CHAPTER IX
The goblin king and the goblin queen sat in chairs on a dais in the ball room in the castle, the fae king as breathtakingly beautiful as all of his kindred, if rather wilder and more unruly than was a fae's wont, and the goblin queen compelling in her human imperfection and her stunning if scandalous blood-red robes, clearly showing more curves than fae women had. Sarah kept a smile glued on her face and her eyes grimly on the crowd - the goblin king had a seemingly unlimited wardrobe, vain a as peacock he was, so why did he wear the bloody high-necked midnight blue tailcoat with the starlight embroidery tonight? As usual he cut a most seductive figure. For a moment she recalled the first time she'd seen him like this, and she stole a quick look at his face. Jareth, lounging most un-regally in his chair for an optimum view of the queen, caught her glance and smiled salaciously, sending a hot blush into her cheeks.
"Let me congratulate you, Sarah, your dress is the most delicious piece of illusion I have seen in many a year."
Sarah looked at him quellingly.
As usual, it did not quell the cheerful goblin king in the least.
"While you do not look any longer as if the next gust of wind would blow you away, my dearest, you are still too thin. Beautiful, but thin. However, this masterpiece of a dress would not let anyone suspect that your luscious curves are nothing as luscious as they have been, and hopefully will be again. Truly, you put the fae ladies to shame, my dearest Sarah. They are all presently considering padding."
Sarah knew that she should be outraged and insulted, but she could not help lapping up his compliments. Especially since the appreciative glint in his eyes seemed to bolster his bold words. She looked at him as coolly as she could, but found herself gazing into the ball room very quickly. She didn't think he actually was more beautiful than when she had been fifteen, so she had to accept that his hugely increased attraction just might have to do with the fully-functional set of hormones she was cursed with these days. It was just so unfair, she thought somewhat glumly, resisting the courtship of an overbearing, autocratic know-it-all with no concept of personal space or acceptable behavior would be much easier if he were not so bloody enticing, and playing on it.
Curious eyes from the elegant crowd in the ball room rested frequently on the king and the queen on the dais, yet nobody would have suspected that the goblin queen was tearing into the goblin king with all the gentleness of an angry hornet from either her sweet demeanor or his quiet amusement. Jareth had long found amused detachment to be one of the most efficient tools to drive Sarah to distraction, second only to riling her mercilessly. She could not help herself, if he was but outrageous enough in his statements, he could get her to loose control even if she knew full well he was leading her on. Oh, she was working on her self-discipline, and he would admit that she was a quick study, but he thought rather smugly that she was no match for a man with countless great years of practice in exasperating the world around him.
"Remind me again, goblin king, why I am here?" Sarah asked Jareth in a low, testy voice, leaning close to Jareth over the armrest of her own elaborate chair, her face a study of regal poise.
"I sincerely appreciate your presence, my dearest Sarah, as I know it is difficult for you to admit that you are here to please me. Everyone knows you are pining for me." Laughter tugging at the corners of his mouth, the goblin king took the queen's hand and teasingly kissed it, fairly sure that Sarah would not slap him, but ready to catch her hand in case he had miscalculated. She only tore her hand out of his, he had not yet lost his touch, he thought self-congratulatory. Skittish, the queen was.
He leaned towards Sarah's seat and spoke low, as to force her to move her head closer to his mouth. "Now, my sweet Sarah, there is no reason to be so incensed with me this time, as well you know. However, I shall be forever indebted to Tobias for convincing you to attend the reception for our gracious visitors from Annwyn and Danu. If he was not such an innocent I should be jealous." His breath was warm on her cheek, his scent as enticing as his nearness, and Sarah could feel goose bumps rise on her skin. "But then, it is not possible to feel resentment towards Tobias. And why would I? I have never seen you shy away from his touch as you do from mine."
As Sarah turned her head for a furious reply, she found his mouth but a breath away from hers and rapidly added some distance between them, if perhaps not as fast as she could have. "Tell me, goblin king," she hissed at him with color rising in her cheeks, "why you are so fond of making me uncomfortable? Just get on with it and make me an indecent proposal, so I can slap you and we're both done with it. Every time I nearly like you, you do your best to make me squirm. And then you're surprised we fight all the time?"
"Why would I be surprised, Sarah? This is a game I have played far longer than you can even imagine, and I have long learned that the pursuit is as pleasurable as the inevitable victory. You are the most startling and beguiling woman I have ever met, powerful and a challenge. You are my equal like no other woman can be, and your intractable nature is part of your charm. I do not care to be done with it, Sarah. I enjoy to see you fight the craving for my touch - it puts us on a much more equal footing. Not that I care to resist the attraction." Sarah stared at the goblin king with her mouth hanging slightly open, her eyes huge. Jareth laughed delightedly. Not for long, though.
Sarah hissed at him, far angrier than he had expected. "Just being the goblin king again, are you? You manipulate people's minds, and you rejoice in their confusion. You play to win, but you don't play fair. Oh, I can believe that I am a pleasant enough diversion for you, a distraction in a long life, a challenge, and perhaps you could even convince me that you desire me. But in truth, you do not want an equal. So what is the plan, make me fall for you so I will be you willing slave? If you take me to be the kind of flighty scatterbrain that can be swayed by her body's desires, you do not know me at all. You are fae, and such as I are drawn to your touch by our blood. It means nothing. Find some pretty girl who gives a damn." Her face afire with passion, the goblin queen rose abruptly from her chair and walked into the crowd with a dazzling smile frozen on her face.
Jareth leaned back on his chair and followed Sarah with his eyes. That had not unfolded quite as he had anticipated. Sarah was determined to read his every action in the worst possible light, and he wondered why she was so persuaded to distrust him. He could not understand how she could be oblivious to his attraction to her, she seemed to be beset by an inexplicable feeling of inadequacy when it came to her appearance. Yet even given her strange blindness to her own allure, how could she believe that he would want her as a bedmate only? She was the goblin queen, the chosen of the labyrinth, and he would not trifle with her. Not that he was contemplating the ... carnal part of their union with anything less than delighted anticipation. His Sarah was seriously underestimating the pleasures the body's desires afforded, although he was planning to show her the errors of her ways. Exhaustingly. But every word he had told her earlier was true, much more so than a human woman, in the underground for such a short time, could understand. He had not a moment's doubt that Sarah would be his queen, and he would be glad to rule the goblin kingdom with her by his side. She would be the most splendid queen the labyrinth had ever had, even more so than she already was. And if her pursuit might take centuries, it meant nothing to a creature as him, immortal and ancient. He savored her subterfuge, her anger, and her unwillingness to accept what had to be. She would love him, and she would be his. He admired her, he cared for her, and he would have her, and all her protestations would not change this. He would not be denied. Her submission would be ever sweeter for the fight she had put up. He did not doubt that he would love her in due course, for she was a woman who deserved love and brought it forth easily, and she would be his. And with a flourish the goblin king joined the celebration, laughing and flirting with his courtiers and guests.
Sarah cut a bold and regal figure among the dazzling crowd in the ball room in the castle beyond the goblin city, the very same room a beautiful king had tried to make a silly girl forget her responsibility to her brother all these years ago, and had so nearly succeeded. But she was not a girl any longer, and she had fought hard to be who she was. Sarah smiled viciously, and an admiring fae courtier who had approached her flinched from her ferocity in terrified exaltation. She had changed in the underground, and would undoubtedly keep doing so, as only in death there was no change, but her days of changing to please others were over. Her desire for the goblin king burned sharp in her, and he drew her in ways she could not even begin to describe, nor wanted to, yet he wished to shape her to his needs, and that could never be. Whatever she desired mattered much less than what she was called to, for all that she had been given came with obligations, which she had agreed to with open eyes. Her love of the labyrinth and her duty to it always came first, and the goblin king could not conceive of aught but a queen of his own making, whose first thought would always be him.
Sarah thought that parties were a lot more fun when you were a high-ranking guest. For once, she did not have to constantly censor every word that came to her mind to not offend anyone, nor did she have to be nice to everyone, however rude they might be, as for a change it was other people who were tripping over themselves to be polite and charming to her. She was showered with compliments, and while it never occurred to her that they as often as not were given from true admiration rather than for the currying of favors, it did not curtail her enjoyment in the least. In the end, a compliment was a compliment, and if it was well-delivered she was more than willing to join into a momentary suspension of disbelief.
She had fallen into a lively conversation with group of Fianna from Dyfed and had joined in an easy camaraderie with the fian as she, with passion, fire, and many expressive arm movements, praised the beauty of Dyfed. Sarah thought it astounding that the Above geography of Wales was basically the same as of Annwyn in the underground, and even the old names were the same. As she had spent two years in a veterinary exchange program in Wales, she knew exactly what she was talking about and was peppering the happily surprised fianna with never-ending questions about their lore and history. They were charmed and flattered by the goblin queen's obvious knowledge and curiosity as much as by her insistence of being called lady Sarah.
"Lady Eirlys, lady Heulwen," Sarah turned to the beautiful warrior women whose names so perfectly matched their looks. Eirlys was as pale as the snow her name denoted, while Heulwen's hair of the color of summer corn and her joyful disposition honored the sunshine she was named after. "Please, forgive me if I my question is rude, for I speak from ignorance and not ill-will, but how did your parents know that your names would so perfectly describe your appearance?"
