I almost didn't update this tonight because I've been totally exhausted for like, a month and tonight it's especially wearing on me. But I did update and.. well, be happy about it, I guess.

You can be unhappy about it, too, but just don't tell me that. I don't respond well to negative criticism.

Chapter 15

As Jareth stared into the clear crystal resting on his fingertips the moon outside the glass-covered window of the tower room slowly began to rise along the horizon and the sun began to sink into a horizon awash with splashes of purple, hazy red and vibrant orange. It wasn't the sun or the wonderful sky that its setting caused that Jareth cared about however, but the moon: because, with its seize of the sky came Jareth's renewal of power. No sooner had the sky darkened to a velvet plum color and the moon's first silver-lavender beams hit the crystal in Jareth's hand did the crystal sparkle and glimmer to life, bringing to its surface an image of Sarah and her traveling companions.

They had made significant progress in the hours since Jareth had warned Sarah through her dream (a medium that he'd thought he'd left behind since her new arrival in the Underground) and Jareth shook his head at her. Once again, she was making the Labyrinth seem easier than it really was.

Toby was awake now and Sarah, Hoggle, and Thilly were trying their best to keep the young boy from jumping, running, and touching every strange thing he saw within the Labyrinth's walls. Sarah was smiling at her brother and chatting with her friends, looking more like a normal girl enjoying a nice walk than someone who plotted and performed a kidnapping, told more lies than she could count, and who, most of all, was in deep, deep trouble.

Jareth let out a sigh as he rotated the crystal around in his hand. The image in the center remained the same, suspended and fixed in on Sarah unless Jareth ordered it to move elsewhere. He didn't know what to do about her. He'd tried warning her, tried giving her a chance to turn back, but she, of course, did not comply. She never did. She was stubborn, prideful, and more work than she was worth.

So why did Jareth expend so much energy on her?

He'd tried looking into himself during the five years between Sarah's visits to the Underground, tried examining his actions then, and he realized that, in truth, Sarah provided a great amount of entertainment for him. She was expressive, imaginative, and completely out of reach for him.

Jareth had lived a life of luxury from the very beginning and it was a curious experience, to find the one thing that he wanted but just couldn't have. He'd gotten everything, anything, he'd ever wanted, but when he found Sarah, and he wanted Sarah, she'd turned him down. He'd tried everything he could to get her, to win her without coming outright and admitting his feelings and, therefore, exposing his weakness, but she didn't succumb to his promised.

Why? It was a mystery to Jareth and though he knew that the solution to it would inevitably be bad for him, he couldn't help but try everything that was in his power to solve it.

In the crystal image, Sarah stifled a yawn and Jareth felt a streak of guilt for costing her yet another night's rest. He shook his head and rested his chin on the hand free of the crystal, subduing the guilt with excuses – he'd needed to disturb Sarah's sleep, for her own good. He'd needed to warn her, and it wasn't his fault that she'd wasted his warning by ignoring it. Perhaps with a little exhaustion she'd be more susceptible to the next warning.

Jareth always did things for Sarah's own good.

In the crystal Sarah laughed at something Thilly had said. The human girl and the changeling were walking together, further back from Hoggle and Toby, and talking quietly to each other. Jareth smiled – if his plan was to work it was crucial that Sarah and Thilly become close friends. She would not, upon any circumstances, be able to leave the Labyrinth gates.

For her own good.

Sarah exhaled deeply and shifted the sack of food and things to her opposite shoulder as she watched Hoggle chase down Toby, who had run off to inspect something more closely.

"Toby, don't go rushing at things like that!" Sarah called after the boy. He didn't seem to hear her, but Hoggle had caught up with him and was guiding him away from whatever it was that he'd been looking at.

She felt like they'd been walking for days, though she knew it'd only been a few hours. The air was cold and the sky looked darker than it should - even the large, bright moon didn't seem like it was enough to chase away the apprehensive feelings that Sarah had been feeling ever since she'd woken up from her dream.

They were out in the open now. All around her, Sarah could only see dust-colored stones and tall, curved walls that seemed to guide them in circles. She was starting to feel like she should ask her friends to turn back and go another way and the nervous, unsure feelings brought back more unpleasant memories of her past experience in the Labyrinth.

The strange thing was that, back then, there were various creatures that Sarah had talked to, but now it was so deserted she almost expected tumbleweed to blow past, like they did in the movies. They hadn't met up with a single conscious life form in a day's worth of travel and it was giving Sarah the chills… Had Jareth completely done away with all the creatures just to make the Labyrinth more difficult? What about Sir Didymus and Ludo – if they weren't here, and they weren't in the City, where could they possibly be?

"Don't worry," said a voice next to Sarah. She jumped reflexively then breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that it was just Thilly.

"I'm sure we'll meet… someone soon," Thilly was saying. "But this is pretty strange, isn't it?"

"You read my mind," she said with a heavy sigh and Thilly allowed herself a small whisper of a smile that Sarah couldn't help but return.

"Toby's quite happy, though," Thilly went on.

Sarah nodded, "Just wait until he realizes that there aren't any 'monsters', as he would put it… He'll completely pull a tantrum, then."

"He doesn't seem like the tantrum type…"

Sarah laughed, "You're right, he's not… But he won't be happy, that's for sure. He'll start asking you and Hoggle full biographies just to make himself feel better."

Thilly nodded and brushed back her feathery white hair, yawing and tugging at her skirts as if trying to straighten the ratty, torn things into a more presentable form.

Sarah adjusted the knapsack on her shoulder again and Thilly, seemingly unconscious of the fact, reached back to take it from her. Sarah lifted a brow at her as the Changeling carried the heavy bag casually, letting it hang off the ends of two of her spindly, fragile-looking fingers. It was yet another example of how strong Thilly actually was, and Sarah didn't really know how she felt about it. How could such a strong creature be forced to do menial labor like washing dished and scrubbing floor tiles? It just didn't make any sense.

"Did you sleep well last night?" Thilly asked after a few steps of silence.

Sarah blinked, not knowing how to answer the abrupt question. The Thilly she'd known back at the castle wouldn't have asked such a thing – especially not with the sort of curious, unapologetic look on her face as she did at that moment.

"I… uh…" Sarah trailed off.

"It's just, you seemed… disturbed… Tossing and turning and that."

"The ground was just… hard to sleep on," Sarah explained. She didn't really want to go into the details of her dream with Thilly and, thankfully, the Changeling girl didn't inquire any further.

The exchange brought Sarah to another dilemma that she needed to deal with. What would she tell her friends about her relationship with Jareth? Thilly didn't have any idea about Sarah's previous experiences with the Goblin King, and as far as Hoggle knew, she hated Jareth just as much as any creature in the Labyrinth or the City did.

What would Hoggle think if he knew that Sarah had romantic feelings for a person they both outwardly considered to be terrifying and malicious?

Sarah shook her head and, though she tried to make it look like she'd just been shaking hair out of her face, Thilly gave her a strange sideways look. Sarah decided that, once they left the Labyrinth, she wouldn't have to tell her friends anything about Jareth. He would no longer be an issue.

"Sarah!" Toby called from far ahead of them. "Come see this, quick!"