There are two great days in a person's life - the day we are born and the day we discover why. - William Barclay

Sarah sat on the edge of the uncomfortable sofa bed, trying desperately to wake up. It was the morning of her twenty first birthday, and she was spending it in her mother's living room in London. The room was perfectly nice, but the sofa was old and creaky and hurt her up with a back ache was a sure fire way of making you feel much older than you were. Her mother was still asleep, alone after a huge fight with Jeremy. What a way to mark becoming an adult (in America at least), listening to your step father scream that you're an inconvenience. Sarah thought back over the past few years.

Sarah had spent a lot of time alone lately, thinking and writing. She no longer wanted to act; that particular career path held no appeal for her now she had seen the life her mother led. She loved to write, and she had filled dozens of notebooks with fevered scribbles over the years. When she read them back, they all shared a similar theme. It was something that frustrated her, made her throw the books against the wall in anger. The notebooks were all filled with tales of the Underground, of goblins, dwarves, things she didn't even know the name of. She was happy to remember those things, and invent fun stories involving the silly creatures - but lately, it wasn't childish tales of Hoggle and Ludo that filled the pages. Instead, there was line after line of not entirely innocent prose about their King. In fact, some of the stuff she had written about him was downright indecent.

Jareth had entered her mind in a way she could never have predicted. He consumed her dreams, her fantasies, her desires. It unsettled her deeply - he had stolen her brother, tried to kill her on several occasions, and had stalked her disguised as a woodland creature for God's sake! That was not a healthy way to begin a relationship in any world, surely, magical or not. A classic case of Stockholm Syndrome is what a therapist would say, Sarah was sure of it. She barely knew him, but his overpowering sexuality was something that she couldn't ignore. She hadn't met anybody like him, before or since, who made her want to rip her clothes off just at the sound of his voice. There had been several mornings in the last couple of years where she had woken drenched in sweat and breathing heavily, haunted by dreams where she was his queen, in every sense of the word.

In the six years since her thirteen hours in the Labyrinth, she had seen her friends a few times. Jareth had even made an appearance once, to demand that they all returned to the Labyrinth as there was work to be done. Once all the creatures had dispersed, he had hung around and made idle chit chat and Sarah was shocked to find that his company was enjoyable. The casual conversation became more serious, and he had stayed until sunrise, just talking to her. He inquired about her life, what she did with her time, how she felt. At first she had been hostile, but he had made her feel..she wasn't sure. At ease was too strong, and so was comfortable, but he made her feel like she..mattered. Yes, that was it.

Jareth hadn't come to her again, and for a while this had utterly devastated her. He had made her feel important at a time when she felt she didn't matter at all. Hoggle and the others still visited her, but her frustration at missing Jareth had caused her to push them away. Hoggle popped in every now and then, but only to check she was alright. She felt angry at herself for spoiling a special friendship because of unfounded resentment towards their King. After a while, Sarah had pulled herself together and stopped wanting Jareth to come back. She stopped looking for owls in the night sky or resting in trees. He wasn't coming back.

Now, Sarah had finally grown up. She had flown to London to visit her mother in a vague attempt to bury the hatchet between them. Linda was appearing in a production of Hamlet as Ophelia, a part Sarah personally thought she was much too old to play. Their relationship had been strained for several years, and as Sarah had grown up she no longer idolised her mother in the blind way she had as a fifteen year old. Instead she saw her for what she was; the woman who abandoned her young daughter for the sake of fame and a man.

Linda had achieved both her goals; she was now a highly successful actress of stage and screen, critically acclaimed and loved by audiences. She had been admired by her young daughter for all the years she had been away, though there had been minimal effort on her part to stay in touch with Sarah. Sarah had eventually grown tired of desperately clinging to her mother, trying to make her love her, trying to make her stay. When Sarah had turned sixteen and there hadn't been so much as a birthday card in the mail, she had started to see her mother's true colours, and the relationship soured after that. Sarah had doubted that Linda even noticed her daughter had stopped calling and writing. After a few months, there had been a few attempts on Linda's side to win her daughter's affection back. Perhaps she missed the blind adoration that boosted her ego.

