Chapter Twenty-Four
Jareth
October 9th, 2002. Day 22 of quarantine.
He could not remember feeling this way before. Not once, never, in his several centuries of life.
Jareth reached out and traced the curve of Sarah's hip where the sunlight highlighted the peach fuzz which coated her skin. A sharp intake of breath came through her parted lips, but her dark lashes stayed pressed against fair cheeks as her chest rose and fell with the deep breaths of heavy sleep.
He was filled up, full to bursting with magic so potent it was as though he had taken a drought from the cauldron of life itself. He had only had this much magic once before, and that had been tempered with such grief and pain that he barely recalled.
Jareth slipped from the bed, moving so as not to disturb the slumbering Queen-to-be. When needed, his steps were as soft as a panther, and as he walked to the door out to the main apartment, he clothed himself with a minor tendril of power.
Rico eyed him from under Sarah's desk, black eyes glittering through slits. Jareth ignored him, just as he ignored the sleeping Toby. He slipped out onto the little fire escape balcony, stretching in the weak dawn sunlight.
As he did each time he was out here, he tested the boundaries of the spellwork which kept him locked in Sarah's apartment. This time, as he pressed against the outer edges, he could sense a weakening.
Interesting.
"Good morning, my friend," called a voice from above.
Jareth looked up to find Hector smiling at him, sitting on his window ledge with a fragrant, steaming mug of coffee in hand. His long pianist fingers were wrapped around the blue stoneware, and the Goblin King could detect a faint tremor there.
His friend only had another decade, perhaps, until the pain from the arthritis stopped his playing.
"Why the long face?" the man asked, taking a deep drink.
Jareth tilted his head, considering for a long moment before he spoke. "Would you come down here, my friend? I would speak with you face to face."
"There's this plague, mio amico, I do not know if you heard?" He laughed. "My wife would kill me. I will not let her go to her knitting circle."
While Hector continued to chuckle, his eyes slitted with mirth, Jareth waited. Waited until the man looked down at him through the gaps in the metal grating. It had been a long time since he had tried to catch a human's will with his gaze, but with the new boost to his reservoir of power, he could pluck at the man's fate string with ease.
"Just a moment," Jareth said in a soothing voice, even as Hector was putting down his coffee and stepping out onto the fire escape. "You won't remember a thing."
Hector made little noise as he descended to Jareth's level, having to duck as he was an incredibly tall, lanky man. His brown eyes were wide as he stepped toward the fae, then flickered over to where Rico the goblin was crouching in the faint shadows beneath Sarah's visible desk, and he jumped, blinking. "What the hell is—"
"It's a dog," Jareth said, voice smooth.
"That's one ugly dog," Hector murmured, scratching the back of his head before glancing back at The Goblin King and getting stuck. "What did you want?"
"May I see your hands?"
Hector held them out just as though he were about to sit at a piano bench, and once more, Jareth noticed the slight tremor.
He had not bothered with gloves this morning, all the better for the healing magics that relied more on physical touch. Though healing was not his specialty, nor did he think he would ever be proficient enough to heal a heart or sight, arthritis was less difficult. It affected near every creature on this plane, and healing it was a simple enough process. "How long has the pain been bothering you?"
A soft chuckle. "You know, you and my wife are the only ones to have noticed? She's worried, too."
"Oh, I'm not worried, my friend," Jareth murmured. He lifted his eyes once more to Hector's brown ones. "May I?" He gestured between them, indicating the musician's hands.
"What are you going to do, some of your fancy psychic tricks? I don't believe in hypnotism, mio amico." He scoffed, then laughed and shrugged. "Go ahead."
Jareth moved with an efficiency born out of the few times of practice in the nursing ward in the castle at the center of the Goblin City. He grasped Hector's hand, pressing his thumb deep into the man's palm, and then ran fingers gently over his, pressing magic deep into his bones as he did. He did the other hand next, performing the same ritual, taking all of ten seconds between the two.
It was easier than anything he had attempted before, healing-wise, and he could tell by his friends eased expression that he had accomplished his goal. His chest squeezed, however, when Hector's choked voice asked, "What did you do? How did you…" he trailed off, eyes shimmering with unshed tears. He did not look up.
