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Sarah was still musing on magic, and all she had to learn, when she got back to her apartment. She stood in front of the vanity, took her earrings off, and leaned forward to put them back in the jewelry box.

A whisper of iridescence swirled at the edge of her vision, and she heard Jareth's voice a second later, full of appreciation. "Lovely Sarah," he said, having just stepped out of the full-length mirror, and stepped up behind her, his hands on her hips. "You look stunning."

She chuckled at him. "It's just a little black dress, Jareth. Every girl has one."

"It shows much of the length of your delightful legs," he countered. "And what the fabric covers, it also reveals, skimming every luscious curve." Sarah straightened up, leaning back against him, and he nuzzled her shoulder.

A lazy smile curved her lips, but he wasn't getting away with it this easily. "Mm-hmm. And are you trying to distract me? Because today was my first lesson with Alix, and something tells me you and she had a conversation. Which is funny, because I told you I had it under control and you didn't need to interfere."

He paused, then kissed her neck. "As it turns out, you were correct. I believe Alix has no negative intentions toward you. But you might have been wrong. I had to be certain. You are my love, Sarah, and mine to protect." He let her feel his teeth briefly.

Sarah rolled her eyes, and reached back to catch a handful of his hair and tug it playfully. "Reminder: when I was just a teenager, I kicked your ass. I don't know that it gets any bigger and scarier than you."

"Sarah, Sarah. Did you find my size so frightening?" Jareth teased. "You seem quite comfortable with it now."

"Speaking of things I didn't know when I was just a teenager," she chuckled.

He nuzzled her again, but sighed against her hair. "Much as I enjoy taunting you with double entendres, Sarah, there are far scarier fae out there than myself. And some who, despite lesser age and power, ought to frighten for the strength of their naked ambition."

Sarah nudged her head against his. "Yeah, I'll be watching out for anyone who thinks they can drain me for power. Alix warned me. For now, you're ruining the mood, Jareth." She looked into the mirror at his reflection and mock-scowled at him.

He smirked back at her. "Oh, but before we return to contemplating my frightening largeness – " she rolled her eyes, but he continued "– I would have one question answered. Why did you wear this particular dress to meet with the dryad, Sarah mine? Trying to impress upon her that you are far too beautiful a woman for anyone to compete with?"

The Champion's Ball was still on his mind, and Sarah enjoyed tweaking his nose a bit over it. "Honestly I just didn't want to look out of place in a Goth club," she admitted. "But in any case, Alix isn't interested in you. What were her exact words … ? Oh, yeah. 'If I wanted the throne of Umardelin, it's him I'd dispose of and you I'd court.'"

He startled at that, and Sarah looked over her shoulder to grin impertinently at him. "Should I be concerned?" Jareth finally asked.

Teasing him was just too much fun. "Dunno. Should you?"

He scoffed. "Well, you were complaining of shocking size. Perhaps I ought to make a few changes so as to be more amenable to your current mood?" Jareth gestured toward their reflections, and Sarah looked there instead.

To her surprise, her mirror-self was being embraced by a tall blonde woman with Jareth's eyes. And his wicked smile. When she blinked, he was himself again. "I will not lose you to another, no matter what accommodations your fickle human heart demands," Jareth said triumphantly.

"You're an ass," she muttered, and elbowed him.

"Whereas you merely have a magnificent one," Jareth retorted, his hands on her hips slipping back to give her rear an affectionate squeeze. "And this dress does emphasize it most gloriously. Particularly when you bend just so." Saying that, he ran one hand up her back, and gave her the gentlest nudge of encouragement.

Sarah thought about telling him that Alix had a lover of her own, but he'd always been most ardent in jealousy. Laughing, she leaned forward and braced her hands on the vanity. "Is that so, Goblin King?" she taunted, looking over her shoulder again.

Jareth was most obviously admiring the view, and Sarah's smile was fierce and wicked. "If you're so concerned about another fae making a chance comment to me, I suppose your course is clear."

"Is it?" he asked, musing and warm.

She knew exactly how to get what she wanted, and that was its own triumph. "Make me your queen, then," she goaded him.

And got exactly the reaction she expected.

Alix's accountant was the merrow who had locked gazes with Jareth. The name she used was Colleen, and her office was in the basement to accommodate her pool. It was fresh water, rather than the salt she preferred, but it was better than being dry. Her desktop was built a little above the lip of the pool, with a special waterproof keyboard and touchpad, and Alix had been very careful about how the computer and other electrical equipment were affixed and wired. That the dryad saw to such details herself had impressed Colleen enough to secure her loyalty, even more than the generous offer of an office pool itself.

Besides, dryads and naiads (of which all the merfolk were a part) had long been useful to one another. It was an easy and fruitful alliance, and she found Alix trustworthy.

Someone knocked on her door as she was entering the day's expenses, and Colleen minimized the screen before calling out, "Come in." Visitors sometimes turned up, usually other staffers and members of the coterie with questions. If they annoyed her, she hummed to them until they fell into her pool and had to scramble ignominiously out.

Today's caller wasn't one of Alix's people. Jenny the grindylow (and oh, they said Colleen was an obvious alias!) strolled in with friendly greetings. Jenny was under the protection of one of Alix's rivals, as it so happened. Still, the water-folk kept common cause with one another at times, though all were aware of each other's loyalties elsewhere.

