Author's Note: In the middle of writing The End of Days, some questions came up that needed answering. Who was the King of the Dead? What was his relationship to Sarah and why would he be in love with her? There wasn't enough room and time to cover all of that in the original story, so I wrote this rather long one-shot to give people some more backstory about the King of the Dead, and also more insight in some of the events that happened during the original fanfic.

This is what I've been doing for the past several weeks, hence the extra delay in updating a new chapter to the original story. I apologize for that, but hope that this will serve as an extra peek into character motivations. If not, then at least you know I haven't just been goofing off all this time!

This story will not make much sense unless you read The End of Days first-- at least up through Chapter 17: The Path of the Dead. Just wanted to put that in so people weren't confused about what happens here. There's also quite a few flashbacks to past events and events in The End of Days during the tale, marked out in italics.

The Forgotten Dream

He had not always been King of the Dead.

Before he took the iron crown and scepter-- embraced that cold, lifeless metal that weighted down his brow and hand-- he'd had a family, a life, a love... a name. But his memories faded with the passing of the centuries in a way that mortals would never believe could happen. In the end, he was robbed of all but the last, and that was only the faintest shadow of a memory.

Sometimes when he was alone, he would speak it and listen to it fall on the empty room where no one else would hear it, living or dead. Rael. That had been his name, a long, long time ago when he'd walked beneath the sun like an ordinary man. But long ago, he'd done something ordinary men did not do, and Rael had been given what ordinary men do not receive. Now wraith-men called him king, and King he would be until the end of days.

There was no time in his kingdom, no day nor night to mark the quiet passing of the seasons. Grey twilight ruled, a shadow-cloaked mistress who wrapped all the underworld in her hushed embrace. No clock would strike away the hours in his hall, no laughter to break the backbone of silence. But the King of the Dead did not mourn.

This is the way it had always been, and the way it always would be. Or so he had always believed.

Dreams touch the realm of the dead, and it was through them Rael could loose the shackles of his rule, questing through the unwaking minds of Labyrinth creatures as they slumbered. Simple minds dream simple dreams, but they were more precious than rubies to the King of the Dead, for he had nothing like them in his kingdom. They were full of light. Rael often thought that was what he missed most of all, and when he dreamed, he dreamed of the sunlight as liquid gold, warm on his face and slipping through his fingers like water. He thought that was what it had been like, when he had been an ordinary man. But he could not be sure. It was only a pale memory, for now he carried the darkness with him always.

The dead could not tell him, for their memories too began to fade as soon as they set foot on the ferryboat that brought them to the Underworld. Some held on longer than others, those in which the life did not and would not ever fully die. But they would not talk to him, and shrank from his touch. Rael cursed them in his heart for their unknowing cruelty and selfishness, but his face showed nothing. Instead, he sought out the dreams of the living, hungry for whatever they could show him of the world above. And in time he hovered like a wraith himself, haunting the dreams of kings...

Jareth woke with a start, bedsheets wound in a silken tangle around his body. He'd been dreaming again, dreaming of Sarah... But he could not remember what it was now, and it slipped further and further away from him as the sun stole up over the horizon. The Goblin King searched his mind, snatching up pieces here and there in a frantic effort to retrieve the precious memory even while he mocked himself for it. Living in the past, he told himself bitterly. You will never learn.

But the dream had been different, he'd felt it. He and Sarah stood once more in the ruins of his castle, where time and place had shattered and where she had spoken her last words to him. In his hand had been the last crystal he'd ever made for her, a sparkling thing, but heavy as lead. He could not move or speak when she'd fixed those eyes upon him. Such power she had for one so young, and so unconsciously cruel in the way the very young can be...

Jareth remembered well that moment and the way his lungs had constricted in fear and anticipation, how his world fell to pieces when she'd said the words that denied him forever. He'd spent many nights re-living it, desiring that it should be altered to a different outcome. All his attempts failed and he could not rewrite history to his liking this time, not even in his mind.

But it had happened tonight, in his dream. He was sure of it, for even though the details were lost to him, the feeling had stayed behind like the heat of a fire after the flames had died out. The scene had played out differently this time. Sarah had said the words, the right words. Even now Jareth struggled to catch his breath, but it had been stolen away by fierce exhultation instead of drowning sorrow. If only he could remember...

Yes, the dream was very precious to him, indeed. He would almost give his kingdom to have it back, whole and perfect like a pearl in the moonlight. And at the same time, he loathed himself for wanting it, wished he could cut this wretched desire from himself like rotting flesh from a wound.

Alone in his tower room, the Goblin King covered his face with his hands. This cannot go on. I must forget her... I must.

Ah. Rael opened his eyes and leaned back on his throne. He realized he'd been gripping the arm supports so tightly until his fingers were numb. Added to that was a new sensation, something that gnawed at his insides until he wished he could tear it out. Pain? He hadn't realized he could still, after all this time, feel. Incomparable pain... and so much more. It seemed that the dreams of sun-dwellers could teach him a great deal, and this one's dreams most of all.

At first, the King of the Dead had crept in like a thief, first only taking fragments of a dream, the lovely shining pieces he could not bear to leave behind. Their owners would never miss them, they had such an unappreciated wealth of such memories past and present. So Rael took them, and he hoarded them one by one: a dream of a summer afternoon, of gold and scarlet leaves in autumn, the scent of a spring storm. He had nothing but time, and in his idle hours he would stir them about, arranging and rearranging them the way a child plays with favored toys. If the King of the Dead could be said to own anything, these were his most prized possessions. But like many collectors, what he had was never enough. Always he hungered for more, and he stole into peoples' dreams with greater frequency and discretion, lingering only in those that called to him so temptingly he could not resist.

Never had he dared to seize an entire dream, not until now.

As wrong as it was, Rael could not bring himself to feel regret. This aboveworld king had many dreams of the dark-haired girl, surely just one was not too high a price to exact from one who had so much? And see, the King of the Dead, reasoned with some relief, This king wishes to forget. That was the gift Rael could leave him in exchange. Oh, he could not make the king forget the girl entirely, she was too deeply imbedded in his head and heart. But Rael could take this radiant, unwanted dream and make it his own...

"Must you study all the time?" asked the girl, tossing her braid over her shoulder. "It's a beautiful day, we won't have many more like it come winter. It would be a shame to waste it."

Her young man looked up from where he sat beneath the oak tree, one finger holding his place in the book resting on his knee. In fact, he had not been reading at all, but watching her as she gathered armfuls of leaves from the ground, russet, amber, and scarlet. She'd been away for two years and was no longer the gangly girl he remembered, running through the meadow with grass stains on her feet. Now she wore long skirts, her wild brown curls tamed into a long braid down her back. But those eyes had remained the same, dark green with flecks of gold like a forest pool in the sunlight. He closed the book.

"What would you like to do?"

The girl rewarded him with a smile, and he felt his stomach go weak.

"Let's walk in the woods the way we used to do. I want to get lost, as if we'll never come back."

This was her favorite game. While she'd spoken of court intrigues, masquerades and parties, the woods were what she loved. He studied her face, the pointed chin that spoke volumes of her determination and stubborness, the faded scar just above her left eyebrow from when she'd fallen out of a tree as a child, her too-wide mouth. She was not beautiful. But she was beautiful to him.

She was aware of his scrutiny. All the teasing light had gone from her expression, and now she gave him a cryptic look, the one he never could decipher.

"Well?" A ghost of a smile crept back to her lips, which she hid with an oak leaf.

The young man stood, brushing the dirt and leaves from his breeches. He glanced at the lady-in-waiting who sat snoozing in the sun outside the cottage door. "You aren't supposed to be alone so far away from the village, Morwen."