Jareth released his hands and stepped back, giving the man his space. "I may have fibbed, a little, when saying what I was and what I do. But it is best you do not know the whole truth, Hector Antonio Palermo." At the use of his full name, the man's attention snapped back to him. "You will not be troubled by pain there any longer."
"Never?" the man whispered.
Jareth shook his head. "Not ever. Go now."
Before he could blink, the small Italian man had grasped him in a tight embrace, kissing him on each cheek with teary, damp presses of his lips. "Thank you, thank you. Noi non potremo avere perfetta vita senza amici."
The man continued to babble in Italian, wiping his wet face on his shirtsleeves even as Jareth shooed him back up the staircase.
And then Jareth sent a minor pulse of power up toward the retreating mind, wiping the last few moments, having it be some sort of miraculous pressure point instead of the first taste of true magic that mortal had likely ever encountered.
Hector's steps slowed, and for a moment he stood there, arms loose at his side and his head canted as though he were listening to far-away music. Then he shook himself, looked around, spotted his coffee, and retreated into his apartment.
"What did you do to him?" asked the scratchy voice of Rico the goblin.
Jareth barely glanced at the creature, still offended at his original transgression. If it had been fully up to him, the man would be forgotten to starve to death in an oubliette, deep in the bowels of the Labyrinth. Instead, the creature had been granted a chance by Sarah. "Healed him," he said, keeping the words clipped and simple. "He was already concealing a great deal of pain."
Music drifted out of the upstairs window. Even though the piano was softly played, it contained an ease and joy which had been missing from the talented musician's performance. Laughter soon bubbled out of the same space, and Jareth smiled to himself before slipping back into the apartment.
Rico went off in the direction of the bathroom, passed the sleeping Toby, and Jareth used the moment of near-solitude to open the left drawer on Sarah's desk. There, half-buried under papers, was the gilded book Aldric had made for her, the symbol of their father's house winking gold in the streaming sunlight.
Jareth glanced at the sleeping Toby, then back to the book.
Without giving himself a moment to hesitate, he grasped it from the drawer and threw it out the open window, watching it arc over the buildings across the street to disappear in a golden glint.
He stared after it for a long time before turning back to Sarah's apartment.
Then froze.
The book was sitting on her desk, propped against the computer monitor.
Jareth's lips curled, and he shoved the foul thing back into the open drawer before slamming it shut, hoping that Sarah would forget it was even there.
The noise woke Toby with a start. Drool in a thin white line dribbled from the corner of his mouth, and his hair stuck out in several inconsistent directions. "Wha—?" he started, blinking and rubbing his eyes.
"Apologies, Tobias," Jareth said, moving around the desk and toward the kitchen. "Coffee?"
That seemed to perk the teenager up. "Seriously? Yeah!"
The Goblin King went about the soothing process of grinding beans and setting the coffee pot up, letting the motions help him forget what had just happened with the book. Toby stretched and went to the bathroom, a scream cutting through the air a moment later followed by explosive cursing in Goblinkin.
"I don't know what that means!" Toby yelled back, retreating into the kitchen with eyes wide and hands up as though he were under arrest. "I'm sorry!"
Jareth roared out a laugh, and the piano music from upstairs paused for a moment before continuing on again. "He said to knock next time, if you please."
"Did not," Rico snarled, jerking the fly closed on his pants as he stomped into the room, glaring daggers at them both. "I said to fucking knock next time."
"What's going on?" a soft voice interjected, and Jareth looked to see Sarah standing in the doorway, inky hair mussed and eyes glazed with the remnants of sleep and—
Oh, he thought, moving toward her. This must be what the legends meant. The ones which spoke of the love a fae could feel for one who was touched. Sometimes it seemed he could not breathe without her.
A spark of mischief twinkled in Sarah's eyes as he came closer, and she slid out of his reach the moment he closed in, smiling as she darted away.
He gave chase, excitement rising, when he remembered they had two witnesses. To most fae, that would not have mattered in the slightest, but Jareth knew Sarah would be bothered.
