Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It happened on a Tuesday—which, in Y/N’s opinion, was offensive. Tuesdays were for burnt toast and bad coffee, not magical abductions.

She’d only muttered something sarcastic under her breath. Something about how she wished she could disappear, or better yet, that her sister would just wish her away and be done with it. She hadn’t meant it, of course. But her sister—jealous, petty, and far too good at repeating things she didn’t understand—had heard.

“I wish the Goblin King would take her away!” she’d shouted.

And the world… shifted.

The floor vanished. The ceiling spiraled. Logic abandoned her like a fair-weather friend.

Y/N landed with a thump—on something that felt suspiciously like moss-covered stone. Her ears rang. Her mouth tasted like copper and surprise.

Then she heard it: the slow, deliberate sound of boots on stone. A voice followed, smooth as silk wrapped around a dagger.

“Well, well,” the man drawled, “someone’s been summoned.”

She sat up, blinking against the dizziness. The voice came closer, and though she couldn’t explain how, she knew it was smirking.

“Let me guess,” she said dryly. “Tall, brooding, overly fond of eyeliner?”

There was a pause—then a short, sharp laugh. “Clever. And accurate.”

Y/N turned her head toward the voice, her fingers digging into the moss as she pushed herself upright. The man—no, not quite a man—was now standing before her. She didn’t know how she knew he wasn’t human, but something in the air bent around him like light around glass. He was too still. Too poised. Too… deliberate.

“You’re the Goblin King,” she said, brushing dirt from her hands.

“And you are the girl who was wished away. Though you don’t look particularly distraught.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” she said. “I didn’t realize being kidnapped required a fainting couch.”

He stepped closer. “Not kidnapped. Challenged. There’s a difference.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Do I get a sword, or just a cryptic riddle and a time limit?”

He grinned, and it was pure mischief. “The Labyrinth. Thirteen hours. Reach the center, and you go home. Fail…” He let that word linger in the air like perfume. “And you belong to me.”

Y/N stood, brushing her pants off with theatrical flair. “I’ve had worse job offers.”

Jareth’s grin widened. “You are delightfully unbothered. Most scream.”

“I don’t scream,” she replied. “I file complaints.”

The Goblin King chuckled again, and for a moment, something sharp in his expression softened. Interest flickered behind his mismatched eyes. He stepped aside with a dramatic sweep of his hand, revealing the high stone walls of the labyrinth behind him.

“Then by all means,” he said. “Complain your way through.”

Y/N rolled her eyes and marched forward, past him, into the mouth of the maze. “Try not to cry when I win.”

He watched her go, head tilted slightly.

“Oh,” he murmured, mostly to himself. “This one is going to be interesting.”

Chapter Text

The Labyrinth stretched before her like a dare. High walls of stone, tinged with creeping moss and whispered menace, twisted in impossible directions. The air smelled faintly of damp earth, old magic, and something sweeter—like peaches bruising on a summer afternoon.

Y/N crossed her arms and stared up—or what she assumed was “up,” given the disorienting angles and warping sky. “Cool,” she muttered. “Escher would’ve had a stroke.”

A disembodied chuckle rustled the leaves of a nearby hedge. She ignored it.

She chose the left path. Why? Because it looked slightly more shady and a shade more suspicious—and in her experience, trouble usually meant she was heading the right way.

⸻

Jareth, in his tower of crystal and illusion, stood before a floating orb, one slender finger tracing its surface. The image within shimmered and spun, showing her progress through the winding maze.

“Most cry by now,” he mused aloud, sipping from a goblet that filled itself with sparkling liquid. “Or beg. Or attempt to bribe the worm.”

A goblin near his boot hiccupped.

“This one,” he continued, eyes never leaving the image, “complains to the architecture.”

⸻

Y/N had met the worm. It had a British accent and offered her tea. She’d politely declined, claiming a prior engagement with survival.

“Second door on the left if you want a shortcut,” it had said.

“That’s oddly helpful,” she’d replied.

“It’s also a lie,” the worm had added cheerfully. “Don’t take it.”

So she didn’t. And as a result, she avoided an illusion that would’ve trapped her in a spiral staircase of endless regret and bad decisions. (Much like dating apps, she later decided.)

Next came the riddle door.

Two stone-faced guardians blocked a narrow passage. One spoke the truth, the other always lied. Y/N clapped her hands once and grinned.

“Finally. A classic.”

She asked her questions, paced a bit, tapped her chin dramatically, then gave up entirely and flipped a coin. She lived by one rule: if logic failed, trust chaos.

She chose right. Quite literally. The path narrowed into a tunnel, then opened into a strange little courtyard full of softly chiming bells and talking hedges that gossiped about her boots.

She stuck her tongue out at one.

“Rude,” said the hedge.

“Flamboyant shrubbery has no room to judge,” she retorted.

The hedge huffed, which was both unsettling and weirdly validating.