She threw a handful of leaves at him. "Then it is well that you will be there, so I won't be alone."

In his haste, the King of the Dead had been careless. The dreams of others are not for the taking, and desiring to possess them can bring the thief no good fortune. What's more, this dream was not a mere glimpse of sunlight on water or the sound of laughter. It was a whole dream, and it was powerful. No sooner had he taken it when it began to work on him, to change him...

Rael turned it over in his mind as curiously as he might have once examined a book. He had seen this girl before in the aboveworld king's dreams, although she had always been more like an airy spirit, sometimes mocking, forever elusive. Sarah. That was her name. A curious name, like a whisper of wind through the trees. Rael turned that over in his mind too, repeating it to himself until the word lost all meaning, but sounded like a poem.

She was unique, this Sarah creature. The Underworld touched many worlds, and few beings could so easily cross from one to another the way she had. Rael could, of course, but death's dominion was inifite and omnipresent. This girl should not have had the power, and yet she had done it. It was because of her that Rael could not stay away. Although he did not understand this confrontation between the girl and the aboveworld king, he understood it was a significant event. The king's feelings left that in no question, and Rael reveled in the raging storm of emotions that were so alien to him. The King of the Dead pondered on how one mortal girl could inflict such pain and fervent devotion all at once, and he studied her face closely, devouring each fine detail. It was beautiful, but it was much more. She was much more. It was a mystery and Rael longed to comprehend it just as he longed to comprehend what the aboveworld king felt for her.

Time passed. The dream was like a potent draught of fiery liquor, and he wanted to drink deep again and again. Slowly, Rael began to understand the aboveworld king's fascination with the mortal, fragile and short-lived as she was, and he understood it a little better each time he lived it. He wanted to see Sarah tilt her head and smile at the king, the way she held out her hand to him to draw him close. It reminded Rael of something that had happened a long time ago, when he'd been an ordinary man.

And Rael began to wish he had been in the dream, and not the aboveworld king at all.

"You are daydreaming again."

The young man blinked and looked guiltily down at the ink spattered page. He was supposed to have been copying down his botany lessons, labeling the sketches of plants Sebastien had drawn in his steady hand. Instead, he'd been thinking of Morwen, and how she'd looked at their last meeting. His master looked down at him now, not unkindly.

"I'm sorry, Master Sebastien," he said apologetically, "I was only--"

His master smiled. "I know, Rael. I was once a young man, too."

Rael flushed and set to tidying up his desk, whisking away the ruined pieces of parchment.

"You've been seeing a lot of her lately since she's returned from court." continued his master casually. "Morwen has grown up."

"I promise I won't neglect my studies, Master."

"I'm sure you won't." Master Sebastien's voice was mild, and now he turned to the hearth, picking up the small copper kettle and pouring hot water for their tea. "But you should be careful. A study such as ours is... delicate. It is tolerated when people have a need for benign spells and the like, but they are wary of us at all times."

Rael knew this. And they did well to be wary, for a spell that could knit bone could also break it, and every sorcerer must know the dark as well as the light or there would be no balance. But Rael had not learned such spells. Master Sebastien had a locked cabinet where he kept books he did not allow his apprentice to read. Not yet, his master had told him. There will be a time for that soon.

Sebastien continued to speak as he waited for the tea leaves to steep. "This is why we live the quiet life, unnoticed by our enemies."

And our friends, thought Rael bitterly. He knew well what it was to be a sorcerer's apprentice, living in a humble cottage on the edge of the forest and summoned to court only by the whim of kings. Master Sebastien smiled tiredly, as if he'd heard Rael's thoughts.

"It is a lonely life, indeed. But that is the way it must be if we want to be left alone to do our work. A liason with the king's niece would be... most unwise."

"It is not like that." Rael blurted out. "We are only friends, that is all."

Sebastien stirred a spoonful of honey into his tea, examining his young apprentice's profile against the weak light from the cottage window. He'd chosen Rael when he was barely eight summers for the boy's intelligent eyes and pert answers. How he'd pitied that pale child, scrawny and underfed, his hands perpetually dirty. But many years had passed, and Rael was a boy no longer. A quick study, Sebastien thought he would make a very credible sorcerer indeed, more than fit to take his master's place when the time came. And that time was not too far off. Rael was already taller than Sebastien by half a handspan, and his lanky frame promised greater height to come. The sleeves of his summer tunic rode too high up over his wrists, and his dark mop of hair fell almost to his shoulders. He was a young man now, but his master would always think of him as The Boy. And the boy was in need of a haircut, he thought ruefully. Among other things.

"She seems very fond of you. As it should be," Sebastien said hastily, seeing his apprentice's eyebrows draw up into an embarrassed scowl, "You were children together. I did not approve of the Duke letting his daughter run wild through the woods, but she has become quite a lovely young lady."

He set a steaming cup of tea by Rael's elbow and sat back in his own chair with a sigh.

"She is nearly sixteen summers now, by my count. Her father will soon be arranging her marriage."

Sebastien scrutinized his apprentice's carefully blank face as he sipped his tea slowly. This was what he'd feared. The boy was infatuated with her, he did not need to be a sorcerer to see that. But it was all for naught. A Duke's daughter did not marry scruffy apprentices, sorcerer or no. He thought Rael did know that, deep down. But whether or not he would admit it was something else. Lately the boy had grown moody and pensive, for Morwen had not been to see them in weeks.

"Rael..."

But their conversation was interrupted by the flight of a raven bursting through the open window. It flew twice around the room before Rael caught it and untied a small silver scroll casing from its foot.

Master Sebastien's face brightened. "Does Morwen still keep that dratted messenger bird of mine? Here, Vortigern, before you break the crockery. Come to me, that's a good fellow." He held out a crust of bread to tempt the raven, and the bird snatched it from his hand greedily.

But Rael did not answer, he was already reading the tiny slip of paper that he'd teased from the scroll case, his pale forehead creased with a frown.

"What is it, my boy?"

"It's Morwen." Rael crumpled the note in his hand, worrying the paper nervously between his fingers. "She's ill."

For a long time, Rael had contented himself with the stolen dream. He'd kept it close to him, like a man trying to warm himself around the flame of a single candle. He watched Sarah from afar, had even sampled one of her dreams but found them not to his liking. Although she seemed not to remember them upon waking, they were always of the aboveworld king with his strange eyes and slender hands holding a shining crystal that reflected the entire world...

This Rael understood. Given the chance, he too, would offer Sarah whatever she might ask of him. But the King of the Dead supposed he would never get that chance, and part of him coldly pitied the aboveworld king for his failure. And then one day...

Hoggle loosened the collar on Sarah's pajamas and tried to help her sit up, but she was fading fast. "Sarah, please forgive me. I never meant to harm you, never..."

There is nothing to forgive, Sarah wanted to say, but she didn't have the strength. Her vision blurred and she blinked her eyes, but couldn't clear it. High above them in the sky, the clouds swirled and pirouetted as the wind swept them toward the horizon. Look, Sarah wanted to tell Hoggle, the clouds look like ladies dancing. But all she could do was lie there and gasp, each inhalation ragged with pain.

"Jareth!" Hoggle nearly screamed it. "Jareth, damn you, we need you!"

"He will not come." Didymus was rushing back and forth between Ludo and Sarah, every hair standing on end. "He has not answered a summons since Sarah left the Underground, not for any goblin or Labyrinth creature."

"But he'd answer you, Sarah." Hoggle leaned over her, tears in his eyes. Her lips were pale, and her chest rose and fell with agonizing slowness. "Say his name, just try to say his name. He can save you, I know it."

Sarah could barely hear her friends anymore. She wanted to ask why it was so cold all of a sudden, why the light had gone, and if someone had frightened off the goldwings. Hoggle was shaking her, yelling something in her ear, but she couldn't hear him. If only he'd let her go to sleep until dinnertime...

