I do not own the Labyrinth, Labyrinthians or a Labradoodle

I also do not own my wonderful Beta nothingnothingtralala, if I did I'd probably die from my lungs splitting open - I laugh WAY too hard at her hilarious commentary in my corrections as it is! *hugs*

Sarah climbed into the bed and pulled the bed sheets up under her chin; the familiar gesture made her feel like she was at home, safe. It would be nice if she could go to sleep and wake to find all of this an odd dream, the outcome of too much television or too many cheese sandwiches before bed time. As she held the blankets in place she stared morosely at the lottery slip on the bedside table, and the moody Goblin King at the window, not particularly focused on either. She sighed loudly, and realised to her eternal shame that she was trying to regain his attention. Like a selfish child, she hoped to have his concentration fixed on her now that she knew what her next task was to be. Every part of him was still set fixedly outside of that window pane, lost in a world she could not see over his shoulder, due to the angle of the setting sun and her position on the bed.

His fury had quelled from its original ire but the air hung anxiously, waiting for his next mood.

The fact that he had reacted so vehemently, and been so outraged, was something that she should respect. It made him much more upstanding than Carl or any of his cronies, despite how she might once have cast him as the villain. Yet here she was, completely self-obsessed and placing her own concerns at the forefront, eager to rekindle the one-sided bargain she had originally tried to escape. It was humiliating to realise just how self-serving the whole arrangement had been from the start; why had he come if not to help her? How could she have overlooked that? Why had it taken until now for her to accept there was good in him? Lowering the coverlet, Sarah drew up her knees up under the blanket, and hugged them tightly.

His silhouette against the dying light from the window was ephemeral.

Hues of pink and orange were caught up in his hair and burned like flames. His dark figure cast a shadow, which crept across the floor and seemed to suck in light with a ferocious intensity, as if pulling everything bright into itself, to conquer and coalesce. Despite herself she smiled as she watched him; even his anger was a beautiful thing.

"Goblin King," she called to him... both hoping and wondering if he would turn towards her. She saw him tense slightly at the sound of her voice, and then relax, turning his face to one side; not so much as to look at her but enough to indicate she had his attention. "What can you tell me of my friends in the Labyrinth?"

It felt natural to finally ask.

She wanted to talk about something from his world, something far away from the misery of this room and the threat of Carl. The Labyrinth was a bright place in her memories; surely he must be missing it? The dangers of the Labyrinth seemed honest and straightforward by comparison to those she now faced.

Finally he turned from the window to look at her, his face worn: "Friends?"

"Yes," said Sarah, "Hoggle, Ludo, and Sir Didymus." The vacant stare he returned made her feel uncomfortable. "I thought perhaps you might know where they were, or what they were doing. They told me I could call on them but… well… they didn't come in the end." The Goblin King simply shook his head, his levelled gaze pinning her to the bed. "I was worried they might be in trouble… or… if my belief wasn't strong enough…"

He snorted rudely.

"Belief has never been a problem for you, Sarah," he told her. "If anything you have a little too much. If you didn't believe, I couldn't have come here to grant your wish. No matter how idle the words 'I wish' might have seemed to you, they had purpose. I've told you before: you wanted the wish, and a part of you both believed, and knew, it could be granted; I'm proof of that fact." Sarah nodded; it was something of a relief to know. For some years she had wondered if the ebbing of her belief had robbed her of her friends. She was thankful that although the belief was not the innocent whimsy it once had been, it still remained, maturing with her. "The being before you is not all-seeing and all-knowing," he admitted. "There are things even I cannot see." The remark seemed to cut him deeply; a self-depreciative smirk quirked his lips, but it wasn't fully committed to. He looked... tired.

"Nobody's perfect," shrugged Sarah, smiling encouragingly. The whisper of a smile melted across the Goblin King's face. "Do you miss the Labyrinth?" she asked. The Goblin King tapped his gloved fingers against his lips thoughtfully, and approached the bed. Stopping at the foot of it, he sat down and leaned backwards, bracing his weight with his arms behind him. Sarah was reminded of his first reappearance, only days ago. It felt like a lifetime had passed since then.

"Why do you think so?" he asked.

