DISCLAIMER: This was originally written by A.C.H.Smith as The Labyrinth which is currently out of print. So I'm uploading this as a reference!! THIS IS NOT MY WORK. There... Please understand this is not copyright. Just trying to entertain the people who would want to read the Labyrinth story as it should be read.

Chapter Eighteen
Seeming

"Toby," Sarah whispered again, gazing down at the empty cradle.

Sir Didymus was looking from her face to the cradle. He lifted the
blanket and the pillow, searching beneath them, and shook his head.
"An exceptionally small knight is Sir Tobias. I cannot even see him."

"He's gone," Sarah said. "Jareth has taken him."

The vulture made a dry cackling noise.

Sarah knew that Jareth would not have abandoned the castle. He had to
be here somewhere, and so had Toby. The sole exit from the chamber,
apart from the way they had come, was a flight of stairs to one side
of the throne. She could not see where it led because the passage
turned a corner, but a lovely glowing light was emanating from it.
"That's the only way he could have gone," Sarah said.

She ran toward it, taking care to avoid stepping on the half-gnawed
chicken bones, rotting tomatoes, squashed pears, and other garbage
that littered the floor. Sir Didymus, Hoggle, and Ludo ran after her.

"No," she said, when she reached the first stair. She turned around
and told her friends, "I ... I have to face him alone."

Sir Didymus, already rehearsing his lunge and parry as he ran, was
disconcerted. "Why?" he asked.

"Because ..." It was a good question. "Because that's the way it's
done," Sarah replied.

"Who says?" Hoggle asked.

"They all do," Sarah told him. "The stories, all of them."

The three of them regarded her for some time. Seeing the
disappointment on their faces, Sarah felt wretched. But she knew that
she was right.

At length, Sir Didymus said, slowly, "Well, if that is the way 'tis
done, then that is how thou must needs do it." He raised his staff
and squinted along it. "But shouldst thou have need of us ..."

"Yes," Hoggle added, "if you need us ..."

"I'll call," Sarah promised. "Thank you. All of you." She smiled,
feeling awkward with gratitude.

The she turned and ran up the stairs, toward the glowing light.

It was a long staircase and turned through several angles. She was
puffing by the time she reached the top and emerged onto a stone
platform. What she saw took all her breath away.

Above, below, or around her -- which, she could not tell -- was a
vast stone hall, with so many staircases, balconies, windows, and
doorways at different heights and odd angles to each other that she
had no idea what was up or down, near or far, inside or out, backward
or forward. Planes reversed themselves as you watched them, receding
corners suddenly jutted out, rising steps inverted themselves, floors
became ceilings, and walls turned into precipices. In this room, it
seemed that the law of gravity had been repealed, and perspective had
seven dimensions. If there had been water, it would have seemed to
flow uphill. She felt sick and giddy, and had to cling to a pillar to
remain upright. "It's impossible," she whispered to herself. As long
as she went on looking at the hall, it went on altering. Does it
still go on altering, she wondered dizzily, when no one is looking at
it?

With her back to the wall, she edged along the platform. If I take it
step by step, she was thinking, I will get there. If there isa there.
She edged along, hoping that it was along and not up or past or
through, until she came to a point that she was quite certain was
where she had started. Yes, there was the top of the staircase behind
her. She began to edge the other way, until she heard a voice from
somewhere below. She knew whose voice it was.

"I've been expecting you," it said.

With a deep breath, she inched to the edge of the platform. Beyond
her, apparently sitting on a vertical wall, was Jareth.

"Where's Toby?" Sarah asked.

"He's safe. In my keeping."

"You're not keeping him."

"Oh. And why not?"

"I have come this far. I am here."

Jareth chuckled. "Sheer luck."

"I am here. Give me Toby back."

"You have understood nothing," Jareth told her. "You have answered
none of the Labyrinth's riddles. You don't even know what the
questions were."

"That wasn't our bargain."

Jareth threw back his head and laughed. "There, just as I told you.
You have understood nothing."

"You are wrong. I have come to understand one thing very well. You
are just putting on a show of confidence. It doesn't take me in
anymore. You are frightened, Jareth."