"Sarah, no!" Hoggle gave her another stubborn shake. "You can't sleep now, you must say his name. Sarah!"

"She is gone. My sweet lady..." Sir Didymus sagged to the ground, finally defeated.

Rael sat on the iron throne, lost in his thoughts and oblivious to the throngs of the wraith-court swirling in the corners of his desolate hall. The dead were constantly around him unless he bid them go, and he had gotten used to their whispery non-voices. But something else now whispered to him, a murmur growing to a thunderous roar that reached inside the hollow cavern of him. Sarah!This he had not expected. Mortals had a brief lifespan and Rael had supposed Sarah's would end like any other. It would be their only meeting, he believed, one he did not look forward to with anticipation. He did not want to see the life in her eyes dimmed, did not want to see her become another pale shadow drifting through the silent halls. This was not her time, and he didn't understand why she was here. But it seemed she was coming, she was very close...

Rael surged down the steps of his throne, scattering the mist forms of the dead before him like dust. He could feel Sarah approaching, she descended like the bright cinder from a bonfire, drifting this way and that with the wind. He would keep her apart from the others. Sarah would not waste away into another wraith, substantial as a spider's web with no heart or mind to illuminate the delicate shell of her body. The King of the Dead decreed it.

"Leave us."

Jareth's tone brooked no argument. Sir Didymus growled quietly in protest, but Hoggle was quiet. Sadly touching the plastic bracelet he wore on his wrist, the little man limped out of the room, gently guiding Didymus before him. The door slammed shut behind them and with a gesture of Jareth's hand, the bolt slid firmly into place.

Finally, he allowed himself to exhale raggedly, seating himself on the bed as close to the sleeping girl as he dared. Cautiously, as if he were accepting the touch of a poisonous snake, he took Sarah's hands in both his own. She did not stir. With a thought, several dozen more candles flamed to life all around the room. He should not spare even that much effort, Jareth realized, his lips thinning. It was going to be a long night.

The dead were forbidden to touch her. Rael had been careful to command this, knowing he must do so or they would crowd her close, drawn to her spirit the way leeches hunger for blood. This he could not allow.

In the end, Rael kept her close by him, out of necessity and desire. A great stone bier he summoned, laid with down pillows and draped in soft fabrics. Robes of heavy silk covered her, white to match his own, and he gave her a delicate crown of iron set with a sapphire the color of a summer sky. She slept on, neither among the living nor the dead. For the first time since he'd come to the Underworld, time had a reckoning. Each infinitesimal minute was now not enough and he stretched out each one as long as he could. Wraiths hovered at his side, ineffectual and silent, but the King of the Dead would not be swayed. He would make this girl his queen. If only she would wake...

He knew little of aboveworld courtships, having long forgotten his own. Rael struggled to remember, it was so long ago. Flowers, he recalled finally. His love had a fondness for wildflowers. She'd worn them in her hair, even longer than Sarah's own but not so dark. He recalled smiles and laughter beneath the shade of a giant oak, but he could not remember the words because it seemed so long ago as to be in another life...

Rael lay in bed with his face to the wall. It was twilight, and the cottage was cold and dark, for he had not bothered to light the fire. He could hear Master Sebastien kneeling at the hearth, the dry, hesitant noises of flint striking together. His master rose with great effort, the pain in his joints slowing his movements. He'd aged in a single fortnight, his back grown stooped and his face lined. Rael felt guilty for allowing the old man to do all the work he had left undone, but his master spoke no word of reproach. There was a slight creak as Master Sebastien sat on the edge of the bed, squeezing Rael's arm gently. He did not respond.

"My boy, there was nothing you could have done. She was very ill..."

Morwen. Morwen with her dark, laughing eyes and the sun in her hair, idly twirling the spray of wild roses he'd given her. Now she was Morwen dressed all in white, lying in a cold, silent tomb in the earth.

"Rael, please listen to me. I would never lie to you when I tell you we could not save her. We could not. The dark arts are not for situations like these."

Rael finally spoke. "It might've brought her back."

"It might." Sebastien's voice was soft and stern. "But she would not have been your Morwen, lad. You must not interfere with the natural order of things, no matter how much you are tempted. A sorcerer has to learn there are things he should not change, even if he can." Sebastien sighed. "You are young, you do not understand the price that must be paid..."

"I would pay any price."

His master shook his head in frustration. "And that is precisely why you are not ready to study these things." Sebastien stood, brushing his hands on the sleeves of his robe.

"You are young," he repeated. "You will understand this in time, and the pain will pass. But promise me you will not do something you will regret, Rael."

Rael promised.

Mortals seemed an entirely different creature to him now, curious in their customs and behavior. The King of the Dead held out his hand and in it materialized a heavy mirror of tarnished silver, some ancient piece of grave-goods of a long-forgotten lord. Rael could take any form he chose, any one of death's thousand faces, but this was the one he wore most often. He touched his cheek, pale as parchment, a long, narrow nose and hair that fell to his shoulders in night-colored waves. He could not be sure, but he believed this is what he'd looked like... before. Would she find it pleasing? Rael no longer knew if a countenance such as this could be counted fair in the world above. Anxiety was a new feeling to him, but now it preyed upon his mind constantly.

Sarah... The King of the Dead stood over her, not quite touching her hand with his own. Open your eyes, love, he called softly to her in his mind. Open to me... But Sarah did not open her eyes, and she did not wake.

In her living death, she dreamed. Rael tasted them but found them bitter. The Goblin King, he realized with growing misery, His name had been the last words on her lips. Rael told himself it didn't matter. When she woke, he could make her forget this old love, he could make her forget it all. As he sat by her and contemplated this, something darker and more restless than anything he'd ever felt stirred deeply within him.

Rael was so lost in this black mood that he did not at first notice the panicked murmurs of the court and the way wraiths shrieked soundlessly and tore down the hall, trailing cold mist behind them. But then the doors were flung open and a sound like a great iron bell shattered the silence of the Underworld. Even the whisperings of the dead took voice now, and they sounded like the rustling of old leaves.

He is here, they sighed, The Goblin King is here for her...

Rael froze. No, he thought to himself, It could not be. The living could not invade the kingdom of the dead, it was not permitted. And yet someone had, he dimly remembered. Long ago, an ordinary man had done just that. But oh, how he had paid...

The Goblin King's footstep sounded in the hall and Rael's mind like a clap of thunder. Almost without thinking, his ghost-white armor was summoned to him, encasing his body in bone. He knew his greatsword was at the ready, his to wield when the time came. This was the most terrible form of the King of the Dead, the one that rode in the wake of armies and feasted upon bloody battlefields. Over it all, a cloak the color of chalk enfolded him, and he drew this dread shape to him lovingly. Rael sat upon the iron throne, his face impassive but his inner thoughts like a gathering storm. He had not long to wait.

"Yield to me, Goblin King, and you will have riches far beyond your imagining."

"I have no need for them." replied Jareth shortly. "You know what I want."

The King of the Dead feinted, then sought to impale Jareth as he slid just out of reach.

"Yield, and you would not see my kingdom again for thrice as long as one of your ilk."

Jareth slashed viciously at the King, forcing the other man to use his wounded shoulder again and again. "You can make no bargain with me that I would accept, save one."

The king swung out again but overreached himself, and Jareth thrust his blade several inches deep just under his opponent's arm, at an unprotected chink in the armor. The other man staggered to one knee, and Jareth seized the opportunity to move in. But the King swept one leg out and kicked Jareth's feet out from underneath him. He caught the Goblin King by the throat, his face still without expression as he tightened his crushing grip around Jareth's neck. Both their swords clattered to the ground, forgotten.

