Here is the next chapter! Hope you enjoy.
And for those who need it, Amantial is pronounced Ah-mon-tea-all.
Edited and improved by the wonderful DarkMoonFox.
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Sarah walked down to breakfast with a bright smile on her face and Ripley on her shoulder, listening to the little goblin chatter on about the ruckus his brother's children had caused the day before, while she had been traveling in the Labyrinth. Apparently goblin children weren't all that much different than adult goblins, with the exception of young goblins being smaller and able to squeeze themselves into more places. After hearing how one goblin child managed to get into the pipes that provided water to the Goblin City and the castle and blocked them with who knows what for days, Sarah was thanking the stars that Ripley seemed like a much more mellow goblin. Even if he did have a tendency to find messy ways to entertain himself when he was bored, leaving messes for Sarah to clean up later on. Thankfully her arrival at the dining room doors saved her from having to hear about how dirty the water was after they managed to extract the goblin child, for even Ripley knew that such things were not spoken about when one was going to eat. Sarah had not eaten much the day before and she was starving. Horror stories about goblin children were not allowed to spoil her appetite this morning. Hearing the goblins yell at each other and make crude jokes while they were serving food was going to be bad enough.
Sarah braced herself for the squabbling of the goblins as she moved into the room, and was pleasantly surprised when it went completely silent before she had even taken two steps towards the table. Goblins who had been in mid-argument caught sight of the "Time Out Lady" and quickly fell quiet, their demeanor becoming almost polite. Smiling to herself, Sarah nodded at Jareth and a pretty young woman who was sitting at his right at the table. They both stared at her with bewildered expressions which grew into comical shock when a trio of goblins rushed over to pull Sarah's chair out for her, then pushed it in once she had sat down in it. She patted the three goblins on the heads before sending them on their way, then flashed a sweet smile at Jareth, whose expression made Sarah want to laugh. The goblins that had helped Sarah slipped from the room quickly with large grins that turned into cheering once they were out in the hallway, where they thought they couldn't be heard.
"How did you do that?" Jareth asked.
"Do what?"
"Make them behave!"
Sarah smiled again and helped Ripley down from her shoulder, to the table, where the little goblin darted forward to take a piece of cheese. "Make who behave?"
"The goblins, of course!" Jareth pointed at the doors that the goblins had left through, curiosity showing very clearly in his mismatched eyes.
Jareth's guest caught onto what Sarah was doing and started to laugh quietly into her hand when Sarah raised an eyebrow and asked, "What about the goblins?"
"Sarah, answer the question," Jareth said in his kingly 'I rule you' voice.
"Then ask the right question, Jareth," Sarah replied with a smirk that turned into a small laugh when Jareth blinked, then huffed, having realized he had his own Labyrinth rules used on him. Shaking his head with amusement at her cleverness, Jareth resigned himself to playing her game.
"Sarah," he began with a patient expression, fingers lacing together on top of the table in front of him, "How did you manage to make the goblins behave in such a polite manner?"
"I threatened them with Time Out," Sarah told him simply and carefully started to fill her plate. After glancing down the table to find no coffee whatsoever, Sarah poured a glass of juice and sipped at it with a smile at Jareth's expression. The Goblin King was staring at her like she was the smartest person in the entire world and he might lower himself to his knees to start praying to her. Before she could comment on this though, Jareth's guest cleared her throat, getting Sarah's attention.
"Normally it is considered polite for the host to introduce his guests, but since Jareth seems incapable of having such manners, I will bypass that and introduce myself. I am Amantial, Jareth's younger sister."
"You're the statue girl!" Sarah blurted out, then blushed as Amantial's eyebrows raised in question, "I mean… Jareth has statues of himself, you, and I think your parents. In the Labyrinth. I came across them. And I'm just going on and not telling you my name after you told me yours, great. I'm brilliant. And Sarah. I'm…Sarah."
A quiet snicker came from Jareth's place at the table and Sarah looked over to see the king hiding his mouth while trying to make it look like he was wiping it with a napkin. Shooting a glare at him, Sarah kicked a foot out, connecting with his shin and causing a completely shocked look to appear on Jareth's face. His sister's eyes went wide as she figured out what had happened, gaze flicking between Sarah, and her brother, who she assumed was about to smite the human girl. To her immense surprise, Jareth only laughed and smirked in Sarah's direction.
