Magic Of the Heart
Disclaimer: All characters and story matter taken from the Labyrinth is the property of the writers, producers and owners of the movie. Though I like to believe the characters belong to themselves.
Rating: G
Notes Written a long time ago
Magic Of The Heart
by
Lattelady
The Legend as told to 10 year Jareth by the Wiseman:
"And so it is said, that for each man there is a woman. Their souls are destined to be joined at the heart. Each of us must roam the many worlds until we find the one person who is our other half. Until that time, our souls are like birds with one wing. They can flap about, but never soar happy and free as they were meant to."
"But, Wiseman," the young Prince asked, as he thought of his father and mother. "What if the person you choose isn't the other half of your heart." Jareth was remembering years of arguing, until one day there was only silence. His mother never leaving the room she had created. Always walking up and down and over and around, on stairs that took her nowhere, as she muttered, 'you can't get there from here.' His father had become hard and sad, running the Goblin City with an iron hand, never smiling and always speaking only of duty.
"That is the secret, Young Prince," The Wiseman shook his head as he fell back to sleep.
"Wake up," The Wiseman's Hat interjected. "The old fool," the Hat muttered, making Jareth laugh. The Hat and the Wiseman were two of his favorite people in the Labyrinth. "You are not helping the boy!" The Hat took over the conversation, "choose carefully, Your Majesty."
"How do I do that, Hat?" Jareth stood; he was tall for his age, already showing signs of the cunning and charm that would be his as a man. "I want to live my life having fun. This flying free sounds like a great deal of fun."
"Beware!" Hat warned. "Do not repeat the mistakes of your parents. Your father chose badly. The other half of your heart must be as strong as you are, or it will lead to ruin and heart ache for both of you. It will have been better that you had never met, then to live as your parents do."
"I must devise a plan...." Jareth murmured as he walked slowly back to the Castle.
.........................................
Midnight 500 years later - Three months after Sarah returned from the Underground:
Sarah Williams tossed and turned in her bed, as the dream came again. She was falling through the pieces of the Escher Room, falling and falling, until finally she landed. There he was, the Goblin King, pale and exhausted. Now she must face him again. Hope surged through her, maybe tonight she would follow her heart, and maybe tonight things would be different. She willed herself to change the words, but every night the words were the same, "you have no power over me." In her dream she was facing Jareth to win back Toby, but in her mind, a voice was yelling, 'it's a lie, can't you see that, it's a lie. He’d never keep Toby and turn him into a goblin. And he does have power over me. I just can’t let him see that.’ But every night the Labyrinth and its King was destroyed with her words.
Like all the other nights, since her return, a white owl watched from her open window. But tonight, the ghostly bird couldn't take her pain any longer, and with a crack of thunder and a gust of wind he changed into the man the girl was dreaming about.
"My poor sweet," he whispered, his dark cloak blowing in the wind beside her sleeping form. "If I take away your pain, all memory of what happened will be gone, too," he stood tall and regal over the dreaming woman-child, knowing if he did that his heart would never fly.
"Jareth," Sarah turned in her sleep, calling his name as she had every night since returning.
"Ahh Sarah," he leaned close and wiped a tear from her face, rolling the glistening moisture in his fingers until it hardened into a small tear shaped diamond. "What's said is said, and done is done. It all happened too early, my sweet. You were years too young, but even then you were magnificent! You passed each of my tests, and sealed my fate."
Standing straight and tall, his pale blonde hair in shaggy spikes around his head, his oddly mismatched eyes looked deep into the girl's troubled sleep. "No more," he whispered, his black-gloved hand holding tight to the tear frozen in time. He called on his magic and cast a gentle spell. "Dream Sarah, dream of a land called the Underground and the adventures you had there. Dream of the friends you met, and the fun you had outwitting the Goblin King to get your brother back. But they will only be dreams, happy dreams, that are forgotten when you waken."
Then in a tiny moment of selfishness, Jareth smiled. "But once in while when the moon is full and your soul needs magic, dream of a crystal ballroom. A ballroom where you dance in a dress made of moonbeams and stardust with a man who can see to the heart of you."
After he cast his spell, he called to the wind and was no more. The next morning when Sarah woke up, she felt strangely rested. Her heart was light for the first time in months.
................................
Nine Years Later:
"No, Margaret." Sarah Williams looked across the table at her publisher. "How many times do I have to say it: I'm not writing about The Goblin King. If you're not happy with my work, I'm sure there is another publishing house that would be glad to handle my Toby and the Underground books."
"I had to try." Margaret Commings shook her head at the young woman she had been working with, since Sarah had sent Margaret her first manuscript when the young author was a senior in college. "Not a day goes by that I don't get a letter from some child or their parent expressing interest in the King."
"I realize that. I get mail like that myself, but Jareth is a background character in the stories, caster of spells, seen only from a distance, sending his crystals off to...."
