Outside a labyrinth - Open

[dangers_untold]

Sarah awakes from a very sore and very involuntary nap, the sort that results from hitting one's head, to find herself lying in the grass. Strange, because she could have sworn she had been in her bedroom. She sits up to gauge her surrounds, eyes fixing on a tall stone wall covered in decaying vines. Actually, it looks sort of like she's just

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[far_underground]

She may not be pleased, but Jareth most certainly is, when, peering through one of his crystal balls, he espies a certain dark-haired lovely sprawled out in the dirt outside his labyrinth. Why, it's just like old times. He chuckles to himself as she clambers to her feet, half expecting her to stomp her foot and whine about the unfairness of it all. She doesn't, although she certainly looks spooked, all her weight on the balls of her feet like a small animal, ready to take flight at any moment.

Idly, the Goblin King wonders whether this is the real Sarah or simply a creation of the Mistress's imagination. It doesn't matter much here; he's never put much stock in the solidity of reality, and he's hardly about to credit himself for less, simply because he's fictional. Sarah might not think the same, though, and he tucks that away as something to determine. For now, though, it would hardly do to let her get away without at least a welcome party, and in a trice, he's melted into nothing, leaving behind only a shimmer of glitter on

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Her eyes dart sharply in his direction, and immediately narrow. She takes an instinctive step back, poised to take more, should the situation require it.

"I knew you were behind this," she spits venomously. "What do you want from me this time?"

[far_underground]

'Your credit flatters me, but I assure you, I am quite as surprised as you to find you here.'

Sarah can believe him as she likes; Jareth just has one of those faces, as the human saying goes. People rarely trust his intentions even when they are pure, and Sarah has no reason to think him innocent of her sudden, unexpected arrival.

One of his eyebrows lifts, purposefully mild. 'An errant wish, perhaps?' he suggests provocatively. 'You people do so like to bandy them around.'

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Sarah eyes him dubiously, her thoughts plainly written on her face. She's never cared much for deception, and certainly has no need to hide anything from him now, even though he's privy to her discomfort as well as her hatred of him. A fair trade, she supposes; though if he would like her to enlighten him on the details of her opinion of the Goblin King, she will happily wax poetic until she bores him to death. If only that were possible.

"Believe me, the last thing I'd do is make a wish that would bring me anywhere near you." She makes to step around him, away from the labyrinth entrance. "Now if you don't mind, I need to find my way home."

[far_underground]

If the girl thinks the only things she feels in his regard are discomfort and hatred, she truly is deluded. But Jareth, of course, is more than happy to disabuse her of that particular misapprehension, now that she's here. All evidence to the contrary, he thinks sardonically at her claim that she'd never wish herself anywhere near him, and when Sarah makes a move to step around him, he smoothly slides to the side, easily blocking her path. He lifts a hand between them, not touching, but the threat is there, coiled in the ostensibly indolent curl of his fingers.

'You won't find it walking, precious, and certainly not that way. You know the way to get out of my labyrinth.'

Never mind the fact that the usual rules don't actually apply here. Even if she does run the labyrinth and defeats it, neither he nor the maze itself have any power to send her back into the real world.

[dangers_untold]

"But that's not fair." And with one incensed outcry, the past three years melt away, and the outraged fifteen year-old he knew once is looking up at him, one more provocation away from stamping her foot. She manages to recover her dignity after a heavy breath or two, but the damage is done, and the flush of her cheeks shows her awareness.

"You don't have anything of mine here," she presses on with an overconfident air. She's bluffing, naturally; while she's been careful in the years since not to wish anything into the hands of goblins, she wouldn't put it past Jareth to take her brother from her again anyway. He always did enjoy tailoring the rules of his world to suit his appetites. "I don't have any reason to go in there. I'll find my own way home. Now please get out of my way."

[far_underground]

Ah, there she is. Sarah may have grown older, matured, gone off to college, or whatever other customs humans had to mark the passing of time, but in regards to him, she's still the same child she was. And all the better; those qualities vaunted as 'adult' are more often terribly boring than anything else; no imagination whatever. Which isn't to say that Miss Williams' childish qualities aren't their fair share of irritating, but it gives Jareth another piece of pleasing leverage against her, and when he smirks, his teeth are white and very sharp.

