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Shattered	By : TarnishedArmour Category: G through L > Labyrinth Views: 7714 -:- Recommendations : 2 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: Based upon the work of Jim Henson; specifically Labyrinth, copyright 1986 by Jim Henson & associated parties. I do not own or have legal rights to Labyrinth, etc., or make any profit from them. *Individual disclaimers for other works in

Chapter List
- 1
- 2
- 3
A/N: POVs will shift, sometimes crisply and sometimes for sections and chapters, but I am using 3rd omniscient, unlimited (omnipotent?). Thoughts are not always word-for-word thoughts-they are impressions and feelings, too, and so they will not always be formatted in italics as an internal dialogue. If you want the dissertation on why this is a legitimate way of developing characters and the like, ask and I'll send it to you via email. I do not like author's notes, so I will try to keep them as minimal as possible and, from this point onward, all A/N, disclaimers, and documentation will appear at the END of the chapters.
Disclaimer remains the same, and I hate repeating myself. Quotes from movie used in fic are NOT meant as plagiarism, but as moments of continuity and homage to Henson. Quotes from the Bard (Shakespeare) are freebies because they are in the public domain as Great Works Over a Certain Number of Years Old. :-) Will document as I rediscover them during edit/post.
Rating: Currently somewhere around T. But it will definitely become NC-17, MA, Adult + (maybe even ++, but that's a new category to me so I'm not certain what fits exactly)…eventually. This story is FINISHED, but I am doing a quick-edit as I move it from FF.net, so it will be posted over a series of weeks. Some sections may be added/changed for continuity, language/mechanics, clarity, imagery, or explication.
***
Jareth watched the young woman as she lay on her bed, slowly beginning to recover from her rather dramatic hello. Both of them.
Yes, he had been captivated by the girl who bested his labyrinth. Yes, he had watched her before and after. Yes, he loved her. Yes, he had offered her everything. No, he was not happy with her or her rather abrupt summons. He had gone out of his way to forget her and everything about her.
To find himself here, at her command, was simply…annoying. He had watched the crystal ball drop to the ground, enjoying that two years of practice had not yet rendered her proficient in the art of contact juggling. He had appeared in the room the instant she had wished him there. Watching, waiting, he had listened to her sobbing. He tried to pretend he didn't care, but he did.
When she lifted her head, he lifted the crystal to her, returning it to her and that silly little stand. Goblins were not that cute, never held that still unless they were passed out, and were terrified of his crystals. Mortals never got the details. He stifled a sigh, and nearly dropped the crystal as his arms were suddenly full of Sarah. Sweet, hot, curvy Sarah…oh, my, but those were lovely curves. Quite different from the last time he'd seen her, though she had shown great promise.
Then she had kissed him. Every wicked, cutting, cruel comment he had imagine fled from his mind as her lips met his in a kiss so passionate he wondered if she really was just eighteen mortal years. She stole his breath from him; he took hers in return. For a long, blissful moment, they were locked in a lover's embrace. Then she drew back, let reality come flooding back in, looked at him-and fainted.
And here he was, sitting on her bed waiting for her to tell him what the hell was going on.
"I should have frozen time in that damned ballroom," Jareth muttered. "Kissed you, taken you, let you see everything that we could be-then let you finish the damned thing." Mismatched eyes glared at her. "But no, you wanted the slightly terrifying, somewhat villainous, ultimately honourable opponent. Damn, you're exhausting." He sighed. "Even lying here, passed out, you're giving me a headache. I'm tired just from being summoned. Probably a good thing I never did get you in bed. You just might have killed me." One gloved hand skimmed down her body from collar bone to hip. "You might kill me yet…"
"Sarah-OH!" Karen froze as she stood in the doorway. There was Sarah, seemingly asleep and a man, the very image of the Goblin King from that story, sitting on her bed. "You're…" Karen's voice rasped from her as the man turned to glare at her. "You're him." The most irrational thought ran through Karen's head: It's a good thing the boys are out at the game tonight. They'd never understand… The world went dark around her.
Jareth found himself with a second woman collapsed in his arms.
"Well, damn," he grouched. "Sarah fainting, this one fainting. What's next? The damned tree fainting?" He looked out the window. "That wasn't a suggestion," he told it. The tree didn't answer. Or faint. He carefully placed Karen on the larger bed Sarah had gotten last year. They were a lovely pair. And the redhead…despite the silver in her hair, she seemed familiar. There were so many girls who dreamed of him, it wasn't surprising, really. Faces flashed through his crystals constantly. Those girls sometimes wished for him to take them away, or take their siblings or children away, and he obliged. He was nothing if not obliging.