"Jareth?" The older woman smiled. "So you've at least given him a name."
"Did I say that?" Sarah frowned, she didn't know where the name came from, "Jareth," she murmured, it sounded so right on her tongue.
"Yes you did."
"I..." Sarah heard music off in the distance, and a voice singing. For a moment she could almost make out the words. "I may have said it, but I'm not writing about him." A chill went down her spine as she buried her thoughts.
"Sarah, are you all right?" Margaret looked at her friend with worry.
"Yes, I'm sorry." She smiled across the table, trying to project a happiness she didn't feel. "You know I how I am, after I finish a book, it always lingers a bit." Wanting to change the subject, she chose the first thing that came into her mind, "I talked to Toby last night. He got the latest book in the mail. As a big boy of 10 he pretends to be very cool about the whole thing, but dad and Karen tell me otherwise."
..........................
That Night
Sarah thought back to how good the years had been to her. Sometime during the summer when she was fifteen she changed. She was still as strong willed, but she had become 'content, almost happy'. She loved her father and little brother Toby, and as the years passed, discovered that she loved her step-mother, too.
When she looked closely at the summer of her change, she remembered it in odd snatches. She saw herself crying, as she tossing in her sleep, and then she saw her sleep relaxed and calm, her tears gone. "Oh well, puberty is no fun, what can I say," she muttered as she locked the door and went up the stairs.
It was good to be in her old house again. Sarah had moved in six months ago, when her father had been transferred to San Francisco. Her children's books were selling very well and the year before she had won the Caldicott Award, assuring her a place in every child’s library in the county. When her parents had moved, she had bought the old house from them.
At the top of the stairs she went into what had been her room when she was growing up. It was now her study. She always felt inspired in that room. She smiled as she looked around. Along with her old Escher poster, there were enlargements of her drawings from her books. All the characters, that were so much a part of the Underground she wrote about, were there...except the Goblin King.
Reaching for the newest of the five children's books she had written and illustrated, Sarah turned the pages one by one until she came to the source of her argument with her publisher that morning. A picture of a hill leading down to the labyrinth that surrounded The Goblin City and in the far distance was the castle. In an open window high up in the castle could be seen the hazy figure of a man, crystal balls floating from an outstretched hand, to carry his magic throughout his kingdom.
"Jareth," Sarah whispered as she felt a pang deep in her. "Jareth," she gasped, holding the book tightly against her. She felt tears begin to well up in her eyes. “It's you I've been dreaming about, isn't it?” she asked the hazy picture.
"Jareth, help me!" she cried out. "I'm so confused!"
Thunder cracked! The wind whipped the tree branches against the house, and the lights went out. Looking up in shock, Sarah saw a white owl beating its wings against the glass. The window opened and the bird swooped in, circling the room twice, making Sarah duck her head.
"No!" she gasped as the bird landed and took the shape of a man in a billowing cape.
"You called?" He stood tall, dressed in midnight and starlight, with the wind whipping his cape and hair around him.
"You're him, The Goblin King," Sarah had turned white gripping the book as if it would protect her. For a moment she felt very young, "I've done this before," she muttered shaking her head, as she willed the vision in front of her to vanish.
"Jareth, King of the Goblins," the slim man with the haughty expression stepped closer and bowed his head. "Don't you remember me Sarah?"
"No, no, get back." She held out her hand. "This is a trick or I'm going crazy...."
"Magic, yes, a trick no." He smiled, his mismatched eyes held a light that made Sarah want to look into them for a long time. "Have you lost so much of your ability to dream that you can't accept me?"
"But I made you up," the frightened young woman argued.
"Did you?" He raised a brow as he smiled at her. "Those books you write about Toby, you claim are from a dream. What you've never told anyone is that in your dream it's you who goes to the Underground. Those are your adventures, not Toby's."
"How do you know this?" The woman shook her head to drive away the dizziness.
Jareth watched as she trembled, still pale with doubt and fear. "Don't tell me my lion-hearted Sarah is going to faint?" He wrapped his arm around her and a moment later they were sitting on her bed in the room across the hall, magic glitter drifting around them and catching in her long dark hair.
"You can't be real, but...but.... you are?" She ran her hands over his shoulders, feeling the solidness of him. Taking a deep breathed she smelled magic, stardust, and the memory of dancing, all things that reminded her of him. "It wasn't a dream was it?" She pulled back to stare at his face. "But I thought I killed you!"
"No, my sweet, not a dream," a deep sadness was etched on the Goblin King's face as he watched the pain return to Sarah as she remembered all she had given up as a child. "All that died was your expectations of me. As you can see and....feel," he crooked a brow at her. "I am very much alive."
"I don't understand any of this, Jareth," Sarah was sure she would waken in a moment and this would all be a memory. "Why did you go away and why are you here now?"