Sarah shrugged. "I think it must be hard to be away from it, to be here. The Labyrinth is a brighter place than this, more innocent in nature. Things might not have always what they seemed, but they weren't vicious and cold like this world can be."

"Weren't they?" he smirked.

She smiled: "Not in my memories." The Goblin King nodded and looked up towards the window again.

"Nothing is constant in the Labyrinth," he explained. "It can be a dark place, just as easily as your own world. Perhaps it has changed a vast deal from what you remember; maybe this is also why you cannot contact your friends."

"You said 'perhaps';" pointed out Sarah. "You don't know if the Labyrinth has changed?" He cocked his head in her direction and pursed his lips.

"My nature is as inconstant as the Labyrinth, so the changes are rarely obvious to me. Undoubtedly it will have changed since you ran, I cannot say how much." Sarah thought about that. Was this the reason she hadn't been able to contact her friends? It was hard to imagine the Labyrinth transformed; in all these years it had remained unchanging in her memory – it was difficult to imagine it as something more or less than she had left it.

"It must be difficult to rule there," she said. At the suggestion, the Goblin King lifted himself from the bed, and began to pace, stopping at the bedside table and lifting the lottery slip between two fingers to casually inspect it. He raised an eyebrow at her. Sarah wet her lips nervously. "What I mean is, it must be difficult to spend time here with me, when you should be ruling over your kingdom." She wasn't sure what she was looking for; a declaration of devotion, a snide remark? Did she hope to chase him away from this dark place, or make him reassure her that he would stay? Smirking, he navigated the bed until he was on the side opposite her, lying down next to her, with his hand propped under his chin. A knowing smile taunted her.

"Time flows differently there, I can reorder time; anything that passes here is inconsequential to my realm."

Nicely dodged: what was I expecting?

Sarah ground her teeth together unconsciously; her brain was self-destructing over their current position on the bed. Her whole body stilled as he reached out towards her, her hands tightening against her knees. Her back was aching from maintaining the stiff position she'd been sitting in for so long, but she worried about moving and jostling her flimsy bathrobe; the coverlet might be all that was helping her maintain her dignity. The lottery slip brushed gently against her cheek and she flushed.

"You can touch me indirectly," she pointed out.

"Obviously," he drawled, but seemed surprised.

He's testing the boundaries of the powers. Sarah blinked, trying to ignore the voice. Why must a part of her continue to doubt him? She felt the light touch of the ticket, gently caressing the ends of her eyelashes.

"What is this paper, Sarah?" he finally asked. Up until that point, she had been fighting to maintain her breathing with him so close; now her mouth went dry. She wanted to look away from him, but his gaze had locked her in place. She opened her mouth and closed it again. Her brain felt numb. "The source of our next wish?" he guessed dramatically. Sarah tightened her fingers on the coverlet, before remembering that they were still tender. "Scraps of paper seem to be oddly important to your people," he sneered. "Does the note on the back indicate your new task?" She sucked in a breath as he twisted the slip before her; she had not seen the messy scrawl before.

'Division one win – Carl'

Her heart rocketed around in her chest. Division one, now that's familiar.

A panicked gurgling noise escaped her mouth at the revelation. The Goblin King leaned forward, his eyes narrowed.

"It seems this paper will not do, your bond here will not be undone so easily," he suggested. "Why don't you just wish for what you really want?"

"And what is that," she rasped, almost choking on her tongue.

"Carl's death," he replied icily. The shock of the suggestion nearly knocked her over.

"Death?" she echoed. It would be an end to things, an end to a bad person. No more pretending to be lucky, no more wishes, no more danger for her family. She forced a weak smile, knowing she could never make that wish. "I can't -" she started.

"No, you won't!" he interrupted angrily. "Of course you can, it's as easy as saying, 'I wish-tralala'. You simply won't do it. Are you too pig headed, or are you too much of a bleeding heart?"

Sarah took a calming breath and closed her eyes for a moment. He'd given her clarity; she hadn't wanted to commit to the new wish forming in her mind, but it was infinitely preferred to his alternative. "I can't ask you to do that," she told him. "I won't," her voice sounded stronger this time. "I will not make you a killer."