With a laugh Eirlys answered the goblin queen, who had her head tilted like a little sparrow considering a seed. "I was seven years old when the goblin king brought me to my parents," she said with a smile in her voice. "My mother always told me that even then I looked like a moonbeam among a flock of ravens, for alone of all of them, I am pale. They felt I should have a name that reflected my looks, and here I am. Not that I have seen many snow-flakes in my life, as it rarely ever snows in Annwyn. "
"I was born to my family, lady Sarah, and it seems my family has never produced any offspring but was blond and reliably cheery, and so they named me appropriately. Sadly, they were right." Heulwen laughed along with the teasing remarks that followed her words. "You must understand, lady Sarah, that it is more common for names to not describe a person quite as well."
"I understand perfectly," Sarah said with a grin. "My dad once told me my mother wanted to name me Chastity. I cannot tell you how glad I was he could change her mind."
The giggles that followed her words quickly grew into a guffaw, Sarah laughing along without restraint.
"But I actually wanted to ask something else. I understand that of the one hundred and thirty fianna who came to the goblin kingdom, twenty and five are women." She smiled at the Fianna around her, the small Carmarthen fian of nine warriors, seven men and two women. "I am bound to be unwittingly insulting some of you, so forgive me, but I understand the training of the Fianna is truly challenging, and all of you stand a fair chance of not living to enjoy immortality. Now, as far as I can tell, men gain in status and in power when they are fian, but what is in it for you women? Fae women seem to be expected to take on the supporting side of things. And how the night do you ever manage to pass these tests?"
"Well, lady Sarah," said a charming young fian by the name of Wyn, who strongly reminded her of Toby. "As I am sure you know from first-hand experience, women have more to gain, doing what was is frowned upon. If you have been fian, at least you can be sure that the men that court you will never stifle your spirit. Yet still, most women do not care to live and die for an oath, so only few of them aspire to be fian. Most women cannot pass the tests. But then, most men cannot either. If you saw Heulwen or Eirlys in battle, you would not wonder about their prowess in fight. They are better than most men, and at least as good as any of us." He gave white Eirlys a cheeky grin. "Not as good as me, though."
Sarah smiled at the warrior women and asked very quietly: "This is not an order nor an official request from the goblin queen, but simply a question from one woman to another." She looked a bit anxious. "I never fought in the above, as there was never a need. I can barely defend myself from an attacker with a knife or a sword, but I believe I should learn. If you would be willing to spend some of your spare time with me, if you can find any, and teach me the basics of self-defense and how to use weapons, I will be in your debt. I do not expect to become an expert at anything, just learn enough to buy me enough time to call for help and live to see its arrival."
With a surprised smile, Heulwen gave the goblin queen a deep bow. "My lady, I know I speak for Eirlys as much as myself, we would be honored to teach you. We have not yet been told where we will be send, so we can begin working with you tomorrow if so you care. But I believe we should warn you, lady, you will need to work two hours a day at the beginning if you want to see any results, one hour to train with us and one hour to do your exercises." Eirlys smiled her agreement.
Sarah groaned, but said determinedly: "Sleep is overrated, I believe, so why do we not start the day after tomorrow? I cannot find enough hours in the day as it is, so do you believe that we might start at sunrise in the fencing halls? I believe they are empty at this time."
Eirlys looked at the goblin queen with frank admiration in her eyes and said simply: "Sunrise the day after tomorrow it is then, lady Sarah. We are honored that you would trust us to teach you."
Wyn had just been waiting for an end of the conversation and bowed deeply to the queen and asked her for the honor of a dance. And so Sarah found herself dancing with many partners through as many dances, and she did not float over the polished floors, light as a feather, as the court ladies did, but moved like lynx, her boundless energy barely contained. She also had a tendency to take the lead from her partner without ever noticing.
After making increasingly less gracious small-talk with ten different men who tried to impress her in ten different ways, she found herself in the arms of Tiernan ap Cethur Mc Greine, who looked at her with a smile that strongly reminded her of his brother, but without Jareth's ever-present challenge. "Lord Tiernan," she said with some relief in her voice. "I sincerely hope you will spare me the obligatory compliments that seem to have to be voiced when you dance with the queen, whether they are applicable or not."
Tiernan threw his head back and laughed out loud, his eyes of summer dancing with mirth, but his lead was sure and strong, and he moved her gracefully through the movements of the dance. "I had been planning to pay you lavish compliments, Lady Sarah, but you just have taken the wind out of my sails. Would it be alright if I pay you the truth, then? You look ravishing, lady, and the only thing those poor men before me tried to do with all their compliments, is to convince you to take them to your bed."
Sarah blinked at him a few times and burst into helpless giggles. "Well, that certainly is an interesting view." She was groping for words, but for the first time in a long time she was speechless.
Tiernan smiled at her while she tried to gather her wits. "I believe, Lady Sarah, that you do not understand how alluring humans are to us fae." His eyebrows rose at her un-ladylike snort. "Forever can be a very long time, my lady, and we are not a kindred that changes easily. Yet you humans do, in the blink of an eye your mood swings, your thoughts change course, your interest is diverted. It makes your kind fascinating. I have never seen strands of white in hair, lady, and no woman I have ever kissed has had lines in her face as you do. Can you truly not see the appeal? And you, lady Sarah, hold power, and power is an aphrodisiac to fae. How could my kind fail to lust after you?"
Sarah looked at him with approval. "You know, lord Tiernan, your brother should take lessons from you. He has been trying to strike me speechless for a long time, but to no avail. Yet you managed with one harmless remark." A wide grin broke on her face. "But I will say, your unconventional way of complimenting me is like your brother's. I would love to meet your parents. Which one of them is to be thanked for their sons' twisted ways?"
Tiernan laughed easily and began to tell her tall stories of a childhood in Danu with his brother Jareth, and Sarah enjoyed the easy rapport that had sprung up between them. She had met him countless times since she'd joined the council, but she found it difficult to find her way around him. He was a incomparable commander who had whipped the goblin army into shape when nobody had thought it possible, and the last years had seen him traveling the borderlands, alone and with Toby, organizing and training militias at the border. Yet for all his invaluable services to the goblin kingdom, he left no doubt that it was the bonds of kinship and brotherly love that compelled him, not a sense of obligation to the goblin kingdom. He was fae to the core, and while he was the most gracious courtier, it was abundantly clear that he was imbued with a sense of fae superiority of his own brand, as he obviously felt superior to most fae as well. Yet he had a sense of humor about him and an easy charm that made it hard to dislike him, whatever misgivings you had. Tiernan might have a lot of shortcomings, and serious ones at that, but he was charming as hell and lacked personal arrogance. Sarah smiled up at the beautiful fae lord and decided to give him another try. She had ever felt what mattered were a person's actions, not their words, and she would base her judgment of Tiernan Mc Greine on his deeds, not his stupid words.
The next dance with a suave courtier who complimented her lavishly passed much easier than the ones before, as whether it was true or not, she could not help being amused by the hidden meaning that Tiernan's words allowed her to glimpse behind his words.
Some time later, when she danced a waltz with the councilor Ningyo, she finally could ask the question that had been prying on her mind for a while. "Tell me, lord Ningyo, is it usual for so many humans to be at a formal ball? I have seen more of my kind tonight than I have for longer than I can remember."
Lord Ningyo carefully schooled his face to a neutral expression. "It is rare to see more than two, perhaps three humans at any formal ball, lady Sarah, and they always accompany other guests. I am sure you know that only very few humans have magic, and there are no human communities in the underground, so they tend to be absorbed into other groups. It is hard to gain enough acclaim to be invited to a celebration such as this when you are short lived and lacking in power."
Sarah didn't bother with a neutral expression and winked at him through a wide grin. "But of course you can find a nice position in a fae's bed if you are human, and then you might find yourself anywhere, isn't that so?"
Ningyo surprised her, as she had thought the man somewhat dour, but with a quick laugh he drew her closer and murmured into her ear to avoid eavesdropping: "I have warned you, my queen, the fae demesnes feel they have a right to the children that you and the king bring to the underground from Above, and they will try to humiliate you, now that their ... supply has run dry. None will insult you to your face, but they have spent countless great years honing the art of the slight, and they are out for your blood."
Sarah smiled at the grinning man with a raised eyebrow. "I would have expected you to be all solicitous and protective of me, my lord, yet you seem to find great amusement in this situation?"
"These fae don't know you, lady Sarah, but I have seen who you are since you joined the council. I should be ashamed to admit it, but I rather look forward to the bloodbath."
"You say the nicest things, Lord Ningyo. Why don't we get some refreshments and gossip a bit? I think I need ammunition."
