Author's note: There's some gore in this chapter (at the very end).

"That was definitely a K."

"Afraid not, precious, but close, alphabetically speaking."

"L?"

"Excellent."

Sarah closed her eyes and concentrated on the feel of Jareth's finger on her bare back. "I?" she said.

"Your skills are unparalleled."

"C?"

"Very good."

She turned her head to look at him. "Are you writing LICK ME on my back?"

He shrugged and lay down next to her on the pile of cushions and blankets that had somehow made their way from the bed to the floor. "You couldn't recognize my more complicated word choices, so I felt it best to keep things simple."

She rolled her eyes and then licked his nose. "Happy now?"

He smiled and bounced a cushion off of her forehead. "Very."

She reached across the floor for her shirt and trousers. "I really should have included more of your juvenile sense of humor in the play," she said, pulling the shirt over her head.

He grabbed the shirt and pulled it back up over her head. "What's your hurry?"

"No hurry, I'm just a bit chilly."

He tossed the shirt aside and pulled her back down into the blankets and cushions. "Then let me warm you."

Sarah laughed. "Not that I don't enjoy your insatiability, but I'm not sure how much I have left in—"

"I wasn't suggesting that." He lay back and stretched one arm across the floor. "Just lie with me."

She felt of prickle of something unfamiliar—a mix of butterflies, and competing impulses to do what he asked and find an excuse not to.

Look, it's not like he's asking you to marry him.

She smiled awkwardly and lay down, resting her head on his chest. She felt his arm wrap around her waist and pull her closer. Warmth seemed to radiate from his body to hers.

"Your heartbeat is crazy," she said.

"How so?"

"It's like, fast and then slow. Irregular."

"I'm hardly regular."

She laughed and pressed herself tighter against him, enjoying the sensation of his skin on hers. "Yeah, you're right about that."

They lay in silence for a moment. She grew warmer and gradually suspected that he was magicking her warm, which she certainly didn't mind.

"Make me a crystal, would you?" she asked him after a few minutes.

"Whatever for?"

"You know what for."

He sighed and produced a glass sphere, letting it hover in the air for a moment before it deposited itself into her open palm. "Your hyper-competitive side would be charming if I didn't feel so humiliated."

Sarah moved the crystal expertly between her hands. "Yeah, like I could ever make a dent in your self-confidence."

"Much as I'm loathe to admit it, certain dents come rather easily, given that you have actually accomplished things beyond the manipulation of crystal balls."

Sarah laughed. "And you haven't?"

When he was silent she stopped moving the crystal between her hands and propped herself up on one elbow to look at him. "Wait a minute, are you serious? You actually don't think you've accomplished anything?"

He raised an eyebrow. "I hardly think presiding over a kingdom of magical lowlifes and tormenting wishers count as accomplishments."

She twirled a strand of his hair around one finger. "So…why don't you do something?"

He seemed genuinely surprised. "Like what?"

"Like…anything. You've got a lot of fascinating thoughts. You could write them down."

"And who would deign to read them?"

She shrugged. "I would."

"Would you, now?"

She lay back down in the crook of his arm. "I'm not saying I'd LIKE what you wrote, just like I was never sure that you'd like what I wrote. But I'd at least read it." She went back to moving the crystal back and forth between her hands. "Not that the judgment of a mere mortal would matter to you anyway."

He took the crystal and levitated it just beyond her reach, laughing when she tried to grab it. "Not in the slightest."

She continued to reach and he continued to pull the crystal further away until finally it vanished with a pop, and she playfully swatted his hand. "Now who's humiliating who, you monster?"

He kissed her suddenly, his lips traveling up her cheek to her ear, and she forgot her feigned outrage. "Would you really read something that I wrote, Sarah?"

She cupped his chin, smiling at him without any hint of sarcasm. "Of course I would. I like the way things arrange themselves in your head."

He blinked. "I do not believe anyone has ever said this to me."

She stuck her tongue out at him. "We're full of surprises, mortals."

He smiled down at her with that look of wonder that always made her feel slightly giddy. "Indeed you are."