"All men yield to me in the end, Goblin King."

Later, Rael would not remember much of their encounter at all, it was as if a veil of darkness had fallen over his eyes. He knew little of what he'd said or done, all he could recall was the bright flash of a blade and a searing pain such as he'd never known. Rael fumbled with his free hand at the exposed joint between his shoulder and breastplate where it felt like a splinter of burning ice had been driven deep. The hilt was slippery, it evaded the grasp of his nerveless fingers as he sank down on a floor already slick with blood. Sarah... He did not know if he'd called her name aloud or only in his mind. But he was denied the sight of her.

Instead, the Goblin King loomed over him, face contorted in pain and anger. He said nothing, only stooped swiftly to seize the dagger's hilt with both hands, bracing a boot against The King of the Dead's chest. With one hard, unforgiving movement, he wrenched the blade free. Rael choked back a hoarse cry. If the cool metal had hurt him, its absence brought little relief and the air grew thick and choking in his lungs. Now the King of the Dead fell back, the harsh taste of copper rising in his throat. He raised a supplicating hand up to his enemy.

"Please," he said, looking up into those strange, hard eyes. "Please."

He did not know quite what he was asking for, but it was in vain. Rael saw the Goblin King turn, saw him walk away and could not stop him. Now he could see that he had not left his enemy unscathed, and he derived a dull satisfaction from that. A long cut had bitten deeply into the Goblin King's side, his shirt and vest already dark and wet.

Soon, Rael promised himself. He will know the cold bite of iron. It was small consolation to the King of the Dead, for he knew what prize his enemy would claim. Rael turned his head to watch the Goblin King stalk away, his own black hair sodden with blood and smearing his ashen cheek. Do not take her from me, he begged silently, I have so little...

But if the Goblin King heard, he gave no sign. He leaned over Sarah as she lay on the stone tablet, one hand cradling her cheek. His fingers brushed against the iron circlet and halted, his face growing dark. With a furious gesture, he dashed it to the floor.

Rael sighed and a sticky bubble of blood burst upon his lips. Sarah. Now his sight was failing in the twilight, and he could not find her in the descending oblivion. The King of the Dead's last coherent thought was of her.

He'd meant to tell her his true name.

Back in her room, Sarah woke, jolted out of her dreams by a sharp stab of pain in her heart. She shoved aside her tangled sheets, gasping for air and tumbling out of bed onto the floor. Hoggle, Sir Didymus, Ludo lying ill in his cave... she remembered it now. But what of the cold and the darkness? She recalled only flashes of images, a desolate road, a cavernous hall with a vaulted ceiling made of human bones...the clash of metal upon metal until sparks flew. Somewhere in her mind's eye, she could see a white owl flying blindly into the wind, its breast stained with blood. The despondent fury in its screech sent fear like a wave of ice down to her very bones. Sarah scrabbled upright in horror and ran to the window, expecting to see the bird battering against the glass.

There was nothing but the silent winter night.

Of course, Rael could not die. This was his blessing and his curse, and he had ample to time for regrets as he lay on the floor with only the quiet company of the shadow-dead. After a time he found that he could not bear their reproachful eyes and sent them away, making the solitude only a little easier to withstand. Rael lay on the ground for a long time, waiting for the pain to fade. I do not bleed, he reminded himself in groggy disbelief. I am not a creature of flesh and blood. But he bled all the same, perhaps because he felt like a creature of flesh and blood for the first time in many centuries.

Is this what it was like to be human? wondered the King of the Dead. I had... forgotten.

As soon as the Goblin King had left and taken the girl, Rael shed his armor like the carapace of a beetle and laid in its remains. For once he wished he could feel the cold of his kingdom, that he could let it numb him to all the restless thoughts in his head that would not be silenced. Time slowed to a crawl and minutes passed like days. The wound healed, the flesh-that-was-not-flesh knitting together so gradually Rael did not notice it until he looked down and saw the silvery-white star that now marked him. She had not made it, but he would think of it always as Sarah's living brand upon his body.

No, thought Rael with something that might have been stubbornness, had he been human. I do not bleed, and I do not scar. But the scar was no less there, tender to the touch. He could feel it give an answering throb each time he laid his hand over his heart, and in his memory, she was a fresh wound still. Soon Rael came to realize that he was glad of it, and did not want the pain to leave him completely. He did not want to forget her.

But the memory was difficult. Over and over again, Rael saw his snarling face, felt the bitter sting of that silver blade. What was this man to Sarah? He treated her barbarously, but one of his kind did not lightly enter the kingdom of the dead. When he was with her he wore a cold mask, yet his dreams of the girl were not of cruelty, but something else altogether different...

Even now when it pained him to think of her with the aboveworld king, Rael longed to let those feelings wash over him in an intoxicating rush. Why, he asked of the shades that flitted just on the periphery of his vision. What right has this Goblin King to one such as her? And why must I feel for this mortal above all others?

The King of the Dead's questions were knife-shards of agony in his brain, but the dead had no answer.

Eventually, Rael understood. Just as stealing small shards of dream and memory from the Labyrinth creatures had given him some small measure of their happiness, taking the Goblin King's dream had bestowed upon him the desires of the dreamer. The aboveworld king did not wish to feel these things-- not for this mortal girl, not for anyone. He cursed it as his downfall, and yet Rael would give anything he possessed for such passions, as distant to him as the cold stars. It was not right, this imbalance... that one man could spurn such rich gifts while another received nothing. Rael had only sought to remedy that injustice, to claim a little of those scorned riches for his own. But he had received far more than he'd bargained for in doing so.

If I had not taken that dream, Rael thought, I would not have come to this. But again, he could not find it within himself to regret this mistake. He would do it over again if he'd had the chance, even for the briefest glimpse of Sarah, the chance to touch her hand. Perhaps that too, was not his own desire speaking, but another's. The King of the Dead shook his head in grim resignation. It did not matter. It belonged to him now, both this forgotten dream and the love it birthed, dark and devouring.

It was a moonless night, but Rael had eyes like a cat's. Sebastien slept by the hearth where his weary bones would benefit from the heat of the banked coals. He did not stir as his apprentice eased up from his own bed and stole over to the small alcove that served as their modest library. The starlight was enough to see by, and Rael made his way to the locked cabinet in the corner.

This was where Master Sebastien kept the books he would not let his apprentice read. The lock was small and tarnished silver that gleamed even in the dark room. Rael brushed it with a fingertip. There was no spell, no ward, nothing. He shivered a little with guilt and fear. Master Sebastien trusted him. Rael almost wanted to turn back then, to go back to sleep. But he knew he would dream of what he had lost, and that he could not bear. He stroked the cabinet's smooth wood, silky with age. It felt warm, almost alive to his touch. It seemed to beckon. A sorcerer must know both the darkness and the light, Rael reminded himself.

The tiniest of spells was all it took, and the lock fell open. He was cold and his mouth had gone suddenly dry, but still Rael opened the cabinet door. Inside was a perfectly ordinary-looking book bound in faded black leather. His hands shook as he took it down, remembering his master's serious expression of years before, the first and only time he'd seen this book.

This is not to be trifled with, Sebastien had told the young boy he'd accepted as an apprentice. Dark magic can do a great deal that we cannot do, and it should never be taken lightly. Always a curious child, Rael had asked many questions. Could it block out the sun? he wanted to know. Conjure up enough wealth to make them kings? Could it bring people back from the dead?

Oh, yes, Sebastien had nodded grimly. All that it can do, and more.

Remembering that day, Rael caressed the soft cover, inhaling the scent of old paper and sulfur as he riffled the pages. The sound it made was like the whispering of the dead. Forgive me, master... He tucked the book inside his shirt where it lay warm against his breast as he crept from the cottage out into the cold night.