So, instead, he watched her with hungry eyes as she slipped into the kitchen and busied herself with making some coffee. "So what was all that noise?" she asked over her shoulder, squinting against the light.
Jareth made a motion that drew the blinds and curtains over her large windows, plunging the room into dimness.
Toby had already gone off to the bathroom again, but before Jareth could answer Rico was jumping up onto the stool between the living room and kitchen, gazing at Sarah with the besotted look most Faerie creatures got whenever they came in contact with a fae touched. "That was my fault," he said. "I forgot to lock the bathroom, and your brother barged in on me."
Sarah gave a soft snort. "Serves you both right, then."
Jareth smiled and came into the kitchen, leaning against the counter alongside her and reaching out, giving the strip of stomach he could see between her pajama set a soft caress. "I'm afraid I wasn't near as quiet as I could have been. How did you sleep?"
A flush rose to her cheeks as she eyed him over the rim of her coffee cup. She took a sip and said nothing, only came to his side so that her hip was pressed to his.
They had spent most of their evening talking, well past midnight. Talking, making love, and simply enjoying each other.
He had promised her, after all. One week.
"Shall I make breakfast?" he asked her, voice low.
She made a small noise of approval as she took another sip of coffee. "What about another aisling? Like the one you did of Paris? Can you do something like that?" Her smile was brilliant. "I think Toby will get a real kick out of it."
"What's an aisling?" the goblin asked.
Sarah launched into an explanation, her face in profile as she smiled and spoke.
Jareth mentally categorizing the ones he had left to show her. Like most of his kind, he had at least a dozen different places and memories to pull from in order to weave an aisling. It differed from summoning up matter and energy to form an object, to change the nature of things and cast illusion. It had to be somewhere he knew and knew well.
There were only a handful left he had not shown Sarah.
Toby returned, and Jareth gave Sarah a nod. "I think I have just the thing."
Without waiting for her reaction, he threw the weaving into the living room, letting everything living in the memory bloom out of his mind and expand into the aisling, forming real snow, real mountains, and a large, sprawling lodge with dozens of rooms where he had spent many of his youthful years.
Sarah shivered and stepped closer to him as snow blasted into the kitchen. With a minor push of power, Jareth clothed all of them, even Rico, in furs and enough layers that they'd be toasty warm. For Sarah, he had already crafted a pair of snow goggles, so her sensitive eyes were shielded from the sun.
"This is worse than St. Petersburg!" Toby yelled over the wind. "You summoned winter!"
"Let's get inside," the Goblin King said, motioning toward the lodge not twenty yards away. "There'll be a fire."
"This is impossible!" Rico said, black eyes glittering through the fringe of fur surrounding his wrinkled face. "How can all this fit in her apartment?"
Sarah gave a delighted laugh, and it warmed his heart. "It's magic, dummy! Come on!"
And she led the way inside.
The lodge was made of thick-hewn wooden planks and well-fitted stone, chinked with thick masonry worn smooth from wind. A single tower rose off it, and several chimneys trailed thin smoke.
Though it had often been filled with servants, brownies, and family members when he had visited in real life, here in the aisling they were alone. The thick wooden doors banged open with a swirl of snow. The laughter of the Williams' siblings ringing in his ears.
Rico was a little more hesitant, but he followed in Sarah's wake, and Jareth knew that the little creature felt drawn to her, still. That there was a sense of belonging with her.
The Goblin King felt it, too.
He closed the doors behind the group, pushing a little with his magic to ensure all the lights were shining bright enough to see but dim enough so that when Sarah swept off her goggles, she was not in any pain.
The great room was large enough to hold over fifty people, with towering ceilings wide, tall windows that let in the light and showed the blistering snow to full effect.
"What is this place?" Sarah called, twirling in the center of the room while shedding the layers of furs he had placed her in. "It's fantastic, but I've never seen mountains like it."
"Think of it like the Alps, only Faerie's version. We are high above the Winter Court, and this lodge and mountain range used to belong to one of my ancestors, long ago, before it was bequeathed to the crown." His tone softened a little as he added, "Apparently the reigning king at the time was so enamored with this place that he gave our family a boon."