As the ground ceased its shaking, a horrible, alien keening sound echoed off the walls of Jareth's bedroom and grew louder and louder with each passing second.

Sarah realized it was her.

Her whole body heaved with painful, wracking sobs. At some point she realized she was screaming obscenities at whatever forces had taken him away, colorful and nonsensical threats that poured out of her uncontrollably, though she wasn't sure that anyone could hear them.

Eventually she stopped crying and forced herself to breathe deeply. Gone. He's…gone.

Lori and Jaye were also gone—safely back in Lori's apartment, she imagined. She stood up on unsteady legs and stared at the room around her as if to confirm that it was still intact—the bed, the pillows, the desk. She ran to the window and confirmed that the castle and the labyrinth, at least, were still here. Not that another round of furious shaking couldn't decimate the whole place at any time.

She realized that her feet were taking her down the hallway to the throne room, where the goblins were all sitting motionless, their complete silence much more frightening than any moments of out-of-control mayhem had ever been.

She had no idea what to say to them.

She heard more footsteps and saw Hoggle, Didymus, and Ludo entering the throne room from the opposite side. They looked as shocked as the goblins.

"My lady," Didymus said quietly, stepping down off of Ambrosius. "Didst thou…I regret that I must say the words, but…didst thou commit an act of murder?"

"No!" Sarah stared at all of them, the way their eyes seemed to accuse her. "No, I didn't—I would never—I didn't know he was going to do this! I swear, I never thought—I would have stopped him—"

Would you have, though? If it was between him and Jaye?

You might have. But then you would have hated him AND hated yourself. And he couldn't have that.

The extent to which Jareth had read her correctly was unnerving.

Sarah wrung her hands, wishing that someone would yell at her, condemn her, do anything but fix her with that blank-eyed stare. "What…what happens now? To this place, to all of you?"

Hoggle shrugged. "Dunno. He's the only king we ever had. Maybe they'll send us a new one."
He grimaced slightly. "Or maybe they'll just turn this place into a tree and make us all birds, ye can never tell w' them."

As if in response, the castle began to shake again. Sarah gripped the edge of the throne. She'd always known that injuries sustained on this side of the mirror remained on the other side, but…could she die here?

The shaking gradually subsided, but the relief that Sarah felt was replaced by a shriek of surprise when she happened to glance at a particular section of the throne room wall.

Where words were slowly appearing.

It was as if an invisible hand held an invisible paintbrush dipped in bright black paint, which splattered letters on the stone wall. The letters looked vaguely similar to Goblin, but she couldn't read them.

She glanced at Hoggle, Didymus, and Ludo. "Anyone know what that means?"

Hoggle's voice was uneasy. "Up the stairs," he said. "One only."

Sarah glanced at the spiral staircase in one corner of the room that had, at one time, led her to the massive chamber of logic-defying staircases. "I guess the labyrinth…wants to talk," she said quietly.

Hoggle snorted. "They weren't never much for talking before."

Sarah's eyes were locked on the staircase. "Well, I have to try." She took a step forward.

She heard Hoggle clear his throat behind her. "Sarah…I know you ain't little anymore, but this…this is a bad idea."

Didymus looked grave. "I fear I must agree with my brother, fair maiden. It should be one of us who faces them. Our deaths would be of less consequence."

Hoggle glared at him. "Speak for yourself."

Sarah tried to tamp down the fear that was rapidly spreading through her whole body. "You really think they'd…kill me?"

Hoggle threw up his hands. "That's just it, there's no telling. The things what run the Labyrinth, they…ain't kind. They ain't mean, either. They just sorta are."

Sarah swallowed hard. "Uh huh."

"Which means, like, you bein' mortal and way beneath them, they might just kill ye. Or turn ye into a mouse, if it amused 'em."

The pounding of her own heart in Sarah's ears became deafening. She remembered the fear in Jareth's voice when he'd talked about dealing with the powers behind the labyrinth. She tried to remember that she'd faced truly terrifying things in her own run through the labyrinth, and she had succeeded.