Morwen, he breathed silently, I cannot let you go.

He could not say how long he waited in the shadows, for time meant so little to Rael now. When he could bring himself to do so, he resumed his watch over Sarah, but she was doing things he did not understand. He watched her flee the goblin city on horseback, traveling in such haste she took little time to eat or rest. The Goblin King was gone, and Rael's spirits lifted. Had he banished her? That too, would be inexplicable to him, but this aboveworld king was a man of many contradictions. Perhaps Sarah was fleeing his cruelty... would she then remember Rael's kindness? Rael crept in closer. She stood on the bank of a great river, making camp in a small cluster of young trees in a lonely countryside. The King of the Dead waited until nightfall, until he could slip into her dreams as easily as a fish slid through the water.

Sarah shifted restlessly on her makeshift bed, using her pack as a pillow and her cloak wrapped around her for a blanket. Nearby, Rumor kept watch over her mistress, shaking her mane as the wind from over the river carried to them the perfume of grass and wild mint. There was something in the air she did not like, something that could not be seen or scented. But the mare could feel it and she pawed agitatedly at the earth.

In her sleep, Sarah cried out. She dreamed that she ran along the riverbank, trying to catch a great white bird that fluttered always out of reach. Its flight was jagged and uneven, and it wept tears of blood as it flew. Where each one fell to the earth, a thorny vine sprang up, tearing at Sarah's face and hands as she ran and cutting her feet to ribbons.

Rael groaned in pain to see it, even though he knew it was not real. But what did this mean? He longed to call out, to wake Sarah from this dream of death and darkness. But he could not turn his eyes away from seeing what happened next.

Ensnared upon thorn-vine and bleeding, Sarah fell behind and the white bird flew on, crying hoarsely in the darkness. It dipped crazily over the treetops, losing height until branches slashed and tore at those soft wings. As it fell, it began to change, twisting and turning in the air and keeping barely aloft until a battered, broken thing landed hard on the riverbank. Pale golden hair and bare limbs gleamed in the moonlight, streaked with blood. Half-lidded with pain were a set of eyes that did not match...

Now Rael shattered the dream with a cry. Now he felt a surge of emotion sweep over him like a riptide. It was not love or desire that bore him away on clouds, but jealousy and disappointment, rage and misery. Always she dreams of this one, he howled to the star-filled sky, Am I never to have what I want?

As if in reaction, Sarah whimpered, bringing the King of the Dead sharply back into the present. A grey light rose in the east, and he fled with the dawn and Sarah's awakening.

Wounded and angry, Rael retreated back to the Underworld. He seized his precious collection of dream fragments and flung them from him in fury. They scattered like a flock of bright-winged birds, rising up through the air until they could no longer be seen. But the Goblin King's forgotten dream he locked up in a box of iron, and Rael buried it deep in the dark earth.

And he grew a little colder and a little harder. And he waited.

Flames sprang up in the hearth, and Sarah gave a small scream. Sprawled across the bed in the corner was the Goblin King, his face white and his eyes like burning coals. He'd torn open the collar of his shirt, the pieces of cloth were gripped in one tightly-knuckled fist.

"Something is happening." he said in a strangled voice, "It has begun. Gods, I can feel it like a blade through my heart--"

Outside there was another loud crack and a groan as another silverwood toppled, this time so close that the very ground shook. Jareth's face twisted in pain, his back arching until it no longer touched the bed. He forced back a moan, turning his head into the pillow until his breath came in ragged gasps. Sarah ran to him, laying her hand across his forehead. He flinched from her touch, but turned his wild eyes to her. They had changed, now pale as winter and focused on nothing. Blood ran from his lower lip where he'd bitten it through.

"We're dying." he whispered.

The King of the Dead felt each spirit's passage into the Underworld. He could not help but feel them, like a nearly inaudible hum that sounded constantly in the background. At first, Rael thought it would drive him insane, but centuries of waiting had accustomed him to it so that he no longer paid attention. This spirit's passing was different, its arrival sang through the air like the plucked string of a harp, bright and golden sweet. Something in his hard heart quivered in anticipation.

"Yes." breathed the King of the Dead. "Yes..."

It was a dream. He stood on the banks of the river Merandanon at night, watching its waters tumble soundlessly on and on. A procession of people cloaked all in white wound their way through the trees, walking past him as if he wasn't even there. The women wore tiny silver bells on their fingers which they rang so the sound carried clear over the water. The men held flaming torches high, and each person wore a curious painted mask. Some had horns and hooked noses, others had twisted leers and haunted eyes, each more mournful and grotesque than the last. The torchlight flickered across them, and their expressions seemed to writhe and change in the shadows.

Last of all in the procession was a group of six, cloaked and veiled in pale gray so that Jareth could not tell if they were men or women. Between them, they bore a gold litter draped in crimson silk, upon which lay a figure whose face was covered with a cloth of purest white. The procession stopped by the water's edge before a slim boat made of reeds and the six waded out into the river, placing the litter softly upon it as if their burden would break. With gentle hands, they set it adrift, the current carrying the boat and its burden swiftly away. The six lifted their heads and keened softly to the wind, lovely, androgynous faces faintly outlined beneath their gauzy veils. The men and women followed suit, a low wail raising from each throat until it became a bleak chorus.

"Who is it you mourn?" he asked one of the women, catching her wrist as she passed by.

She looked at him, gaze impassive behind a mask painted a pale violet with a single midnight tear under one eye.

"Don't you know?" she said. "The Goblin King is dead."

Rael waited on the riverbank in the grey dark, watching the water tumble ever on and on, chill and black as a starless winter night. No ferry was in sight, only the boundless fog obscuring the boundary between this world and the next. He waited, leaning on his iron greatsword with his white cloak wrapped close about him. All was still, an unbroken hush with every sound dampened by the murky haze. Rael cast his gaze upriver, biding his time until he felt it, the slightest breath of air like the ghost of a breeze. It brought with it the scent of moonlight over water, soft and cooling on his face. He waited.

Then he saw it, the outline of a high prow silhouetted in the mist. It was a little boat strangely fashioned out of reeds, riding low in the water as if it bore a heavy burden. As it came closer, Rael could see a pale nimbus of light around it, a luminous beacon drifting through dark waters. In the boat was a gold and scarlet litter bearing a still figure draped in shining white silk.

Rael waded out into the river, the inky water swirling around the tops of his boots all without seeming to touch him. With a shaking hand, he uncovered the face of his rival. The Goblin King lay as if asleep, but his face was pale in death. He was clothed in black from head to foot, gloved hands folded over a silver sword bound with black ribbons. At the sight of that bright blade, he felt a jagged stab of pain through the left side of his chest and Rael hissed in surprise. From somewhere in his mind, he thought he heard unbalanced laughter.

Though the Goblin King's form lay cold and inert, an angry spirit raged within. Pent up in his lifeless shell of a body, he howled and wept at his passing and powerlessness. Rael marveled to feel it. This one did not let go of life easily, and even in death he fought to be free, to return to the place he'd left. In the aboveworld king's near incoherent grief, Rael could discern one word above all the others...

Sarah...

The King of the Dead allowed himself a small, dead smile.

"She left me," he whispered to the Goblin King. "But you will remain. Forever."

It took him three days. He did not return to the village, but lived in the woods like a wild thing, drinking from the forest streams and living off roots and the last withered berries of autumn. Once he'd even suceeded in snaring a rabbit which he ate raw, gagging as warm gobbets of flesh slid down his throat. But it did not matter, because he had what he needed.

The night of the third day found him crouched in the rotted hollow of an ancient tree deep in the woods. He'd seen the light of torches the night before, heard the cries of the villagers and his master. They were looking for him.