⸻

In his tower, Jareth watched as she sidestepped a pressure plate just in time, thanks to a momentary breeze and the faintest click beneath her boot.

“She listens,” he murmured with a gleam in his eye. “She learns.”

He tilted the orb, watching her walk beneath a collapsing arch of vines and bones.

“She doesn’t panic.”

He didn’t like that.

He adored that.

⸻

Further in, the Labyrinth turned crueler—walls shifting silently behind her, paths rearranging, shadows slinking just beyond the corners of her vision. But she kept walking. Sometimes she ran, sometimes she yelled, and once she told a door it could “shove its riddles where the sun don’t metaphorically shine.”

Jareth reappeared briefly around what she could only describe as a swamp of regret. The water bubbled with memories, crooning voices whispering secrets in her own voice.

“Don’t step in that,” he warned, lounging atop a rock as though he hadn’t just materialized out of thin air.

“I wasn’t planning on it,” she said, adjusting her pack and glancing in his direction. “Unless it’s the express route?”

“Only if you enjoy drowning in your own insecurities.”

“Tempting,” she said, “but I’ve already been to high school.”

He laughed, a low, delighted sound.

“You’re enjoying this,” she accused, squinting.

“Immensely,” he admitted.

Then he vanished again—just as a boulder sprouted legs and began chasing her.

⸻

By nightfall—if such a thing could be measured in this time-warping world—Y/N collapsed beside a cluster of bioluminescent mushrooms that hummed lullabies.

She stared up at the sky, which blinked and shimmered with unfamiliar stars.

“This place is trying to kill me,” she said aloud. “And honestly, I think I’m flirting back.”

Somewhere, far off, laughter echoed like wind over broken stone.

Chapter Text

The Labyrinth was unusually quiet.

Y/N had noticed it the moment she stepped through the twisted archway of thorn-covered columns into a clearing that was too… still. No whispering hedges. No passive-aggressive doors. No riddles screeching at her about moral quandaries.

Just a wide, empty circle of stone and moss, with a faint breeze curling around the edges like the breath of something ancient.

Her boots scraped against gravel. She frowned, turning slowly. “Alright,” she muttered. “This is either a trap or a dance recital.”

The wind changed.

With a sharp crackle and a sudden updraft of glittering dust, the air split open above her. Magic fractured the silence like shattered glass, and from that impossibly elegant rupture, he appeared.

Jareth.

The Goblin King descended as though gravity bowed to him. Cloak billowing. Boots barely making a sound. His hair tousled by some theatrical wind that existed solely for his entrance. A crystal spun idly between his fingers, catching the strange light of the realm like a miniature moon.

“Miss me?” he purred.

Y/N folded her arms. “Only like a rash.”

He landed smoothly, a smirk curving his mouth.

“I thought you might be lonely,” he said, circling her slowly, deliberately. His voice was velvet wrapped around something sharper. “The Labyrinth is vast. Cold. Unkind to the unprepared.”

“I’m fine, thanks,” she replied flatly, turning to keep him in her periphery. “Though I did trip over a sentient rock that insulted my fashion sense. You might want to check its manners.”

“Oh, Pebble. He’s got strong opinions.” Jareth’s voice hummed with amusement. “And impeccable taste, mind you.”

She snorted. “Then he’s blind.”

Jareth stopped walking. That crystal hovered now between two fingers, spinning lazily, like he wasn’t entirely aware he was doing it.

“There’s something about you,” he said, almost conversationally. “You’re quite different from the others.”

“The others who got dragged here unwillingly and forced to solve your big magical escape room?”

“Most of them cried.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Do you want me to cry? Is that a weird Goblin King kink?”

He laughed—actually laughed—though he tried to suppress it into something more regal. “You are bold. I like that.”

“Yeah, that’s what all the fairy tale villains say right before trying to marry the heroine or kill her.”

“Why not both?” Jareth murmured with a glint in his tone.

Y/N didn’t flinch. She stared him down—or at least tilted her head in a way that made it clear she wouldn’t be intimidated. His magic felt close here, thick in the air, tugging at the edges of reason. But she held firm. She always had.

He sighed, more theatrically than necessary, and stepped closer.

“I came to offer you… guidance,” he said, voice dropping. “A warning, perhaps.”

Y/N rolled her eyes. “Let me guess. The Labyrinth is full of danger. Time is running out. Betray no one, trust nothing, the usual ominous fortune cookie stuff?”

Jareth offered her a lopsided grin. “Something like that. Only more poetic.”

“And you just happened to stop by to deliver this in person?”

“Oh, I enjoy watching,” he admitted easily. “But sometimes, I find it far more… engaging to interfere.”

He stepped even closer, holding out the spinning crystal. It hovered, weightless, before her.

“A gift,” he said. “For when the road twists too tightly. When choices seem… unkind.”

She eyed it warily.