"So are you."

"Yes."

For a few seconds, they were watching each other's eyes.

Then Jareth began to move, all over the seven perspectives, and Sarah
watched him as he moved. He seemed to walk along ceilings and climb
descending stairs. He danced on high walls. And as he moved he called
to her, "You are cruel, Sarah. We are well matched, you and I. I need
your cruelty, just as you need mine."

Watching him, Sarah felt her knees start to wobble. She had fallen
for his trick. She had no idea now whether she was looking up or
down, whether the platform where she stood was solid or void.
Everything switched continually, like a photographic negative at an
angle to the light. She held her arms out for balance, but it was no
good. She stumbled, her head spinning, and felt herself topple. She
landed on a ceiling, and tried to adjust her senses. Shakily, she
stood up.

Then she saw Toby. He was crawling up a flight of stairs, still in
his striped pajamas.

"Toby!" she called.

The baby did not respond.

"Toby!" she shouted.

The only answer she got was Jareth's laughter.

Somehow, she had to reach Toby. She began to work her way down a
flight of stairs. A movement below her caught her attention. She
peered beneath the stairs and saw Jareth walking parallel to her,
apparently upside down, like a reflection in ice. Or maybe she was
upside down. She ran to get away from him, to get to Toby. Jareth
mirrored her wherever she went. She ran along a balcony, and suddenly
he appeared at the far end of it, upright. She turned, ran back, and
fell. She landed with a bruising thud. Jareth was watching her,
laughing.

"I will reach him," Sarah said to Jareth.

Instead of answering, Jareth produced a crystal ball and tossed it up
a flight of stairs. Sarah's eyes followed it, and she saw it land
near Toby, who was happily climbing on hands and knees up another
staircase.

"Toby!" she cried in alarm.

The baby was fascinated by the bouncing ball. He reached for it, and
when it passed him he scuttled after it. Sarah saw him approaching
the edge of a precipitous fall.

"No!" she called out. "Oh, no! Toby!"

Toby went over the edge and crawled down the vertical wall, still
chasing the ball, which was bouncing around crazily in defiance of
all laws of motion.

Sarah blinked. It was impossible. Jareth laughed.

She started to follow a line of stairs that went in the direction of
Toby. As she drew near him, the baby crawled after the ball in
another plane, leaving her stranded. She followed him again, and the
same thing happened, and again. He was moving on an axis with which
she could not intersect. And everywhere he crawled, he seemed to be
at risk of falling from a balcony, or tumbling all the way down a
flight of stone stairs.

Suddenly, Jareth appeared behind her. He laid his hands on her
shoulders and spun her around. She was too weak to resist him. His
face, as he looked into hers, was amused. It said: It's been a fine

game, Sarah, and now it's time to finish playing, because you cannot
ever win.

In the corner of her eye, she saw a small movement. Toby was crawling
toward a window ledge. She shrugged Jareth's hands from her shoulders
and stared at her brother. There could be no optical doubt about it
this time. Outside the window, birds were flying in the sunlight, and
Toby was clambering up onto the ledge. Between her and the baby was a
vast space of the hall. He was teetering on the ledge now, trying to
stand up. She could not run to him, even supposing she were able to
find a path to him through the deceiving planes. It was possible, she
could not be sure, that he was below her, and that she could reach
him with a jump; a jump so deep that she would crack every bone in
her body.

Jareth was smiling triumphantly at her. This was how her quest ended.
If he could not keep the baby, nor would she. She watched Toby totter
on his precarious perch, and a small cry came from her lips.

She closed her eyes and jumped.

When she opened her eyes, she was not sure where she was. It could
have been another part of the hall. She thought she recognized it,
but could not place it.

Yet something had changed. Near her was an ogee window, without
glass, and through it she could see the upper half of one wing of the
castle. It was in ruins, the cladding stones mostly gone, grass
growing in the gaps they'd left. The turret roofs had collapsed, and
brambles were reaching for the throat of the tower. Within the
castle, where she was, she heard in the air the humming that she had
come to associate with Jareth, but it had a hollow ring to it,
something forlorn, like music in an abandoned house. In the crack
between two flagstones where she lay she saw that weeds had started
to push their way through. She stood up and looked around. There was
no sign of Toby.