The Goblin King gave an exasperated sigh: "And if I'm already a killer?"

"I will not make you a killer," she reiterated.

He studied her face with a new intensity. Reaching out, he moved as if to brush a tendril of hair from her face, his gloved fingers slipping away uselessly, unable to touch. The very air around them seemed to still in the moment, Sarah realised she was holding her breath, and let it go in an unfulfilled rush. The Goblin King's eyes burned into hers as he reluctantly withdrew his hand, and his sharp teeth flashed in an ironic smile. "You're being generous with me, Sarah," he remarked.

"I learned from the best," she retorted. Her fingers twitched, longing to complete the unsatisfied contact; she wanted to touch him. She wanted it too much. Biting her lip to find focus, she brought her attention back to the slip of paper in his hand, and the grim reality before them. "When I first discovered my power…. Wait, no…. When my father first discovered my power, he was ecstatic. He wasn't really a greedy man; he just thought it made me special. He liked to boast about how lucky I was, and whenever anyone would doubt him, I'd be there to prove his claims. Eventually his pride became something else; he started wagering against friends, betting that I would win in some specific event, or that luck would shine on me in some unexpected way. Winning became important to him, like a drug he couldn't get enough of. At some point, I'm not exactly sure when, it wasn't enough for it to just be me winning. He started to begrudge my luck. Why wasn't he lucky? We had the same genes, he was my father, wasn't he entitled to some of the luck? After that, he set about destroying himself. I don't know if he thought he could force the power out if he exposed himself enough; whatever the cause, he started to bet big, and threw himself into any competition he could find.

"It wasn't long before he was close to bankrupt.

"He came back to me then, telling me how important I was, apologising for all he'd put me through. That was close to my nineteenth birthday. Shortly after our reconciliation, I won a cruise, but I never went, I sold the ticket off and gave him the proceeds. I thought that if he could just get himself out of trouble, all might be well. For a while it seemed like he came back to himself, and I was happy. We were a family again – Toby needed his father after all – and he sought help for his addiction. He hadn't recovered though; I should have remembered that, it was a mistake to think that it might be that easy. It's like a sickness; he just learned to hide it better. I sacrificed as much as I could to bail him out of debt, to help get him back on track. Everything I won in the sweepstakes was used to try and settle his accounts; I did it myself, I could no longer trust him to use the money sensibly. Even though I watched him become a weak man, a shadow of what he had been, I couldn't have expected this." Sarah snatched the lottery slip from the Goblin King's hand; his face wore its usual mask of indifference. "Every few months he would bring me a slip like this. 'Time to win big, my lucky Sarah', he would tell me. 'Time to settle those debts and set up your little brother for life; don't you want to see Irene happy, don't you want to take care of our family?'" Sarah's lips twisted in an anguished smile. "And I did, so I tried. I tried and tried and tried, but I could never win it big. No matter how many times I picked the numbers, I could never do better than the last two division prize pools. I watched as he doubted me, as if I was losing on purpose. I was his lucky Sarah, a girl with an extraordinary gift, a girl who would sacrifice anything for her family, and still he was disappointed in me." She could feel her voice become thick with emotion; her throat was tight with unshed tears. "This power is a curse Goblin King; if only you had never given it to me." She turned away from him, so he wouldn't see how tears stung at her eyes. Breath after shuddering breath, she willed herself to be calm. She hadn't meant to get upset with him; she just wanted him to understand what the power had done to her, what it had done to her family.

"Give, give, give," muttered the Goblin King under his breath, "you're very hung up on that, aren't you?"

Slowly she turned towards him, her face stony at his perceived mocking.

"What did you say?" she grated.

"I understand that it's very convenient to blame me for every woe you've ever encountered," he replied, "but why exactly is this my fault?"

"Because you gave me the powers!" she accused.

"Says who?"

Sarah paused, grasping for the memory. "It was in the book!" she crowed triumphantly, finding her reasoning. The Goblin King frowned. His eyes were slightly unfocused as he reached up into the air above the bed, and with a flourish, he produced a little red book from nothing, turning it over in his hands in a self-satisfied manner. She could see from the gold, embossed font on the front cover that it was a copy of the Labyrinth. It was the stain across the back, from a mishandled slice of pizza, that made it her copy. "That's mine!" she cried in surprise. The Goblin King raised a sculpted brow at her, and snapped the book open.