Since it wasn't her home pool, just an office space, Colleen invited the grindylow in for a quick dip, and Jenny was more than happy to slip back into her natural element for a moment. Mortals would find a grindylow unattractive; unlike the merrow, whose human half was lovely, Jenny's race had bulging eyes and frilled gills and large greenish teeth, like a pike-fish. Now, though, sporting joyfully in the water, there was a certain beauty to the grindylow. Colleen watched with patience; Jenny's self-styled lord didn't bother to make her comfortable, so the poor creature could only swim in whatever ponds she found in the city's parks.

At last she came up, shaking her straggly green hair over her shoulders, and sighed with contentment. "You're a lucky one, Colleen," Jenny said, treading water easily with slow movements of her large webbed feet.

"Say that when you're walking above, and I'm pushing the chair along," Colleen replied, and got a nod of acknowledgment. "What brings you here, cousin?"

The relationship was probably much more distant than that, but it was courteous. And Jenny preened a little under it. "Just a social call," she said. "Your dryad fits your office out so well, you end up staying in its confines too much. We of the water missed seeing you, last moon. I heard from one of our mer-men that the tide was glorious."

Colleen gave a rueful shrug. "I thought I found a discrepancy in the books. Turned out it was a simple entry error, but it could have caused some confusion." It had been more complicated than that, and had cost her two frustrating days of backtracking to pin down, but Jenny didn't need to know that.

"She works you too hard," Jenny said.

"Alix didn't ask me to stay. I like knowing my work is done right." Colleen leaned back against the edge of the pool. "Did I miss anything interesting?"

Only the typical gossip and scandals exchanged at the high tide amongst all the water fae, where rivers met the sea. Some selkie idiot was brokenhearted over the loss of his sealskin, but then, what could one expect when dating mortals who actually remembered their folklore? Someone was courting someone else's lover, as usual, and then all the little scuffles for power and rank among the two other main factions in the city. Not to mention those heathens from Jersey, trying to muscle their way up into the East River.

In short, nothing truly interesting. "And what of you?" Jenny asked. "Any news?"

Colleen sighed, and let herself dip beneath the water briefly. Her own gills were much more discreet than the grindylow, and she breathed deeply of her natural element before resurfacing. "We did have a bit of a stir," she said reluctantly. "You just missed it, the other night. But I'm not really supposed to talk about it."

"If you're not bound to silence by a geas, then it's just a suggestion," Jenny said with a sly grin.

"Still…" Colleen flicked her tail in agitation, stirring the water.

"Look, is it something that might be important to the water fae?" Jenny asked, floating closer. "Because we understand each other, as those of the land do not. If it could impact us…"

"It could impact all the fae in New York," Colleen said in a hushed voice. She glanced around, then dipped below the water again.

Jenny did the same. They could speak and understand each other underwater, while a dry-land fae would hear only distorted burbles. "This is not to be general knowledge," Colleen said urgently. "But Alix had a visitor the other night. A fae king, from Below. Jareth, of Umardelin."

"The king of the Labyrinth?" Jenny exclaimed, bubbles rising. "What was he doing Above? Hunting for runners?"

"No. He has a mortal lover, Jenny. And she lives here, in our city." Colleen shuddered. "Alix saw her traipsing about with the very Key to Umardelin around her neck. She let the woman know what she saw, and her king shielded it – but then he came calling, to make sure Alix didn't get ideas."

"Protective, of course," Jenny mused. "That's a great deal of power to have wandering around loose. But why would he give the key to his kingdom to his human pet?"

"Not pet," Colleen murmured, her eyes going wide. "Queen-to-be. She's beaten the Labyrinth – twice. He named her his Champion, with a ball in her honor and everything. The curse that bound him to Umardelin is broken, and he's chosen to stay there as king, with her at his side."

Jenny gulped a profanity that wouldn't have been understandable to a creature of the land. "Then why hasn't the fool wedded her and brought her Below? Having her running around up here with us is as bad as having a king trying to annex us!"

"She has a job and a life here, I take it," Colleen shrugged. "And she's too strong for him to sway. Alix is teaching her to control her magic – between her link to him, and some gift of her own, she's a potential threat. This woman is a power, mark my words, and he's several magnitudes greater. I saw him drop his glamours, Jenny. He could level Manhattan if he chose. And after a century and a half in Umardelin, he cannot be the most stable and sensible of fae. I fear for all of us, if some idiot tries to harm her."

Jenny's already huge eyes were monstrously wide with shock and dismay. "By all the old gods," she murmured. "And Alix wants to keep this to herself?"

"The fewer know the woman exists, the fewer will try to harm her," Colleen said. "I disagree. We should all know of this danger, the better to prevent it."

"I will make certain the word is carried to those sensible enough to hear it," Jenny said.

Colleen thrashed her tail, a wave slopping over the edge of the pool. Luckily there were drains in place to prevent damage to the computer equipment. "No! I won't betray Alix. Promise me, you'll tell no one."

Jenny ducked her head. "If it frightens you so, cousin, then I will keep silent. I still think you should speak out."

Colleen shook her head. "No. Alix may be right. It can't be long before that king of hers grows impatient. He'll trick her Below, some way, and once she's wedded to him she'll be as bound to Umardelin as he is. Better that both of them stay down there, and forget we all exist."

"Yes, that would be best," Jenny agreed, and changed the topic. Soon enough she had to take her leave, and Colleen flipped back to the surface to wave her out.

Once the grindylow was gone, she allowed herself a smile. Jenny had agreed to keep silent, but that didn't stop her from writing down the information and passing it along. Knowing her propensity for gossip – and for selling news to her rivals – the word would be all over town by tomorrow.

Which was precisely what Alix wanted, and had asked her to do.

Dry-land fae though Alix might be, she was trustworthy. That was more than Colleen could say for most of her watery cousins.