When Jareth looked over the ballroom for Sarah, he found her in the middle of an animated group at one of the open doors to the terraces, her flushed face bright with intensity, making a point with her voice and her hands with great relish and sending the mixed group of courtiers around her into giggles. He recognized the huldra couple next to her, an old Elm lord and his Spruce lady from the forests of Kemerovo who had held power in the Kular range for as long as he had been king. They would have towered over the queen, but they had considerately seated their tall bodies on low chairs so their heads were at a level with Sarah. They must have taken a liking to the queen to accommodate her so and to truly partake in the conversation, Jareth thought, for huldra were slow to warm to anyone and it would take many meetings until they would feel comfortable enough for a conversation.
When he walked up to the group, he heard the tail-end of Sarah's words. "... be magic. I have been looking for an hour now, and as energetically as she dances they would have fallen out if it was not for magic." Her gestures left little doubt as to what was being discussed, but following the direction of Sarah's gaze made it crystal clear. The lady being discussed was the guest of the ambassador of Ardar Iforas, a buxom young human with stunning hip-length red hair, whose low-cut clingy dress left little to the imagination. Although, judging from the discussion, this was not strictly true.
"Definitely magic," Jareth stepped next to Sarah and joined the discussion without any ado. "I happened to observed a sadly unmannered young fian from Carmarthen, I believe his name is Wyn, try to liberate the lady's sorely squashed ... ahem.. appendices with a little magical encouragement, to no avail. It will not be an accident should they escape."
Sarah laughed with him delightedly, all earlier anger forgotten in her enjoyment of the evening.
"And this pretty thing is actually one of the less appealing ones," she observed shrewdly, "if you take a look at the other human guests, well, they may not be a beautiful as their fae lords, but they are a lot more ... earthy. Approachable. Bedable."
The old Elm lord laughed loudly and touched the queen's hand. "That's the spirit, girl. But you better prepare yourself," he said in his rumbling voice, "I am sure there will be some really impressive show of ... respect coming your way soon. To honor the queen, you know. Perhaps a dance, or some such thing."
"I just bet. In the Above we have some dancing that would fit perfectly into our fae guests plans." Prompted by the curious looks of her listeners, she explained. "Think poles in the middle of the room and much more scantily dressed human women doing intriguing and indecent things while wrapping themselves around those poles. Primal music, mainly consisting of a strong beat. That's pretty much it. Oh, and if the audience is so minded they may show their appreciation by pushing money into the minimal clothing of the dancers."
Jareth looked at her with a glint in his eyes and a grin on his lips. "Now, this sounds like the most intriguing dance I have ever heard of," he said with heartfelt conviction. To tell from several faces in the group around Sarah, he was not alone in this evaluation. "I am determined to see this dance, come what may." He smiled coldly. "But not tonight. And while I am sure that this idea would appeal to some of our guests, they are not suicidal."
Sarah looked at him with approval. "I believe we should put them out of their misery, goblin king." She lifted her head questioningly, and with an elegant bow Jareth offered his arm to the goblin queen who, with a gracious smile, put her hand on his arm. They walked towards the fae at the other end of the ballroom, but Jareth was not minded to let Sarah go that easily and drew her into a dance before she had time to think. In a heartbeat she found herself in his intoxicating embrace and spinning through the ballroom, and Jareth was smiling down at her. For a few moments Sarah threw all caution to the winds and allowed herself the illusion that he actually saw her, and not a challenge. She would just enjoy this dance, and so she let herself fall into Jareth's embrace and followed his sure lead. Sarah closed her eyes and smiled as she lightly moved with him to the rhythm of the music, his body much too close yet not enough, her skin alive with the nearness of him.
He should have know that keeping the lead was not a given when dancing with Sarah, Jareth thought amusedly, but she made up for it by being herself. Dancing was an enjoyable game, a civilized way to touch and entice a woman, and allow your partner to show her grace, her lightness, her delicacy. Dancing with Sarah was much more, the woman in his arms supple yet coiled with power, not a diversion but an antagonist he burned to vanquish and possess. Jareth was drawn to the unknowingly seductive smile on her face, acutely feeling the heat of her body and his need for her touch as he pulled her even closer, and he was sorely tempted to throw all caution to the winds and take her away.
When Sarah opened her eyes, she saw the goblin king examine her with an unsmiling face, wearing an expression she could not read. As she turned her head away in a moment's confusion, she noticed the many faces around them, looking at her and the king, and suddenly her memory brought her back to a dance whose subtle undertones she had barely perceived, too young to understand the danger that was the goblin king. Now she understood well the dangers, but she would no more give in as she had then.
Jareth watched her come back from her reverie, and come back angry, her body tense and suddenly resisting his touch, her open face closing under his watchful eyes, as antagonistic as she had ever been. As if she remembered something... His eyes widened. "You are a runner girl, my sweet lady Sarah, am I right?" he asked with a taunting laugh, "So this is the reason for your unexplainable dislike of me, is it not? I have been trying to remember if I have ever given you cause to disapprove of me so, and I could not think of anything,"
"What a self-serving memory you have, goblin king. You insulted me without ever having even talked to me, did you not?" Sarah could not restrain herself.
"But you already deplored me even then, admit it, my dearest Sarah. This of course throws a new light on your irrational reactions. You feel guilty about having wished someone away, and you neatly place the blame at my feet."
"I do not." Sarah was furious. "I know I did wrong, but I paid the price in full. I played by the rules that YOU set. Irrational reactions my ass. You cheated like crazy, you tricked me, you scared me to death, and now you have the bloody nerve to tell me that you are the wronged party in this?"
Invigorated by Sarah's near incoherent protests and anger, Jareth thought he would have a lot of fun with this information. But first he would put Sarah's fury and frustration to good use, it was time to see what the disgruntled fae with their little human pets had planned. Smoothly he turned Sarah out from the last turn of the dance and bowed to her: "Why do we not postpone this fascinating conversation until we have more leisure to get into the details?" Sarah's face left no doubt that as far as she was concerned, this little talk was not going to happen in her lifetime. "I do believe, my dearest Sarah, that we still have unfinished business with some of our guests at hand."
"But by all means, goblin king, let's go and be polite to our guests," she spat at him as she put her hand on his arm again, all the while staring daggers at him.
If looks could kill, he thought, he'd lie lifeless at her feet, but Sarah had her priorities straight. Jareth felt confident that he could stop her from actually maiming anyone, and after a brief consideration of the imminent risk of war he decided cheerfully that it would be worth it.
The goblin king and the goblin queen seemed to be chatting amiably as they left the dance floor. They took long-stemmed glasses of fire wine from the tray of one of the serving girls circulating through the crowd, standing commandingly between two columns at the side of the room, Sed and another guard a step behind them like statues. Ambassador Féilim Ó Súilleabháin and a high-born fae couple, the lord Cianáin Ó hUiginn and the lady Aodh Nic Gearailt from Ardar Iforas, with them several other fae lords and ladies from other demesnes in the underground, approached the sovereigns of the goblin kingdom. They were accompanied by sixteen humans, beautiful women and men of all races, all of them dressed to show their beauty to its best advantage. As they approached, all bowed deeply before the king and the queen.
"It is an honor to meet you, my lady," the ambassador said in a seductive voice. Sarah thought with contempt that it was but a poor imitation of what Jareth managed without even trying. "You are far more beautiful than the stories tell."
"And you are as sweet-tongued a liar as I would have expected from an ambassador, my lord Ó Súilleabháin, as even a impotent and blind idiot would clearly realize that any of the humans with you are far more beautiful than I ever was." Sarah looked at him with a patently false smile, "It is a pity, however, they did not teach you how to properly address a queen in ambassador school."
Féilim Ó Súilleabháin turned an ugly shade of red, but many great years survival in fae courts had taught him self-control. "Forgive me, your majesty, I believe I was misled by listening to the courtiers here, as everyone seems to be addressing you as lady Sarah."
Sarah looked at him with a mocking smile. "Oh no, you heard quite correctly, Ambassador, my subjects call me lady Sarah. I trust them, so I don't stand on formality. The moment you will swear your blood oath to me, I will be happy to have you address me by my name. Until then, you will give me the courtesy I am due."
Jareth followed the exchange in high spirits. He could see the faes' problem, they were expecting to deal with somebody like themselves in a war of words, veiled insults and insinuations. His Sarah went for the jugular without delay, and her preferred weapon was a club on the head, not a knife in the back.
The lady Aodh Nic Gearailt moved up to Jareth and put her hand on his arm, greeting him with the ease of a close relationship, a right she had well earned. "I have just returned from Tahat, my lord Jareth - oh, forgive me, should I say your majesty?" she smiled impishly at him, her breathtaking beauty a thing of songs and poems. Aodh was considered one of the most beautiful women in the underground, and Jareth saw no reason to doubt it.
"My sweet lady Aodh, I am sure we do not need to stand on protocol between old friends like us," Jareth purred at her with a wicked grin, and with a flourish he took the lady's empty glass from her hand and put it on the tray of a passing serving girl. He took two fresh glasses and gave one to the lady Aodh, the other one he offered to Sarah. She looked up distractedly and took the glass, turning back into the fray in a moment. Jareth devoted himself to flirting outrageously with lady Aodh, as the lady might well be willing to join him in his rooms tonight, and such a converstaion did not take but a small part of his attention, leaving him free to eavesdrop on Sarah's exchanges.
