Chapter
Four
She
didn't quite understand how she managed to get back. She could only
assume that she'd run, considering how much trouble she was having
catching her breath. After having seen the owl, everything was pretty
much a blur. All she knew was that she was exhausted by the time she
pounded up the back steps to the wraparound porch and slammed her way
into the house. As she headed for her room, she caught sight of
herself in a mirror hanging in the hall and paused to examine
herself. She looked an utter wreck. There were twigs and leaves stuck
in her hair, and she could feel her face stinging where low-hanging
branches had whipped it during her headlong flight through the woods.
She crept down the hall, past the living room, making her way
stealthily toward the stairs while praying that she wouldn't be
noticed. No such luck.
"Good heavens,
Sarah! What happened to you?" Daniel exclaimed as he took in the
sight of his disheveled daughter. He and the rest of the family were
sitting in the living room, and Jack was reading a story to Toby. All
eyes immediately turned to her, and she shifted uncomfortably.
"Um…I…I
saw something in the forest. I thought it was...uh...dangerous."
It was not entirely a lie. That owl had seemed dangerous enough to
her.
"Well, are you okay?
You look a little beat up there," Marie said in concern.
Sarah smiled weakly. "Oh,
I'm fine," she replied with false cheerfulness. "Just a
little scratched up. I'm pretty tired, you know, so I think I'm gonna
turn in early. Um...g'night." She started up the stairs.
"What about supper?"
Karyn asked. "We're having beef stew. It'll be ready in a few
minutes."
"No thanks! I'm not
hungry," Sarah called back, and scrambled up the stairs before
anyone could argue. She sighed with relief when she reached her room
and firmly closed the door behind her. The late sunlight flowed
through the large window, tinting the carpet rose and gold, and Sarah
sank into the old chair and stared blankly out at the forest, almost
imagining that she could see the glen from her position. A flash of
movement caught her attention, and she glanced to her right,
squinting against the sunset. There was a bird flying a distance
away, its wing beats slow and graceful. It sort of looked like an
owl.
She scowled and yanked
the shade down savagely, blocking out the sight. "Stupid owl
shouldn't even be out of its nest yet," she grumbled and began
to strip from her clothes, tossing them in a heap on the floor. The
perfectionist inside of her cringed at such an untidy display, but at
the moment, the rest of her could have cared less. Her stomach
growled, but she firmly ignored the protest, instead concentrating on
brushing all of the tangles from her long hair.
After washing up and
brushing her teeth, she climbed into the bed and pulled the covers
over her head, trying to block out the remaining light. Why was she
even bothering, she thought grouchily. She was so keyed up, she
probably wouldn't even get any sleep, anyway. Maybe she should have
had supper, first. At least then her complaining stomach and the
hunger pangs wouldn't distract her. Sighing heavily, she closed her
eyes and began to count sheep. It was a silly idea, and it probably
wouldn't work anyway, but at least it kept her from thinking too much
about...other things.
As she counted, she felt
her thoughts growing hazier. The sheep cavorting over the fence in
her mind slowly began to morph, and looked less like sheep and much
more like sheepdogs. Merlin? she wondered sleepily. Or
was that Ambrosia? Funny, she'd never noticed before how much the two
dogs actually resembled each other.
The next dog that leapt
the fence had a small, furry rider on its back, which greatly
resembled a fox dressed in knight's clothes. The rider laughed
heartily and brandished a familiar wand as it passed. Hey!
That's... Sarah realized with surprise as she watched the pair
vanish on the other side of the fence. It had been a long time since
she'd seen her small friend. “Sir Didymus!” she
called, but the fox didn't turn around. Forgetting herself, she
scrambled over the fence and took off after the trotting sheepdog.
“Ambrosia! Sir Didymus! Wait up!” she
shouted, but they still didn't turn; didn't even seem to realize she
was following them. Stubbornly, she jogged after them, trying to
catch up, but although Sir Didymus didn't appear to be in any great
hurry, he still kept getting further and further away. She was
starting to feel a bit like Alice chasing the White Rabbit.
When
the knight and steed vanished into the beginnings of a forest that
had suddenly appeared out of nowhere, she didn't hesitate to plunge
in after them. Of course, as soon as the trees had closed
around her, she belatedly realized what had just happened and where
she was. It seemed that she had fallen asleep after all, and
something was now leading her subconscious a merry chase, right
toward a place she knew she didn't want to go. But at least she knew
it was a dream this time, which meant she could make herself wake
up again.