Many gave him up for a dream, which was fine. It made those few who hung on that much more special. And that was when the memory came to him. The woman, the redhead, had called out to him, spoken the last lines of that damned book--he really needed to do something about the thing--and done so with such passion that it caught his eye. Her sorrow, her knowledge, her love of the fantasy was sweet. Jareth smiled, much as he had while he watched her recite the last words. Oh, there were a few mistakes, but the passion was there.
And Sarah…was Sarah this woman's daughter? He had been trying so hard to forget Sarah that he really couldn't remember the details now.
What was taking them so damned long? Here he was, waiting for some information so he could bid this girl a polite, if slightly frosty, goodbye, and he'd already gone through two memory sequences and a reflection. Didn't these women understand that time was measured in memories and reflections? These mortal seconds ticking by were nothing to him. Numbers made the people seem more at ease, so he limited their time to thirteen hours. He gave them the number, but watched their memories and reflections. Sarah's had been particularly shallow then, allowing her time to complete the entire damned puzzle.
And he'd removed time for two of each from her at that!
Frustrating girl, and there was another long moment lost!
"Oh, wake up, dammit!" he snapped at the women. "I'm losing time!" Here in the mortal realms, his time was finite for any one visit. He could stay for no more than 30 memories and reflections. The girl would say thirty minutes, but she would be wrong.
Jareth stood and began to pace. When he had to abort several memories of Sarah running his labyrinth, when he began to reflect on time, he cursed and began plundering through the room. Snooping and discovering did not count for reflection or memory, and so his time was ample.
Sarah had grown up in the two years since she ran his labyrinth, that much was obvious from her clothes and tastes. The room was neater, more refined in the fantasies she kept alive. There were sketches of many different aspects of his home, and of him, but nothing that explained the crystal on her desk or her desire to move it through her hands as he did.
Then he saw the manuscript in the leather-bound book. Loose pages surrounded it with bits and pieces crossed out, rearranged, arrows here and there…but inside, she had written the story neatly, complete with the large, loopy "The End."
He flipped back to the first page and read the opening lines aloud.
"The girl found herself back in her room, holding the baby the Goblin King had taken from her. Carefully, gently, she walked to the boy's crib and put him to bed. The love in her motions made it clear that the boy was a duty, but one she now accepted gladly. She loved the child, this darling brother of hers, and watched him with a smile on her lips and gentleness in her eyes."
Jareth recognized the end of the story that kept him and his alive. It was a good story, if a bit mushy at the end. No clarity, no real ending, just a moment where the author had gotten a hand cramp or something and quit. His eyes skimmed the next words.
"Turning away from the crib, her smile faded and she tears welled in her eyes and throat." Jareth paused. This was new. Very new. He turned and looked at the beautiful brunette on the bed, her womanly curves neatly shown in the light skirt and blouse she wore. Lovely.
And deeper than he had thought, more feeling.
Damn! That was another realization.
"Wake up, girl, else I drag you with me when I have to go."
Those were the magic words, it seemed, because both women began to stir.
Sarah opened her eyes. It couldn't be. He couldn't be here… she thought. Then she remembered her wish, the wish her heart had sent to her lips without pausing to check with her brain. "Oh, what have I done?" Sarah whimpered, knowing she had just brought more pain into her life. She sat up slowly, wondering how to fix this, to change it.
"You summoned me, dear girl," came the cool, calm voice from her desk. "And now, do you mind explaining whatever it is you want to explain?"
"I…Oh…There's so much…Can…Karen?" Sarah's attempts at explanation were short-circuited by seeing Karen next to her. "Did you…"
"No. She saw me in here with you and fainted." A small smile curled the edges of his lips into a wicked curve that Sarah wanted to kiss. "She recognized me." The sheer smugness of that statement made Sarah's eyes pop open.
"Recognized? Did she ever-" Sarah didn't get to finish her question.
"Again, no. But she had such lovely dreams about the Labyrinth and about me." He laughed softly. "She wanted to be the Dancing Queen of the Goblin Court. Lovely girl…" He let his voice fade off instead of revealing that her dreams had changed.
"She does love to dance," Sarah said, smiling. "She owns the dance studio here in town." Karen stirred and began to sit up.
"Mm." Jareth said nothing more. "But she is not what I came here to discuss. Why did you call me?"
"I…I didn't think about it," Sarah said, honestly. She blushed. "It was something I didn't realize I had wished." Sara sat upon the edge of the bed and let out a deep breath. She went straight for the issue. "I had a duty."