Rael closed his eyes, dizzy with hunger and thirst. The hollow was filled with the scent of earthy decay and damp leaves, and if he listened carefully, he thought he could hear tiny insects boring continuous tunnels in the wood. It was the faintest of sounds, like thousands of tiny footsteps on gravel. Rael was exhausted, and he wrapped his arms around his body for the meager warmth they could provide. Dried blood was crusted beneath his fingernails, on his hair and scalp, and in every crevice of his skin. He did not want to think where it came from.

From far away, he heard them calling. They would find him soon enough, or at least find the skinless, eyeless horror that now hung from a tree in the clearing outside. Jaws agape and gathering flies, Rael could not bear to see how its bloody limbs glistened wetly in the moonlight, a monstrousity of what it had once been. But he did not need to look, because he knew its every detail. It had taken him three days.

Master Sebastien had told the truth. There was a price to pay, and Rael would pay it.

The man slouched in a corner, knees drawn up and head resting on his folded arms. Although his clothing had once been fine, it was now tattered and threadbare, as if it had seen the passing of a hundred years. Faint bruises wreathed his neck and slender wrists, and there was a large patch of what might have been dried blood on the sleeve of his shirt. He was exhausted, near-crippled with weariness and pain.

But he was not broken.

"We have all of eternity, Goblin King." Rael said, flexing his gauntleted hands.. "You and I."

"A most distressing thought," agreed Jareth, his voice muffled. "Particularly since your hospitality seems somewhat lacking."

"Do you laugh, even now?" The King of the Dead spoke from behind the skull half-mask that covered his face and hid his eyes and intent. "There is no one here to witness your courage."

Now the Goblin King raised his head, white and sick but his mouth twisted in scorn. "Nor your cowardice."

Rael clenched his jaw. Such swaggering bravado, after all he'd done to this... nothing. But his prisoner was not yet finished. The aboveworld king fixed Rael with those strange eyes of his, the light in them undimmed.

"And you," Jareth asked quietly, "Do you wish there was someone here to see what you've done?" Here he paused and let his next words sink in with a vicious twist. "Or are you glad she is another world apart from us?"

The King of the Dead had cause to be glad of his mask then, or his prisoner would've seen his expression contract with the pain of remembrance. But what he felt could not be hidden from this man, for their misery was one and the same. Still he cursed the Goblin King for his insolence in daring to mention her. Rael did not want to hear this man speak of her. He could not bear it if this man spoke Sarah's name aloud the way he'd said it in his mind, anguished and possessive. Rael wanted to sound strong, but when he spoke, his voice sounded hollow, as it always did when he spoke through the mask.

"You make accusations of cowardice, but you are the weak one."

"Cowardice and weakness are not the same." replied the Goblin King. "I am weak now because I am your prisoner. But this," He held out a ragged, bruised arm, "is the deed of a coward. She would despise you for it if she knew."

If he were not already dead, Rael would have killed him right then and there. He wanted nothing more than to seize that neck in his hands until the last breath rattled from the Goblin King's throat. But Rael remained icily calm.

"What do you care for her regard? You know what it is my heart, but I also know yours, Goblin King. It is no great enemy you face, only yourself. But you cower behind words like fate and destiny, like a child whimpering at the dark. You were afraid to live, and now you are dead and she is beyond your reach. She might condemn me for what I have done, but I would never deny what I feel out of fear."

"Then you would be a fool." replied the Goblin King angrily. "A wise man knows what he must fear, even when it comes in the guise of temptation."

He is a selfish, frightened fool, realized the King of the Dead. One who is not brave enough to understand that great reward is only won through great risk. And yet this is the man who haunts her dreams. Rael knew better than anyone what risks a man could take, and how far he could fall. He thought of Sarah. She does not yet know she loves him, but she will mourn him. She will spend the rest of her mortal life longing for something she cannot define.

Jealousy and envy gnawed at him, bitter and hateful. His reply was hard, with an edge like honed glass.

"You talk too much, Goblin King. All your suffering has taught you nothing of wisdom or prudence. But we have all the time in the world for you to learn."

Rael raised a heavy hand and the mists seemed to thicken, but such a mist it was... Innumerable tiny teeth and claws it had, red-pupiled eyes that searched and hungered. Jareth braced himself for the assault, curling up as tightly as he could. He shielded his face and eyes in grim silence, bending all his thought into a single narrow beam, a solitary image that would keep his mind whole through the torment. Around his body, the mists swarmed like a cloud of angry insects, biting and suckling the way to madness.

The rider was dressed all in white. White breeches that fit her like a second skin, open-necked shirt, and a snowy cloak with the hood pulled well over her face. She bent low over her mount's back as they sped along a desolate road, the bleak, treeless landscape winding away behind them. To either side, towers of jagged rock burned black against a sickly yellow sky, the crags wrapped in a choking fog that swirled past the horse and rider.

She was not aware of her surroundings at all, she only felt the dull, pounding rhythm of the horse's hooves on the road. Doom, doom, they seemed to drum, like the hammering of her own heart. She could think of nothing but riding as hard as she could, toward a destination and a purpose she did not yet know. After a time, they came to a wide river with waters like the very night. The current ran swift and deep past its banks with no sound until it vanished into the mist-wrapped beyond.

The rider dismounted as easily as if she'd been in and out of the saddle all her days. Her step brimmed with a confidence she did not feel, as sure and proud as a warrior's. Although she did not reach up to touch it, she knew that a plain circlet of iron with a single sapphire set in it bound her brow. The chill weight of it and its ominous presence was a constant whisper, an inaudible dark song that was an unwelcome distraction. The rider could not be turned aside now. She had a quest to fulfill.

"Boatman!" her voice rang out across the water. "Come and earn your keep!"

Dying was like drowning, being dragged down from the light into the darkness. It had been torturously slow, with everything slipping between Jareth's fingers the harder he tried to hold on. Then when he opened his eyes to the Underworld, the King of the Dead was there-- gloating behind his death-mask, the scent of cold stone and earth hanging from him like a winding cloth. That awakening was the worst part of it, when he knew himself to be lost.

This is not real. This is only illusion.

Body curled so tight he thought his bones would crack, Jareth tried to reason with himself, to set himself above the pain. Logic told him that if he was dead, he had no flesh to bruise or bloody, only incorporeal spirit. He should feel neither pain nor anger, he should feel... nothing at all. While that was an appealing prospect, he had long since discovered the error of his assumption upon entering the Underworld.

The needle-like pain was almost monotonous in its constancy, and he could not tell how long he had borne it. His skin felt blistered and tender, his limbs strangely light. At times he wavered between despair and delirium, unsure if what he saw and felt was truth or fantasy. Everything in this place was disconnected and unreal: light without sun, flesh and feeling without life--and through it all, pain without surcease... Jareth thought he would go mad.

To anchor himself to what was left of his sanity, his thoughts skimmed through his life's memories, skipping like a stone over the water to flash upon random images until his last hours. Jareth remembered lying on his bed in the cottage, the dying fire and the scent of smoke and ashes. In the cold and the dark, death crept up on him slowly, the emptiness of the room closing in upon him like the walls of a tomb. Sarah was gone. He did not have to open his eyes to know it, he could feel her absence as surely as he knew he was going to die.

If the gods were kind, she was already on her way back to the goblin city, where she might find refuge and solace for a while even if she could not make her way back Aboveground. Let her last hours be not cruel, he thought. Grant me that if you can give me nothing else... That was his sole regret-- that he had not been able to ensure her safety. Then he'd heard her calling to him, although he could not tell if it was real or another dream. She must not find me here, he'd thought blearily. I cannot let her in. With the last whisper of his strength, he'd reached out with the power, braced against the beams of the cottage until the timbers groaned in protest. He sealed every crack and window, then barricaded the door. Already he could feel her battering against his shields, her efforts clumsy but astonishingly powerful. Go home, Sarah. Forget about the Labyrinth. And he pushed.