"I went away, because that is the way it is done, but you were so miserable after your returned from the Underground, that I put a spell on you. I thought it would be kinder to make you think it had been just a lovely dream, if you remembered it at all." He looked at the beautiful woman she had become, sorry for the bad timing of his goblins.
"I'm amazed you bothered to be kind." Sarah shook her head. "I was a selfish child, I can't believe you didn't turn me into a toad for all the times I yelled, 'it's not fair.'"
"You were just that Sarah, a child," he sighed. "And I was a man, who would never hurt a child, especially you."
"Me? I was just a source of mild amusement and irritation. It was Toby you wanted. You can't have him, no matter what happened in the past." She knew that he wasn't telling her everything. "Is that why you've returned, to try and get him back?"
"I came back, because you need to make a choice, Sarah, but before you do, I need to tell you the real reason you were in my Labyrinth." He watched her eyes grow big as he spoke. "Do you remember telling your brother a story before you wished him away? It was a story about a girl and the Goblin King."
"Yes," Sarah was looking into the past. "I stood in front of a mirror in this room, wearing Toby's stripped hat, playing my game as I said, 'but what the child didn't know was that the Goblin King was in love with the girl and had given her the right words..."
"Yes," Jareth smiled. "I was and I am...."
"But...." she tried to interrupt, afraid he was trying to trick her again and confused by the soft feelings she was having for this being.
"Still the doubter?" He arched his brows as he smiled. "You were destined to come to my Labyrinth, but not for another five years. That night, you didn't have the 'right words', at least not at first. My goblins were to watch over you, not bring you to me. But when you said the wrong words, one of them became impatient and whispered the right ones in your ear. Then you said them, unfortunately, years too early." He shrugged, trying to make it look as if it didn't really matter to him. "But what was said was said, so the game had to be played out."
"But why didn't you tell me?" Tears filled Sarah's eyes when she thought of how lonely she had been all these years, as if a part of her had been missing. Writing her stories had been able to alleviate some the pain. "Why didn't you show me any of the kindness then that you're showing me tonight?"
"I'm many things, but a seducer of children isn't one of them," he touched her cheek with an ungloved hand, letting himself feel her skin against his just this once.
"No, but you would scare me half to death with your Labyrinth, and your conniving to take Toby," Sarah's temper heated up.
"Yes, and you were magnificent," His eyes glittered as he remembered. "You met my every challenge and passed every test."
"Test, it was a test! You would have taken Toby as a test!"
"No," he smiled and shook his head. "That was the biggest test of all, and the only lie I've ever told you. When you wouldn't give up your brother when I offered you the thing that was most essential to your being: your dreams, I knew I had found a woman whose love would last. Unfortunately I found her as a child and therefore couldn't keep her."
"You never meant to take Toby?" She gasped, looking back on her adventure with the eyes of a grown woman; Sarah saw things that she had missed. "So I didn't really win?"
"You beat my Labyrinth, fair and square, if you hadn't, I wouldn't be standing here now." Jareth could see how important this was to Sarah, so he told her the whole truth. "The only help you had from me was to keep you safe. There were dangers there, which could have hurt or killed you, that couldn't be allowed!" He stood before her, his head thrown back, every inch the man she remembered.
"If you didn't want Toby..." She shook her head refusing to believe that Jareth was saying what she thought he was.
"The objective of the game was always you, Sarah." His mismatched eyes looked deep into hers. "I devised the game to find out if you had the courage, strength and love to do what needed to be done. If you had given up your brother, or failed, it would have been over in a second." He snapped his fingers to underline the importance of his words. "You wouldn't have been worthy." He stepped closer to her, lifting her hair to smell the scent of the woman he would spend eternity wanting.
Sarah felt a strength and power radiate off of him. She realized that she had felt it as a child, but hadn't been able to put a name to it. She recognized it for what it was now, desire! Years ago it had been part of what had frightened her most about the Goblin King.
"Wait, please," she pushed against his chest, knowing how easily he could overcome her if she didn't put some distance between them. A current deep in her was answering the power in him, and things could easily be sent out of control.
"Don't be afraid Sarah." He stepped back, seeing the effect he had on her. She had won with honor and he owed it to her to do the same. "I didn't go to all the trouble to make you forget years ago, to give you misery now. The spell I placed on you should have been lasting. You should have had no memory of the time in my Labyrinth. I've come to correct all that."
"If I hadn't remembered, I wouldn't have written my books," Sarah argued. "That's not all bad, they're lovely stories. Children love to read them."
"You would have written, it is your alternate destiny, and those stories would have been told, even if you hadn't written them." He held her slim hand in his larger one. "I came here tonight to right the wrong of nine years ago, because I think I know why you remembered when you shouldn't have."
"Are you trying to trick me again?" Sarah pulled away from him, "I don't want anything changed?"
"It must be, or you'll tear yourself apart. You're living with part of you here and part of you in the Underground, that can't be," He stood and paced not wanting to admit his mistake. "When you were in my Labyrinth I cast a spell on you...."