Sarah's smiling face went still, and she glanced at him, expression sharp. "Isn't that was you used—"
"Yes," he said, cutting her off before she spoke too much in front of the others. There were some things that were secret, especially among monarchs. He gave her a smile when she frowned at him, then spread his arms wide. "Welcome to my ancestral home."
"Can I explore? If I move away from you, will it disappear?" Toby asked, bright eyes shining.
"You can go wherever you wish. You will feel it if you go beyond the bonds of the spell." Jaret paced up beside them all, but kept a special eye on Sarah, who seemed to grow increasingly furious. "Rico? Care to escort our young friend?"
The goblin looked up and then squawked when Toby took his arm. "Hey! I didn't say I'd come with you, kid."
"Come on!" Toby said, laughing. "I bet there are some places here that only someone your size can fit into, eh? It's made my fairies."
"Not made by fairies," Jareth said, not bothering to raise his voice enough for the young man to hear as he ran off with the new goblin. "Just sometimes infested with them."
Sarah stepped up beside him, reached out, and pinched his side. "The hell was that about? Toby's my brother. I don't want to keep secrets from him."
Jareth cast her a sidelong look and slid out of her reach. "Yet you thought you kept the secret of your run from him for years."
She narrowed her eyes. "That's different."
"Is it?" Turning away from her, Jareth noted the roaring fire in a hearth wide enough to roast a boar. He hated this place. Knew it backward and forward, enough to make an aisling, and yet…
Why had he summoned this place specifically?
There was something he had to do.
"Come with me," he said, softening his words with a, "Please," when he saw her stormy look.
He waited until she took a step toward him before he moved deeper into the lodge. They went through the great room, covered in paintings not just of the royalty of the Winter Court, but of those of the original owners, his ancestors. Mismatched eyes in similar shades of blues and browns gazed down at him alongside the piercing black of the monarchy.
Sarah stopped to take in a painting, and once he saw which one it was, he was unsurprised.
It was of his great-grandmother, the only human they could trace back in their lineage. She had come from the Roman Empire, and wore a pleated dress and flowing, gauzy layers of fabric. She was seated, a fan of peacock feathers spread in her lap. Stand behind her was her son, Jareth's grandfather, and the one everyone said he resembled the most of their family.
"My grandfather, and his mother," he said, coming back and touching Sarah's elbow over her long-sleeved thermal shirt. "She's where I get that drop of human blood from."
"She's beautiful," she said. "But he looks almost exactly like you. That's—that's for sure not you, is it?"
He laughed. "No. I promise."
Somewhere in the hallway above came a crash and a chorus of raucous laughter. Both of them looked up at the ceiling, then caught each other's gaze on the way down.
He smiled at her. "It sounds like your brother is having a great time."
"He's been cooped up for almost two more months than we have," she said, letting him pull her away from the painting. When he laced his fingers through hers, she squeezed his hand through his gloves. "Except he hasn't had magic to supplement the boredom. I suppose any of this is going to strike him as fantastical and wonderful."
"Toby has seen less of it than you," Jareth said.
There was a beat of silence as they continued down the long hall toward a stairwell at the end that would reach up to the solitary tower. Then Sarah asked, "Is Toby fae touched, like me?"
Jareth shook his head. "No. I thought so once, when he was still very small, but I believe that was just your protection over him. It has waned with time, as he's grown older and more capable of taking care of himself."
"What about my parents?"
"Neither of them," Jareth replied, dropping her hand as he started up the twisting staircase, having to go single-file. "I checked long ago, but in your entire family, you are the only one. Not a single one of your cousins, aunts, or uncles has the same presence."
They continue their ascension in silence, though he could feel her gaze on his back, and wondered what was in her mind.
There were no windows, but Jareth could sense it when they reached the tower itself and left the main building behind.
Sarah panted behind him. "Talk about thigh day at the gym."
"Only a little further, precious."
When they at least reached the door outside the single tower room, Jareth hesitated, his fingers clasped around the cold brass handle. He wanted to trust, wanted it with his whole heart, but instinct screamed that this was the wrong idea. That knowledge was a power that would warp his Sarah away from him.