Well...that was the
theory, anyway. But theories, it appeared, didn't always work
out as one expected them to. She remained stubbornly asleep. So she
tried, at least, to make herself stop running.
That had slightly better
effect, but she was still being drawn forward, quite against her
will, toward a pale, silver light in the distance. Oh, all right,
fine. Be that way, she
thought rebelliously, giving up and letting herself be pulled along.
She reached the forest glen in no time at all, but this time
instead of stopping at the edge of it, she started running straight
through to the other side, heading for the stunted tree. The owl
will be in the tree, she thought, right where I saw it today
in the real forest. This time it isn't going to get away from me!
But
the owl was not in the tree. The tree was quite empty; it
looked almost abandoned. Sarah glanced around suspiciously,
half-expecting a white flash to go winging off into the moonlight.
The clearing looked exceptionally empty, but she felt something was
there, watching her, and she was beginning to get pretty pissed off
about it.
"Okay, I'm here!"
she called boldly, and a small part of her noted that her voice did
not echo at all as it would have inside a real forest. It
sounded more like she'd been trapped inside a box, where every sound
was muffled and closed-off. The thought made her feel claustrophobic.
"Where are you? I know you're there so you might as well give
up! Why are you doing this? Why do I keep having this dream? I demand
that you come out."
"So, still
demanding things, are you? I shouldn't be surprised, I suppose."
Sarah whirled with a
screech, and began to wonder if it was at all possible
to die of actual heart failure while dreaming. Before her he came; a
tall, ghostly figure, drifting gracefully through dappled
patches of moonlight and shadow like a wraith. His alluring,
mismatched eyes met and held her own with an unnerving intensity that
made her tremble. A thin, mocking smile faintly lifted his sensual
lips, and wisps of silky, silver-gold hair ghosted across his perfect
face in an unfelt breeze. He was the perfect figure of a man, almost
too perfect to be real, beautiful and terrifying all at once.
Sarah suddenly realized
that she was scared to death. "Jareth," she
whispered as her face drained of color.
He cocked his head at
her, standing very close and yet not touching her. "Hullo,
Sarah," he murmured softly. "It has been a long
time. You're looking…well."
Sarah struggled to reply,
to dredge up some shred of courage to chew him out the way she'd
fully intended to before actually seeing him again. She had
almost forgotten how utterly devastating the Goblin King's presence
was. His powerful aura reached out and wrapped her in a cocoon of
magic and desire, and she was finding it exceedingly difficult to
resist the sudden urge to lean forward and steal a kiss from that
gorgeous mouth of his.
What must it be
like...to kiss such a man...?
She blinked, as if
suddenly realizing the dangerous direction her thoughts seemed to be
trying to lead her, and hastily lowered her eyes before Jareth could
read them and figure out just what was on her mind. But it was too
late for that; his eyes seemed to be laughing at her as he swayed
forward, just a little, in clear invitation, and it was then that she
found the will to step back, forcefully reminding herself that this
man was the enemy, damn it, and not the kind of person
one should consider as boyfriend material.
"Just what do you
want?" she demanded, wincing when her voice came out
sounding weak and shaky instead of irritated and pissed-off, like
she'd been aiming for. Fear was not something any sane person should
be showing in front of a guy like Jareth.
She made herself take
several more steps away, trying to put a safer amount of distance
between them. He was dressed, she realized, in the same glittering,
midnight-blue ensemble he'd worn after he'd abducted her into the
crystal ball.
Wait...hadn't he been
wearing some gray, feathered cloak-thing just a moment ago?
Her eyes widened, and she
quickly dropped her gaze, not wholly surprised to find herself
clothed in a familiar, exquisite creation of white tulle and satin.
She glanced at the Goblin
King, who was regarding her without expression. He seemed to be
waiting for something. It almost seemed as though he was waiting for
her to make the next move. She clenched her teeth stubbornly
and refused to say or do anything. A smirk twitched at Jareth's
mouth, and his eyes crinkled at the corners as he silently laughed at
her obstinance, before extending a slender, black-gloved hand toward
her. Sarah flinched back, half-expecting him to throw a snake at her
or something, like he'd done before. But he only stood there with
hand outstretched, still watching her in that unnerving manner.
Music abruptly swelled
from the stillness surrounding them; a beautiful, haunting melody
that she quickly recognized as the song he had sung to her at the
ball, and she looked at him in astonishment. His intentions were
suddenly very clear; he wished to dance with her, just as he had
before.