It cost him everything. In one final blinding burst of light, his vision was gone at last, leaving him nothing but darkness. He was numb to the sensations of his body, that pale, twisted thing discarded on the bed below. Sarah's call caught him halfway between life and death. Illusion or not, how she said his name would always sweetly pierce him to the core, an exquisite pain he wanted to feel again and again. That voice was the last thing he allowed himself to take, clinging to it like a shining thread following him into the abyss.

"Do not think of her, Goblin King." hissed an angry voice in his ear, harsh and grating like the buzzing of flies. "I can feel it when you do. You do not deserve to think of her."

As if to punish him, the swarm's intensity increased tenfold, and Jareth thought the agony would surely crush him. Its presence was suddenly suffocating, and something feral and angry rattled him, like a beast in a cage. He spoke the word that would infuriate the King of the Dead, knowing it would bring him pain because it brought Jareth pain.

At first it was only a hoarse whisper. "Sarah."

The King of the Dead recoiled, his anger like a clap of thunder.

So Jareth said it louder, twisting away from the King's punishing grip, shutting his ears to his roars for silence. Jareth screamed it until his throat was raw, each repetition like a jagged thrust of a sword blade into his own belly. The anguish made him feel alive again.

Powerful hands closed upon his neck, crushing his windpipe and choking off his wild cries. The King of the Dead was standing over him, breath like an icy draught and the glittering eyes behind his mask like a mad creature's. Was it possible for him to die again? Jareth thought he might soon find out. But already it was too late, from far away came an answer as bright and piercing as the clarion call of a silver hunting horn from out the dark woods.

Jareth would have cried out again, but the hands around his throat were unyielding, and it was like breathing fire. As his awareness trickled away, he was not sure if what he heard was anything more than the thunder of blood in his ears.

My love, I come...

At first, there was nothing except the road. Rael put one foot in front of the other, his steps silent on the fine, white soil that marked his path. If he looked behind him, he could see his trail of footsteps disappearing over the hill, each perfectly preserved in the dirt. All around him was gray fog, and it smelled of woodfires and ashes. He could hear nothing, not even the sound of his own breathing.

At times the silence was so deep and consuming that he wished he could scream just to break it, but he did not dare. Something in this land forbid it, deadened all strength and feeling until Rael's body felt full of lead. The only thing that kept him from collapse was the occasional glimpse ahead through the mist, the slender silhouette of a girl with one long braid down her back. But Morwen did not turn, did not speak. Her footsteps left no impression on the path. They walked for what seemed an eternity. Rael wanted to call out to her, make her turn so he could see her face, but his voice died in his throat.

Bit by bit, the landscape lightened until he could make out a bleak hall just ahead. Timbers as thick as a man's waist rose up from the ground, but the roof was a vaulted structure of human bones. The shade of the girl disappeared into the hall, and Rael could not help but follow. Inside was dim and cool, and the doors closed noiselessly behind him.

He could not see her. Panic gripped him for a moment and he became aware of the reek of sweat on himself, overlaid with the coppery scent of blood. At his appearance, a slow murmur began to gather in the hall and something stirred the shadows like the murky water of an abandoned well. The first wraith brushed lightly against him, like the wings of a butterfly but cold, so cold. Rael's teeth chattered, sweat ran down the sides of his neck, rivulets down through the hollow of his collarbone.

And then he felt it, the first tentative icy lap at his skin, followed by more and more. Now he could make out faces in the mist, empty eyes and grasping hands, open mouths... They could smell the blood, both on his skin and pulsing underneath. Before he could move, he was surrounded, dozens of chill tongues sipping delicately at his skin like hummingbirds sucking nectar from a flower. Rael thought he would surely scream then, shriek until he was mad. But he forced himself to close his eyes and remain still. He would let them take from him. This too, was sacrifice. He did not know how long he stood there, trembling with fatigue. But he was startled when a voice spoke out of nowhere, satin-smooth and cold as frost.

"How utterly fascinating," it said, "And how did you find your way here?"

He opened his eyes. Before him stood a tall man, his hair and clothing all snowy white but his face smooth an unlined. A circlet of dark metal gleamed dully on his forehead and strapped to his side was the largest sword Rael had ever seen. Beyond him in the shadows was the pale shade of a young girl with eyes the color of summer leaves. They seemed to gleam in the low light, but he could not see her face.

"Clever mortal, to make it thus far," said the King of the Dead, "But perhaps not so clever. The price of entering my kingdom is death, young one. Did your master never tell you that?"

Rael swallowed hard. "I've... I've come to bargain with you. For her."

"Amusing thought. Out of all kingdoms, mine is the greatest, for all men must bow to me in the end. What could a mere mortal possibly offer?"

"My life for hers," said Rael desperately, "Only let her live and take me."

At this, the king laughed, and it sent the wraiths fleeing for the shadows. "But your life is already mine to dispose of as I please. What else?"

Rael's mouth was dry as sand now. He had not thought so far ahead, part of him had simply believed it would be easy to win Morwen back. He'd made the sacrifice, endured the hardships... he'd thought that was all that was needed. Now it was all for nothing.

The king watched him in silence. He leaned toward Rael, stroking the curve of his cheek with a gaunleted hand. Then he smiled, but it did not reach those ink-black eyes.

"I'll make you a deal."

Rael could not recognize what he'd become, and part of him cowered in horror at all his actions gone awry. The Goblin King lay curled at his feet, quivering and under the assault he'd inflicted. The voices of the dead were like shattering glass in his ears, wailed condemnation that stung him until he knew no rest nor peace. It was as if Rael had become two men, one gibbering and guilt-ridden in a corner of his mind. This is forbidden, it lamented. We have a duty to the dead, we cannot...

But his darker half extinguished protests with clinical ruthlessness. He will pay. As we have paid. His mind eaten away like rotting wound, this King of the Dead drank in the scene with relish. He wanted to crush this pale creature who'd stolen from him, wanted to see this thing broken beyond repair. It was like battle-madness, he was blind with the lust and desire to crack bones and suck out the bloody marrow. More, it whispered greedily. Give him more.

But what was this? The creature still moved, still defied him. Now its lips were forming a word, something so quietly spoken that it drifted up to him like smoke carried on the wind.

"Sarah..."

The King of the Dead recoiled, raising his clenched fist to strike the creature down. Something broke loose in his head and howled. Do not speak her name. Never speak her name to me again. He struck the pathetic thing crouched on the ground, struck at it again and again, but still it spoke, shouted... screamed.

To silence it, he put his hands around the creature's throat and squeezed. In his red-eyed madness, Rael sometimes thought it was Sarah's white throat crushed between his fingers, but he could not stop. He felt so cold and he did not want to stop...

And then he heard it. Something was approaching fast, like a ship driven by an approaching storm. It was she, there could be no other. Rael stared down at his prisoner, so white and still.

Clever creature, snarled his dark half. I should have silenced you sooner and scattered your spirit to the four winds.

Quiet! he screamed into his own mind. A summons, gods, he has done it...

The thought was like waking suddenly from a heavy sleep, and Rael felt the madness leave him, draining away like the last dregs of wine in an upturned goblet. The broken man at his feet did not move, and the King of the Dead swept him up like a limp rag . All his rage turned to ice and dread. She cannot come here. She cannot find him.

Rael raised his hand to his face, and he remembered. He must leave this form behind, take on the mortal form he'd carefully created when he'd first seen Sarah. Dull hope flared within him. There was still time, he could court her with kindness, make her forget...