But this had to be done.
Jareth glanced back at her. "Shield your eyes for a moment." He knew they had adjusted to the dimness and were still sensitive from the healing. The venom was gone. He had Regina check the night before, just in case, but the healing process was still ongoing.
Sarah glared at him before putting a hand up just as he opened the door.
The room smelled just the same as it always had. Old, decaying paper, parchment, and vellum, somehow always reminding him of a clean barn. There was the sense of things living here. The map room was encircled with windows, over which he pulled the drapes with a press of his magic, plunging it into dimness.
Reaching around, Jareth pulled Sarah forth. She dropped her hand, looking around with blatant curiosity, and he resisted the urge to pull her to him, dip his head, and press his mouth to hers. He craved the taste of her, but…
Jareth moved to the shelves that wrapped around the room, taking up the lower portion of the wall. They were deep and tall; the windows starting at chest-height and soaring above his head. Here, they could hear the wind better than in the stone-walled staircase. He reached for one book that he knew well, a large atlas he brought to the center table and plunked down before Sarah.
"What's this?"
"Something I need you to see." He stepped aside, motioned toward the tome. "Please."
Sarah opened it, the spine crackling, her wince one that he recognized from book lovers everywhere.
"Remember, it's not exactly real, just an aisling," Jareth said, hoping to soothe her anxiety.
She nodded, but her attention was already caught on the drawings and descriptions within. "These are like your amulet, like Al—" she stopped herself, glancing at him.
"You can say his name, precious," he said, even though he knew it would be painful to hear. He knew, perhaps even better than she, how close a thing this had been. That Sarah had fallen so thoroughly into his arms the moment she returned was a gift he would never take for granted.
Yet, he still poses a danger, Jareth thought, eyes straying to the book.
It was a beautiful thing. Each pair of pages was one large map, showing a section of Faerie and the ruling houses that inhabited the areas. Drawn in the margins and colored with inks were copies of each of the amulets the various heads of families would wear. The official seal of their line.
Coming up beside her, Jareth gently turned a few pages, then smoothed his gloved hand up the map which showed the base of these very mountains. There, a valley bloomed verdant, the aerial view in the map still showing enough detail that he softly explained, "Here there are the fields of grains, and where we raise some of the finest horses in all of Faerie." There was something like longing in his voice.
Sarah's hand covered his, and he looked at her. "This was home for you?"
"Yes," he said, the sudden lump in his throat and the urge to tell her everything near-overwhelming. "I thought I'd travel the worlds, but that would always be home. Aldric was the eldest son and set to inherit all that my father had built over the last six centuries, since his own father had faded." Jareth turned his hand under hers so that theirs fingers laced together. She squeezed. "There wasn't much expected of me, considering the twins and him. I was nothing. I grew up in their shadow and was thankful for the anonymity it granted me."
Sarah's smile was wry. "Not so anonymous now, are you? Goblin King."
He laughed, lifted their twined hands, and kissed her knuckles. "No." He sighed, closing his eyes for a moment before refocusing on the pages showing his old homelands. "I know I told you I would give you a week, precious, and I do not renege on that lightly. This is important, however." He spoke fast, could near see the protest bubbling up in her throat. "That book Aldric gave you, I need to tell you what it does."
Sarah sucked in a breath. "What does it do?"
"It contains every memory of those that wore it, though only while they wore it. I assume he told you how to open it?"
She nodded.
"If you were to do so, I do not know if it would react to you the same way it would react to a fae. I know even if the fae is not a direct blood relation, it will perform a major magic. The book becomes the device yet again, settling around the neck of the one who opened it. When that happens, there is a transfer of memory. I—" he swallowed, remembering. "It's difficult to remember what is real, and what is remembered from some other life. Especially for those who came just before you."
Sarah reached out, tracing the edges of his own talisman. "When you got this? What was that like?"
"Painful," he said. "But it is rarely so for everyone. The Labyrinth is as old as the land on which it is built, ever-shifting, ever-growing. It chooses who rules it, and it had stayed without a king or queen for more than a thousand years." His voice had grown impassioned, and Jareth bit his tongue. He was going off-topic and instinct told him to keep quiet. This was Sarah, and she had said she would go back with him, to be his ally and equal.
