed it over her shoulder and began to pat its back…that's what you're supposed to do with babies, right? She was mostly going off instinct; it just felt like the right thing to do. She still did all of this blind.

She jerked at hearing a noise, as if feet were shuffling against a hard surface.

"Who's there?"

"It's alright, it's just me."

The gravelly voice was familiar, yet she couldn't place it. She held the baby closer to her, to protect it should this person be unkind.

"Who are you?"

"You know me, Sarah."

Sarah. The name tickled her mind, though she knew it to be a female name, and the voice she heard was certainly not female. "Your name is Sarah?"

"No…you're Sarah."

"I'm Sarah?" She whispered the question because for the first time since she'd awoken, she realized she didn't know anything about herself, not even her own name. She then placed the baby in her arms, cradling it, holding its head as it still felt unsteady. "Do you know what to do with this baby, where to find the mother?"

"The baby's mother?"

She was annoyed that the person just repeated her words and annoyed that they hadn't had the decency to turn on a light when coming into the room. "Can you please turn on a light? It is so dark in here I can't see anything." She felt along the bed beside her to find a spot to place the baby, then satisfied it would be secure there, she used her hands to cover up her chest, feeling for the buttons along her shirt. "If you're not going to tell me how to find the baby's mother, then I will go…"

"Sarah, she's your baby." The person was closer now, but for some reason they sounded lower, like they were kneeling on the floor.

"No she's not. I don't have a baby. I'm a virgin, how could I have a baby?"

"Sarah…"

"Why do you keep calling me that? That isn't my name."

"Then tell me what is." The person spat back.

What was her name? "I…I don't know. Okay."

"Hoggle, you leave the poor girl alone. You shouldn't even be botherin' the girl while she's nursing her babe. It's indecent."

This more feminine voice scolding the one she now knew was named Hoggle made her want to smile. But she didn't. There was no reason to smile through her extreme confusion. This woman echoed what the man had said; the baby was hers.

Subconsciously, she started shaking her head in denial. Her name wasn't Sarah. She didn't have a baby.

She swung her legs over the side of the bed and felt for the floor, which she still could not see. Her feet were bare and when she felt it beneath her, the floor was unpolished wood. She stood and cautiously took a high step, not wanting to shuffle her feet and chance getting splinters.

"My lady, what are you doing?"

My lady? That was new too, a title given to nobility. Who was she?

"I need to go."

"Go where, Sarah. Tell me so I can help you get there safely."

She felt a hand grasp her wrist and she wrenched her arm out of there grasp and shouted, "Will one of you please flip on the lights or turn on a flashlight or something! I would really like to be able to see!"

"Sarah, you're bl…"

"Hoggle, don't." The woman said. Then in a stern tone she stated to the man, "You need to leave."

"But…"

"Go, now. She needs to hear this from someone not so emotionally involved."

She stayed in one place while she listened to the two bicker, too afraid to take another step without being able to see where she was going.

"Sarah…"

"That's not my name." She responded on rote.

"It is, and you are going to have to get used to that fact. I take it you are very confused right now, and frightened and have no reason to trust those that are strangers to you. But please believe that me and my husband would never cause you harm. We've taken you and your babe, yes, she is yours, into our home because we love you and only want what's best for you."

"Are…are you my family?" She tried to recollect who the people were in her life that loved her or she loved. Those type of people were friends and relatives, right?

"In this place, we are the closest thing you have to family, yes." She heard the woman come closer to her, again closer to the floor than she thought a person should be. "Please, may I lead you to sit back down so we may speak comfortably?"

She nodded her head and felt a warm hand grasp her wrist and another push against her hip. The woman had led her back to the bed. The baby sighed and groaned at the movement of the mattress, making her reach out her hand to find it and place her hand on the soft swell of its belly to help placate it.

"See, your motherly instinct leads you to care for her."

At the woman's words, she gasped and quickly removed her hand from the child as if it was a burning flame. She shook her head and felt tears in her eyes, "No. No. How…? I've never been pregnant."

"Oh Sarah, how to explain…"

"Was…" She shuddered as she inhaled, "Was I raped?"

"No! No, dear heart. Your daughter was created in the greatest of loves."

"I was in love? To who? For how long? Where is he now?" The other woman was quiet. Why did she not answer her yet? "Please tell me something."

"I wish I could speak of him, but I cannot. Just know he loved you very much and gave up much to keep you and the babe safe."

Out of sheer curiosity, she asked, "What's the baby's name?"

"Honor. She was named by your husband."

"I was married?"

The woman groaned, "I've said too much."

She could accept that she had been with a man, but to have been in a committed relationship, she didn't want to be married. Marriages didn't work out, like her parents. On instinct, she reached her right hand over her left and sure enough, there was a ring on the designated finger of commitment.

"I don't want to be married. My parents got divorced." She blurted.

"You remember your parents?" The woman sounded surprised.