Jeremy was still in the picture, although Sarah had gotten the impression that he was annoyed at her presence in at their home London (mainly because he had said so in that fight last night). Sarah had planned to stay for at least a month, having nothing to do after leaving college, and this had greatly irritated him. They had gotten on well when she was younger, but the relationship between him and Linda wasn't good and Sarah was an easy target for his resentment, she supposed. He was out most of the time, returning in the early hours of the morning. Sarah had laid awake on the sofa for the past week, listening as her mother and Jeremy argue in hushed voices. Every night, the hushed voices would become less and less so, until it developed into full on yelling. Occasionally Jeremy would storm out, and Sarah would squeeze her eyes shut as she tried not to listen to her mother cry. The next morning, Linda would force a bright smile and act as though nothing had happened. She certainly was an actress. Sarah had grown irritated with her constant performance, and longed to truly see her mother, rather than the role Linda felt she had to play.

Sarah got dressed, brushed her teeth and waited for her mother to wake up. Linda stumbled in to the living room/kitchen area, looking like shit and apparently feeling like it too, as she ran to the bathroom and threw up. Sarah sighed - no chance of birthday fun today.

Sarah had excused herself that morning, saying that she wanted to go explore London on her own. Linda had been hungover and wallowing in her own self pity in bed, and merely waved Sarah away. Grabbing her bag and a wad of cash that her mother had left out for her, she went for a walk. She was no stranger to London; she had even spent a year studying there when she was nineteen, before dropping out this year. Her mother hadn't been there then, Linda and Jeremy had been in LA for the whole year so Sarah didn't see her at all. Sarah loved London; the history, the culture - even the weather didn't bother her, though she had been caught in downpours more than once. She had moved away when she was twenty to finish her course back home, but she had dropped out in her final year, much to the bitter disappointment of her father. Her father had been disdainful of her choice to study creative writing, and then when she dropped out - well, that certainly put their relationship under strain. She had told him she was still writing but hated college so much that she couldn't stay anymore. Clearly the idea that his eldest child could make a living out of writing hadn't even occurred to him. Things had been going quite well for her, with short stories she had written appearing in magazines every now and then. She was hoping for a book deal in the future, and had submitted several manuscripts involving a powerful King.

Sarah wandered through London for hours, popping in and out of sweet little shops and walking for miles. Walking calmed her greatly, and today she was feeling particularly unhappy. It was her twenty first birthday, and her mother had completely forgotten, too wrapped up in her own never ending relationship drama. The time difference meant that her father would call late that evening, after he had finished work, so she had nobody to wish her well. Cards would be waiting for her back in the States, but right now nobody even cared it was her birthday. Sarah stopped walking at her favourite bridge, Westminster Bridge. From here, you could see Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, as well as St Paul's Cathedral in the distance. It was four pm, and the sun was beginning to lower in the sky. It wasn't dark yet, but lights from the surrounding buildings were coming on, making the city sparkle. Sarah felt lucky to be here, in her favourite city, but she wished that she wasn't alone.

"I wish somebody loved me enough to be here with me right now." She muttered under her breath. Sighing, she walked over to the rail of the bridge and stared out into the city, watching the water race down the river.

"Happy birthday to me.." Sarah sang quietly to herself, staring over the bridge into the murky waters of the River Thames. "Happy birthday to me.."

"Happy birthday dear Sarah.." A voice sang into her ear, and she screamed. She knew exactly who was standing behind her, a little too close, and she was reluctant to turn to face him.

"You startled me Jareth." She said calmly, trying to hold her nerve. She used his name for the first time to his face, although she had always referred to him as such to Hoggle. She thought that if she addressed him as "Goblin King" she would sound ridiculous and frightened. To her surprise, she felt no fear. Instead, she felt something jump within her that she desperately tried to ignore. "I didn't think you were the type to sing Happy Birthday." She told him, and he moved from behind her to stand against the rails next to her. She refused to turn her head to look at him, but she could see in her field of vision that he was staring straight out over the river.

"I thought I would make an exception for you, precious thing. Many happy returns." His voice was rich and smooth, a lilt of humour running through it. She turned, finally, to look at him. He was wearing normal clothes, his long hair gone and cut close to his head with a longer bit on the top. His eye markings had vanished, though he did have missing patches in his eyebrows. To look at him, he was the same as any other man on the street. His eyes were still unusual, and his grin was positively predatory.

