Sarah cautiously looked around the throne room. It was dark, silent, and maybe a little scary, not that she'd admit that out loud. Candles in every shade of red covered the walls casting shadows into the corners of the throne room. Merliah cooed gently into her ear as she watched every shadow flitter across the floor. Sarah smiled a little and felt a bit safer. Her brave warrior owl always at the ready.
Then she saw it - the throne. Carved from a black wood flecked with pulsing silver veins of what looked like lightning, it shone brightly in the otherwise darkened room. She looked closer at the wood, certain humans had never seen anything like it before and smiled. A bright red velvet back cushion nestled into a silver frame that seemed embedded into the wooden chair. The seat cushion was also red and looked very inviting. The chair had a high back carved with flowers and what looked like fairies ready for battle. They seemed to watch her and she swallowed.
At the top of the throne was a face, eyes closed. Was this Meridia, or some other queen carved for posterity?
Sarah walked over to the throne and touched the back cushion, looking more closely. It was not velvet, they were tiny feathers, as if the cushion was the breast of some wild bird, soft and warm. She ran her hand over it and the chair seemed to hum. Quickly she removed her hand and glanced at Clarice.
"The throne has feathers sown onto it?" Sarah asked.
"Well, not everything is as it seems here," the captain reminded her, and Sarah smirked knowingly. "Go ahead, try to sit on your throne."
Sarah paused - it couldn't really be this easy, could it? She turned her back on the chair and went to sit. Suddenly she found herself on the cold floor and she jumped up, puzzled. The throne was on the other side of the room. She ran over to it, trying to sit on it again and was stunned when the throne ran away from her, the face on the top center of its back staring at her with a hostile yet amused look.
"You're alive?" Sarah gasped and the throne laughed. Clarice rolled her eyes and Merliah flew up to a high wooden beam in the throne room ceiling for a better view of the battle set to begin.
"So are you - for now," the face hissed. "Who are you to claim me as your own?"
"I - I'm Sarah, Champion of the Labyrinth and - well, I'm going to be Queen of Wishes as soon as you settle down and let me sit on you." She smirked. "I never thought I'd ever say anything like that in my life."
"Well, Sarah, Champion of the Labyrinth, you have exactly twenty minutes to convince me that you have a right to be queen."
"And just who are you?" Sarah challenged.
"You haven't figured that out yet? Everyone's been talking to you about me - I'm Crimson, the throne for the true queen. You don't seem to have the sense you need for this sort of work. Turn back Sarah," the throne said in a bored tone and Sarah's eyes grew dark. She remembered Jareth saying that to her and still she had prevailed. She would do so now as well.
"I resent that - you don't know me," Sarah huffed and a large round white clock appeared on the wall. Lit from behind, it shone brightly with red numbers and a sweeping second hand that slowly rotated around the face.
"I do know that you now have fifteen minutes to claim your throne - if you have it in you of course. Personally, I doubt it."
"I'm not going to fail the fairies - or Jareth," Sarah snarled, lunging for the throne. Crimson ran on her four swift legs, knocking Sarah over in a mad rush for the door.
"Jareth? That little heathen?" Crimson said rolling her eyes. "He's still alive? Meridia and I would argue endlessly about his lack of discipline."
"He's Goblin King now and my king," Sarah said firmly. "And once you are a good little throne and let me sit down - he'll be my husband.."
"You - married to the elusive Jareth? Sounds fascinating. Catch me if you can, your highness," Crimson mocked as she ran from the room.
Sarah bit back a growl and chased Crimson out of the throne room into a large ballroom. There were hundreds of chairs there that all looked like Crimson. How was she going to find the bratty throne?
Merliah perched on her shoulder, scanning the chairs. She thought she saw movement in the back of the room and flew in that direction. A net came down from the ceiling and caught her as she squawked in anger. They heard a giggle echo through the room and Sarah ran past the chairs, searching for her throne.
"No fair cheating, you have to find me on your own," Crimson giggled again. Sarah saw a flash of silver race out of the room and ran after it, determination in every step.
Not watching where she was going, she ran through another door and fell into a pool of green slime. Screaming, she pulled herself out and sniffed. It smelled like melons.