Her brow furrowed as she
hesitated. Truth be told, the crystal ball was one of the more
favorable memories she held of her trip through the Labyrinth,
despite the reasons behind it. She had felt like a fairy princess
dancing with her prince…or rather, her king. She remembered
the tenderness in his eyes, the way he had gazed at her so lovingly,
as though she was precious to him. And his song was forever branded
into her heart. It was a love song he had sung to her, and even
though he had merely been trying to distract her from her mission,
she couldn't help but think that maybe—just maybe—there
had been some actual truth behind his words and gestures.
Jareth still waited, and
she was still staring at his hand as though it would vanish if she
took her eyes away for even a moment. Finally, she glanced up to
regard him uncertainly, wondering what sort of trick he was trying to
play on her now. His expression softened slightly, a look of gentle
understanding passing through his eyes. "Touch your dreams,"
he whispered.
She blinked at him in
surprise, but he said no more. Another moment's hesitation, a
deeply-drawn breath, and she slowly extended her white-gloved hand,
expecting to feel a strong grip closing about her fingers. What she
felt was the disorienting sensation of suddenly being pulled
backwards. Startled, she lunged forward, trying to grasp his hand,
and instead grasped nothing but air. “J-Jareth?”
she called, panicking as the pull on her spine grew stronger.
The Goblin King was
fading before her very eyes, like a shadow before the rising sun. The
sound of wildly-flapping wings filled the air.
"Jareth!"
Sarah lunged up from her
bed, panting harshly with the shock of suddenly being wide awake. The
shade on the window had rolled up and was spinning chaotically, its
plastic rod slapping against the glass with a noise like the wild
flapping of wings. Bright, morning sunlight poured into the room and
over the bed, illuminating the dust mites dancing in the air like
sparkles of pixie dust. She stared at the dappled patterns it made on
the quilted cover, luminous gold on shaded green, and tried to tell
herself that the tears falling from her eyes were because of the
brilliance of it.
~*~*~*~
It was difficult to go
through the next two days without letting on that anything was wrong,
but Sarah hadn't taken all those acting lessons for nothing. She
laughed, she smiled, she played with Toby, and talked to her
grandmother about school, the play she was soon going to put on, and
what her plans were for the future. She had replied "acting"
to that last part, but it had been more from habit than anything. The
truth was, she wasn't sure anymore what she wanted to do.
Becoming a famous actress just didn't hold the same appeal that it
had three years ago.
Christmas Eve finally
arrived, and the Williams family gathered around the tree, eager to
begin the traditional opening of the gifts. Even Sarah felt a little
more into the holiday spirit when her grandfather, with a mysterious
smile, handed her a large, heavy box wrapped in silver paper. "Merry
Christmas," he told her as she eagerly tore it open. Inside, she
found a beautiful figure of a dragon in full flight, finely sculpted
and painted in silver and gold. A faceted gem was clutched in its
gold-tipped claws, and its base was formed of leaded crystal, shaped
to look like the tips of jagged mountains. "Oh, Gram. Pap, it's
beautiful,” she breathed, carefully lifting it out of
the box. "This must have cost a small fortune."
"Nothing's too good
for our granddaughter," Marie told her fondly. "I knew
you'd take a shine to it the moment I saw it."
"I'll treasure it,"
Sarah promised.
"Hopefully better
than you treasured the owl my mother gave you," Karyn added in a
low voice. Sarah flushed and pointedly ignored her stepmother,
choosing instead to watch Toby tear apart a brightly-wrapped package
that was nearly as tall as he was. It contained something a bit less
fragile than a sculpture, but just as exciting. "Ooh! A caw!"
Toby squealed, pointing to the picture of a Power Wheels jeep
decorating the side of the box. "I got a caw!"
Daniel groaned. "Oh,
fabulous. Thanks, Dad. Now I get to teach another one how to drive,"
he quipped, earning a laugh from everyone but Toby, who ignored him
in favor of opening his "caw" and demanding to ride in it
at once. It took some doing, but the adults managed to convince the
little boy to wait at least until the sun came up before going
outside.
Sarah watched with a
contented smile, her hoard piled on her lap. Aside from the
sculpture, she had also received new clothes, books, makeup, and a
porcelain doll dressed as a fairy queen. Despite the fact that Karyn
often complained about Sarah owning such childish things at her age,
it was apparently not enough of a concern to quit buying them for
her.
All of the other gifts
had been passed out by then, and Toby took it upon himself to collect
the paper and leftover ribbons and put them in a bag. He used the
shopping bag that had carried the wrapped gifts, but before he had
gotten very far, he suddenly frowned and exclaimed in a very loud
voice, "Oh no!"
