"Haven't you got a kingdom to run? Or are you letting your subjects run amok and getting up to their usual mischief?"

Jareth opened his eyes and grinned at the tall Fae.

"Thenus, and what have I done to have you so graciously swagger into one of my private gardens and insult my kingdom and its subjects?"

The Fae opened his mouth in mock horror. "Dear brother, I thought you'd have been ever so pleased to see me?"

Jareth smirked at him. They weren't really similar looking. Where Jareth had blonde unruly hair, Thenus had long, raven hair that smoothed down his back. Where Jareth had icy blue eyes (with his left eye that had a dilated pupil) that spoke of mischief and defiance, Thenus had midnight blue eyes that spoke of responsibility.

"How's Tirion? Or is that a stupid question?"

Thenus rolled his eyes. "Good, as usual, we've been having a problem with the Selkies again. But other than that, the land has never been better."

"Coming from a King who mainly rules over water and has so little land." Jareth retorted.

"At least my subjects don't cause trouble all the time."

"Because my subjects can at least accompany me to Cethala without wanting to dive into the palace's fish tanks and the, dare I say, private gardens and their ponds and fountains." Jareth sneered.

"Yes, but my subjects don't throw food at each other at one of the Royal meetings."

Jareth paused at this, he knew his brother was right, but he couldn't help it if he was put in charge of the goblin kingdom. Anyway, it's not like the goblins were told not to throw food, it was the opposite actually. Jareth had gotten bored of official talks and wanted to… liven up the place.

"So what are you actually doing here?" Jareth replied, almost bored.

Thenus grinned at his victory. "Well brother, I was coming to see you anyway-"

Jareth snorted. "Yeah, more like-"

"And I was told about a certain Royal engagement that we will have to attend. I was merely coming over here to warn you about this matter." Thenus interrupted with a glint in his eyes.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Jareth frowned. "No-one's getting married."

"Oh, but brother, that is where you're mistaken." Smiled Thenus.

"Well, then, spit it out!"

"Our dear Belleanna." Thenus paused waiting for Jareth's reaction. Belleanna was the only sister in his family, and she was the youngest. Despite being the middle child in a family of six children, Jareth had taken the role of big brother seriously when it came to Belleanna.

Jareth's eyes opened wide. "Who the-"

Thenus cut in, he didn't want Jareth to get angry, especially not at a happy occasion. "Rifur, of course, who else?"

Jareth scowled. It was not like he didn't like Rifur, hell he was the only guy that he had sort of liked that Belleanna had brought home, but it was that she was his younger sister and he didn't want her to get married yet. She was still only young. Well, she was quite a lot younger than Jareth, but he and his brothers had been born within a scale of time. Belleanna was over a thousand years younger than Jareth, she was only four hundred.

"So, what, are they getting married?"

"Well duhh! But this is the engagement party. No marriage for a while. She wants a long engagement." Thenus rolled his eyes at Jareth.

"When is it?" Jareth sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"A few months. Thought I'd come and warn you. You do know mother's expecting us all to bring dates? Probably trying to marry us all off again… Especially you, Jareth, mother seemed particularly interested in you bringing a date. Is there something you're not telling me?" Thenus tilted his head, being mock serious.

"No. Unless you're deluding yourself and thinking I'd bring a troll of a Fae such as Rypena, now would you?" Jareth laughed. He was secretly hoping that, by the time of his sister's engagement party that Sarah would agree to live in the castle with him, and would accompany him. He knew she would never agree, but he couldn't stop hoping things, could he?

Thenus laughed. "True, dear brother, true. So now to move on to what I was going to ask you as soon as I came here. What are you doing in this garden? You don't have a book or any official scrolls to read over. But to be honest, you'd rather lock yourself up in your study to do that. You looked as though you were day dreaming. Pray tell, what were you dreaming about?"

With that, Jareth conjured a crystal and threw it at his brother, in which he disappeared as soon as it hit his chest. His disembodied voice laughed and said, "Well then that was rude. But I shall leave you be. Until next time, Goblin King."

Jareth sighed. As much as he loved and was close to his brother, he annoyed the hell out of him. They were forever playing tricks on each other as children, and still did to this day. Jareth leant his head back against the tree and closed his eyes. He inhaled the warm, sweet air in hopes of returning to his dreaming.

Thenus looked defeated. He had remembered that time several decades ago when his brother was so obviously heartbroken, but no-one would tell him why until he bribed his sister into telling him what she and his mother were talking about. A mortal girl, called Sarah. He sighed and hoped that his brother had returned to his old self, that maybe this Sarah wasn't his bonded.

He hoped that someday, the situation would sort itself out and Jareth would be truly happy again. It was an awful thing to be bonded but have no feelings reciprocated.

Love, 'tis harsh and cruel like the burning, destructive fire. But can be as calm and as soothing as the moon, wonderful as the stars but as warm and loving as the autumn or spring sun.

A/N: Uni has finished for Xmas *victory dance*. I am now free to write, doss about, play on the PS3 and do some art. Huzzah!

Again, thank you for everyone who has reviewed; put on story alert and put it on favourite.

Apologies for a very short chapter, but I haven't updated in days due to Uni work.

I may have to edit over some things, as some chapters were written late at night when I had no clue how to make the story flow. That and I've forgotten how the story has gone :|

Also, I've recently read some Labyrinth fanfics and my story has had some similar plot lines, so I'm going to end up changing my future plot which will involve me taking longer in writing them.

*I ended up throwing random letters around in the hopes of making names a while ago. Selkies are different to mermaids, as Selkies are seals that can imitate a human's body for a couple of hours before they have to change back. So, just to clear up, these are how you pronounce the names:

Thenus (Th-en-us)
Tirion (Ti-rhi-on)
Cethala (Keth-ahh-la)
Belleanna (Bay-ah-nah)
Rifus (Reef-her)
Rypena (Ri-pea-ner)