"Finders takers," he mumbled, as he grasped his glove between his teeth and removed it with practiced grace, wetting the now bare fore finger on his lips, before beginning to turn the pages.

"I think you'll find it's finders keepers," she grumbled.

Playfully, he waved the book in front of her. "I think you'll find I'm right." As the book danced through the air, its pages ruffled, and a slip of paper fluttered down to land on the bed between them. Sarah mistook it for the lottery slip, until it was snatched up by the Goblin King's eager hands. "Oh, Sarah, what is this?" he laughed, half crushing the page in his enthusiasm

Sarah stared at the back of the lined sheet of paper, completely lost. A blank page… or maybe not? It looked like it had been pulled from an exercise book. Understanding followed swiftly, and she coloured with recognition. "It's nothing," she muttered, embarrassed. "A school girl's whim."

The jarring sound of his chuckle put her hackles up. "Oh, sweet Sarah, is this supposed to be me?" He spun the paper to face her, and she thought she'd die of shame. She'd never been much of an artist, and here he was, captured in stick figure splendour, crown and all. At the time, she'd thought she needed to try and capture his memory on paper, during math to be exact. She had planned to treasure it in the one place she thought no one would ever see it. Now the person she wanted to hide it from the most held it in the palm of his hand.

"It's not like I was doodling your name, surrounded by love hearts in my notebook," she shot at him nastily.

His smile only increased. "My name?" he murmured. "No indeed." Thoughtfully, he folded the crude art piece in half, and placed it in his jacket.

"You're not going to keep it are you?" she railed.

"Finders takers," he winked.

Sarah growled in irritation. Distracting herself, she puffed up the pillows behind her, taking particular effort to ignore the continued gaze of the Goblin King. She stretched her aching limbs out beneath the sheets and slipped the cover up under her chin, as she lay back to find a comfortable position. When she looked up again, he was leaning down over her, unsettling all the nerves she had just smoothed down.

"What?" she grumbled, she still felt humiliated at the thought of the picture.

"Your wish, Sarah," he persisted. Long blunt spikes of his hair hung down from the sides of his face. They almost touched her, but gravity disobeyed itself, reflecting them away from her, mere millimetres from contact. She wondered what it would feel like to have them brush against her skin.

She wondered if she was still an infatuated school girl.

"I have to win division one in the lottery," she remembered.

"That's not exactly a wish," he replied dryly. She seemed to be having trouble framing the wish; her eyes kept darting to his lips hovering above her. They moved sensuously when he spoke.

She wet her lips instinctively.

"What will happen if I w… ask to win it, how will it work?"

The Goblin King smiled crookedly. "One thing cannot become another thing," he reminded her, holding up the ticket and running it across her cheek. "You cannot get something from nothing; these wishes work on giving and taking. I would need to take the winner's numbers from him, and give them to you."

"Him, or her," Sarah corrected.

"Him," he assured.

Sarah blinked with surprise, amazed that he could so easily see who the winner would be.

"If you can predict the winner, can't you simply predict the numbers?" she asked.

"Those are his numbers; the only way to have them is to take them from him. Wishes have a cost, Sarah, something you have to pay. Granting wishes has a cost also; a cost for the making, and a cost for the taking."

"A cost that you have to pay?" she asked.

He shrugged, "Sometimes. Last time the cost was your scratch cards."

"So this time it could be my lottery slip numbers?" Sarah smiled, and then felt it falter. For a moment she had forgotten her luck was gone, that was why they were striking this bargain after all. For a brief window, she had thought that she could find some small way to recompense the man whose fortune she was going to steal. She had thought that she could give him her lesser winnings, but her luck was gone, she would win nothing, she could give him nothing. There would only be taking.

"Or your empty slip," suggested the Goblin King. Maybe that was kinder, at least then he wouldn't have wasted money on the entry ticket. She wondered if it had to be a division one win. Was Carl merely pushing her to see where her limits lay, as her father once had? Taking such a huge prize from someone was a horrible thing to do, even if they'd never know. Worse yet, she wouldn't be the one depriving them of it; she would be making the Goblin King grant the wish.