"Springtime wishes," Clarice said helpfully. "They ferment here before being sent out into the world. Right now they aren't really ripe yet. You're lucky, you could be smelling like old shoes."
"Old - shoes?" Sarah sputtered. "Why on earth would I smell like that?"
"Because that is the smell of old wishes being forgotten as they walk away, silly. You'd be covered with old wishes coming back to the castle and jumping back into the wishing pools."
Sarah shook the green ooze out of her hair, splattering the now free Merliah. The bird spat out ooze, glaring at Sarah while Clarice laughed.
"Sorry, Merliah," she sighed. "Didn't see you there." She looked at the green slime and wrinkled her nose. "We make wishes here? I thought I'd just grant some."
"Every season has its own wishes and its own magic. Each new wish made in springtime is born of this pool. When it matures, the wish comes true. But more often than not, the wish dies either because the wisher didn't need the wish fulfilled, or the wish itself did not want to be born."
"That's amazing," Sarah whispered, staring at the green with new respect. There was so much to learn.
A voice came drifting out of the darkness.
"Ten more minutes - tick tock, silly girl."
Sarah fumed, feeling sticky and cold. "I will catch that throne if only to kick it into the Bog," she ranted. Running out of the room, she slid on some wishes and slammed into Crimson who had come back to gloat. Sarah hung on for dear life as the throne screamed, racing through the halls of the palace, trying to fling Sarah off of her.
JSJSJS
"So we are in agreement then," Jareth was saying to the Council. "We shall banish Famish to a world within a world." He held up the dark crystal and smiled. "He shall reside within till he takes his last polluted breath."
The High King nodded and took the crystal. "Are we prepared to banish the Troll King and put Princess Penelope back to her rightful place as Queen?"
"We are," Symmons, Lord Chamberlain to the High King nodded. "With the proof the princess gave us from her memories, we can move against him."
The Council members nodded and Rinna let out a deep breath. They had been deliberating for close to an hour. She realized the time - Sarah's challenge was coming to an end soon.
"Jareth - we must see to Sarah's challenge," she said and he threw the crystal at a nearby Council member.
"Make certain you trap him legally, we want no loopholes."
"Tell us Majesty, before you leave - what is your new queen like? We are earnestly waiting to meet her," a member asked brightly.
"She is calm, rational, and thinks on her feet. Eminently suited to be Queen of Wishes and my bride," Jareth boasted and in an instant, he and Rinna were gone.
JSJSJS
"Stand still for two seconds and let me sit on you," Sarah screamed at the racing throne. Clarice and Merliah flew after them, trying not to laugh. They'd already been through the summertime wishes where bugs had gotten caught in the springtime ooze still sticking to Sarah's hair and clothes. And maybe her teeth. The room showed the history of past wishes made in that season and Sarah glanced at them, marvelling at how a wish was born then delivered.
"Prove you deserve a throne, little girl," the chair screamed back at her.
"You know I do - I was chosen by an," Sarah spat out a bug, "owl and I saved Penelope from Famish and don't tell me you don't know about any of that because I won't believe you. I wish you'd stay in one place and just stop moving."
The throne abruptly stopped running and skid through the hall of autumn wishes, disrupting leaves of all colors and shapes. Sarah was fascinated even as the leaves stuck to her hair. She looked at the softly rotating tornadoes of leaves spiralling around them like dancing painted jewels. The throne bucked again, like a horse and slammed intot he next room, dragging Sarah along with her.
They were flung together into the hall of winter wishes where slime, bugs and leaves froze onto them both. Sarah jumped into the seat of the throne and all of the lights came on in the castle. Fae of all the realms appeared, but Sarah did not notice them.
Sarah and Crimson closed their eyes as they spun out of the winter wish room and hit against someone warm, knocking the person over and crashing into a wall.
"Sarah, what the hell is going on?" Jareth scowled, seeing his beloved frozen to a throne that was currently almost upside down against the wall.
Sarah spat out another leaf and stared up at her intended from her upside down position. She shrugged, teeth chattering as the Fae royals and nobles started to giggle.
"I caught my throne?"