"What's wrong?"
Karyn asked, immediately concerned for her son.
Toby shook his head in a
surprisingly adult gesture and planted a fist on his hips. "We
fowgot a pwesent," he stated seriously, and with obvious
disapproval.
"We did?"
Daniel looked surprised. "But I'm sure we passed them all out.
The bag was empty."
Toby reached into the
bag, which was half as tall as he was, and came up holding a small
package wrapped in white paper that shimmered like a pearl, tied with
a wide, golden ribbon. Karyn took it, frowning with confusion. "Where
did this come from?" she murmured. "I don't remember seeing
it before." She checked the tag that dangled from the ribbon,
then looked at Sarah in surprise. "It's for you," she
added, holding it out to her.
Sarah was equally
surprised. For her? She accepted the box, regarding it curiously.
"Are you sure neither of you got this for me and maybe just
forgot about it?" she asked. Her parents shook their heads.
"Does it say who
it's from?" Marie asked. Sarah checked the tag, and was hardly
surprised to see that it bore no other mark but for her name, which
was scripted with beautiful, calligraphic handwriting. Weird. Nobody
she knew wrote like that.
"Nothing there,"
she replied. "I don't know who it would be from."
"What about Kim?"
Daniel asked.
Sarah thought it over.
She and Kim had exchanged presents right before she'd left, but maybe
she had managed to sneak an extra gift into the bag somehow. It
didn't seem likely, but Sarah couldn't think of any other
explanation.
"Open it!" Toby
demanded, bouncing impatiently. Sarah smiled and carefully opened the
gift, trying her hardest not to tear the exquisite wrapper. Finally,
she eased it off, and in her hands she held a box of smooth, white
wood. It looked like a jewelry box, and as she turned it over to
examine it, she felt something move inside. Curiously, she opened the
lid and—
"Oh, Sarah, how
lovely. It must be from a secret admirer," she heard her
grandmother exclaim in delight, but she didn't respond. She couldn't.
She was frozen, all of the warmth flooding from her body as she
stared down at the perfect crystal formed of opaque gold, which lay
nestled in a bed of white velvet. It looked as delicate as a golden
bubble, shining and glimmering in an almost unnatural manner, as
though it had been crafted of…magic.
Sarah slammed the lid
down, catching her thumb between it and the box. The resulting pain
brought her back to her senses…somewhat. "Sarah!"
Karyn was scolding. "Be more careful! You might break it!"
Sarah doubted that. She
had once seen a crystal much like this one bounce up and down several
flights of stairs, ricocheting off a few walls and ceilings in the
process, and it had not received so much as a scratch. But she could
hardly tell Karyn that, now could she? "I...I have to...go to my
room now," she stuttered. "I don't feel well." She
stood on trembling legs, still clutching the box.
"Are you all right?"
Marie asked in concern. "You don't look so good."
Sarah somehow managed a
smile. "Yeah, I-I'll be fine," she lied. "It was
probably that huge second helping of spaghetti. I wasn't really all
that hungry, but your spaghetti is so good I couldn't resist. If I
sleep it off, I'm sure I'll be fine."
She turned and fled the
room and stumbled up the stairs, knowing that she was going to have
some serious explaining to do come morning. At the moment, however,
she was too freaked out to care. If her family thought she was losing
her mind or something, they probably had every right to. She wasn't
too certain of her sanity, herself. How else was she supposed to
explain what was happening to her? She sat down on the edge of the
bed, the box clutched firmly in hand. Fighting against common sense
for a moment, she slowly opened the lid, hoping that what she had
seen the first time had been a figment of her overtaxed imagination.
The crystal gleamed just
as brightly in the moonlight as it did in the firelight, looking as
though a piece of the sun had somehow been captured inside of it, and
it occurred to her suddenly that this was unlike the Goblin King's
normal crystals. If memory served, they had always been as
clear as glass.
So maybe…maybe
this wasn't from him, after all? Maybe it was from a secret
admirer, although she'd never thought of herself as being the
secret-admiring type. She glared down at the crystal, willing it to
go away. Her eyes began to tear and burn from staring so hard, and
she blinked to clear them; a stray tear fell and landed on the
crystal, sliding smoothly over its flawless surface. Without
thinking, she reached to wipe it off.