"The peach, we were dancing!" Sarah's face glowed, "I've dreamt about that over the years."
"I shouldn't have danced with you, but I wanted to feel you in my arms, just once." He shrugged and smiled at her, then looked very proper. "In a dance I could hold a girl of fifteen and no harm would be done...I thought."
"It was a lovely dance, and a lovely song." She smiled up at him. She may be a woman now, but she hadn't gotten any taller.
"Yes it was," the memory was a pleasant one for the Goblin King as well. "But the night I wished away all your pain, I added one little dream for you. Every once in a while you would return to the crystal ballroom and we would dance through the night. Over the years, more and more of your adventure slipped through the crack between our two worlds, created by the ballroom, until you were remembering it all, but in the form of a dream."
"Are you telling me, we really danced all those nights?" Sarah hugged herself at the memory of strong arms around her as they moved through intricate steps, never taking their eyes off of each other. "Is that why I've never fallen in love?" She accused. "Is that your magic, too?"
"No, the magic of your heart is yours to command." He bowed his head, not wanting her to see the relief that flowed through him. He had always wondered if there had been other men in Sarah's life. "And the dancing, well, it is as real as it can be while you're still part of this world."
"If you take away my memories, I won't have those dreams, either?" Sarah looked up as she began to understand what he wanted from her. "If you don't, what's my other choice, Jareth?"
"To live your true destiny." He stood over her looking every inch the King she remembered, proud and strong, refusing to be hurt. "Come with me and live forever in the Underground. It takes a strong person with a deep love to help me rule my kingdom."
"I want to believe you," Sarah stood and walked over to Jareth. "But you tricked me before."
"The game was yours, you set the rules." His hands on his hips he tried to look in control of his heart. "The only lie I ever told was that I'd keep Toby if you lost. Admit it Sarah, you had fun."
"Dance with me, Jareth," she looked up at him still very unsure.
"Of course, my sweet." His arms came around her and they moved in the steps they knew so well. Around and around the room they danced. Their bodies inched closer and closer, until he bent his head and kissed her upturned lips. As their lips met, Sarah felt a surge of power rush though her, power that reached in and gripped her heart.
"Wait, stay back," she gasped as she stepped out of his reach, trying to remember the words. "Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered, I have fought my way back to the Castle beyond The Goblin City---"
Jareth froze, feeling the loss all over again, but this time it was more intense, because his lips were still warm from her kiss. "Sarah beware! This time it is forever!" If the tear shaped diamond he wore close to his heart, was all he would have of her, then so be it. He knew she had lied years ago when she had said the words. That was what had given him a second chance and allowed him to assume his owl shape when needed. If she said the words as an adult, truth or lie, it wouldn't matter. He would never be able to return to her, because his soul would truly be a bird with only one wing.
"----I have returned the child you have stolen. For my will is as strong as yours-----and my kingdom as great." Putting her arms around him she whispered with her lips against his, "but you have a great deal of power over me!"
"And you over me," he sighed as he wrapped them in his cloak.
"I love you," was echoed by both as the room spun, and a great wind swept through the house, leaving two owl feathers floating to the floor. Destiny had been set back on its rightful path.
.............................
Ten Years Later, San Francisco:
"Mom," Toby yelled as he came home for spring break. "I'm home mom."
"Hi dear. You're a foot taller since Christmas." Karen hugged her handsome blond son. He was looking so much like his dad as he grew into a fine young man it made her heart sing.
"Classes are going great. I've a surprise for you and dad!" He pulled a file folder full of papers out of his backpack. "Look at this."
As Karen looked through the file, she saw that Toby had been writing again, something he had done since he was a child.
"Read this letter," he handed it to Karen. "It's from a woman named Margaret Commings. She's an editor and wants to publish that story."
Karen read the story that Toby had written, and admired the illustrations. "What a wonderful adventure." She smiled, so proud of her son. "Tob, I'm sorry you don't have any sisters or brothers," Karen felt a pang as she read the story he had written. When he had been growing up, Toby had invented a half-sister to keep him company when he couldn't sleep.
"Awe mom," he fussed as he often did when his mother was worried about him. "I don't think any live sister could be as much fun as the one I made up," he grinned as he thought of all the adventures he and 'Sarah' had gone on over the years. "Ms Commings says she wants me to write more stories about Sarah and the Underground. I'm an author!"
……………………………………
In a different world, a man and a woman lived and loved. Time moved strangely there, but they didn't care, they had each other and the family they were creating. The woman wore a tear shaped diamond on the third finger of her left hand. Sometimes she would dream of another life, but they would be fleeting dreams that never lasted into morning. As those dreams would touch her sleeping mind, she'd snuggle closer in her husband's arms. A smile would cross her lips as she felt his presence, always there to bring her back to the magic that was real. The magic she found only with him in their Kingdom in The Underground.
