A/N: Second part of Two Shot...Do not own Labyrinth and that pains me to say.

A sudden, abrupt cessation of water from the garden sprinkler reminded Sarah once again of her vulnerable state of near-undress. She was self-conscious as Jareth noticed and once again looked her form up and down. There was no mistaking what his gaze implied as he returned to her eyes.

With a wry, somewhat disappointed grin he conjured an overlarge towel before handing it off to the stunned girl. Sarah took it, wrapping it quickly around herself and staring at the Goblin King as if he were a completely alien force of nature – which he was, in a sense. She knew he could sense her unease at his perusal and his next words proved it.

"You cannot blame me for looking Precious; I am a full-blooded male even if I am not human. And you are beautifully formed woman. Surely other men have looked at you before?" She could intuit a deeper question and for once decided to drop her guard. Honesty returned for honesty right?

"Men may have looked before…they've never touched. You've spoiled me for the males in my species I am afraid. But sometimes, I hated the way your look made me feel," She couldn't help the bitterness that welled up in her answer. "You can touch with your eyes. At fifteen – hell, even now – it frightened me to death."

"Then I beg your forgiveness for frightening you, although I cannot apologize for desiring you Precious," His tone was formal, stilted even. She was surprised to realize that it was not because he was angry with her. He was uncomfortable with vulnerability and in some way she had yet to discover, she made him more vulnerable.

"What did you mean by first gift?" She returned to more stable ground – at least she hoped it was sturdier than the shifting sand they had just traversed.

"I had hoped to cleanse the past; start afresh with you, now that your brother is not a prize to be won in battle. I wish to prove we are not truly enemies," He flinched as a pained grimace crossed his face. "…I wish to court you now that you are of an age to understand what I offer. I…Oh blast it all!"

The entire time he had explained himself, the pain in his expression grew, as if invisible hands were pinching him or sharp knives jabbing into his skin. Sarah watched in part horror, part shared anguish – his pain felt so real when she looked at him. The words he spoke registered, but she concentrated instead on the sudden doubling up of a once stoic Goblin King.

"Jareth?" She tentatively reached out to touch him, drawing back several times before finally giving in and placing a comforting hand on his bowed shoulder. He jerked back reflexively before relaxing under her touch. "What's wrong?"

"Two things my darling girl. One, I am not strictly supposed to be speaking to you about this. Your words of five years ago put a gag on me so to speak. Technically, I am breaking that gag by requesting that you court me," Sarah felt him clench in pain again and it hurt her to see him suffer – something she might never have admitted to. She couldn't even blame the heat of summer on this one though.

"What is the second thing?" Though his situation evoked her sympathy, it would take some thoughtful meditation on his request before she surrendered her power in such a way. After all, they had only just reconnected.

"Well, there is a particularly persistent wisher who is about to get his ass kicked for trying to force my hand in such a way," Her eyes widening in amused shock, Sarah could not help giggling at his very human sounding terms. "I am fighting the yoke that this particular wish puts on me because I did not ever intend to force your hand love and your words prevent me from actually doing so, though the wish causes me great pain. Like splitting a person in half."

"Wait what?" Her chortles stopped as she tried to connect the two concepts. A wisher and her own part in his wish. Her brain scrambled quickly and at a telling glance from Jareth, when he could look at her through his pain, it snapped together in a flash of understanding.

"TOBIAS ROBERT WILLIAMS!" Jareth winced as Sarah bellowed her little brother's name loudly. It occurred to her afterwards that the Fae King's sensitive eardrums just might have blown out at her ruckus, but at the moment she didn't care.

A tousled blond head poked its way from behind the back door where he had been most obviously eavesdropping on their conversation. Sarah's cheeks flamed with mortification, though most of it had been fairly innocuous if she could recall.

"What's up sis?" He attempted to be innocent, but his eyes were twinkling with mirth.

"What have I told you about making foolish, irresponsible, careless, reckless wishes?"