"Did you now?" Jareth held back a yawn. "Well, congratulations. May I go now?"
"I'm not holding you here," Sarah said, surprised at the question.
"You stated you wished to tell me why, that I was here. Come, come. We haven't got all day. If that is the grand truth you wanted to tell me, I shall be going-"
"No." Sarah said, forgetting Karen was in the room, listening. "That's not all. I had a duty. That duty was to take care of Toby-"
"Toby?" Karen whispered, staring at Sarah.
"-and I did it." Tears welled up in her eyes as Jareth watched her and listened. "It hurt, it cost me, and I did it anyway. I hurt you," Sarah said, rising and walking over to the proud, seemingly unaffected man. "And I'm sorry, but I couldn't stay with you. Not then."
"So your duty is over? No longer do you care for your brother?" Jarethe's eyebrow lifted in disbelief.
"My duty was-and is-to take care of him when Dad and Karen need me to. They needed me to that night, and now Karen is here, so I don't have that duty. I've graduated from school, I don't have any college classes yet, or a job, and my work here is done." She did not mention that her work had been the book. "So, no, I have no duties here at the moment. I'm free to choose for me, now. I never was free to choose for Toby."
Karen watched, eyes wide, as Sarah lifted her hand up to Jareth's face. She wanted to warn her stepdaughter, the girl she'd gotten so close to over the past 2 years, but found she was choked by her own tears. So this is what changed her…
"And yet you did," Jareth replied, his voice light.
"I did," Sarah admitted, "and I immediately regretted it. I had a choice at the end, and the price was too steep, then."
"Then?" Jareth said, closing his eyes. "What makes you think the offer is to be reissued?"
"Nothing," Sarah said. "But would you give up your kingdom, your subjects, and come here to stay with me?"
"Don't be daft, girl," Jareth snapped, "I have responsibilities that-"
"Exactly." Sarah interrupted the man without a second thought. "And no matter how much I hated the choice, no matter how much it hurt, my responsibility that night called me back to this place." She lifted and gave him a soft kiss. "I just wanted you to know that I didn't want to refuse you. I had to."
"Do you know how much it hurt?" Jareth asked, his eyes trained on hers, her lips a breath from his.
"Yes," she replied softly. "Because it hurt me just as much."
Jareth closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He felt her breasts brush his chest as it expanded. What the girl did to him!
"And now you want me to just offer everything again? Why? What is your wish, Sarah-your dream?"
"I…" Sarah remembered what she had written in her book. "I want to be worthy of you, worthy of being your Queen." Behind them, Karen gasped. "Whatever that takes, that is what I want to do."
"Sarah!" Karen finally found her voice. "Be careful!" Tears were in her eyes and falling down her cheeks, dripping slowly from her jaw. "A queen is so much more than a dream…"
Turning to look at her stepmother, Sarah felt Jareth's arm steal around her waist. "I know," Sarah said, taking a deep breath and letting it out. "I have to do this, Karen. I have to try." Thinking back to their conversation so long ago, she added. "This is my dream, and I have to chase it. The price may be too high," Sarah gulped back her own tears, "but I'll never know if I don't try. The book…that's what I learned. Guessing, thinking, imagining just isn't enough."
"What…what will I tell your father? Toby?" Karen knew she had to let Sarah go, and that Sarah would never be gone, not really. Karen still believed, in her heart of hearts, in the places where dreams lie slumbering, she still believed.
"Tell them…I had the chance to chase my dreams, and I couldn't resist." Jareth's arm was possessive around her waist, pulling her into full contact with him. Sarah's hands were over his, holding him that much closer.
Karen nodded. She spoke to the Goblin King. "Goblin King, would you hold her from us forever?"
Jareth hesitated. He sensed that this older woman feared him, loved him, and desperately needed him to be more than the wicked king or handsome prince. She needed him to be fully man, as complex as he was in reality.
"No," he said softly. "Sarah will be able to contact you, perhaps even to visit." He paused. "I will have a home some distance from here where we can meet." His free hand traced the curve of Sarah's cheek. "But not so close that you will easily be able to visit."
Sarah felt her body relax as he said this. The words he whispered to her were well known to both the women.
"I can be cruel."
"But you do not have to be," Karen said, smiling. She had read and discussed much with Sarah over the past two years. "Thank you, Goblin King."
"Call me Jareth," he sighed. "And, Karen?"
"Yes?" Startled, Karen felt the pain of losing Sarah lessen with the assurances of contact.