Jareth stepped out from a shadowy archway, wearing a faded,
threadbare cloak. His face looked older, drawn. In his blond mane was
a trace of gray.

How long had she been here? She detected no change in herself.

Jareth was waiting for her with his arms folded. She advanced upon
him. "Give me the child," she said.

He paused before answering. "Sarah -- beware. I have been generous
until now, but I can be cruel."

"Generous!" She advanced another step. "What have you done that was
generous?"

"Everything. I have done everything you wanted." He took a pace back,
into the shadow of the archway. "You asked that the child be taken. I
took him. You cowered before me. I was frightening."

Taking another step away from her, he gestured in the air. "I have
reordered time," he told her. The thirteen-hour clock had appeared,
floating above his head. Its hands were whirling around. "I have
turned the world upside down."

Sarah continued to advance upon him, her arms outreached. He
retreated deeper into the shadows.

"And I have done it all for you," he said with a shake of his head.
"I am exhausted from living up to your expectations. Isn't that
generous? Stay back!" He raised his hands as though to fend her off
and took another pace away from her. In a louder voice, he repeated,
"Stay back!"

Sarah's lips were parted. "Through dangers untold and hardships
unnumbered, I have fought my way here to the castle beyond the Goblin
City --"

"Listen!" said a goblin, one of a nest in a dark corner of the
castle.

Jareth was retreating step by step up a staircase behind the archway.

Sarah continued to advance, into the archway.

"-- to take back the child you have stolen," she repeated. "For my
will is as strong as yours --"

"Stop!" Jareth raised the palm of his hand to her. "Wait! Sarah, look
-- look what I can offer you." He raised his left arm and made a
large gesture with his hand. A glowing crystal ball appeared in it.
He spun it around in his fingers, smiled wanly, and said, "It will
show you your dreams. You remember."

Sarah took another step.

"-- and my kingdom as great --"

"She's going to say it," a goblin hissed.

"She's going to say the words," gabbled another, agitatedly.

The stairs behind Jareth were descending now, and he backed slowly
down them as Sarah stood above him. "I ask so little," he said,
spinning the crystal. "Just believe in me, and you can have
everything you want ... everything you have ever dreamed of ... your
dreams, Sarah ..."

She was frowning, and had halted her advance. "... and my kingdom as
great ...," she said. "Damn!"

A goblin shook his head decisively. "That's not it. Never."

"Sshh!" said another.

Sarah's fists were clenched white. She was thinking frantically. What
were her right words?

Jareth took a step toward her. He need her belief in him. "Just fear
me and love me," he told her in a gentle voice, "and do as I say, and
I ... I will be your slave." He stretched his hand out toward her,
and took another step back up the stairs.

"Nah." A goblin shook his hideous head. "Doesn't look like it now,
does it?"

Jareth's fingers were close to Sarah's face.

She stood where she was, and swallowed. "Kingdom as great ...," she
muttered, " ... kingdom as great ..." She saw the crystal spinning in
his fingers, and felt on her lips the warmth of his outstretched
hand. She gasped, and, from some inspired recess of her mind, the
words came out, blurted out.

"You have no power over me."

"No!" Jareth screamed.

"No!" the goblins exclaimed, astounded.

A clock began to strike.

Jareth tossed the crystal ball up into the air, where it hovered, a
bubble. Sarah looked at it, and saw Jareth's face, distorted, on the
shifting, iridescent surface. Gently, it drifted down toward her. She
reached out fascinated fingers for it and, as she touched the bubble
with her fingertips, it burst. A mist of water atoms floated down the
air toward Jareth.

But she saw that Jareth had disappeared. She heard his voice, for a
last time, moaning, "Sarah ... Sarah ..."

His empty cloak was settling onto the ground. A beam of light picked
out a little cloud of dust motes rising from it.

The clock continued to strike.