"You're being a bit redundant my love," Jareth gasped through the pain, his eyes watering with mischief and tears.

"Shut up you! I'm trying to help," Sarah growled and nearly blushed when it caused Jareth's eyes to darken with something akin to lust. Oh gods, he liked it when she showed spunk. "As for you little brother. You are in so much trouble. One – take back your wish whatever it was. It's hurting the Goblin King. Two, what did you whisper to him before you ran into the house?"

"Alright already," Toby knew better than to argue with his sister when she was on a rampage. She'd threatened to wish him into the BOES often enough that he could smell it in his dreams sometimes. "I take the wish back and what I told the Goblin King is none of your beeswax."

Jareth had straightened at Toby's words with a sigh of relief. Sarah wondered how it worked that way for Toby, but when she had tried to take her own words back she still ended up running a Labyrinth. Jareth smirked.

"You did not have a magical gag preventing you from fulfilling that wish Sarah-mine and you truly did mean every word," He held up a hand when she began to protest. "At the time love, you did. Besides, your wishes will always be more powerful than Toby's when they are directed at me. You and I are far more connected than you might want to believe."

Toby took the opportunity of distraction for slipping back into the house. Sarah vowed to pay him back later, but for the moment she wanted to make sure her former enemy/new friend/something? was okay.

"Your face is so expressive Sarah; it's one of the things I like about you the most. Yes, in answer to your unspoken question. I will be just fine. No lasting harm done. But I will not verbalize my request aloud anymore if you don't mind. I will wait on your good graces for an answer," She was still reeling from this new facet of him.

Oh the arrogance was still there in full force and the mischief nature would never be tamed – just like his wild mane of hair. But there was a gentleness about him, a sort of wild, frenzied hope that she would not turn him away – this time.

The water had dried on her body and the sun's heat once again beat down in relentless waves. She could feel the sweat begin to pool again and jealously she wondered what it would be like to possess enough magic not to sweat. The Goblin King seemed cool as a cucumber if still a little shaken from his recent distress.

Her brain was feeling a bit foggy in the muggy warmth and she clenched down hard on the wayward thought of sweat and heat and bodies bared to one another and fully vulnerable in every way. To save herself from embarrassment as she felt the beginnings of a blush, she turned to face the forest again. Her gaze fell on the beautiful crystal unicorn and its foal. She smiled.

"Can I touch her?" She asked Jareth quietly, hoping to give herself space and a moment to think.

"Of course. She is yours. Just be gentle; a female unicorn especially is skittish when face to face with the intentions of others," Sarah knew he was not talking about the unicorn, but she walked steadily and cautiously toward her gifts, hands outstretched in a gesture of trust and vulnerability.

The mare and babe stayed hidden among the honeysuckle vines, the heady scents of the blossoms surrounding them with a magical fragrance. Sarah continued to approach and the mare warily eyed the offered hand.

It occurred to Sarah that when he said he had gentled them for her, that unicorns were far more appropriate a beast for the use of his riding crop. The riding crop – an extension of himself when held as a guide for an independent spirit. His hand extended outward – giving and taking.

He had followed along a few paces behind and stopped just an arm's length from where she stood. Close, but not intruding into her own personal space – as if she were a skittish foal waiting to sense his intentions.

She couldn't see the analogy at all. And sarcasm had never really worked when she tried to convince herself of something. She hid her smile this time and waited to see what the mare would do.

Could it really be that simple? Had she truly been so blind all this time? He had told her nothing was as it seemed. But what that meant to him and what that had meant to her…it was so difficult to fathom the gap in their understanding of one another.

Slowly, the beautiful creature stretched her neck out to whuff at Sarah's hand. She scented along the skin, making goose bumps rise and Sarah waited.

With a nod of her crystalline mane – which tinkled musically as it shook – the mare accepted Sarah's claim, allowing herself to be pet and her babe to be cooed over.