'Sarah, Sarah, Sarah,' he sighs. 'Do you think I'd lie to you? I've never told you anything but the truth; you cannot get out any other way. No matter how hard you stamp your pretty little foot, I'm afraid

[dangers_untold]

The intent of the gesture isn't lost on her - the flash of understanding in her eyes says as much, though the slight parting of her lips and the way her eyes dart about like a cornered mouse, her body immobile, suggests she hasn't the slightest idea what to do about it. She swallows audibly.

"What sort of rules?" she asks quite shakily. Once the words are out she rouses a bit, tossing her head to dislodge his fingers, though she takes only a half step back.

[far_underground]

But more adult in that respect, at least, Jareth notes with pleasure. Before, fifteen year old Sarah had been aware of some tension, certainly, but she'd hardly been equipped with the skills to recognise it or deal with it once she had. Now, though, the click of her throat as she swallows, the undeniable knowledge in her eyes-- oh, that just makes him want to play.

'Rules, pet,' he repeats himself. 'You know how they go; invoke the right words, and the world obliges according to the old patterns.' Despite her bid to move away, his hand is still there, hovering by her neck, and now his fingers curl around her chin, exerting gentle, inexorable pressure, bringing her face up to meet his eyes as he invades her space. 'I wish,' he says softly, mockingly, 'you would take Toby away, right now

[dangers_untold]

Sarah is more than a little out of practice; over the intervening years picking up her books of fairy stories had grown more painful, and eventually had begun to collect dust, though she'd never brought herself to pack them away with the rest of her childhood. They were an inexorable reminder of her brief adventure, a journey so brief she had questioned more than once whether it had merely been a work of her overactive imagination. It was difficult to maintain that resolve with the Goblin King's fingers curled so resolutely under her chin. She racks her mind for the stories she knew so well by heart; somewhere there must be the solution. What had she said to break the spell the last time they had faced off?

"You have no power over me," she says, with an obstinate raise of her chin. "You haven't taken anything from me, and I'll make sure you never will."

[far_underground]

The human child is so very stubborn. But that's what makes her so very much fun to play with, and Jareth lifts an unimpressed eyebrow at her words.

'That may have worked three years ago, but as I say-' The fingers grasping her face tighten for a moment before he lifts his hands, rolling his wrists in an elaborate, expansive gesture to indicate the world around them. 'Things are different here. And as for what I can and cannot take from you... well, one does so hate to be premature about these things.'

This chance encounter is nothing, after all, if not the perfect opportunity to demand reparation for his humiliation and defeat of three years previous. Not that he'll be demanding anything, really; this time, he thinks, he'll take the subtle approach.

[dangers_untold]

She gives an irritated twitch at his vice-like grip, her ire rising to match her uneasiness. His manners, if possible, have only declined in the intervening years; his affected nobility barely begins to disguise the consummate manipulator beneath. Jareth is all teeth and lies, just as he was when she last rid herself of him.

While naturally distrustful of anything he says, his insistence that the rules have changed catches her notice, and her eyes narrow sharply and lock on to his, her fear momentarily suspended. She doesn't expect an honest answer from a man (a generous term) who breathes deception, and she let's him clearly hear the skepticism in her tone.

"What sort of rules?"

[far_underground]

'Do you recognise this place?'

His voice is mild, and he turns away from her, trailing fingertips gloved in dove-grey fawnskin over the nearest wall. 'The walls, the sky, the earth beneath your feet?' To further illustrate his words, he sinks gracefully into a quick crouch, pinching some of the fine soil between his fingers, letting it fall away as he rises in a breath of dust and glitter.

'Does it all look the same as you recall it to be?'

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"Yes."

She answers hastily, but looks uncertain even as she says it. In truth, if she is basing her answer on looks alone, it might not be the same labyrinth at all - or perhaps the same one, but centuries older (or perhaps younger, knowing how the usual rules can be disregarded here); a plaintive victim of the tides of time, left to shift and change at his will. But it feels like her labyrinth, the way a familiar place might look different in a dream, but she instinctively knows where she is. She used to dream of the labyrinth after leaving it, but it always looked the same and was never this vivid.

"Well, not exactly the same, but it is, isn't it? Why else would you be here?"