With a last, slow flutter, the cloak lay still. From beneath it, as
the clock struck for the twelfth time, a white owl flew out and
circled over Sarah.

Tears were trickling down her cheeks.

Chapter Nineteen
Good Night

Sarah closed her eyes to stem the tears and brushed her cheeks with
the palms of her hands. "I must stop this habit of crying," she said
aloud, as a distraction from her sadness. "I must also stop gasping,
gulping, trembling, shouting, and generally going over the top when
..." Then she remembered that she had not found Toby again, and she
opened her eyes in alarm.

The white owl was still flapping above her, but in other respects the
scene had changed. She was standing on the staircase of her home, and
it was dark outside.

She raised her eyes to look at the owl. It circled her for a last
time, found an open window, and flew out into the night. Then she was
running up the stairs two at a time, shouting, "Toby! Toby!"

He was in his crib, fast asleep. She could not help but pick him up
and cuddle him. He opened his eyes dozily, thought about crying, but
decided that he was in good enough shape without it, so he smiled
instead. Sarah picked up Launcelot from the floor and put the teddy
bear in his arms, saying, "Here you are, Toby. He's yours." Then she
tucked him into his crib again. He went straight to sleep.

She stayed there with him for a long time, watching him breathe
peacefully, with Launcelot in his arms.

Back in her own room, the full moon was shining outside her window.
She left the curtains open, to see it. If she went to bed quickly, it
would still be shining in when she turned the light out. The alarm
clock by her bed showed that the time was after midnight. Her parents
would be back from the show any minute now.

She sat at her dressing table and picked up a hairbrush, but her
attention wandered to the photographs she had around the mirror, her
mother and Jeremy, smiling at each other like young lovers, the
signed posters, the gossip stories about romantic attachment.
Deliberately, she began to remove one picture after another from the
mirror. She glanced at each one before putting it away in a drawer.

On the dressing table one picture remained, of her father and mother
and herself, aged ten. Sarah straightened the picture. Then she went
to get the music box and put it in the drawer along with the pictures
and clippings, shoved far back.

Downstairs, she heard the front door open and close. Her stepmother
called, "Sarah?"

She didn't answer at once. She was holding her copy of The Labyrinth.

"Sarah?"

"Wait," Sarah whispered. "I am closing a chapter of my life. Just
wait." She paused, and added, still in a whisper, "Please." She put
the book in the drawer with all the rest, and stood with her hand on
it there.

"Sarah!"

Sarah left it a moment, then called back, "Yes. Yes, I'm here." She
looked at the drawer, and sighed. "Welcome back," she called.

"What?" Her stepmother, taking her coat off downstairs, paused,
puzzled. "What did you say?" she called up.

Sarah opened her mouth, and closed it again. Once was enough, she
thought. Once was all right. Any more would be overweening. I nearly
overwent there, she smiled to herself, and pushed the drawer shut.

She straightened up, and on the dark window saw her reflection
against the moonlight. Behind her reflection was Ludo.

"Ludo -- good-bye -- Sarah," he said.

She spun around with a cry of joy. The room was empty.

She checked the window again. Sir Didymus was there.

"And remember, sweetest damsel, shouldst thou ever have need ..."

"I'll call," she told him. She glanced around the room again. Empty,
of course.

Sir Didymus was hurrying back into the window pane. "I forgot to say,
also, that if ever thou shouldst think on marriage ..."

"I understand," Sarah told him. "Good-bye, brave Sir Didymus."

He faded. Sarah kept her eyes on the window. She did not have long to
wait. Hoggle popped up from behind the bed. "Yes, if you ever need us
... for any reason at all ..." He stared at her from under his bushy
eyebrows, and started to fade.

"Hoggle," Sarah said, "I need you. I need you all."

"Sometimes," the Wise Man observed, "to need is ... to let go."

"Oh, wow!" said his hat. "And that's just for starters."

Outside the dark window, the white owl had been perched with his
claws hooked on a branch, an effigy of watching and waiting. Now he
swooped away over the park, on silent velvet wings, up toward the
full moon. Nobody saw him, white in the moonlight, black against the
stars.
--