"You look different." She said, and he laughed. He turned towards her, leaning against the bridge's rails easily. He looked so relaxed, and entirely different to how he had been all those years ago in his Labyrinth. Even when he had appeared in her bedroom a few years ago, he had still been regal and arrogant.

"I thought the cape and the breeches might make me stand out a little, love. I believe this," he gestured to the denim jacket he was wearing "is a little more the current style." Sarah blushed a little when he spoke about his breeches - she had certainly thought about the tight trousers he had worn on more than one occasion.

"What are you doing here?" She asked him, and he smiled at her predictable question.

"I hate the thought of a wonderful girl like you being alone on her birthday." Sarah scoffed at him, turning back out to look at the river.

"Funny, I didn't think you cared that much. Shouldn't you be stealing someone's baby right now instead of worrying whether or not I have a good birthday?" Sarah said bitterly. He had some nerve, turning up here when she hadn't even called him here. You wanted him here a voice in her head reminded her. You've always wanted him here.

"Come Sarah, I'm not the monster you think I am. I play a part, I am the Goblin King. I do as I am bid - you were the one who wished the child away, after all. I did not make you do so, but you did." He spoke as if talking to a simpleton, slowly and deliberately. "What's said is said, after all."

"I won him back." Sarah said defensively and Jareth nodded, grinning. Sarah looked at his mouth, and thought that his crooked fangs made him look like a lion about to pounce.

"Indeed you did. You defeated my Labyrinth, I have no power over you." He said, his voice light and slightly mocking. "Trust me, dear girl, I haven't forgotten. It's been six years - surely you've forgiven me now, Sarah? No hard feelings and all that."

"Why would I forgive you? You tried to kill me, you drugged me! I think I'm allowed some hard feelings!" She pointed out, and Jareth shrugged. He was so smug, Sarah thought. He really did know it all.

"Nonsense, Sarah. I would never have killed you. I was merely following how the story was meant to play out. I have my part to play, after all. The Labyrinth demands a little showmanship." Sarah thought about what he said for a moment, until realisation struck her.

"So..you knew I would win?" Sarah asked him, hands on her hips and a victorious look in her eyes.

"Ah." He said, a small smile tugging at his lips at her superior stance. "Not exactly. You weren't meant to win, but you were never going to die. If you must know, I planned on keeping your young Toby as my heir, as I'm not yet married and have no plans to be. You were supposed to return above, with no memories of the child."

"So if I'd lost, I'd have no memory of Toby at all." He's not married! Her mind screamed at her. Like that even mattered.

"That was the plan," Jareth explained. "As you progressed through the Labyrinth, I rather fancied keeping you." Jareth crept his hand over hers, covering her small hand with his larger one. Sarah wondered if this was his misguided attempt at flirting with her.

"Keeping me?" Sarah said in outrage, slapping his hand away. "I'm not a stray dog, Jareth. You can't just go around 'keeping' teenage girls." She did quotation marks with her fingers. "It's got a name in my world, same as what you did to Toby. Kidnapping?" She reminded him, though she didn't sound as angry as he had expected. The situation was ridiculous; she was standing on a bridge in London talking to a man she knew was King of a bunch of Goblins in a land nobody knew existed. People walked past as though nothing strange was happening, and it made Sarah want to scream with laughter.

"It isn't required that a runner is returned Above if they lose, you know Sarah. That's at my own discretion. Keeping you would have violated no rules, it would have been seen as simply claiming my prize. My most precious treasure." His voice was soft, and she stared into his eyes for what felt like minutes but was more like seconds. His unsymmetrical pupils were hypnotizing, especially when he was staring at her so intently. She tore her eyes away from his, trying to keep a level head. She was not some cliche chick in a crappy movie who was going to swoon just because some jackass with nice eyes said his right words.

"Well, I'm not some trophy to be won Jareth, so I'm sorry your prize wouldn't play along. Now if you'll excuse me, I really must be going." Sarah turned to leave, and he grabbed her arm and pulled her close to him. She looked up at him, not saying a word, hardly breathing. He smelled like wood smoke and sage, and being so close to him made her a little dizzy.