"Don't you miss the above sometimes, your majesty? After all, it was your home, and holds all that you know." Lord Cianáin said, unable to completely cover up how distasteful he found it to address a human so.
"Missing implies there is something Above I cannot have, lord Cianáin. Yet if there is something I want from the Above, I go there and get it. Of course I understand that the ability to move over to the Above is limited to the goblin king and the goblin queen, the fae being restricted to the underground alone?" Her solicitous tone sounded fake even to her own ears. Sarah smiled with sweet insincerity.
"I do believe restricted is not the right term," the haughty lord Hurin replied with a clipped smile. He was a powerful baron from Matagamon, a rich demesne which was home to a sizeable part of the fae population in the underground. The newly imposed ban on giving children to allies only had caused a strong negative reaction in Matagamon. "Who in his right mind would want to go to the Above unless they had to?" Lord Hurin attended the reception with two human companions, a delicate Bantu woman and a man who looked like a Han warrior. Sarah thought with pity that if the gossip about Hurin was true, his pets were not to be envied. Hurin was known to have little regard for any but fae, and his tastes ran towards the violent. He looked at the goblin queen with barely veiled anger. "After all, what does the Above have to offer to us fae that we do not already possess? Or want, at that matter?"
"Spoken like a man who has never tasted a Big Mac in his life. But surely, lord Hurin, it would seem that the above has at least supplied you with human companions, which is not something you could get here. And you must be doubtlessly very fond of them, as you have brought them to the reception."
With crystalline laughter, standing very close to the goblin king, the lady Aodh turned to Sarah. "Oh, ...your ... majesty, I am confident your king is very fond of you as well. And it is easy to see why, such a high-spirited woman."
"I am sure I am ... honored by your approval, lady Aodh. Although you might want to spend some more time on the wording of your praise. If I was so minded I might take offense. You really should try some subtlety, lady, though that may be beyond your ken." Sarah's cold eyes and voice sent a shiver of apprehension over the fae lady. Sarah disinterestedly shifted her attention to the goblin king and fell into deep, formal obeisance, beautifully executed and utterly ridiculous looking on her proud form. She got up with considerable less poise, however, and gave him a crooked grin. "So, goblin king, what do you make of your pet then? Am I properly housebroken yet, or does my training still leave something to be desired? Am I the obedient little goblin queen you had in mind?" Sarah looked at the flustered lady Aodh with contempt. "I do not believe the goblin king has a pressing need for what humans are famous for among the fae. I doubt he is as easily seduced by the pleasures of the bedroom as you seem to think, not that he would turn them down. It isn't as if he hasn't had just about any woman he wanted in his bed. And he certainly is not limiting himself to humans." She threw Jareth a laughing look. "Or beds, I suspect."
It took every ounce of control Jareth possessed to keep his face impassive and not show his amusement as he took in the shocked and affronted faces of the courtiers. The queen wasn't as easily intimidated as they had expected. And she was a lot cruder.
Sarah walked up to the group of humans that stood together as if for support. She gave silent thanks to her luck, at over six foot at least she would not look like a tiny ugly duckling amongst swans. Being able to look down at people did wonders for one's self-esteem. She flashed a toothy grin, perhaps that explained the unshakable superiority of the fae, and their dislike of so many of the other kindreds - the fae after all were not the tallest kindred, easily topped by the huldra and others.
Sarah could not know what an incongruous picture she made among the other humans, she barely seemed to be related to her own kind. The human companions who had been brought to the reception had been carefully chosen for their beauty and blatant sexual attraction, without power or pride, to show off the goblin queen as the member of a cruder kindred, only not as beautiful as her brethren. Yet the goblin queen transcended beauty. Neither as beautiful as the human pets nor their fae masters, yet she enthralled and enticed. Her lips asked for kisses, her skin invited touch, her soft body called for caresses, yet her eyes told that what she had to offer came at a steep price; no plaything, she. Sarah radiated the power of wild magic, it touched the tips of her short chocolate-brown curls around her mobile, animated face with flashes of magic, the energy in her barely contained, seeping out in her expressive hands and voice, and her careless disregard for fae customs and manners well illustrated her opinion of them, as of her confidence in being able to face them on their own terms. Sarah was an earsplitting scream in a room of polite whispers.
The human guests reacted to the queen as they did to the fae, inexorably drawn to her, smiles and desire strong on their faces they drew near her, searching out her attention and Sarah was chatting and laughing with them in a short time, lively and at ease.
The lord Hurin, furious at finding their intentions thwarted, stomped over to the group and grabbed his Bantu companion cruelly at the arm, snarling at the woman in a low voice, making her blanch. Sarah looked at him menacingly as she looked pointedly at the white marks the fae lord's grip left on the young woman's arm. With a forced smile he begrudgingly let go of the woman's arm and turned to the goblin queen, to find the goblin king having appeared soundlessly next to her, a sneer on the narrow, arrogant face. "I am glad to see that your friends have taken a liking to the goblin queen, my dear lord Hurin," Jareth remarked with a smile that did not reach his eyes. "I am sure it is an enlightening experience for them to realize that the goblin kingdom allows freedom of choice for all its denizens, a free mingling among equals."
Hurin was shaking with fury, barely able to constrain himself, and Sarah's disdainful inspection of him did not help matters any. Sed, as always behind his king, showed his teeth in a wolfish grin of anticipation. But fae were cut from sturdy cloth, and the fae lord regained his control. "I am glad you get along so well with my ... friends, your majesty," Hurin said smoothly to Sarah, "but I am not surprised, like calls to like, isn't that so?"
Sarah looked at Hurin with a languid smile, and Jareth stilled and readied his power to ward off a strike against Sarah should it become necessary. The goblin queen walked up close to the imposing fae lord and flirtatiously chided him. "But of course you know, my lord, that mere humans like me are drawn to such as you, do you not?" With a seductive smile she slowly raised her leather-clad hand to Hurin's face and delicately traced his cheekbone with her fingers. Hurin's insolent expression dissolved at the queen's touch, a shiver ran through his body and his breath escaped in a shuddering exhalation. An expression of fierce hunger touched on his face as he unconsciously leaned into the queen's teasing touch, his face mirroring the look of a human drawn to fae.
Jareth's eyes widened. Power was leaching from the queen's body as from his, her touch sending rivulets of magic into the person she touched, an intimate and arousing sensation that was best minimized as much as possible. That would explain why she always wore gloves, as was he. He grinned. It was not complete protection, as her reaction to his touch showed, and as Hurin learned to his regret now. It certainly explained his own reaction whenever he touched her.
At length the queen pulled her hand back from lord Hurin's face and smoothly stepped back to stand next to Jareth, a condescending smile on her lips. The visibly shaken Hurin bowed perfunctory to them and escaped to hide his shame away from the prying eyes of his brethren. Sarah seemed minded to pick up the conversation with the rattled fae where she had left off earlier, but Jareth felt that a little bit of the queen went a long way. With practiced charm he extricated Sarah from their suddenly far more polite and circumspect guests and escorted her away to mingle with their other guests.
Many glasses of fire wine and more dances later Sarah walked unnoticed to the open doors the terrace to catch a breath of the mild night air to cool her down. To her surprise she found the lady Sindri standing in the shadows of the velvet curtains, her cheeks flushed with wine and anger, visibly fighting for her countenance.
"What are you staring so morosely into your drink, Sindri? That glass is much to small to drown yourself in, trust my experience in these things. Where is the dashing lover? Off to slay a dragon for you, or whatever a hero does for the damsel around here?"
"If you don't stop this instant, Sarah, I will burst into tears right here. Or perhaps screams, it doesn't matter. It will not be a pretty sight, however, and Porr shall hate you forever. "
"Ooh, that bad? What has lover-boy been up to now?"
"That is definitely the wrong question, Sarah. Remember, we are talking about Porr. He is never up to anything. Tell me, is there something wrong with me? Have I been misunderstanding the situation all these many years? I have been so patient, and I have told myself that he is well worth waiting for, but this is getting beyond ridiculous. It is exactly what you humans say in the Above. My bell is ringing, but he just won't hear."
Sarah looked at her with a blank face for a moment, then dissolved into very un-ladylike giggles. "Well, close enough. We actually use the term 'my clock is ticking'. But considering that you have a fair bit more great years before the alarm goes off, I don't believe you need to be concerned quite yet."
"Well, at the speed Porr is moving, I certainly cannot be sure about that."
"Don't be so sour so young, Sindri, it isn't becoming. I admit he is a bit too circumspect for just about anyone's taste, but what stops you from making the first step?"
"Do you believe I have not done this? I have been subtly encouraging - for several centuries no less. I finally gave up on subtlety, but it did not make a difference as far as I could tell. He always stares at me like a wounded doe when he thinks I am not looking, he is so charming and sweet when we talk, and he does seek me out whenever he can, but that is a far as he ever goes. I even flirt with him, which is not a pretty sight as it does not suit my style, but he just does not seem to get it. And yet he keeps courting me in his clumsy way. I swear, Sarah, if I did not know that he is a brilliant man I should consider him an irredeemable idiot."
"Perhaps he doesn't understand words. Lots of men don't."