And Sarah and Jareth lived happily ever after
Rating: G
Notes Written a long time ago
Magic Of The Heart
by
Lattelady
The Legend as told to 10 year Jareth by the Wiseman:
"And so it is said, that for each man there is a woman. Their souls are destined to be joined at the heart. Each of us must roam the many worlds until we find the one person who is our other half. Until that time, our souls are like birds with one wing. They can flap about, but never soar happy and free as they were meant to."
"But, Wiseman," the young Prince asked, as he thought of his father and mother. "What if the person you choose isn't the other half of your heart." Jareth was remembering years of arguing, until one day there was only silence. His mother never leaving the room she had created. Always walking up and down and over and around, on stairs that took her nowhere, as she muttered, 'you can't get there from here.' His father had become hard and sad, running the Goblin City with an iron hand, never smiling and always speaking only of duty.
"That is the secret, Young Prince," The Wiseman shook his head as he fell back to sleep.
"Wake up," The Wiseman's Hat interjected. "The old fool," the Hat muttered, making Jareth laugh. The Hat and the Wiseman were two of his favorite people in the Labyrinth. "You are not helping the boy!" The Hat took over the conversation, "choose carefully, Your Majesty."
"How do I do that, Hat?" Jareth stood; he was tall for his age, already showing signs of the cunning and charm that would be his as a man. "I want to live my life having fun. This flying free sounds like a great deal of fun."
"Beware!" Hat warned. "Do not repeat the mistakes of your parents. Your father chose badly. The other half of your heart must be as strong as you are, or it will lead to ruin and heart ache for both of you. It will have been better that you had never met, then to live as your parents do."
"I must devise a plan...." Jareth murmured as he walked slowly back to the Castle.
.........................................
Midnight 500 years later - Three months after Sarah returned from the Underground:
Sarah Williams tossed and turned in her bed, as the dream came again. She was falling through the pieces of the Escher Room, falling and falling, until finally she landed. There he was, the Goblin King, pale and exhausted. Now she must face him again. Hope surged through her, maybe tonight she would follow her heart, and maybe tonight things would be different. She willed herself to change the words, but every night the words were the same, "you have no power over me." In her dream she was facing Jareth to win back Toby, but in her mind, a voice was yelling, 'it's a lie, can't you see that, it's a lie. He’d never keep Toby and turn him into a goblin. And he does have power over me. I just can’t let him see that.’ But every night the Labyrinth and its King was destroyed with her words.
Like all the other nights, since her return, a white owl watched from her open window. But tonight, the ghostly bird couldn't take her pain any longer, and with a crack of thunder and a gust of wind he changed into the man the girl was dreaming about.
"My poor sweet," he whispered, his dark cloak blowing in the wind beside her sleeping form. "If I take away your pain, all memory of what happened will be gone, too," he stood tall and regal over the dreaming woman-child, knowing if he did that his heart would never fly.
"Jareth," Sarah turned in her sleep, calling his name as she had every night since returning.
"Ahh Sarah," he leaned close and wiped a tear from her face, rolling the glistening moisture in his fingers until it hardened into a small tear shaped diamond. "What's said is said, and done is done. It all happened too early, my sweet. You were years too young, but even then you were magnificent! You passed each of my tests, and sealed my fate."
Standing straight and tall, his pale blonde hair in shaggy spikes around his head, his oddly mismatched eyes looked deep into the girl's troubled sleep. "No more," he whispered, his black-gloved hand holding tight to the tear frozen in time. He called on his magic and cast a gentle spell. "Dream Sarah, dream of a land called the Underground and the adventures you had there. Dream of the friends you met, and the fun you had outwitting the Goblin King to get your brother back. But they will only be dreams, happy dreams, that are forgotten when you waken."
Then in a tiny moment of selfishness, Jareth smiled. "But once in while when the moon is full and your soul needs magic, dream of a crystal ballroom. A ballroom where you dance in a dress made of moonbeams and stardust with a man who can see to the heart of you."
After he cast his spell, he called to the wind and was no more. The next morning when Sarah woke up, she felt strangely rested. Her heart was light for the first time in months.
................................
Nine Years Later:
"No, Margaret." Sarah Williams looked across the table at her publisher. "How many times do I have to say it: I'm not writing about The Goblin King. If you're not happy with my work, I'm sure there is another publishing house that would be glad to handle my Toby and the Underground books."
"I had to try." Margaret Commings shook her head at the young woman she had been working with, since Sarah had sent Margaret her first manuscript when the young author was a senior in college. "Not a day goes by that I don't get a letter from some child or their parent expressing interest in the King."
"I realize that. I get mail like that myself, but Jareth is a background character in the stories, caster of spells, seen only from a distance, sending his crystals off to...."
"Jareth?" The older woman smiled. "So you've at least given him a name."