"You can't want to do this," whispered Sarah, "I'd feel terrible to ask it of you."

"Then don't ask it, wish it," he frowned. "It's not like I'm getting nothing from the bargain."

"Something broken, something unwanted?" she laughed painfully. "I could use this money to clear the whole debt, to see myself free of this arrangement and secure my family's safety. You will get a pittance, how is that fair?"

A shadow flittered across his face. "You're always speaking of fairness, Sarah, who are you to decide? Haven't you already been noble enough by keeping me from murder? Do you really believe you can find the perfect wish solution to make everyone happy, with no cost at all?" Sarah hung her head dejectedly; that was exactly what she had hoped for. "Precious, your morals are commendable, if a little idealistic," he complimented. "I told you that your wishes were need based... you need this."

She still didn't like it.

She felt like she was standing on a precipice; it was a slippery slope down if she started on this path. She had watched her father being eaten up by greed and becoming undone. If she condoned this, even for the right reasons, if she made someone else pay this cost, could she live with herself? Did she really have a choice? "If I take the numbers from him, what will happen?" she whispered.

"He will forget them."

Sarah tensed in alarm, "He'll forget the numbers; will he be mathematically disabled, unable to ever use them again?"

The Goblin King sighed, "No precious, he'll simply forget the reason why he chose those numbers; their importance will be taken from him, he'll have no reason to pick them."

Sarah nodded, only slightly more convinced. She couldn't really think of a better option. Perhaps one day in the future she could find a way to pay this man back, or maybe he would consider this as charity since her family's safety was at stake? She rather doubted he'd care, but the thought made her feel a little better.

She made up her mind.

"I wish that I would win division one in the lottery," she muttered hastily, the words burning on her lips. "Tonight," she quickly amended, catching an approving smile from the Goblin King. She felt like the words had been on her lips for years, finally dusted off and used.

The Goblin King leaned in so close that she thought her heart might stop. "What will you pay, Sarah?" he asked. The breath from his question caressed her lips, making them part in anticipation.

"What do you want, Goblin King?" she asked playfully.

His reaction was unexpected.

He pulled back sharply, his features freezing in place, eyes shuttered. "No more jewellery, Sarah, the ring you wear, I won't accept it," he growled.

Sarah's eyes widened in surprise. Puzzled, she looked down at the sore red hands holding the coverlet. "I don't have a ring," she told him.

His head snapped up, and he leaned towards her again, glaring in accusation at her fingers on the blanket. "There was definitely a ring," he muttered. Sarah frowned. What was he talking about? She hadn't worn a ring in years, not since…

"Ah!" she cried, remembering, "The one I wore in the Labyrinth, my mother's ring. I don't have it anymore." She was floored by his memory; what a small detail to notice during their brief encounters.

"Careless, Sarah, to have lost it. A ring is a bond you know."

She hadn't lost it; she had traded it to the Wiseman for information. Not that it had come to anything, but still, it was now somewhere within the Labyrinth. She'd sooner die than be humiliated twice today, she wasn't about to tell him she'd traded it to an old man, with a talking bird for a hat, and received nothing useful in return. Instead she shrugged his comment off, or tried to. He did not want to be bound to her, she had expected as much, but still it hurt.

Love hurts…

"When I was young, I dreamed I was in love with you," she admitted finally. "That's why I drew the picture; it was a fantasy of mine. Now that I'm older, I see that you're not at all as I had imagined; that love was all in my head, that person never existed. It's safe to say that's a broken dream now: will you accept it as payment?" She hoped it would hurt him; just a little would be fine. Not that the love of a child would mean much to him, but she wanted him to think that he meant just as little to her as she did to him. To make him believe that she was just as uninterested in a bond between them as he was. It wasn't a lie, the childhood fantasy of love had all but burned out, though it might be a lie to say that something new wasn't starting to replace it. She was being childish, but she didn't want to lose to him.

"Sentiment again," he drawled; "you'll have to offer me a token of the broken affection, to close the bargain."

It pissed her off.