Jareth watched from the sidelines as his beloved cavorted playfully with her gifts. She had shown surprise at the soft, velvety feel of the unicorn's hide and laughed quietly to himself that she still took things for granted. He sobered up at the thought that she might not take his request at face value given the propensity for most Labyrinthian associations were not what they seemed to be. Though that in itself should be an indicator of what the Labyrinth truly was. For its creator's heart was as mystifying and puzzling as the terrifying and beautiful creation. However, at the center would always be the one thing that never changed. The Goblin King, offered up to the girl with the powers; the girl no one knew with whom he had fallen in love.

Everything he was, had been, and ever would be rested on the words of one young, beautiful, wonderful, sometimes foolish, always challenging, ever growing Sarah Williams.

Keeper of the Dream Keeper's heart.

"I will not allow you to court me Jareth," The Keeper of his heart cruelly crushed it in her gentle hands and he nearly fell over at the finality of her words. Such cruel eyes stared at him, glittering emerald depths hard as the gems for which they were named.

"I see," He would not recover from this second rejection. He heard his death knell tolled in the twilight sounds all around him. Jareth turned to go. He could not die in the Above where his death would be as cold as his now frozen, crushed heart. The Labyrinth would survive; he had willed it so. His goblins would mourn him at least.

"Ask me again Jareth," He blinked, stunned. Why on earth would she do this to him? She had crushed him enough; could she truly hide such bitter hatred that she would crush him a third time. He would not ask. "Please. Ask me again. I think I understand this time."

He had never heard such a raw, anguished tone in her before. Turning to face her, he noted her eyes as they sought his. Her hand still rested on the neck of her mare – he would not take back his gift. But her eyes – they were not cold and hard and icy like he had originally thought. The emerald orbs blazed with an inner fire, yet they shuttered as if to prevent the vulnerability that he could now clearly see.

Hope flamed high in his chest, his heart reigniting as a sudden, crazed thought entered his chaotic mind. She could not mean…

"I know it is cruel and unfair…no man should have to make such a plea a second time after being so brutally crushed. Forgive me. Would you understand me if I said I was only human and a woman at that?" She relaxed enough to smile tentatively – just enough that Jareth could tell she was terrified.

Of what though? Not him surely? And then it struck him. He felt it lift from him even as he understood exactly why she was so frightened.

Love could be such a powerful emotion; vulnerability was never something he approved of before she came along and love was the most vulnerable one could ever get with another being. She did not know the depths of his love for her, but she knew that she might possibly love him in return.

It scared her because it released him from her previous words and opened her up for being completely at his mercy. But oh, what she didn't know…what she didn't know…

"Fear not that I would use my power over you for harm; fear only that you hold the same power over me and use it wisely. Love me Sarah-mine; if you loved me even half as much as I loved you it would be enough. Do not bend your will to mine so that I may crush it under foot; just allow me to meet your weaknesses with my strength as I ask you to do for me. I move the stars for no one but you Precious. In this I am your slave, but willingly – so very willingly would I give my everything if only to see you content and happy beloved.

"Please Sarah. Be my own heart; I offer you mine once more."

Sarah smiled, the heat of the summer forgotten as a torrent of rain swept over her – the first rainstorm of the desolate season. Lightening surged in blinding flashes and thunder cracked so loudly that the mare and her babe whinnied fretfully, hiding under the largely unhelpful forest canopy. She laughed aloud as one nod of her head brought Jareth rushing to embrace her. He swallowed her laughter with his own, lips pressing hungrily against hers as he took her nod for acceptance of his suit.

Not courting her. She was his, claimed rightfully and fully. He peppered her face, her skin, her body with kisses, delighting in the blush that spread over every inch of her pale skin. The towel had dropped when he lifted her into his arms and she no longer seemed to care that she was a feast for his hungry eyes. She returned his kisses with the passion he had always craved, knowing that she possessed it, but never hoping that he would experience it himself.

Sarah pulled back for one breathless moment. Though the answer was tingling in the magic-laden air, she knew he had to hear it from her own mouth. The final piece as it were to their own labyrinth of hearts.

"Yes."