"Did I say that?" Sarah frowned, she didn't know where the name came from, "Jareth," she murmured, it sounded so right on her tongue.
"Yes you did."
"I..." Sarah heard music off in the distance, and a voice singing. For a moment she could almost make out the words. "I may have said it, but I'm not writing about him." A chill went down her spine as she buried her thoughts.
"Sarah, are you all right?" Margaret looked at her friend with worry.
"Yes, I'm sorry." She smiled across the table, trying to project a happiness she didn't feel. "You know I how I am, after I finish a book, it always lingers a bit." Wanting to change the subject, she chose the first thing that came into her mind, "I talked to Toby last night. He got the latest book in the mail. As a big boy of 10 he pretends to be very cool about the whole thing, but dad and Karen tell me otherwise."
..........................
That Night
Sarah thought back to how good the years had been to her. Sometime during the summer when she was fifteen she changed. She was still as strong willed, but she had become 'content, almost happy'. She loved her father and little brother Toby, and as the years passed, discovered that she loved her step-mother, too.
When she looked closely at the summer of her change, she remembered it in odd snatches. She saw herself crying, as she tossing in her sleep, and then she saw her sleep relaxed and calm, her tears gone. "Oh well, puberty is no fun, what can I say," she muttered as she locked the door and went up the stairs.
It was good to be in her old house again. Sarah had moved in six months ago, when her father had been transferred to San Francisco. Her children's books were selling very well and the year before she had won the Caldicott Award, assuring her a place in every child’s library in the county. When her parents had moved, she had bought the old house from them.
At the top of the stairs she went into what had been her room when she was growing up. It was now her study. She always felt inspired in that room. She smiled as she looked around. Along with her old Escher poster, there were enlargements of her drawings from her books. All the characters, that were so much a part of the Underground she wrote about, were there...except the Goblin King.
Reaching for the newest of the five children's books she had written and illustrated, Sarah turned the pages one by one until she came to the source of her argument with her publisher that morning. A picture of a hill leading down to the labyrinth that surrounded The Goblin City and in the far distance was the castle. In an open window high up in the castle could be seen the hazy figure of a man, crystal balls floating from an outstretched hand, to carry his magic throughout his kingdom.
"Jareth," Sarah whispered as she felt a pang deep in her. "Jareth," she gasped, holding the book tightly against her. She felt tears begin to well up in her eyes. “It's you I've been dreaming about, isn't it?” she asked the hazy picture.
"Jareth, help me!" she cried out. "I'm so confused!"
Thunder cracked! The wind whipped the tree branches against the house, and the lights went out. Looking up in shock, Sarah saw a white owl beating its wings against the glass. The window opened and the bird swooped in, circling the room twice, making Sarah duck her head.
"No!" she gasped as the bird landed and took the shape of a man in a billowing cape.
"You called?" He stood tall, dressed in midnight and starlight, with the wind whipping his cape and hair around him.
"You're him, The Goblin King," Sarah had turned white gripping the book as if it would protect her. For a moment she felt very young, "I've done this before," she muttered shaking her head, as she willed the vision in front of her to vanish.
"Jareth, King of the Goblins," the slim man with the haughty expression stepped closer and bowed his head. "Don't you remember me Sarah?"
"No, no, get back." She held out her hand. "This is a trick or I'm going crazy...."
"Magic, yes, a trick no." He smiled, his mismatched eyes held a light that made Sarah want to look into them for a long time. "Have you lost so much of your ability to dream that you can't accept me?"
"But I made you up," the frightened young woman argued.
"Did you?" He raised a brow as he smiled at her. "Those books you write about Toby, you claim are from a dream. What you've never told anyone is that in your dream it's you who goes to the Underground. Those are your adventures, not Toby's."
"How do you know this?" The woman shook her head to drive away the dizziness.
Jareth watched as she trembled, still pale with doubt and fear. "Don't tell me my lion-hearted Sarah is going to faint?" He wrapped his arm around her and a moment later they were sitting on her bed in the room across the hall, magic glitter drifting around them and catching in her long dark hair.
"You can't be real, but...but.... you are?" She ran her hands over his shoulders, feeling the solidness of him. Taking a deep breathed she smelled magic, stardust, and the memory of dancing, all things that reminded her of him. "It wasn't a dream was it?" She pulled back to stare at his face. "But I thought I killed you!"
"No, my sweet, not a dream," a deep sadness was etched on the Goblin King's face as he watched the pain return to Sarah as she remembered all she had given up as a child. "All that died was your expectations of me. As you can see and....feel," he crooked a brow at her. "I am very much alive."
"I don't understand any of this, Jareth," Sarah was sure she would waken in a moment and this would all be a memory. "Why did you go away and why are you here now?"
"I went away, because that is the way it is done, but you were so miserable after your returned from the Underground, that I put a spell on you. I thought it would be kinder to make you think it had been just a lovely dream, if you remembered it at all." He looked at the beautiful woman she had become, sorry for the bad timing of his goblins.