As soon as her fingers
touched the glassy sphere, a flood of images filled her mind;
memories of her journey into the Labyrinth, the faces of those she
had met inside, of those whom she had called her friends. The image
of glittering, mismatched eyes filled with sad longing caused unnamed
feelings to rise as she recalled her first awe-filled meeting with
the arrogant Goblin King, and her victorious, bittersweet
confrontation in the end.
He had seemed so washed
out, pale and bitter, and it had cut her heart like a knife to see
him looking so…defeated. It didn't seem right, but she
knew that it had been the only way. Yet, even knowing that did not
make her feel any better about herself. It did not erased the guilt
she'd felt, knowing that her selfish demands were what had brought
this upon him. He knew it as well as she, but even so, there
had been no hatred in his eyes when she'd chanted the final words of
his defeat. Only a deep, lingering sadness for what might have been.
Sarah snatched her hand
away from the crystal and slammed the lid on the box, hastily tossing
it onto the other side of the bed. From somewhere inside, she felt a
familiar whisper; "Touch your dreams..."
She shook her head. She
didn't want to touch anything. What she wanted was some
actual peace. That wasn't so much to ask for, was it? Still, she
expected that there was really only one way to go about getting it,
and it wasn't likely to come to her without a little effort on her
part.
Suddenly determined, she
jumped to her feet and opened her door, peeking out into the hall.
Everything was dark. How long had she been sitting there, anyway? It
looked like everyone had already gone to bed.
Well, good. It would make
sneaking out of the house a whole lot easier.
She crept down the
stairs, cringing at every little creak and groan her passing made,
and finally made it to the back door in the kitchen. She shrugged on
her jacket, found a flashlight on top of the refrigerator, and
quietly opened the door to step outside.
She didn't switch on the
flashlight until she had reached the forest, and even then she waited
until the trees had fully blocked her view of the house. She jogged
along at a fast pace, trying to shake the eerie sense of deja vu.
This seemed entirely too familiar; she felt as if she was reliving
her dream.
There was the clearing,
just ahead of her. Switching off the light, she cautiously made her
way toward it, stumbling a little over hidden tree roots and stray
rocks, biting back growls and curses, and generally making enough
racket to wake every living creature within a ten mile radius. With a
sigh, she gave up trying to sneak in and simply concentrated on
getting there without breaking anything vital. No need to make an
embarrassing entrance, after all.
Her heart was pounding,
and she couldn't decide whether it was from excitement or fear. She
decided that she didn't care, just so long as finally got a genuine
conclusion to her dream. Taking a deep breath, she stepped into the
clearing and looked around cautiously. She didn't know what she
expected to see. The owl, perhaps? Or maybe Jareth himself would be
there, waiting for her arrival.
What she actually found,
however...was nothing.
There was no Goblin King
waiting for her. The white owl was absent, as well. The only creature
there was a startled deer, its back burnished with silver moonlight,
that looked at her as though resenting her intrusion on its privacy,
before bounding away into the forest with a flash of its white tail.
She couldn't quite shake
off an overwhelming sense of disappointment.
"Um…hello?"
she called out tentatively, and this time, her voice echoed clearly
as it had not in the dream, startling a few roosting birds from their
nests at the sudden noise. They burst from the foliage with an
explosion of feathers and angry squawks, and managed to scare Sarah
half to death. She glared after them briefly as they winged away
before turning her attention back to what was really important;
namely, how much of a fool she was.
"I am such an
idiot," she stated, resisting the urge to throw herself onto the
ground and give in to a righteous tantrum, complete with screaming,
beating fists, and kicking feet. Of course
he wasn't there! He had probably never been there, and even if
he was, why had she ever let herself believe that he was anything
other than an arrogant, stuck-up, child-snatching trickster? She
clenched her teeth so hard that her jaw ached, noticing that the
ground in front of her was beginning to waver and blur.
She impatiently swiped at
her eyes, feeling indignant. There was no way she would give him the
satisfaction of seeing her cry. He had more than enough to laugh
about as it was. What right did that jerk have to come back into her
life after she had gone and kicked him out of it? Didn't he
understand the meaning of "get lost"?
"I hope you're
happy, Jareth!" she shouted, startling awake several more birds
and a pair of squirrels, who chattered at her angrily from their
branches. "Congratulations! You've succeeded in driving me nuts,
if that was your aim! Go ahead and yuk it up! I'm finished. Do
you understand? No more games! Just go away and leave me
alone!" With those words, Sarah turned on her heel to stalk
haughtily away.
She had not taken more
than a step, however, when a soft, richly accented voice spoke from
behind her, "I was never trying to drive you anywhere, dear
Sarah, and I am certainly not laughing."