"No. I just know that they aren't together. I don't remember who they are. I can't even think of what they looked like. Why can't I remember my past? Why can't I remember who I am? Why am I blind?" She was sobbing by the time she reached her last words.

"I am sorry that many things must still be kept from you. But what I can say is you are a lovely woman with a kind heart. You make everyone you meet feel valued and special. And you gave up everything you knew to live a life full of love. Someone tried to cause harm to your babe, and when your husband tried to save her, he got harmed too."

"But he saved her." She said it with sadness, because if the child had been saved, that meant he had not. She would never get to meet him.

"Aye, she was saved at a great cost. And now you must care for her. You are everything she needs. She is all you can have of your past, all that's left of your husband."

And that was that.

She learned to embrace the name she was given, Sarah. She learned this kind woman's name was Kohzie, who turned out to be a dwarf, like her husband, Hoggle. They promised they would help her learn to live with her disability and would teach her all they could about being a mother as they had no children of their own. And they would show her their way of life. She found it hard to believe magic and creatures like goblins even existed. She felt so disconnected from this world, like it wasn't what she grew up with.

She came to the understanding that this world wasn't her original home, and no one in this world, the Underground they called it, had ever seen her world so they couldn't tell her anything about it. But she had dreams of operating a moving metal box on wheels that took her far distances, of a beautiful woman with long raven hair up on stage shining in the spotlight, of a little blonde boy running into her arms and rolling with her down a grassy hill all in giggles. She began to know their faces, but she never learned their names.

The city was always busy, always noisy, and at first it overwhelmed her senses. Her caretakers confirmed that up until the week she awoke damaged, she had her full capacities. Not having her memories or all senses, she had to learn certain things for the very first time, like walking for herself without aid. They provided her with a walking staff and showed her how to use it to find her own way. She learned to take counts of how many steps it was from the bed to the dresser, from the dresser to the washroom, from the washroom to the kitchen. Before venturing outside of the cottage, she wanted to feel comfortable in her own skin.

Living in the Goblin City that encompassed the Castle at the Center of the Labyrinth, she found that she and the baby were the only humans, or at least that's what she gathered from what the dwarf couple told her. Aptly named, the city was inhabited by goblins and other strange creatures that she wished she could see. Or maybe not if her other senses were to be believed. Some creatures smelled hideous, others she had to cover her ears, they were so loud.

Home life was blessedly peaceful. Hoggle and Kohzie embraced her with open arms and no expectations, which she found extremely generous. She offered to pay them for letting her live with them. While Hoggle had to attend to duties working at the Castle of the Labyrinth, it was Kohzie who taught her how to adapt to life without sight. The dwarf woman was patient and kind, but extremely stern whenever she tried to doubt herself. Whenever she thought she couldn't do something, Kohzie showed her how to manage or find an alternative solution. And she made her feel comfortable in asking for help. As Kohzie put it, life wasn't meant to be lived alone.

A few months into her stay, she started to feel bored. She couldn't see to read, there was no radio or television to listen to (whatever those might be, but she was certain they existed since they instantly came to mind-something perhaps then from her old life?). And there was only so many times she could feign interest in hearing Kohzie tell stories of life growing up in her village at the base of some mountain range in a far off distant land. So one day, she asked if they could find some way of her being useful outside of the house. Kohzie instantly had an answer. A friend of a friend of a cousin's neighbor was in need of an assistant at a dress shop in the Goblin Market.

Having a career where she worked with textiles felt strange. Her hands didn't feel coordinated; she had to teach them to do what she wanted them to do. She rather liked thinking critically and solving problems, like when her employer needed to have a roof repair done on his shoppe and she dictated to him the steps he should take and who to contact to go about doing it. She did get a pay raise, but she still had to sit in a corner and sort the product. She couldn't distinguish color, but she could feel the difference between Elvish made fabric from that made by the Fae. This turned out to be very useful to her employer when a troll merchant wanted to pass off counterfeit fabrics. She got extra pay for that as well.

Despite finding new purpose and usefulness in her life, she felt so helpless and had a sense of unfairness. She knew this wasn't the life she was meant to be living. Why had she lost everything?

Well, not everything.

She came to adore the child the dwarf couple insisted she take to her breast frequently each day, but it didn't start out that way. At first, she didn't want to accept what the dwarves told her; though her own body proved she was the child's mother. She had to admit, the changes in her body proved it was undeniable. She discovered physical differences to her body she thought she should have that only one who had given birth could achieve. Beyond her leaky breasts, her hips felt different when she walked, and parts of her body were rounder than she thought they should be. She learned she had the baby just four months prior to her bout of blindness and amnesia, though her mind was so far from believing it. She wanted to ignore the ache in her heart and guilt she felt when she let the baby cry and cry. Her mind wanted to deny the existence of the child, to maintain that it wasn't hers. But her conscience could only hold out for so long before her heart caught up with what she should have never denied. Oh, how she fiercely came to love the child. Her Honor.

So she accepted her name, Sarah, mother and citizen of the Goblin City, and went on living the best she could for the sake of Honor.