"I'm amazed you bothered to be kind." Sarah shook her head. "I was a selfish child, I can't believe you didn't turn me into a toad for all the times I yelled, 'it's not fair.'"
"You were just that Sarah, a child," he sighed. "And I was a man, who would never hurt a child, especially you."
"Me? I was just a source of mild amusement and irritation. It was Toby you wanted. You can't have him, no matter what happened in the past." She knew that he wasn't telling her everything. "Is that why you've returned, to try and get him back?"
"I came back, because you need to make a choice, Sarah, but before you do, I need to tell you the real reason you were in my Labyrinth." He watched her eyes grow big as he spoke. "Do you remember telling your brother a story before you wished him away? It was a story about a girl and the Goblin King."
"Yes," Sarah was looking into the past. "I stood in front of a mirror in this room, wearing Toby's stripped hat, playing my game as I said, 'but what the child didn't know was that the Goblin King was in love with the girl and had given her the right words..."
"Yes," Jareth smiled. "I was and I am...."
"But...." she tried to interrupt, afraid he was trying to trick her again and confused by the soft feelings she was having for this being.
"Still the doubter?" He arched his brows as he smiled. "You were destined to come to my Labyrinth, but not for another five years. That night, you didn't have the 'right words', at least not at first. My goblins were to watch over you, not bring you to me. But when you said the wrong words, one of them became impatient and whispered the right ones in your ear. Then you said them, unfortunately, years too early." He shrugged, trying to make it look as if it didn't really matter to him. "But what was said was said, so the game had to be played out."
"But why didn't you tell me?" Tears filled Sarah's eyes when she thought of how lonely she had been all these years, as if a part of her had been missing. Writing her stories had been able to alleviate some the pain. "Why didn't you show me any of the kindness then that you're showing me tonight?"
"I'm many things, but a seducer of children isn't one of them," he touched her cheek with an ungloved hand, letting himself feel her skin against his just this once.
"No, but you would scare me half to death with your Labyrinth, and your conniving to take Toby," Sarah's temper heated up.
"Yes, and you were magnificent," His eyes glittered as he remembered. "You met my every challenge and passed every test."
"Test, it was a test! You would have taken Toby as a test!"
"No," he smiled and shook his head. "That was the biggest test of all, and the only lie I've ever told you. When you wouldn't give up your brother when I offered you the thing that was most essential to your being: your dreams, I knew I had found a woman whose love would last. Unfortunately I found her as a child and therefore couldn't keep her."
"You never meant to take Toby?" She gasped, looking back on her adventure with the eyes of a grown woman; Sarah saw things that she had missed. "So I didn't really win?"
"You beat my Labyrinth, fair and square, if you hadn't, I wouldn't be standing here now." Jareth could see how important this was to Sarah, so he told her the whole truth. "The only help you had from me was to keep you safe. There were dangers there, which could have hurt or killed you, that couldn't be allowed!" He stood before her, his head thrown back, every inch the man she remembered.
"If you didn't want Toby..." She shook her head refusing to believe that Jareth was saying what she thought he was.
"The objective of the game was always you, Sarah." His mismatched eyes looked deep into hers. "I devised the game to find out if you had the courage, strength and love to do what needed to be done. If you had given up your brother, or failed, it would have been over in a second." He snapped his fingers to underline the importance of his words. "You wouldn't have been worthy." He stepped closer to her, lifting her hair to smell the scent of the woman he would spend eternity wanting.
Sarah felt a strength and power radiate off of him. She realized that she had felt it as a child, but hadn't been able to put a name to it. She recognized it for what it was now, desire! Years ago it had been part of what had frightened her most about the Goblin King.
"Wait, please," she pushed against his chest, knowing how easily he could overcome her if she didn't put some distance between them. A current deep in her was answering the power in him, and things could easily be sent out of control.
"Don't be afraid Sarah." He stepped back, seeing the effect he had on her. She had won with honor and he owed it to her to do the same. "I didn't go to all the trouble to make you forget years ago, to give you misery now. The spell I placed on you should have been lasting. You should have had no memory of the time in my Labyrinth. I've come to correct all that."
"If I hadn't remembered, I wouldn't have written my books," Sarah argued. "That's not all bad, they're lovely stories. Children love to read them."
"You would have written, it is your alternate destiny, and those stories would have been told, even if you hadn't written them." He held her slim hand in his larger one. "I came here tonight to right the wrong of nine years ago, because I think I know why you remembered when you shouldn't have."
"Are you trying to trick me again?" Sarah pulled away from him, "I don't want anything changed?"
"It must be, or you'll tear yourself apart. You're living with part of you here and part of you in the Underground, that can't be," He stood and paced not wanting to admit his mistake. "When you were in my Labyrinth I cast a spell on you...."