That all seemed like a very long time ago, though.

She rolled up her sleeves with a confidence she definitely didn't feel. "Still going."

Hoggle's mouth fell open, but Didymus placed a hand on his chest and bowed his head slightly. "My lady, I thank thee for showing me, once in my brief life, an expression of true love."

Sarah laughed, though she knew that she had to move quickly before panic rooted her feet to the floor. "I'd say it's closer to madness than love, noble sir, but maybe they're not so different."

She turned back toward the staircase and jumped when a hand closed firmly around her arm. She heard Didymus gasp as she turned around.

Hoggle gripping her arm and staring at her with a fierce expression she'd never seen before.

"Dammit, Sarah." The words sounded strangled. "He ain't worth dyin' for."

She gently removed his hand and knelt down until they were at eye level. She could see tears pooling in his eyes.

"I don't intend to die," she said.

"Nobody ever intends t' die! But you do, all the time, you Aboveground things, ye break like old firewood…"

Sarah pulled Hoggle tightly against her and he struggled for only a moment. Eventually he groaned in resignation.

"Ye couldn't take a leaf outta my book, just once? Play the coward instead of the hero?"

She pulled back and kissed his forehead. "You know you're not as much of a coward as you claim to be. And I…I did this. I'm the reason he's gone, I'm the reason this whole place might be gone soon, so if there's consequence-facing to be done, well…"

Hoggle sighed. "Just…be a little humble, all right? Might save yer life."

She smiled, though she could feel the fear seeping back into her bones. "I'll try."

She turned and started up the staircase at a run before she could stop herself.

Instead of the open archway that had once led to the staircase room, at the top of this staircase Sarah was met by a door.

Under normal circumstances that wouldn't have been a surprise—the labyrinth and its castle were full of doors and gates. But this door was, to put it mildly, wildly out of place in the castle.

It was made of metal, with a greenish coat of paint that seemed to be peeling slightly. There was a small, rectangular opening in the middle that might have been a mail slot. The doorknob was silver.

Sarah recalled what Jareth had told her about how the powers behind the labyrinth often presented themselves—to him they'd been a lake of fire and a roomful of knives. Was that sort of thing what waited for her behind this door?

Probably best not to think about it for too long.

She gripped the doorknob and opened the door…

…to reveal the offices of Sayles and Cullingford.

Or if not the exact offices, an eerily accurate replica.

There were the eternally dusty Venetian blinds, the cheap-looking desks piled high with file folders, the faint smell of tobacco (technically no one was supposed to smoke, but it was obvious that people did after hours), the sound of phones ringing. The place where she'd spent the most miserable six months of her post-university life.

The internship had been a favor from her father when she was having trouble getting a foot in the door anywhere, even though she'd never wanted to be a lawyer. Just try it for a bit, he'd said. You're a performer, law can be a way to channel that. Law school might work for you.

She was grateful to Sayles and Cullingford for one thing, at least—filling her with so much existential dread that she'd sworn she'd never work in a place like that again, and had thrown herself wholeheartedly back into theater and waitressing to support herself, financial instability be damned.

Part of her wanted to laugh. The labyrinth could have chosen so many appearances as a way to frighten her, could have dredged up any number of childhood memories…but no, this was what it had chosen.

The more she thought about it, the more she realized this was really the ideal choice. She'd only been in the room a few seconds and she already felt mildly ill.

People—at least they looked like people—were scattered throughout the room seated at various desks, typing on computers and talking into phones. Their movements had an oddly dance-like quality, as if they were all performing a choreographed routine.

A woman with her hair in a tight bun who bore a striking resemblance to Genevieve, Sarah's old boss, sat at the desk closest to the door. She looked up when Sarah cleared her throat.

"You're an Abovegrounder," she said. Her voice sounded human, but strangely flat, sort of close to computer-generated voice technology.

"Yes." Sarah's voice was a squeak, and she cleared her throat again. "I, uh, move between the two worlds, though."