He was so cold about it, so business-like. A few times now, he had been so close to being gentle with her, treating her like she was something precious. Next thing she knew he was backing away, or yelling, or accusing, or simply closing himself off. Now she had baited him with feelings, and he had breezed past them, completely indifferent. As she stared at his infuriatingly beautiful face, she felt anger lick through her veins. She wanted to force him out, to make him look at her and feel something. Her hands moved of their own volition, she knew exactly what she had really been wishing for all night. Briefly she registered his surprise as her fingers wrapped around the back of his neck, then she was kissing him, and the world fell away.

It was like sunlight lit her up from the inside.

She pulled him down onto her, feeling her skin singing with electricity at every point of contact. Her head thrummed with energy as she deepened the kiss hungrily, her fingers stroking the hair at his nape, silky beneath her touch. Her heart felt so full it might burst; her body so tense she might snap at any moment. But she couldn't taste him, nor could she smell him. She hadn't given him back that power yet, so the sensation remained locked away. Also he wasn't kissing her back, because he couldn't. It was a sobering realisation; she was kissing someone she hadn't trusted enough to allow them power over her, forcefully, possibly against their will. How could she call that love? After that, it was easy to break the kiss. Loosening her hands, she leaned back into the pillow, and pushed lightly against his chest, breaking even that contact to be completely free of him. When she finally overcame her shame long enough to meet his eye, she found that his gaze was molten. His face was so intense that her heart quailed in her chest, and she placed her hand over it, as if to protect it from him. His breathing was ragged, and his eyes were slightly unfocused as he sat up, turning away from her.

"That'll about do it," he croaked, and disappeared from the suite. When Sarah came back to herself, she realised that the lottery slip had gone with him. Lying back in bed, she ran her fingers across her lips, and sighed. She was an idiot; why had she done that? If she was starting to feel something… no… because she was starting to feel something, she needed to make a decision. All or nothing, she either trusted him completely or she didn't, this wasn't going to work if she couldn't resolve that. Her mind, caught in a spiral of doubt and emotion, soon exhausted itself, and she succumbed to sleep.

She was in the ballroom with him.

Everything was just as she remembered it: the weight of his hand on her waist, warm and reassuring. She smiled up at him; it felt comfortable to be in his arms again. Her tousled hair arrangement felt heavy, but she forced herself to ignore it as she danced with the Goblin King. Twirling endlessly, her dress sparkled under the candlelight, and lit up like flames in his eyes.

He leaned down to whisper something in her ear, but it was snatched away by strains of discordant music. As she was turning her head towards the musicians, the direction of the dance suddenly changed, and she was pulled away from the source. Couples around them parted to make way as they continued their endless circuit. Sarah could feel that the heels of her shoes were starting to wear thin, but the arms around her held her so tightly they allowed no rest. Suddenly the hand of a stranger snatched at her dress, and she turned to face the perpetrator, but just as they came into view, the direction of the dance changed again, and she felt herself being led away. The hand holding hers tightened, and she looked up at the Goblin King, confused.

She hadn't realised he was wearing a mask.

He leaned down again to whisper in her ear, and she felt a chill creep through her.

"Sarah, you've been letting me lead this whole time… don't you think that's rather unlike you?" he asked.

As he began to laugh, she watched as the ballroom shattered around them; they fell.

Thank you lurkers and reviewers, it's up later than I anticipated but it's finally done. I made it a long one to apologise for the delay, enjoy!

Kaytori: As I said you picked it, the lottery slip had history, now you know. Thanks as always for your glowing reviews, they keep me motivated. Some of the stuff we talked about in PM should raise it's ugly head next chapter, look forward to it ;D

Aleta Wolff: Poor tired Jareth, he keeps getting stuck with all the dirty work and they both have to reap the emotional guilt!

Jay Madeleine Griff: I hope this update is soon enough for you, I'm trying to keep to a chapter a week where possible, thanks for reading.

LingeringSentiments: I had in fact been thinking the same thing, doesn't this guy have a kingdom to run? Hope you enjoyed my patch solution... I still envisage a goblin uprising and scattered pieces of fieries upon his return - but that's his problem I guess. I think your review got me over the line on this chapter, so thanks, remembering that people are waiting to find out what happens next is what keeps me coming back!