Meeting her gaze, he continued. "What happened when I received this amulet is not something I have spoken of to anyone. I will tell you about it, but not today." He took a breath. "I know that if you put your hand on that book and speak his name, you will inherit the memories of my ancestral line. I am not sure how that will sit in a human mind, even one who is fae-touched. With it, you would inherit all the lands and titles which once belonged to Aldric, and he will fade utterly."
Her hand went to her throat. "I thought you had to choose to fade."
"This would be considered a choosing. He gave the seal to you of his own volition, knowing full well what it would mean, and Sarah—" he swallowed. "The process will have already started with the amulet gone. He has weeks to live, at most."
Alarm shone in her face. "I have to get it back to him, then."
"That's precisely why he gave it to you." Jareth cursed under his breath and turned away, striding around the room until he found another book, pulling it from the shelf and bringing it over to lie beside the atlas.
"Jareth…" Sarah started, touching his forearm gently as he flipped through the pages of the second book. "How can I get it back to him without danger to myself, or you?"
"It's impossible," he said, stopping on a page and then tapping it with a gloved finger. "Look at this."
Sarah did, her eyes flashing over the parchment, a frown deepening around her mouth. "What is this? A list of names? I don't understand."
"This was the first quell," Jareth said, turning to the next page, where an etching showed a gruesome scene. A party turned foul, the guests strewn about the floor, bleeding from their eyes and mouth. "They never officially pinpointed my brother, and he never acted so bold again, but these—" he smoothed his hand over the faces. He knew them all by heart. "Were my closest friends. It was one of the greatest of travesties, that so many younglings were struck down by a mysterious illness. I suspect it was poison, but somewhere in the chain of investigation my brother did enough favors, or gifted enough gold and jewels, that there were no genuine inquiries. Even the parents were quieted, somehow. They were often second and third children and so not as important in the grand scheme of things."
His voice had grown soft, and Sarah's hand was on his back, stroking in comforting circles.
Jareth closed his eyes for a moment before he continued. "If you choose to take the book back to Aldric, I will do everything I can to help you, to ensure you're safe, but I know there is some trick in this. He's acted in ways I thought were desperate before, and he always had a greater plan at work."
Her movements faltered for a moment, and then Sarah leaned into him. "Or," she said, "He truly was lost."
Baring his teeth for a moment, Jareth wrapped his arm around her, pulling her tighter against him. "Forgive me, my love," he said, his voice rough. "My sympathy for Aldric died with the last of my friends."
She wrapped her arms around him, snuggling close, and he turned away from the spread-open books at last, gathering her up and inhaling deep.
What he feared, above all else, was that Sarah would join those on that list. That Aldric would know hurting her was the ultimate punishment.
The thought of a world without her in it was enough to make him want to walk straight into his brother's sword. Damn the consequences. Only…
Only, if he were ever to gain the powers of the Labyrinth, he would be unstoppable, a tyrant.
Despite his dark thoughts, Jareth did not stop Sarah as she moved to kiss him, her mouth hot and breath sweet. As her hands roamed, moving from his shoulders to his chest, the heat she raised in him rushed to his groin. When she grasped him, stroking his hard length, Jareth growled and pushed a little with his magic, swinging the door to the tower room shut, the lock sliding a moment later.
"I will not be gentle, precious," he warned, his emotions too close to the surface, too tumultuous.
In response, she whimpered and pulled her shirt over her head.
Jareth grasped her hips and pulled, shredding the fabric of her leggings and underwear until he could smell her arousal pungent on the air.
The shelves were too tall, and the table too short for most positions, but he grasped Sarah under the thighs and backed her up against the door, then lifted her so that her legs wrapped around his waist. "Oh," she breathed, her eyes wide as she reached between them and freed his straining erection. "Fuck me, Jareth."
Capturing her lips again, tongues warring and teeth grazing, Jareth thrust against her grip on his cock, the tip of him pressing along her wetness. She was all high sounds of pleasure, and already he could sense the magic coiling in her coming out to play, delighting in the dance of it against his skin.