Not-Genevieve cocked her head and stood up. As she moved closer it took all of Sarah's willpower not to shriek.

She'd initially taken the thing in front of her to be a human woman, one who bore a specific resemblance to someone she once knew. Up close, though, she could see that whatever this thing was, it was…not human. Its face was vaguely egg-shaped and the color of faded white wallpaper, with two sunken pools of blackness where eyes should have been. It had no nose. Its mouth, similarly, was a circle of blackness with no teeth or lips. Set against that uncanny template, its very realistic-looking hair and clothing were all the stranger.

Not-Genevieve reached out to touch Sarah's forehead with a long, too-smooth finger, and Sarah did her best not to recoil. "Hmmm," she said. "An in-betweener. We don't see many of you anymore." She gestured for Sarah to sit in a chair that seemed to have materialized out of nowhere. "You'll do, I suppose."

Still trying to process everything that she was seeing and hearing (but grateful that, for the moment at least, the powers behind the labyrinth had decided not to dismember her), Sarah sat down. On the desk in front of her were two large sheets of parchment covered in writing that she couldn't decipher.

The woman-thing was rifling through a desk drawer. "I'll just need a few signatures," she said, as though this were an everyday occurrence.

Sarah's eyes darted back and forth between not-Genevieve and the papers. "What…what are these? What am I signing?"

The woman-thing located an oversized ballpoint pen and set it on the desk. "The first one's a notice of decommissioning." At Sarah's blank stare, she continued. "The labyrinth will no longer be a repository for wished-away children. We're…closing up shop, as you might say."

"Closing…just like that? Is the place just, like, going to vanish into thin air?"

Not-Genevieve made a very awkward sound that might have been laughter. "No, of course not. It's a perfectly decent magical space full of beings that are invested in its presence. And it might be useful again one day." She looked momentarily thoughtful, though it was hard to tell given the lack of movement in her eye-holes. "If not wished-away children, maybe it'll be a place for socks."

"Socks?"

"Yes." Her tone indicated that this was the most natural thing in the world. "Mortals are always losing one sock. They come up with all sorts of excuses for why it happens, when actually it's magical beings stealing them and taking them to the alternate-universe sock repository. It's getting overcrowded, though. The labyrinth could be useful in that way." Not-Genevieve leaned in slightly, and Sarah again fought the urge to recoil. "We understand it's pure torture for you, not being able to find that other sock."

Sarah nodded slowly, realizing that this being's equation of lost socks with actual pain and torture could certainly work in her favor. "Yeah. It's, uh, the absolute worst."

Sarah glanced down at the paper nearest to her. "So…when I sign this I'm just acknowledging that wished-away children won't go to the labyrinth anymore, right? I'm not agreeing to the place being demolished or vanished or any of its current inhabitants being eliminated?"

"Yes, yes," not-Genevieve said, sounding slightly impatient.

"What about those…earthquakes?"

"That was your king's doing—tampering with the order of things in a magical realm is never a wise choice. Now that he's gone there may be aftershocks for a time, but they'll cease eventually."

Sarah picked up the pen. He never lied to me. Who knows if this thing can lie…not like I can do much of anything but trust it.

She cleared her throat. "It's not like I really have a choice, right?"

The woman folded her arms. "My experience with humankind tells me you'll respond better if I let you believe that you do."

Sarah swallowed. Pick your battles.

She signed her name in ink that looked suspiciously like blood. As soon as she finished, the piece of paper floated slightly off of the desk, rolled itself up, and vanished with a small shower of glitter.

"Right, now this one," not-Genevieve said, tapping her finger against the other sheet of paper.

"What does it say?"

The woman cocked her head at Sarah. "Does it really matter?"

"Uh…" Sarah remembered what Hoggle had said about being humble. "I'd just like to know what I'm signing before I sign it, that's all."

Not-Genevieve sighed. "Suffice it to say that it concerns the former Goblin King's torture and exile."

Sarah gasped before she could stop herself. "Torture and exile? But why—"

She paused as the meaning of the woman's last word sunk in. Her heart gave a leap. "Wait…so he's not dead?"