"The peach, we were dancing!" Sarah's face glowed, "I've dreamt about that over the years."
"I shouldn't have danced with you, but I wanted to feel you in my arms, just once." He shrugged and smiled at her, then looked very proper. "In a dance I could hold a girl of fifteen and no harm would be done...I thought."
"It was a lovely dance, and a lovely song." She smiled up at him. She may be a woman now, but she hadn't gotten any taller.
"Yes it was," the memory was a pleasant one for the Goblin King as well. "But the night I wished away all your pain, I added one little dream for you. Every once in a while you would return to the crystal ballroom and we would dance through the night. Over the years, more and more of your adventure slipped through the crack between our two worlds, created by the ballroom, until you were remembering it all, but in the form of a dream."
"Are you telling me, we really danced all those nights?" Sarah hugged herself at the memory of strong arms around her as they moved through intricate steps, never taking their eyes off of each other. "Is that why I've never fallen in love?" She accused. "Is that your magic, too?"
"No, the magic of your heart is yours to command." He bowed his head, not wanting her to see the relief that flowed through him. He had always wondered if there had been other men in Sarah's life. "And the dancing, well, it is as real as it can be while you're still part of this world."
"If you take away my memories, I won't have those dreams, either?" Sarah looked up as she began to understand what he wanted from her. "If you don't, what's my other choice, Jareth?"
"To live your true destiny." He stood over her looking every inch the King she remembered, proud and strong, refusing to be hurt. "Come with me and live forever in the Underground. It takes a strong person with a deep love to help me rule my kingdom."
"I want to believe you," Sarah stood and walked over to Jareth. "But you tricked me before."
"The game was yours, you set the rules." His hands on his hips he tried to look in control of his heart. "The only lie I ever told was that I'd keep Toby if you lost. Admit it Sarah, you had fun."
"Dance with me, Jareth," she looked up at him still very unsure.
"Of course, my sweet." His arms came around her and they moved in the steps they knew so well. Around and around the room they danced. Their bodies inched closer and closer, until he bent his head and kissed her upturned lips. As their lips met, Sarah felt a surge of power rush though her, power that reached in and gripped her heart.
"Wait, stay back," she gasped as she stepped out of his reach, trying to remember the words. "Through dangers untold and hardships unnumbered, I have fought my way back to the Castle beyond The Goblin City---"
Jareth froze, feeling the loss all over again, but this time it was more intense, because his lips were still warm from her kiss. "Sarah beware! This time it is forever!" If the tear shaped diamond he wore close to his heart, was all he would have of her, then so be it. He knew she had lied years ago when she had said the words. That was what had given him a second chance and allowed him to assume his owl shape when needed. If she said the words as an adult, truth or lie, it wouldn't matter. He would never be able to return to her, because his soul would truly be a bird with only one wing.
"----I have returned the child you have stolen. For my will is as strong as yours-----and my kingdom as great." Putting her arms around him she whispered with her lips against his, "but you have a great deal of power over me!"
"And you over me," he sighed as he wrapped them in his cloak.
"I love you," was echoed by both as the room spun, and a great wind swept through the house, leaving two owl feathers floating to the floor. Destiny had been set back on its rightful path.
.............................
Ten Years Later, San Francisco:
"Mom," Toby yelled as he came home for spring break. "I'm home mom."
"Hi dear. You're a foot taller since Christmas." Karen hugged her handsome blond son. He was looking so much like his dad as he grew into a fine young man it made her heart sing.
"Classes are going great. I've a surprise for you and dad!" He pulled a file folder full of papers out of his backpack. "Look at this."
As Karen looked through the file, she saw that Toby had been writing again, something he had done since he was a child.
"Read this letter," he handed it to Karen. "It's from a woman named Margaret Commings. She's an editor and wants to publish that story."
Karen read the story that Toby had written, and admired the illustrations. "What a wonderful adventure." She smiled, so proud of her son. "Tob, I'm sorry you don't have any sisters or brothers," Karen felt a pang as she read the story he had written. When he had been growing up, Toby had invented a half-sister to keep him company when he couldn't sleep.
"Awe mom," he fussed as he often did when his mother was worried about him. "I don't think any live sister could be as much fun as the one I made up," he grinned as he thought of all the adventures he and 'Sarah' had gone on over the years. "Ms Commings says she wants me to write more stories about Sarah and the Underground. I'm an author!"
……………………………………
In a different world, a man and a woman lived and loved. Time moved strangely there, but they didn't care, they had each other and the family they were creating. The woman wore a tear shaped diamond on the third finger of her left hand. Sometimes she would dream of another life, but they would be fleeting dreams that never lasted into morning. As those dreams would touch her sleeping mind, she'd snuggle closer in her husband's arms. A smile would cross her lips as she felt his presence, always there to bring her back to the magic that was real. The magic she found only with him in their Kingdom in The Underground.
And Sarah and Jareth lived happily ever after