"Dreams never really go away, my dear. They just sleep for a while, waiting for the right moment to awaken and return to you." He paused and let that sink in. "Call me by name and look into the mirror. Then, touch the crystal ball," he sent the crystal into Karen's hand, "to the mirror and wish to speak to Srah. She will be connected through the next mirror or crystal she is near."
"Like a telephone line?" Karen snickered.
"Mm." Jareth grinned. "Extension Gorgeous King of Goblins in the Castle Beyond the Goblin City, the Labyrinth."
Sarah felt the laughter beginning to take hold of her as Karen giggled. The moment was surreal and wonderful and perfect. She belonged here, in his arms. Familiar crystal magic swept over them, and Sarah found herself outside the Labyrinth.
On a dust-swept hill she stood, the Goblin King pressed close behind her. His lips caressed her ear as he whispered.
"You wish to be worthy of being my Queen? Then, Sarah, you must solve the riddle of my Labyrinth, and you must do it alone."
"It doesn't look that far," Sarah lied, remembering well how far it was, and how strange.
"It's further than you think." He turned the woman in his arms and kissed her gently. "This time, Sarah, you will face the darkness of the Labyrinth, not just her challenges. You compete not for a child, but to rule by my side."
Sarah closed her eyes, wondering what in hell she'd gotten herself into. "Do I have a time limit?" she asked, her voice raw with want and memory.
"Time is different here," he said, holding her close, relishing the feel of her against him. How had he made himself forget this girl? That he had managed to succeed at all was beyond him. Then again, wishing often made things so, here. "You will have no more than 27 memories, 18 realizations, and 9 lessons taken to heart to reach me."
"Will you tempt me again?" she asked, hoping and fearing the crystal ballroom that had so captivated and terrified her before.
"Oh, yes, my Sarah," he kissed her hard this time, his hands rough on her body. He was breathing hard when he released her. He bit her neck. "And even should you fail, you will be mine."
"But not your Queen," she managed, shuddering at the contrasts in his touch, his lips. The feel of his bite.
"Never my Queen," his eyes glowed with magic and passion, "but forever mine." Jareth forced himself to step back and pulled in his magic and sensuality.
"Remember your time limit and keep track of it carefully." He waved his hand and a small notebook and pencil appeared next to her. "I would suggest a tally." He paused. "I cannot help you, nor may you ask for or take assistance without recompense from any within these walls. I will tempt you," a dark promise filled his voice, "but I will give you this before you start: Discoveries and curiosity cost you no time, nor does learning the way of the land. Lessons that you learn and keep forever are not the same. Do not let the past colour your perception of my home. I live in a world filled with dreams, and those can be deadly."
"Nothing is what it appears to be," Sarah whispered, then recited, "Fair is foul and foul is fair; nothing is but what is not…"
"Ah, the Bard," Jareth smiled. "For your journey, I offer you this: Dreamers often lie."
"In bed," Sarah replied, smiling for the first time since her transport to this place. "Asleep, where they do dream things true."
Jareth did not smile. "Be wary, dear girl. Queen Mab may visit you here. Time is not measured by the sun here, but only by memories and realizations and lessons taken to heart. You will sleep, you will dream, and you will eat here while you prove yourself. I would not lose you to your dreams, Sarah, when you have wished aloud to be my Queen."
Sarah nodded. "Then dreamers often lie." Jareth began to fade. "Wait!"
"Yes?" Solidifying, Jareth waited for the question.
"Doe that count as my first realization?" she asked, biting her lip.
Jareth laughed. "Your time begins the minute you enter my puzzle. Here, you are…not safe, but not, what is that phrase? Ah, yes. 'On the clock.' Take your time, Sarah. I will be…somewhere."
Before she could speak again, he faded away, leaving only his laughter ringing softly on the air.
=-+=-+=-+=-+=-+
DOCUMENTATION

*Sarah's book, the first paragraph when she is putting Toby to bed, is, if not directly from the book Labyrinth, very close to it and based upon the actions of the characters in the movie.

*Jareth's & Sarah's lines re: labyrinth when standing outside and during conversation (I can be cruel, etc.), direct quotes from the movie/book, though altered later in the scene as needed. The line "Come, come. We haven't got all day" is not particular to the movie--I've heard it all my life.

*"Fair is foul..." & other lines from Shakespeare are from Acts I of MacBeth and Romeo & Juliet. Queen Mab is a figure from English Literature spanning several centuries and, like many character of that ilk, cannot be attributed to a single author.
If I forgot anything in the documentation, please let me know.
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Shattered