"Death is a very mortal concept." If the woman-thing had had a nose, Sarah was fairly sure it would have been turned up. "What happened to the Goblin King is likely beyond your mortal mind's ability to comprehend, though I might explain his current situation as…tumbling about in the ether." She glanced down at the paper and ran her fingers over it. "Or floating, depending on the nature of the wind." She tapped the paper more insistently. "If you could just sign—"

"It was my fault, why he did what he did," she blurted. "He shouldn't be tortured and exiled for it."

Not-Genevieve moved her body in a way that resembled a shrug. "The reason is irrelevant. There were rules and he defied them too many times. What's said is said."

Sarah gritted her teeth. At least she was learning where Jareth had gotten his phrasing.

Keep her talking. "Wh-Where is he being exiled to?"

"We're still working that out, honestly, along with the nature of the torture. A life as long as the Goblin King's, there are quite a few ideal situations and locations to choose from." The lipless mouth turned up in a strange approximation of a smile. "We like to get things just right."

Sarah took a deep breath. "Please," she said. "I know you're not…probably not in the habit of being compassionate, but seriously, if you'd just let him go, I'd do anything—"

She gave a tiny shriek when the woman-thing suddenly leaned forward and affixed her mouth-hole to Sarah's forehead. She felt an intense pulling sensation, as if the skin of her brow were being sucked very hard, and a cascade of images from the past several years suddenly overwhelmed her field of vision, all of them blurring into one another—

And then the woman pulled back with an uncomfortably organic popping sound and it was over as quickly as it started. Sarah became aware of the odd noise of phones and typing again.

The woman leaned back in her chair and folded her arms. "Intriguing," she said. "You may have just solved our conundrum."

The writing on the other sheet of paper began to move, symbols swirling around each other like water until they stilled again. Sarah blinked, trying to clear her head.

"Solved your…so you're not going to torture and exile him?"

"Oh no, that's definitely still happening." The woman's voice was horrifyingly chipper. "The exact nature of it just became much clearer to us, though." She positioned Sarah's hand over the paper. "If you'd just sign."

Sarah gripped the pen. "I can't…you seriously expect me to be the one who sends Jareth off to be tortured?"

"Actions have consequences. Surely you learned this on your own journey through the labyrinth."

"Yes, but—"

"You're really, really beginning to try my patience, in-betweener." The woman sounded bored. "I need a signature or I need blood, and I'm really not particular."

Sarah gripped the pen. "No. I can't be the one to—"

With shocking speed the woman grabbed Sarah's left hand and yanked it toward the black hole of her mouth. The hole closed, and Sarah heard a sickening noise that was unfamiliar and yet immediately recognizable in the same moment that she felt a sharp stab of pain.

She screamed and pulled her hand back. Her two middle fingers had been reduced to stumps, and blood was pouring out onto the paper on the desk.

Like the one before it, the scroll rolled itself up and vanished in a puff of glitter. The woman-thing showed no emotion, though obviously it was difficult to tell. "It's funny how mortals always say you'll do anything," she said drily. "I'm guessing you wouldn't last beyond a few more fingers, though."

Sarah clutched her hand, the pain blinding her to the point that she couldn't think clearly. "Please," she gasped, "please don't…"

The woman gave Sarah a perfunctory pat on the head. "You have nothing to bargain with, even if you WOULD give up more of your limbs. Your friend Higgle was right. The Goblin King isn't worth dying for." She sighed. "No one is, really."

"Hoggle," Sarah gasped.

The woman chuckled. "Good-bye, in-betweener. I doubt we've seen the last of you." She folded her arms. "Or your wayward king."

A roaring sound like a tidal wave and a tornado combined filled the strange space surrounding them, and desks and human-like bodies swirled madly, blurring into each other. Sarah felt the ground beneath her feet give way, felt herself falling endlessly, and her last thought before the world went black was that if this was what "tumbling in the ether" was like, she prayed that Jareth wouldn't have to experience it for much longer.