"You wouldn't have been a trophy." He said quietly, avoiding her gaze but still clinging to her arm. "You would have been my Queen. My wife." The world around them seemed to fall away, and it was just the two of them standing on that bridge. Sarah felt her breath catch in her chest, as she stared at him yet again. His being here overwhelmed her, and his unexpected, and rather heartfelt, confessions had caught her entirely off guard.

"Fear me, love me, do as I say and I will be your slave." Sarah parroted his words back to him, perhaps rather more harshly than she had intended. He released her arm as though it had burned him and leaned back against the wall as though nothing had happened. "I was fifteen," she reminded him "not exactly in a hurry to get down the aisle."

"That's true. Fifteen is a little young, especially by Underground standards." Sarah wondered how old he was; from what Hoggle had told her, the Fae could live indefinitely if uninjured. "How old are you now?" He asked lightly, the uncomfortable atmosphere between them lifting a little.

"You remember my birthday but not my age? That must be why you didn't get me a card." She teased. "Twenty one. The big one. Well, not over here, I guess. I've been able to drink here since I was eighteen."

"I know. I've heard stories of your drunken escapades from our friend Toggle."

"Hoggle." She corrected him automatically, and then what he said hit her. "Wait, what? Hoggle told you about me getting drunk?" She made a mental note to torture Hoggle slowly and painfully the next time she saw him.

"Yes, yes. Something about a bottle of vodka and a table?" Sarah cringed as she remembered dancing on a table in some dingy Soho bar clutching a bottle of vodka. She had told Hoggle about that whilst in a hungover state, and she never expected him to report it to the freaking King. Surely Kings had more important things to worry about than what she chose to do with her Friday nights.

"Um, yeah. That's happened before. Anyway, my mom's expecting me back so.."

"Let me take you out for dinner." He asked her, desperate to keep her with him. She looked at him for a moment, mulling the offer over. He stared at her with searching eyes. "We can celebrate your birthday properly then. I do believe birthday dinners are somewhat customary."

"Thanks but my mom has plans for me later I think." Sarah hoped that her body language wouldn't give away her lie. Her mom had a show tonight, and anyway she didn't even realise what day it was.

"Won't she be performing tonight? I've seen many reviews for Linda Williams in Hamlet. Apparently she's quite good." Sarah raised an eyebrow at him.

"You read the mortal newspapers?"

"You'd be surprised at what I do in my spare time, Sarah. Really you know very little about me. I know so much about you, wouldn't you like to level the playing field? Aren't you even a little curious about me?" He asked, raising an eyebrow playfully. She was curious about him, she wanted to know everything about him, she wanted to see everything..

"Fine. I suppose if I don't say yes you'll just follow me around and bug me until I do."

"I have better things to do with my time than follow around a woman who doesn't wish to know me, Sarah. Believe it or not, I do have a Kingdom to run. I would enjoy spending time with you on your birthday, that's all. I'm not going to steal you away to the Underground and ravish you. You needn't be so concerned."

I wish! You could ravish me all you want! Sarah cursed her inner voice for saying everything she wanted to suppress.

"Good to know. I suppose we could go for dinner around eight. Shall I book a table somewhere? Wait, do you even eat?" She realised that she'd never seen him eat - not surprising really, because as he'd rightly pointed out, she hardly knew him.

"No need. I will arrange the venue. And yes, Sarah. I eat. I'm the Goblin King, not a ghost." He said sarcastically, making Sarah feel like an idiot.

"Well, okay then. Where should I meet you?"

"Meet me here, at eight o'clock tonight. Is that convenient?" Sarah did some quick calculations about how quickly she could get home, shower, change and get back here. She nodded in agreement, and she smiled. She liked the way his eyes crinkled in the corners. He looked less like a hungry lion and more like the Cheshire Cat.

"Wonderful. Well then, I shall see you then." She nodded dumbly, unsure what to say, feeling completely overwhelmed. He lifted her hand and raised it to his lips. He placed the softest kiss over her knuckles, then walked away without a second glance. Sarah's eyes followed him as he mixed with the crowds using the bridge and suddenly - he was gone.

Sarah turned back to the railings, and couldn't believe what had just happened. Then, the words she had said before he appeared echoed in her mind.

"I wish somebody loved me enough to be here with me right now."

A/N: I hope you enjoyed the first part of my first ever Labyrinth fanfiction. Part two will be coming soon. Please leave a review if you'd like to!