"Be nice, Sarah. There is company present," he drawled out and Sarah rolled her eyes before going back to cleaning her plate and struggling to remember all the etiquette rules her stepmother had forced on her as a teenager. She was sure she made a few errors and tried to correct herself by watching Jareth and his sister out of the corners of her eyes, though neither of them seemed to care about how she was eating.
Finally it seemed that Amantial was bored and not a fan of silence because she dropped her fork on her plate with a loud clatter and stood up. "If Sarah is quite done, I will be taking her with me. I wish to know what is so fasc…I mean get to know her."
Then without waiting to see if Sarah was indeed done, Amantial walked around the table, took Sarah by the arm, and pulled her from the room. She pulled Sarah down several hallways before stopping and looking around with an irritated expression. "How in the world do you find the library around here?"
Sarah smiled at the grumbling before pointing to a hallway that was connected to the one they were in, "Go down that one, then take the second left. It will go by the library."
Amantial gave Sarah a suspicious look before pulling her down the hallway Sarah had pointed out, following the mortal's directions. As they came to a stop outside the large double doors of the library, Jareth's sister gave Sarah a surprised smile. "Now how did you do that?"
"I'm good at remembering where I've been," Sarah said with a shrug, reaching out to push one of the doors open. Amantial seemed to accept her explanation and once the doors were open, she pulled Sarah inside, and then did some sort of magic that caused the library doors to glow a light blue.
"There, now my brother won't be able to listen in on what we say here," Amantial said with a satisfied nod before going to lounge across a couch in a fashion that was eerily similar to Jareth's. Sarah took a hesitant seat on a chair, trying not to look overwhelmed by Amantial's pulling her every which way and her casual kidnapping.
"Why would he listen in, and why should we care?"
"Because I want to hear all about your relationship with him of course!" Amantial rolled her eyes as she gave what she deemed an obvious answer.
"I don't really have," Sarah paused and shook her head. "We don't have anything like that."
"Then why are you here? Jareth never lets guests stay for an undetermined period of time the way it looks like he is doing with you, or have playful arguments like you two seem to have. Oh, and let's not forget he went to see the Queen of Seers to ask about you."
Sarah blinked several times, a curious expression flashing over her face before she shook her head again. "I think he's just being nice, and he probably went to ask the Queen how long I was going to be here or something." She refused to acknowledge the fact that it was Jareth's conditions of their deal that now landed her here indefinitely, with the exception of her Aboveground trips.
Amantial's eyes narrowed as she looked over at the mortal girl, her lips turned down in a frown as she mumbled, "Too bad, it would be nice to see Jareth with someone. He's been alone for a long time. I'd love to see him married."
Sarah blinked at the other woman before looking away, a small smile twisting her lips as an image of Jareth dancing around with children who looked like him invaded her mind. Amantial grinned at the light blush on Sarah's face and decided then and there that she would play matchmaker for her brother and this mortal girl.
"Tell you what, I'm going to throw a ball in two weeks and you and Jareth are invited, separately, but if he asks you to attend with him, you'll know he's interested. A king does not go to a ball with someone unless he is serious about them."
"That's nice, but I wouldn't know how to act at an event like that. I'm just a human girl, I never learned about high class functions," Sarah said quietly, looking down at her hands in her lap.
Amantial jumped up from the couch she had been lounging on with a grin, "Then I have two weeks to teach you everything you'll need to know, won't I?" She then darted over to the bookcases, glancing along the rows, often times muttering to herself about how Jareth had books about wars from tens of thousands of years ago that were fought because one kingdom accidentally offended another, yet had nothing on simple etiquette. Sarah watched with growing trepidation, sure she had gotten herself into something she wanted no part of.
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His sister having taken Sarah, Jareth was left to his own devices and had turned to the only other being left in the dining room. Sarah's little goblin friend. Sighing at who he was forced to converse with, Jareth beckoned the creature closer.
"What is it that Sarah called you? Tripe?"
"Ripley, Sire," the goblin squeaked out as he shifted from foot to foot near Jareth's goblet. The king smirked at the goblin's fearful look before he nodded.
"How long have you been with Sarah?" Jareth asked, then frowned. "More importantly, how did you get to Sarah? After she left, no one should have been able to come in contact with her, least of all a goblin."
"Sarah had magics mirror in her room that she called her friends through. She called one right as Ripley was running from other goblins and I jumps through! She lets me stay with her, even when she be leaving home to go to cool-age!" Ripley explained with a bright smile, momentarily forgetting his fear of the king.