Sindri looked at her with some exasperation. "So, I just go up to him and kiss him?"
"That should do in a pinch, but I suspect Porr could foul even that one up." Sarah was smirking now. "No, I was rather thinking of going to his room while he works one of his late evenings, and try out his bed in your birthday suit. You know the long nights he is keeping. There is a really good chance you'd be in deep sleep by the time he comes in. Odds are, when he finally wakes you up, you'll have missed all the embarrassment and get to move straight to the fun part." Sarah grinned. "And just imagine what a great story that will make when your children ask you 'And how did you and Daddy first get together?'"
When the women's laughter had finally calmed down, they determinedly set out to forget all that ailed them, and with much flirting and drinking finished the evening on a most enjoyable note.
/
A week after the ball Jareth strolled back to his rooms from an afternoon in the stables with his milk-sister Nerromiktok's great horses. He saw his chancellor walk towards his own rooms in one of the hallways, and something in Porr's stance made him lengthen his stride and catch up with his friend. A short look into Porr's face convinced the goblin king that something was wrong indeed, and without listening to his protestations he forced Porr to follow him into his library.
"Now, you can protest that it is nothing and you have no idea what I am saying, and I will refuse to listen to you, and this little charade will go back and forth until one of us gives in." Jareth gave Porr a mocking salute. "If memory serves me right, that has never been me. So why don't you save us a lot of useless talk and just tell me what is bothering you, Porr. You know me too well, old friend, to even hope for escape."
Porr looked at Jareth with an unconvincing smile, his jaws set. "You must be bored, Jareth, to be so insistent when nothing is going on."
Jareth sat down in one of the chairs and with a flick of his fingers two mugs of hot larak appeared on the small table beside the chairs. "At the rate this is going, we might be in for a long night. You may want to make yourself comfortable, Porr, because you are not leaving until you have told me about nothing." He grinned, teeth showing. "And you know better than to try the doors, don't you? I doubt your magic can trump mine, but if you think things have changed since the last time we were here, be my guest."
Sullenly, Porr said down and wrapped his fingers around the mug, staring into the lapis depths as if his salvation lay at the bottom. Jareth leaned back comfortably in his chair, perfectly content to wait as long as it took for Porr to open up. After minutes of silence, Porr finally spoke up. "For months now she leaves the castle in the evening, at least once a week, sometimes twice. She wears a dark cloak, and a basket with I know not what, and when I try to follow her at a distance she vanishes withing minutes however hard I try to follow. My magic is much stronger than hers, so how does she vanish? I worry about her."
"You have considered talking to her, haven't you, Porr?" Jareth was careful to keep his amusement out of his voice. A man desperate in love did not need to be made light of.
"What would I say, Jareth? 'Where are you going? I don't like it.' I have no right to ask questions of her," Porr sounded desperate.
"And whose fault is that? I have seen glaciers move faster than you do, Porr. You do realize that Sindri is a beautiful woman, and you are not the only man who has shown an interest in her? How long are you going to wait, until you finally get up the nerve to ask her whether you may pay court to her as you should? I cannot imagine that the lady Sindri has found a lover outside the palace," and mercilessly Jareth drove home the point he was making, it was time Porr realized that he risked loosing Sindri if he could not gather his courage, "but there are many crafts- and tradesmen that come to the palace, and not all of them are as blind and slow as you are". When he looked at Porr's horror-stricken face, he relented. "But I believe there is a much more innocent explanation for Sindri's sojourns from the castle."
He moved his hand just so, and a scrying crystal appeared on his palm. He took the crystal between his fingers, and in the air before the table a man-sized image appeared in the air, faithfully depicting all it faced. With a quick turn of his wrist, the crystal was gone, and Jareth said with satisfaction "Done! Sit down, Porr, now we will have to wait. The crystal is at the bottom of the basket, but when Sindri arrives where she is going, it will find a vantage point from which we can see and hear what happens."
And he sat back in his chair, drinking his tea, sure all they would see would be Sindri visiting the house of some relative or friend who had come to the goblin city.
/
The lady Sindri did not have strong innate magic, but her skills were well-honed and sure, and with a charm Sarah had given her she wove a sound spell of concealment to protect both herself and the whereabouts of the goblin queen's home in the goblin city. Wrapped in a simple dark wool cloak she walked the wet, dark streets from the castle to one of the poorer parts of town, and any eye that touched on her small form would move over her without truly noticing. Even those on the streets for dubious purposes would barely discern her, forgetting her as soon as she had passed. It was an exceedingly efficient spell as much power was needed to render anything truly invisible, but distracting the minds of an observer required very little strength. The heavy basket on her arm feeling as if it were getting heavier, and drenched to the bone by the deceptively soft rain she finally arrived at Sarah's home. Befitting its occupant, the tiny, shabby house in a run-down part of the goblin city was much more than met the eye. Only those who knew the goblin queen would ever see the truth of the house. Everyone else saw a house like any of the dwellings in the area, barely big enough for a small living room and a kitchen on the ground floor, a few tiny windows, with a narrow staircase leading to tiny sleeping quarters under the roof, just big enough for a bed and a chest under the eaves. A small back yard to let the occupants to grow whatever food they could and keep some chickens and rabbits to supplement their diet, or in Sarah's case give her dogs a spot do dig holes and run. There was no response to Sindri's knocks, so she opened the door with her keys. As she climbed up the narrow, rickety stairs, her wet, cold clothes dried up more with each step and when she reached at the top of the flight, her clothes were dry. As Sindri pushed open the low door to the room and entered, as always she was stuck how bare it was compared to the rooms in the castle. The queen's room was many times bigger than could be possibly contained within the tiny house, and while it was comfortably if shabbily furnished with discards from the junkyard, it lacked any of the many fine pieces of furniture that could be found in even the poorest rooms in the goblin king's palace. A table and a few mismatched chairs, a few chests at the back of the low couches set facing each other in the middle of the room and the fireplace, and then books - stacked wherever there was space. The couches were beset by stacks of books, teeming towers of them leaning against any bit of wall available, and the queen's low bed was mostly cordoned off by layers upon layers of books. Sindri smiled, Jareth's library was much more extensive, having been built over countless great years, but his books were properly shelved, taking over many rooms to make a truly impressive library. She hoped Sarah would decide on shelves before all her books collapsed on her. How could she ever find any one tome that she wanted? But if the furnishing left something to be desired, the walls did not. The room had a wealth of huge windows along two walls, each opening to a different vista in the goblin kingdom, and all of them now showing a velvety black nightscape, the bright stars and both moons full in the sky, glittering electric blue over the eternal snow of the peaks of the Simien mountains; over the endless Plains of Ashes, the dry white grass longing for a spark, reflecting the moonlight like restless water; over the ripening thick green spikes of wheat and rye in the central plains moving lazily under the bright moonlight like oil; and over many other scenes that Sindri did not recognize. She thought dryly that, all in all, Sarah's windows were a lot more pleasing than many of the pictures that graced - or rather not - the walls of the castle. Upon the councilor's entry the room had lit up magically, bathed in early summer daylight, and Sindri carried her basket to the fireplace and put it down. It was chilly outside, but the queen's living quarters, shaped by the labyrinth's very essence, were ever warm and comfortable, like a mother's embrace. Sindri took kindling from a basket at the fireplace and within a few minutes had a fire going, ready to cook dinner for herself and Sarah.
Unbeknownst to Sindri, while she had started the fire Jareth's scrying crystal had quietly rolled out from the bottom of her basket and up the wall, to come to rest on the man-high mantle of the fireplace, nestling into the shade between some storage containers and kitchen utensils.
Sindri looked around in the cold chest Sarah kept in the corner, next to her few dishes, but it held nothing but some containers that Sindri could not identify. What was this red soupy stuff in a glass bottle, the lettering on it reading "Heinz Tomato Ketchup"? A quick taste decided the dwarf lady that it was not meant for consumption. It was as sweet as molasses, but like tomato as well, a strange and rather inedible combination. After she had burned her taste buds into oblivion with a healthy taste of "Sambal Oelek" she decided that humans liked inedible things. As she had seen Sarah eat real food, she decided to cook a stew with the food she had brought with her. Within a short time Sindri had a big iron pot of stew with hake, cod and vegetables simmering on the crane over the edge of the fire, and daringly she decided to add some of that strange spicy Sambal paste - it would add an edge that should go well with the stew. Not knowing when Sarah would come home, Sindri moved the crane to the outer edge of the fire to keep the stew warm and retired happily to one of the couches with a book chosen haphazardly from one of the piles.
Seated comfortably in the library, cups of larak cradled in their hands, Jareth and Porr took a good look around the room through the crystal. They were confused. The room lacked all trappings of wealth and power, yet the windows were a work of potent magic. It might have been the room of a scholarly mage unconcerned with outward success. Porr was distressed. Sindri seemed well at home at the place and had made herself comfortable with the ease of someone performing an often-repeat action.