Sarah lined him up and let go just as he slid into her.
The first thrust was always the most shocking. Her heat gripping him tight, muscles playing, gripping, and fluttering along his shaft. All the air in his lungs went out, and he broke their kiss with a gasp.
Sarah gripped his shoulders and back, spasming around him as she moaned his name.
He did not want to hear her moans.
He wanted to hear her screams.
Placing a sound warding around their space, Jareth leaned forward and captured the lobe of one ear in his teeth. He moved, his hips rocking with a too-gentle rhythm at first that had her easing around him.
And then he slammed into her, not giving her a chance to catch her breath before doing so again and again. Gripping her hips, pinning her to the door, Jareth fucked her, just as she had asked.
"Oh my gods," she whispered, once and then again.
His grip on her tightened, and he growled, licking the shell of her ear before murmuring into it, "Is this what you want?" To punctuate his words, he slammed into her, hard, and went still, cock twitching deep within her.
Sarah seemed to crawl into him, her nails digging into the flesh of his back and the heels of her feet digging into his buttocks. He could tell she was attempting to fuck him back, but the leverage just was not there for her. "Damn it," she hissed as he withdrew by a mere inch before plunging deep once more. "Please don't stop."
"Answer the question, precious," he said back, not moving.
"Yes!" she cried. "I want you, please…"
He moved again. Much slower than before, drawing out their pleasure. He kept her pinned, kept her pleasure his, and she called out his name.
"Please," she begged after only a few moments. Her walls gripped him tight. "Harder."
His grin was savage. He did as she asked, panting through the motions. "Like this?"
"Faster," she moaned, glorious eyes half-lidded with pleasure.
Jareth drove into her, the slap of flesh against flesh loud in the circular room. At first, Sarah was almost silent, her head bowed and her breath a gasping, fluttering thing like a bird.
And then she was clamping down around him, her grip stronger than ever before, and he could feel the deluge of her power, the very power of creation, flowing out of her and into him. Her cries reached a pitch unheard before, and she was gripping him so tight he could hardly move within her, despite her slickness.
Jareth cursed as he felt his end roaring over him, his seed spilling deep within her as he trembled and breath hitched. Magic zinged like electric currents between them, sparking where his flesh touched hers.
Sarah was clutching him tight, and he could feel the thrumming of her heart through their chests pressed together.
Kissing her hair, her cheeks, which were wet with tears, Jareth pulled back. "Are you okay?"
She lifted shining eyes to him, and her nails were pinpricks on his back. "I don't want to lose this."
He pressed his forehead to hers. "Do not worry, lover mine. I'll take care of you."
"Even if I have to take back the book?"
Nodding, he rocked within her once more, the motion subtle. A question. She answered with a breathy plea, and he picked up his pace, hitching her leg higher over his hip.
They became nothing but two bodies, finding one another, delighting in the pleasures they coaxed ever higher.
All the while, Jareth wondered if he had made a mistake. If Aldric had faded, if she had forgotten about the book? That would have been his favored outcome, and yet—
Yet, as he gasped into her neck and once more emptied himself into her, her own cries ringing in his ears, Jareth knew he could no longer do such manipulations. Not if he aimed to keep her.
And he did.
Author's Note:
The expression Noi non potremo avere perfetta vita senza amici, which Hector utters after Jareth heals his hands, is an Italian idiom meaning, "We can't have a perfect life without friends."
Thank you, friends, for your enduring patience. As I've mentioned before, I'm not abandoning this piece. Things just got hectic and shitty for a long time and, hell who am I kidding? They're still hectic and kinda shitty, but I think we've found our light at the end of the tunnel, so to speak.
That said, I don't think it'll be *checks calendar* SIX F*CKING MONTHS—
*faints*
(I started writing this authors note 2 months ago)—
Uh, yeah, we should have significantly less time between updates. Sorry, folks. There was a whole kerfuffle explosion in my life and it kind of… keeps happening.
Anyway,
Act 3 of 31/32 begins! What do you think? 😊
xoxo,
CrimsonSympathy