"College," Jareth corrected absently as he pondered the comment about a magic mirror.
"Yeah, yeah!" the little goblin agreed before sitting down, leaning against a piece of fruit. "Sarah even be taking me with her after that. Said she liked having a friend that would always be there for her. So Ripley stayed, even though he didn't like Sarah's suitors!"
Jareth raised an eyebrow at the plural use of the word suitor and leaned closer to Ripley, one gloved hand resting on the table's edge. "And just how many suitors did she have?"
"Since her be beating the Labyrinth?" Ripley asked, then answered at Jareth's nod, "Twelve!"
"So many?" Jareth breathed out, mostly talking to himself now, though Ripley answered him anyways.
"Sarah not be liking a lot of them. Says they were too boring for her. Even the one who asked her to marrys him!"
Jareth's eyes jerked back to the goblin, who shook a little under the force of his king's glare. "Ripley, that wouldn't be the one who was hurting her, now was it?"
"No, meanie Mark was the one who be hurtin' Sarah. Joe be the one wanting to marrys her. Though… he did hurt Sarah's feelings when she told him no, said she was cold, but I been hugged by her before and she be warm!"
The Goblin King rolled his eyes at the goblin's mistake and stood up, one gloved hand reaching out to scoop up Ripley before he left the dining room, heading down the hallways until he reached his study. As he sat down at the desk in front of a window, he set the small goblin down, forgetting that he had brought him along. Jareth searched through the large stack of books on his desk making a quiet, triumphant noise when he found the book of marriage he had looked through a few nights previous in order to know the proper way to call off his engagement with Mizumi without starting a war. He started to flip through the book while one hand dug through a drawer to find silver rimmed glasses that he settled on his nose.
"Whatcha lookin for?" Ripley asked while looking interestedly through the knickknacks on Jareth's desk.
"I want to know if Sarah can marry someone in the Aboveground while on one of her visits there if she lives Underground. Usually it's against the law for someone who lives here to marry a mortal from Above," Jareth said absentmindedly.
"Does that mean Kingy can't marry Sarah?" Questioned the little goblin, showing he wasn't as dumb as most goblins were.
Jareth looked up sharply and snapped out, "What was that?"
"Kingy said no one from here can marry a mortal from up Above! Sarah being from the Aboves, Sire."
"Sarah lives here now. She'll be considered a citizen of the Goblin Kingdom," the Goblin King mumbled, mostly to himself. Ripley just shrugged and went back to examining a crystal on a clawed base that sat on Jareth's desk.
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"Why is this so difficult?" Sarah cried out as she dropped into a chair, having flubbed up yet another phrase one had to use when greeting a Queen from a different kingdom. Amantial sighed and shook her head, taking her lounging pose on the couch across from Sarah's chair. The pose once again reminded Sarah of Jareth and the longer she stared, the more similarities she could see between the siblings. Both had upturned eyebrows and wild blonde hair, though Amantial's seemed tamer than Jareth's did, and was much longer. Amantial of course, wore a beautifully embroidered dress, but when she leaned against something, or was on a couch or chair, she adopted the same posture and poses that her brother had. And of course Sarah couldn't miss the way Amantial smirked in the same fashion and just as often as Jareth did, giving Sarah the impression the siblings were almost mirror images in looks and personality, though Amantial seemed more childish at times, clapping her hands when she was happy and jumping up and down.
Noticing Sarah's staring, Amantial raised an eyebrow at Sarah, one hand self-consciously touching her hair. "What?"
"Oh, sorry. I was just noticing that your eyes are like Jareth's, just opposite," Sarah replied, shaking herself out of the daze she had fall into.
"An unfortunate side effect of what happens when a Seer Princess and an Owl Prince have children," Amantial sighed.
"I think they're lovely," Sarah smiled and sat up again, her small break giving her enough energy to try again. "Shall we continue attempting to help me learn to avoid throwing the Goblin Kingdom into war?"
Jareth's sister groaned and shook her head, one hand waving Sarah away. "No more for now. If I have to recite the lines anymore, I am likely to throw fireballs at something. Maybe Jareth will help you practice."
Sarah pressed her lips together at being shooed away like a child, but nodded and left the library, hands curled into fists. They stayed that way until she bumped into someone and headed towards the floor, a curse on her lips ready to come out when she hit the stone below. Fortunately, the landing she was expecting never came because two gloved hands shot out and grabbed her by the waist as she started to tip backwards, pulling her back to an upright position.