But he did not change.

No, he cried in anguish. He didn't want Sarah to see him, not like this. But try as he might, Rael could not shed what he had become. Now the armor was a part of him, it fit as closely as his own skin. The dread skull helm was the only face he would be able to show her, this living, stumbling half-horror of a dead man's bones.

Ah, my Sarah, he wept. I did not want it to be like this.

"I have waited long for this moment." Smiling, the man gestured and between his fingers appeared a deep red rose. "Take your place by my side, rule with me. You will be my equal in all things, no head shall remain unbowed and no door unopened to you."

No door unopened... Something about that set off a tiny alarm in Sarah's mind, but she could not think over the sound of his voice. He held out the rose to her and its cool fragrance reminded her of moonlight. She would be Queen of all the world... Isn't that what she wanted?

Sarah stretched out her hand to take it when the sight of her upturned palm caught her cold. A thin red scar traced from just below her first finger to the bottom of her palm where it met the wrist. Her eyes widened at the sight of it and brought back to her an image of blood staining the reflection of the moon in dark waters. The memory of it burned like fire and suddenly everything was clear.

She dropped her hand abruptly, clenching it to her side.

"Give me the Goblin King."

He'd hidden the aboveworld king well, but in the end Rael had no power to refuse her demand. It was his most private place, a garden as most like the world above as his memories and power could make it. In one corner bubbled a spring, cold and clear, its waters streaming through the garden and feeding the roots of a flowering tree. Tall and slender, its leaves were the color of Sarah's eyes, its blooms the white of her skin, the smooth bark as red as her blood. No breeze stirred its branches, but it dropped ivory petals like the rain, each one fluttering down to alight on the grass. Beneath the tree was a large stone tablet, and lying on the stone was the Goblin King.

Rael offered her power. A throne, a kingdom to rule side by side. He tempted her with peace and prosperity for the aboveworld kingdom she loved, even though Rael had no power to bestow it. But he knew now that he would lie. He would whisper any falsehood with a smile if she would only turn aside from the sleeping Goblin King lying on his tablet of stone-- if she would only stay. The armor that sheathed his form was a wall of ice, and inside it Rael mourned in his prison.

Stay, he pleaded silently, the words trapped within him, Do not make me deceive you. Choose me of your own free will, and I will do all you ask of me. Fear me, love me... Do as I say and I will be your slave...

Where had he heard those words before? Rael did not know. But they were not the words he could say aloud, he could only gaze out from behind his nightmare of a mask. It was in vain, because Sarah did not reach out to him. Power did not sway her, his devotion frightened her. But there was one more thing he could offer her, one the aboveworld king could not.

He was King of the Dead and he summoned a shade for her, the shaggy beast with the mournful eyes. He watched hungrily as she took an involuntary step toward it. I have her.

"Ludo!"

She was so close now that he could see the wisps of hair curling at her temples. He wondered if the Goblin King had ever been this close, if he had bent down to brush his lips against that soft skin. Rael sent an investigative thought over to his rival, lying so stark and somber on his bed of cold stone. But the Goblin King slumbered, his spirit wrapped in drugged oblivion.

Rael allowed himself to hope anew. She was so close, all of him strained to touch her just once. He had never touched her, had never dared. But that uncertain light in her eyes and the way she stood, unmindful of the cold and dark...

With one fingertip, he traced a trembling path down the length of her arm until it met the tender skin on her inner wrist. There he paused, that small point of contact a growing heat that drew the cold from him. High up on the left side of his chest beneath the shell of armor, he felt the sword wound burn, and grasping her slender wrist he pressed the tip of his finger firmly to her flesh. As you have marked me, I now mark you. Her heat was almost unbearable, but Rael could not pull away, and he did not care if it consumed him whole. This is what the sun feels like, he triumphed. She could feel it too, he felt her go still and hold her breath. My love, it is time.

When he whispered to her, it was a sweet persuasion that curled around her like smoke from incense, a heavy perfume to cloud the senses.

"You must choose, Sarah."

"You must choose."

"I cannot."

"You can." The King of the Dead leaned back on his throne. "The choices are simple, young one. Stay or return to your world. Alone."

Rael shook his head in frustration. "I can't choose if you won't tell me what that means."

"If you return to your world, you gamble with life and death. If the villagers find you, you will surely hang for your crimes. But you might escape... and live."

"Not without her." said Rael desperately. "Please--"

"Then you agree to stay and accept my conditions."

"Tell me what they are."

The king's reply chilled him to the bone. "That is not part of the bargain, mortal."

Rael shivered, rubbing his arms for warmth. "This is no choice, then. It never was."

"That is where you are wrong." The King of the Dead gestured in the air, and a heavy goblet of worn silver appeared in his hand, brimming with a dark liquid Rael could not identify. "We always have choices. You chose to give up everything you had on earth for this girl. The question is, will you risk it all?"

"I have nothing left to risk, save my life."

The king smiled as if something greatly amused him. "Oh, but you do. Just one more thing."

"You know I can't leave without her."

The king said nothing, only waited.

Rael was no fool. There was too much he did not know, the king was too sure of himself. Yet what choice did he have? He glanced over to the the silent wraith of the faceless girl in the shadows. She had not once moved or spoken since they'd come to the great hall. But even so, he could feel Morwen's eyes upon him. He could not abandon her, and so he looked back at the King of the Dead.

"I will stay. Do what you will."

The king held out the cup to him. "Let us drink. Then call her name. If she comes to you, then she is yours. But I must warn you," he cautioned as Rael took the cup, "The dead have short memories."

"She will remember me."

Rael kept his eyes on Morwen's shade as he raised the cup to his lips and drank. It was not wine but water, colder than anything he'd ever tasted. It numbed his tongue and throat, and when he'd swallowed a mouthful he felt frozen inside. He set down the cup with shaking hands, then the king took it up and drained the remainder in one long draught.

"Call her." His smile was wolfish, touched with pity and contempt. "And see if she will come."

"She will come." Rael's voice stumbled along, burred and rough. The girl's shade had grown bright and more substantial than ever, and now he could see her face. She was weeping.

"Go on," said the king, soft and encouraging. "Say her name."

"I--"

Rael could not remember.

He blinked as if he'd woken from a dream. Before him stood a slender youth with black hair that fell to his shoulders. He looked oddly familiar, but Rael could not think from where. A cold weight pressed down on his forehead, and when he raised his hand to it, he found it was an iron crown. At his side was a sword with a single sapphire set in the hilt. The strange youth bowed down upon one knee to him. Rael lifted his hand, he was clothed in heavy white silk finer than anything he had ever seen.

"Who am I?" he whispered.

"Don't you know?" asked the youth, lifting a luminous face to him. "You are the king."

Sarah looked down once more at the Goblin King. Faint lines etched his face and brow as if his dreams were not peaceful, and where his shirt opened at the throat, Sarah could see a faded ring of bruises around his neck, so light they were the palest of violet shadows against his white skin.

"My fate is bound to his." she said simply. "I choose him."

No, whispered Rael, his dejection chilling him until he felt leaden, turned to stone. No.

In his grief, he felt himself give way, crumbling like a fortress wall worn down by the wind and rain. He did not care, he let it slip from him like scattering a handful of sand to the wind. What use does a king of wraiths have for an earthly form? It is better this way. As his outer shell distingrated slowly, the girl hid her face from him in horror. Rael sighed. Oh, Sarah. He had no voice now, only sounds like the wind blowing over the winter sea.

Everything you wanted, I have done...

But on her raised arm was his mark, it glowed incandescent and beautiful to his eyes. A little of me shall go with you, he promised her.

You will not forget me. And one day we will meet again...

The End

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