Sindri was drawn out of her fascinated immersion in the life of the riddle master of Hed by the door banging open and lifted her head to see Sarah shuffle into the room looking like something the cat dragged in. The goblin queen lifted her head to the bright light in the room and a smile broke on her face. As Sindri walked up to her, Sarah flashed a blinding smile at her, her hands unobtrusively hidden in her skirts, and said with rough, tired voice: "Not another step, Sindri. Forgive me for being so late, I didn't imagine you'd come here tonight since you just visited the other day. I'm filthy, I stink, and I am cold to the bone. I need a hot bath and some hot food, and by the smell of it you have taken care of the most time consuming part already."
"You still eat fish, don't you Sarah?" Sindri said as she looked over the exhausted goblin queen with a dismayed face. "Will Nehorai join us for dinner?"
Jareth's face had gone grim when he beheld the bedraggled figure of the goblin queen, and her words and the mention of a man's name made it grimmer still.
"Well, luckily for me, no fish have as yet talked to me, so yes, I still eat fish. And it smells delicious, so I promise I'll be fast. But it will just be the two of us for dinner, Nehorai has gone home to the mists until I go back onto the road, and luckily he has taken the dogs with him," and with a smile Sarah went to her luxurious bathroom, her one indulgence. Behind a plain door hid a fantasy that would have made a Roman emperor blanch with envy, with a hot bubbly pool carved from malachite, forever overflowing with sweet-smelling water of whatever temperature the occupant wished for, and a soothing waterfall shower that put technology to shame. The floors and walls were covered with the softest pale blue grass, a soothing golden light suffused the air, and a soft warm breeze filled the room with the sweet scents of spring grass. Sarah occasionally felt guilty about having the labyrinth waste any of its magic on her, but she enjoyed her baths too much to really give a damn.
Barely a moment had passed when the door opened again and several grinning goblins flew out bathroom, followed by their queen's voice: "This is the final warning, my little imbeciles, so you best pay heed! If even one of you shows his face in here while I take a bath, I swear I will rip you to pieces, dunk you into the bog, and then feed you to the hellhound – out now! And if you have pissed in the bath I'll kill you anyway." The utterly unimpressed goblins picked themselves up from wherever they had rolled and joined growing crowd of goblins who seemed to multiply in all corners of the large room as nobody was looking. While they were certainly noisy and created a running hazard, they left Sarah's books well alone and kept their hands away from the fruit that was on the table. As Sindri pushed the cradle with the stew pot back over the fire, filled the water kettle and began cutting thick slices of bread, Eek came over and greeted her with a grin, then grabbed plates and spoons from the chest and began setting the table. Sindri could hardly suppress a grin, she wondered how Sarah had managed to train her goblins so well, they were not only much better behaved than the crowd in the goblin king's castle, but they were also a good deal cleaner.
When Sindri heard the door open, she turned to see Sarah in a soft unbleached cotton chemise under a faded green surcoat that had seen better days; but at least she was clean and dry, if still too thin and tired looking. Eek jumped up on his Sarra's shoulder and held on to her hair as he settled into a comfortable position. Something in the queen's demeanor made Sindri unobtrusively keep an eye on her, and she walked up behind her quietly as Sarah opened a small chest and took out a jar of ointment.
"What is wrong with your hands, Sarah?" she asked, her voice strained with shock as she took one of the queen's torn hands, the palm covered with red welts and broken blisters. "Night, have you been digging ditches?"
Sarah looked at her with a fatigued smile. "Don't worry about it, Sindri, it's fine, just let me put some ointment on them."
Sindri roughly took the jar and put it back into the chest, then she took the queen's hands into hers as she invoked a healing spell. Even healed, the queen's hands were red and showed the signs of hard physical labor, the skin thickly callused and crisscrossed with tiny white scars. "Your hands look worse than a washerwoman's, my queen, let me heal them for you," she said, barely keeping her emotions under control.
"Don't, Sindri, I need these calluses," Sarah said as she pulled her hands away. "I work with my hands. If you gave me soft ladies' hands, they'd just bleed faster and worse than ever. Leave them be."
Sindri bit her lip. "But ..., why did you not heal yourself, Sarah?"
"Oh Sindri, I don't know how." With just a touch of bitterness in her voice Sarah continued. "I am only human. I share in the labyrinth's power, but I have never learned the use of magic. All I know is what I have taught myself by trial and error since I came here. I don't know how to use healing magic on myself." She gave Sindri a loop-sided grin. "But you know, Sindri, I am starving, so let's eat first. I really need to get some food into me before I get into any kind of discussion."
The silence in the goblin king's library was deafening. Jareth and Porr had followed the exchange between Sarah and Sindri with rising horror. A look at the queen's hands had suggested to Jareth that perhaps her decision to always wear gloves when she was at court had less to do with avoiding to leach magic, than drawing unwanted attention to her hands, and how they got to look as they did. How in the night could the goblin queen not know magic?
Sindri held her tongue as they sat down for their dinner and found herself unexpectedly amused as she watched Sarah. Sitting down was a rather involved process for the goblin queen since as many goblins as possible tried to get close to her as possible.
When she was finally able to take her first sip from the steaming mug of larak, she had a goblin each sitting on her shoulders and one holding on to the top of her head, although Eek had made sure that the only the very smallest and lightest of goblins took these lofty seats. Several others crowded on her lap, with Eek in the position of pride in the center, which gave him the additional strategic advantage of being able to snatch some food from Sarra's plate when she wasn't paying attention. Several ugly heads peeked out of the pockets in Sarah's skirts, and even more goblins hung on to the chair the queen was sitting in, occasionally touching her hair, poking her and generally making a nuisance out of themselves. The floor around the queen was packed with even more goblins fighting with each other to get as close to her as possible. Sarah ignored them with the ease of long practice.
The dwarf lady made sure to fill Sarah's bowl twice, heaped with as much fish as possible, and fed her as many slices of bread as she could, until finally Sarah pushed back her chair with a smile on her face. "However much you would like to fatten me up, Sindri, I cannot eat another bite." Sarah removed the goblins from her and refilled their cups to the rim with steaming, lapis larak. "I am sure we can be much more comfortable on the couches, so let's go there for the inevitable sermon."
As they sat down on opposite couches, Sindri watched with mounting amusement as the goblins repeated the whole earlier rigmarole of draping themselves either on top or at least as close as possible to their queen who seemed happily oblivious to the whole procedure and began petting whatever goblin came under her hands as she settled down comfortably on the couch.
"It is not my place, my queen, to tell you what you can do," Sindri started decorously, but she found her words immediately interrupted by Sarah's disbelieving snort. Sindri looked up peevishly and decided to forgo the courtly talk - it was wasted on the goblin queen anyway. "What the night did you do to tear your hands so, Sarah?"
"The storm that blew over the city this last week flattened a lot of trees in the forest outside the city walls." Sarah said matter-of-factly. "We figured we should take advantage of it, and the whole neighborhood went out with the carts to cut up the trees for firewood in winter."
"But what do you need wood for, Sarah? It is always a perfect temperature in here, the labyrinth keeps it so."
She sounded confused. Sarah did not blame her, but she did sometimes wonder how the courtiers thought everyone else lived. "You are right, I am always warm here, but my neighbors are not. They need the firewood, and we always go out together to cut it. Only humans, dwarves and haltija can touch cold iron, so it falls to us to wield the axes and saws."
Sindri found herself getting angry with her stubborn friend. "So you have been out cutting wood in the rain all day, all week, and there is not enough food here to feed a dog. Although, last time I saw them, both dogs looked well fed, which cannot be said for you. I bring you a basket of food every week, Sarah, but where is it? You are so thin, Sarah, you don't eat enough." Sindri could not stop herself. "You give the food to the others, don't you? Oh my lady, who takes care of you? You are the goblin queen, you should not go hungry in the heart of your kingdom. You are not helping anyone by living like this, always hungry, exhausted, clinging to survival like the meanest of your subjects."
She had a lot more to say on that topic until finally Sarah snapped. "Stop it, Sindri. I am the goblin queen, and I live in the labyrinth as my subjects do. What is wrong with this? They are hungry, and I share their fate. I am immortal, and I will not die from hunger. Let it be, Sindri." She cradled the cup of larak between her hands. "There is a ork family in the neighborhood, Awrang and Farkhonda. They have a small child. They work their fingers to the bone to feed the little one, but you don't know how hard it is. Food has become so expensive, and they have nothing left of value that they can trade." Sarah swallowed hard. "Farkhonda was blessed with another child on the way, but three weeks ago she lost it. Always hungry, always feeding the child before eating themselves. What do you want me to do, Sindri? Eat your food and watch the children die? We share our food and make do with less, to make sure the children eat. We get wheat from the king's granaries, but it is never enough."
Sindri was crying now. "But Sarah, how does it help them if you're here with them, hungry and desperate as they are? I thought the granaries still had enough food to feed the people in the city. You could have helped them more if you were in the castle where you could make sure that the help goes where it is needed. Oh Sarah, you ARE the goblin queen, and you belong in the castle beyond the goblin city."
Jareth' face was as white as bleached bone, his eyes black in his shocked face, as he listened to the lady Sindri's words and his heart agreed with every word she said.