"You should really be more careful, Sarah," a silky voice said and Sarah looked up at the Goblin King.
"I know," she muttered, pulling away from Jareth's hold. The way she looked down at the floor with her lower lip caught between her teeth, almost as if she was expecting to be yelled at concerned the king.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
An upturned eyebrow raised up slowly and Jareth's hand reached out to rest on Sarah's shoulder. "It's obviously something, because if it was nothing you wouldn't look like someone just took away your puppy."
"I just," Sarah sighed, her head lifting enough to let her see Jareth. "Your sister invited me to a ball in a few weeks, but I can't get the stupid greetings and phrases for each different kingdom right, and even if I did, I don't know how to dance!"
"Sarah, you've been here for just a few days, no one would expect you to use all the formal greetings. Just use the generic one that applies to everyone. I usually do," Jareth said with a small smirk that hid a relieved smile at the disappearing frustration in Sarah's eyes. "Now, as for the dancing, that is something we can fix rather quickly."
"How? Are you going to magic me some dance moves like you did in the ballroom when I ate the peach?" Sarah asked, a hint of accusation in her voice.
"No," Jareth laughed, his hand moving to capture her wrist in a firm grip, which he used to pull her along as he went down the hallway at a quick pace, turning corners sharply until he reached a tall set of double doors. He pushed them open and smirked when he heard Sarah's gasp.
"This is from my dream! You brought me to the castle for a dance, then dropped me out in the trash heaps when I broke it?"
The Goblin King shrugged and pulled her inside the room. "I'm a sore loser and I didn't want an amnesiac roaming around my castle."
"So, the dangerous trash heaps?" Sarah asked in a snarky tone.
"It's not my fault you couldn't just be happy with the dreams I gave you," Jareth shot back in an equally snarky, yet somewhat pained tone. As Sarah's eyes widened, he shook his head and cleared his expression, hands reaching out for her as music started to play from seemingly nowhere. "Now come closer, Sarah."
Sarah slowly moved forward and placed a hand in his gloved one, the other resting on his arm as he pulled her closer. She avoided looking up at his face and instead focused on their feet as he started to slowly move them in a dance reminiscent to the one they had done years before. This time however, he counted quietly aloud for her, up to three each time, before starting over. Since she was steadfastly not looking at his face, she couldn't tell if he was wincing or glaring at her every time she stepped on his feet. It took well over half an hour of his patient leading and counting for her to feel comfortable enough to look up from the ground and at his face, where approval clearly showed. Sarah smiled faintly, feeling much more confident in herself now that she knew he thought she was doing well.
"Thank you," she said quietly, soft color coming to her cheeks as he smiled down at her.
"You are most welcome Sarah," he replied, his fingers tightening slightly where they rested at her waist. "If I have been invited to this ball, which I suspect I have been, perhaps you will give me a dance."
To Jareth's bewilderment, Sarah's face fell slightly before she nodded and pulled away from him. "Of course I will, but for now I think I should get ready for dinner."
As the Goblin King blinked at her sudden change in demeanor, she all but ran from the room, not even giving him time to say goodbye or inform her that dinner was hours away.
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Sarah fled back to the library where she found Amantial still lounging on the couch, but with a book in her hands this time. The princess looked up when the doors opened and she immediately sat up at the expression on Sarah's face.
"What's wrong?" she asked, placing the book on the floor next to her.
"Nothing. Well, I was with Jareth and we talked about your ball. He asked for a dance while we are there, but said nothing about going together. I guess you were wrong," Sarah shrugged in an attempt to look indifferent, though it failed miserably.
"Look, I know my brother. He's interested in you," Amantial firmly said while sitting up, eyes narrowed at Sarah. "So stop acting like a child and give him time to ask."
Sarah looked like she was about to angrily respond when she sighed and seemed to deflate right in front of Amantial's eyes. "You're right, I'm sorry. I've just never had this problem before."
"What problem would that be? Someone not asking you to a ball?"
Sarah sent a glare towards Jareth's sister and shook her head, "No, liking someone… like how I like Jareth."
"Well suck it up sweetie, you now live in a world where men can take decades to make a move, simply because we have that much time."
Sarah sighed and dropped her head to her hands, muttering too quietly for Amantial to hear.
"But I don't have that much time…"
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Ho ho… Yeah, that's all I have to say right now. I look forward to your wonderful, very inspiring reviews!