"You don't understand, Sindri. The goblin kingdom is ruled as well as can be, the food is distributed where it should, and if the poor go hungry, they do not starve. If I were in the castle, nobody would get more food, and how would I know who needs it anyway? We will all live to see the next harvest. I am the goblin queen, but Sindri, think! The goblin kingdom never needed a queen before the labyrinth choose me. My presence in the castle would not make a whit of a difference to the ruling of the kingdom or the how the people live. I was chosen not for the ruling, but for the labyrinth. The goblin king needs no help to rule." As Sarah moved a couple of goblins around to tuck under her feet, Eek pushed another one off her lap and crawled on as she was settling, leaning into her. "The labyrinth has made me its own, all of who I am at its disposal, and shares its magic and its power. Yet mine is not the power of high magic that the kindreds of the underground have, Sindri, I cannot use magic like you do. I can re-order time, I can move across the labyrinth in a heartbeat, I can use the magic I need for the runners. I have learned a little control to use the power for healing, but there are no books to learn magic from, and trust me, I have looked. The shedim shape magic with dreamsong, which is what I can do anyway, for what else is shaping reality with my dreams? Nothing I have to offer is of any use to aid the goblin king in his ruling, but only to the labyrinth itself and its people." Her voice became wistful. " I dream of the Queen's Palisade still, and of the wild hills over the central plains, in the nights after I bury another child on another farm, and all my hunger for peace creates the only beauty I still see, there. It is so beautiful at the shores of the lake in the mountains, you cannot imagine, Sindri. When I just want to run away, I think of the giant birds in the air over the lake, and they never touch the ground, being born alive, and riding the wind on their parents' back until they can fly. Dreaming them keeps me sane."
Sarah's face was alight with joy as she described the wonders of the world she created from her mind together the labyrinth. But soon a shadow fell on her face again.
"But mostly these days I see the need among my people, and I dream what might be of use. If I never again dream into existence a line of solid, old willow trees to act as windbreakers, it'll be too late. And do not get me started on streams. Why the night do people start farms without making sure they have some water supply but the sky? Oh, and let's not forget the various monsters I dream into existence. I never realized what a vicious imagination I had until I saw some of the things that I dreamt up." Sarah lifted her cup to her mouth, but stopped midway when she realized it was empty. Quick as lightning Eek grabbed the cup and jumped off her lap, stopping for a moment to take Sindri's empty cup on the way to the pot over the fire. He returned with the filled cups and returned to his seat on Sarah's lap.
Jareth swore exquisitely and extensively for well neigh a minute, and he never repeated himself once. His queen should not ever live like this, she should be dreaming of what she wanted, the things she enjoyed, not live a life that left her exhausted, disgusted, full of self-loathing. His hands were clenched to fists at his side.
"Thank you, Eek," Sarah smiled at the little goblin as she took up her story again. "This is what I am to the labyrinth, Sindri. I am the queen, but not for the ruling. I love the labyrinth, I love its goblins, and I love its people. I want to live among them and know their lives. If I survive this war," and Sindri turned white as a sheet at her words as did Eek, as did Jareth and Porr in the library in the castle beyond the goblin city, "I will be happy again. Before the attacks began, I was happy. For this is what this goblin queen is, Sindri. All of it. It is not the castle, or the silks and jewels. Just dreaming the labyrinth and loving its creatures."
Sindri was not convinced. "Jareth is the goblin king, he loves the labyrinth and its people as much as you do. You said yourself, the kingdom is well run. Would not the king and the queen together to an even better job?"
"A remark like this makes me wonder if he hasn't somehow blackmailed you into swaying my opinion to his wishes," Sarah said dryly. "Luckily for you I know you are simply deluded." She laughed. "He is the goblin king. He was a skillful and talented mage long before he was chosen, the son of a powerful ruler, born to privilege and glory. Also a bit unstable and wild, from all I can gather, which doubtlessly stood him in good steed once he got to be king here. He shaped the goblin kingdom in many ways, and made it much more secure and powerful than it had been before. A distrustful mind can be a great resource. The goblin kingdom is better organized and run than any place I have seen in the above - there seem be to obvious advantages to not having to shill for majorities. And he is actually keeping diplomatic ties with all the other demesnes who would like to see us wiped out. So why fix something that isn't broken in the first place? Adding me to this mixture, even if I were willing, would be a recipe for disaster. The goblin king was born to be a ruler. I am not. I am just human – a nothing, not pretty, not smart, not politic, not diplomatic, neither willing nor able to actually organize and run a kingdom. All I can do is dream and love. It's little enough, but I do it well. It's enough for me."
"Why do you think so little of yourself, Sarah?" Sindri asked quietly. "The kingdom is growing still, so much bigger than it ever was, filled with wonders that none in the underground has ever seen, all this from you union with the labyrinth. You can see through people's mask to who they are, you know what is real, and it is the narrow-minded, stupid ones who get stuck on the outside, my queen. I will admit, inviting you for a diplomatic meeting might not be the best idea, but then, many people would not make good diplomats. And you are beautiful."
Sarah had listened to Sindri with wistful expression on her face until the end of her words. "And there you go ruining such a perfectly lovely list. Sindri, I was not even beautiful when I was young, very pretty I'll admit, but pretty fades with the years, leaving behind an unremarkable face." Sarah sang a blues chorus to her friend: "To old to be pretty, to plain to be beautiful, too good-looking for ugly, just a face in the crowd." She grinned. "Beautiful? Any number of men and mirrors have not told me so, Sindri, and at this late point in the game I suspect it would be rather difficult to convince me otherwise. I do not care – whom do I want to be beautiful for? The labyrinth made me its own. I belong. I dream. I love. It's enough and more." Sarah got up gracefully from the couch and made her way to Sindri's basket.
Porr threw a worried glance at his friend. Jareth had sat through all of the queen's tired words without a word or even a movement, his eyes burning and his face like ice.
"Perhaps you are right, Sindri," she said over her shoulder, "I might not be the complete write-off I presented myself as, but that does not mean I'd be of use at court. There's nothing there for me that someone else could not do better, but there is nobody in the goblin kingdom who can do what I do." Sarah knew that she still had some cookies stashed away from her goblin's greedy little paws, in one of the containers on the mantle. "And by the way, you are also wrong ..."
Sindri would never know what Sarah was going to say, as the goblin queen's next words were squashed by a sudden furious hiss "What the night ... " and a strangled scream of rage. Eek was by her side in an instant and Sindri but moments later, and they saw the goblin queen holding a crystal in her hand. "Eek," Sarah called to her goblin in a voice that brook no resistance, and the little goblin jumped on her shoulder without delay. Sarah grabbed Sindri somewhat roughly by the hand and angrily crushed the innocuous globe in her hand, transporting herself and her companions to its source.
/
When Jareth and Porr saw the hand grabbing hold of the crystal, they guiltily jumped up from their chairs. This was definitely not a situation they cared to be caught eavesdropping on. Yet Jareth was completely taken aback by the development as suddenly the goblin queen and the lady Sindri stood in front of him and Porr in his library in the castle. Damn it, he had not known you could DO that, follow a crystal to the source. Of course, nobody had had part of the magic of the labyrinth but him before, so it was not an idea that seemed awfully important when you are the only one who can manipulate scrying crystals. But now he found himself on the receiving end of the goblin queen's stare, glaring down at him with unleashed fury, an impossible feat that she managed despite the fact that she was several inches shorter than he. Sarah had been angry with him before, furious even, but the woman he faced now seemed to be frozen with a cold rage that changed her into someone he barely recognized. Her heat he could deal with, but her frozen anger gave away nothing.
"I should have know it was you, goblin king," Sarah's voice cut him like a shard of ice, hard and emotionless, without a flicker of fire, but heavy with contempt. "It seems your power has corrupted you beyond the point of caring about disregarding any even remotely justifiable behavior. Pray tell, what could have made you think it was acceptable to spy on me in my home? Do you believe you have a right to control the queen without her acquiescence? Do you even care?"
Jareth looked at her with a forced smile on his face. There was nothing he could say as she was right, of course. Once he realized that the lady Sindri was visiting with the goblin queen, he could and should have dissolved the crystal. Unfortunately for him, his curiosity and his concern had been overriding his good sense, never his strongest feat, and he was not going to get away with it this time. "I can only beg your forgiveness, my lady Sarah." He put all the sincerity he could find in himself into his words and kept any trace of seduction out of his voice. "I only can say in my defense that I had no intention of spying on you. I swear I have never sent a crystal to search you out, my lady, nor have I ever had any intention to do so. Lady, I know I should not have kept listening to your conversation, but how could I have stopped myself? I was worried about you."
Porr would not let his friend take the blame on himself. "Lady Sarah, please, it was not Jareth' fault. I was ... ahm..." he stumbled over his words, but soldiered on valiantly, albeit with a violently flushed face. "I was ... mmmh... worried about the lady Sindri, and Jareth magicked the crystal into her basket to make sure that she was safe, as nobody ever knew where she was going these nights." His flush got deeper and his voice more fumbling as Sindri shot him a look full of pure venom.
Sarah turned on Porr without hesitation or mercy. "Then you are to be blamed as much as the goblin king, chancellor. Considering as I get berated for not living up to the high standards of behavior expected from the goblin queen," Porr's head practically shrunk into his shoulders, he was never going to live down his one stupid remark at the beginning of their acquaintance, "I would have expected better sense and manners from you. I do not accept either your or the goblin king's apology." Human, tired, thin, and dressed in old, shabby clothes, Sarah nonetheless could not have been taken for anything but who she was, a powerful creature of magic, furious beyond caring about consequences.
"Since manners, morals, or, night forbid, common decency are not enough to keep my life my own, against prying eyes I did not invite, I believe it is time I made you understand that I mean what I say, goblin king." Sarah stood up straight to her full height, her shoulders back and her hands furled to fists at her side. Her green eyes burning bright with anger she stared unflinchingly into his eyes, and with a murmur to Eek on her shoulder, she took the dagger the goblin handed her and cut the blade deep into her palm.
Ignoring the hiss of breath from the watchers, she let her blood run over her fingers and drip to the ground before she opened her mouth and said viciously and in a low voice: "Listen to me, goblin king, and finally believe it. You have no power over me! If you ever spy on me again, whether it be by magic or by any other means, I will sever any ties with you that I may have. I am the goblin queen, and never will I forsake my ties to the labyrinth; but you, I am not bound to by any ties of blood, obligation or loyalty."
Jareth flinched at the merciless anger in her words. "Another attempt to pry into my life, and you will not see me again, goblin king, in this life or beyond the night. I will ever labor for the labyrinth, and the goblin king will ever reap the results of all the queen learns, but never again will you set your eyes on me."
NO, CHOSEN, DO NOT SWEAR THIS! WHAT IF YOU ARE IN NEED OF HELP? FINDING YOU HE WOULD INVOKE THE OATH. DO NOT CLOSE YOURSELF OFF IN NEED!
After a moment's hesitation Sarah continued inexorably. "As I am sure you have heard the labyrinth's entreaties, goblin king, I will leave this exemption - were I in dire need or immediate danger that you knew of, but I could not be made aware of, I will give you leave to search me out and observe or act if necessary. Should there ever be a threat to the labyrinth I need to know, but cannot be contacted otherwise, I will give you leave to search me out. But whatever you do, goblin king, if you spy on me again, it will have been the last you've seen of me."
Her fury unabated, the goblin queen turned on her heel and gave a short nod to Sindri, then winked out of place in a heartbeat, leaving stunned silence behind.
Unfortunately, the night was not over yet. Sindri smiled coldly at Jareth and Porr. "If I may inquire, your majesty, what could have led you to suspect me of treason, I should be most obliged." The angry lady pointedly ignored the sputtering chancellor as she addressed the goblin king.
Jareth rubbed his fingers against the bridge of his nose. He had had enough already to last him a month's nights. "Night's sake, Sindri, spare me. You damn well know that I have never suspected you of treason in my life, and I never will."
"Then I cannot really see any explanation why you would follow my steps with your crystals, Jareth. What could you have been thinking? Either you distrust me, or you spy on me. Obviously talking to me did not enter your mind. And if it is not you, then it is Porr, and you helped him. There is no excuse for this either way, for either of you." Sindri gave a most formal curtsy before the king and Porr and swept out of the room without giving either of them a chance to respond.
/
Jareth and Porr shared a look of mutual dejection. Then Jareth walked over to a tray with a bottle of honey-colored brandy and glasses. He filled one glass to the rim, then held the bottle for a moment over the other glass. "How about you, Porr? Do you need an alcoholic crutch, or will you give yourself over to self-flagellation without any fortification?"
"Make it a big one, will you?" and with a crooked grin Jareth handed Porr the drink. The men sat down heavily into their leather seats and stared into their drinks glumly. "I am sorry, Jareth, I had no idea I might be dragging you into something like this."
With a short laugh, Jareth took a big gulp of the burning liquid. "You know what they say, Porr, curiosity killed the cat, and yet we live. Everything considered, we got out of this relatively unscathed. Well, at least I did." He grinned at Porr maliciously. "I believe your courtship of the lady Sindri just suffered a major setback, if not a complete reset. I, on the other hand, cannot have lost more than a few years advance in my courtship of the goblin queen. How long is it exactly since she came to the council first? A few years, right?"
Porr laughed rather against his will. "Sindri will never talk to me again. Night, I messed this up but good, Jareth. I was worried about her, and now she is angry. And the worst is, she is right. She is as honorable and trustworthy a woman as I have ever met, so why would I expect her to hide a lover? Why did I not just talk to her?"
Jareth emptied his glass with another swallow and refilled it. "Do not bother asking me for advice, Porr. You might have noticed that my counsel in these matters is not as sound as it used to be. And right now Sindri is as angry with me as she is with you, so do not believe for a moment I will stick my head out for you. Your on your own there, my friend. I rest comforted in the knowledge that by tomorrow Sindri will be angry with you alone and I will carry the weight of only Sarah's disapproval. I am afraid dealing with her is going to take all my strength, so I have nothing to spare for you."
Porr broke into a hacking cough as a mouthful of brandy went down the wrong way. "Have you taken leave of your senses, Jareth? She'll cut you to pieces with that sharp tongue of hers. And who can blame her for being so mad with us, Jareth? Night, I had no idea of the life she lives. How can she bear it? I could scarce stand listening to her. I would stay well away from the lady Sarah until she comes back to the council next time. The queen carries her grudges close and well-tended, but I fervently hope time will help, unless of course you continue on your dedicated course of angering her."
The goblin king replied rather grimly. "It is not as if I have a choice in the matter, Porr. As unpleasant as this little intermezzo has been," and he ignored Porr's mumbled "unpleasant he says," as if he hadn't heard it, "I must consider it most fortunate that we were able to hear Sarah's words. It is a grave oversight on my side, but I never gave any thought to how she would master magic, as she seemed to have such a good understanding of it. She must be able to control and use the labyrinth's magic while she insists to go gallivanting in the goblin kingdom. I know the labyrinth will keep her as save as possible, but she insists on putting herself into harm's way without a second thought. The queen must learn high magic, and I am afraid it will fall to me to teach her." He looked at Porr with a caustic smile. "Unless you know anyone else who could tutor her, of course. I would be enthusiastic about any other candidate for the position."
Porr looked at him with commiseration clear on his face, and emptied his glass. "You know what, Jareth? I am ever gladder I am not you. I do not think that you will find any volunteers for the position of the goblin queen's magic tutor. Where are the people with a burning death wish when you really need them? I wish you all the joy of the job, and please, try to keep the queen away from me. I don't even know what to do about Sindri, and the lady Sarah is a problem I'll gladly leave in your capable hands."
With these cheering words he bade the goblin king goodnight and retired to his room for a ego-crushing sleepless night of soul-searching and self-flagellation, just as Jareth had suspected.
/
I should be grateful to you forever if could help me avoid similar unpleasant situations in the future, he thought morosely as he pondered the excellent brandy in his glass. It seems most unfair to be punished for something I actually did not do, for I certainly did not spy on her. She was just collateral damage, so to speak.
I WILL NOT TAKE SIDES IN THE DISAGREEMENTS OF MY CHOSEN. BUT I DO NOT WANT YOU APART FROM MY QUEEN. IT PLEASES ME TO FIND YOU FRIENDS AND TOGETHER.
Our friendship was just dealt some serious setback, and we are most certainly not together, and will not be for a good while longer, I imagine. But I must thank you help limit Sarah's oath, so she can still be safe. Why did you not tell me how she lives and wears herself out? The goblin queen should not live like this. I will not have it.
MY PROMISE BINDS ME TO SILENCE, CHOSEN, AND I MAY TELL YOU NO MORE. SHE WILL NOT LISTEN TO ME AND IN TRUTH SHE HAS TAUGHT ME MORE THAN ANY OF MY OTHER QUEENS. SHE LEARNS THE LESSONS SHE TEACHES WITH HER PAIN AND HER SPIRIT. YET MY CHOSEN MUST BE SAFE. I CANNOT BE WITHOUT EITHER OF YOU.
Jareth smiled. I was hoping to hear this. As I begin to teach her magic, do not give her access to all your power. My defensive magic does not need work, and the teaching would be much more pleasant, and safer for at least one of your chosen, if I did not have to fight of killing strikes all the time.
laughter - I WILL KEEP YOU SAFE, CHOSEN. FORGIVE MY SILENCE. SHE IS SO DIFFERENT AND HER POWER TO TURN HER DREAMS INTO REALITY IS STRONG. I NEVER KNEW SHE CANNOT CONTROL ALL MAGIC.
How could you have known? All in the underground take the use of magic for granted, and I did not think about it any more than you. I did not think how she lived her life outside the castle either.
I do not believe Sarah wants to talk to me, but she must begin her lessons. Let her know her about her new lessons in magic. An hour after sunrise in the goblin throne room beginning the day after tomorrow, and get her there, preferably with very little magic at her disposal. I do not believe she would follow an invitation by me.
/
The goblin king sat in the silence of his library until the light outside turned gray and the castle began to stir. He cradled his head in his hands, his hair as wild as his eyes, as he considered Sarah's role in the goblin kingdom. When the first rays of the sun touched the horizon, he finally took to his bed.