“What does it do?”

“Nothing,” he said with that infuriating twinkle in his voice. “Yet.”

She took it, because of course she did. Curiosity wasn’t just a weakness—it was a challenge.

The crystal was smooth and cold in her hand, pulsing faintly with energy. She could feel it—not like warmth or heat, but like potential. It hummed against her skin.

“If this explodes,” she said, “I’m haunting you.”

“I welcome it,” he replied. “A haunting from you would be… delightful.”

Then, with a flutter of his cloak and a dramatic whirl of wind, he vanished. No smoke, no flash—just a quiet, sudden absence.

Y/N stood in the center of the clearing, staring at the crystal. It shimmered softly, catching a sliver of otherworldly starlight.

She tucked it into her pocket.

“Creep,” she muttered.

But she smiled.

Just a little.

Chapter Text

The Labyrinth had teeth.

Not literal ones—though Y/N was no longer ruling that out—but metaphorical, creeping ones. It gnawed slowly, not with claws or fangs, but with silence, with stillness, with repetition. She’d taken the same turn three times. She was sure of it. Same mossy wall. Same weeping ivy. Same suspiciously shaped stone that looked just enough like a sleeping cat to make her apologize when she tripped over it.

The sky overhead—if there even was a sky—had stopped changing. The light didn’t shift. There was no sun. No stars. Just a dim, grayish glow that reminded her of hospital ceilings.

And her jokes, once steady armor, began to crumble.

“Oh great, another left turn,” she muttered dryly to the empty path ahead. “Whoever designed this place must’ve been really into crop circles.”

The echo of her own voice bounced back at her—thin, stretched.

She rubbed her arms and kept walking.

The worst part wasn’t the dead ends or the looping corridors or the rude statues who refused to answer her questions. It was the quiet.

The crushing, patient quiet.

At first, she’d filled it with talking. Muttering to herself. Narrating her journey as if she were in a cheesy adventure movie. But even that had grown stale. Now she spoke less. Not because she didn’t want to—but because the sound of her own voice made her feel too alone.

And then came the whispers.

They weren’t always audible. Sometimes just a flicker of breath on her neck. Sometimes a word, half-caught, tangled in the wind: trapped… lost… failed…

Sometimes she thought she heard her name.

Once, she turned a corner and found writing scratched into a wall with something that looked suspiciously like fingernail:

“She made it this far too. And then she didn’t.”

Y/N stopped looking for messages after that.

Sleep came in snatches. She curled against warm stone or tucked herself between roots that wrapped around her like tired arms. The Labyrinth didn’t stop while she slept. Paths moved. Places changed. Once, she woke to find the trees had bent above her like guardians. Another time, her boots were filled with black feathers.

She laughed less.

Until one night—if it was night—when the air thinned like glass stretched too far, and something familiar twisted in her gut.

He was coming.

She sat up slowly. No sparkle this time. No thunderous entrance.

Jareth appeared like fog, seeping from the stones. No flash. Just presence.

“You’re wilting,” he said calmly.

“You’re late,” she replied, pulling her knees to her chest. “Don’t tell me I’m not your favorite damsel in distress anymore.”

“I’ve never liked damsels,” he said, cocking his head. “You’ve always been more of a storm in borrowed boots.”

Y/N didn’t laugh.

He noticed.

“You’ve done well,” he said gently. “Most don’t get this far.”

“And most don’t have your irritating face showing up every five minutes to gloat,” she muttered.

“I haven’t gloated once,” he said with mock-offense. “Not properly.”

She shook her head. “What do you want?”

He knelt beside her—not too close, just enough. She could smell the strange magic on him. Like thunderclouds and silk and something older.

“I’m here to offer you a choice,” he said, twirling a crystal between his fingers.

“Oh good,” she muttered, “a choice. Those are never loaded coming from you.”

He smiled, bemused. “There’s a door. Hidden. Not far. It leads almost directly to the center. A… shortcut.”

“And the catch?” she asked, voice flat.

“Every path costs something,” he said softly.

She looked at him. Really looked.

“You mean me,” she said. “You want me to owe you.”

“I want you to consider,” he replied. “This place—it’s not kind. You’re tired. Alone. One slip and the Labyrinth will eat you alive.”

“That supposed to scare me?”

“I don’t need it to scare you,” he said, voice low. “I need it to wear you down.”

For a moment, the air between them thrummed.

Then Y/N stood. Slowly. Shakily. Her voice was hoarse, but steady.

“No deal.”

Jareth didn’t look surprised. If anything, he looked… intrigued.

He tilted his head, as if studying her, then gave a small bow.

“As you wish.”

And with that, he was gone.

No smoke. No sound.

Just the echo of his magic, lingering like a half-remembered dream.

Y/N stood alone in the darkened path, heart pounding.

She could still feel the crystal he gave her earlier, heavy in her pocket. She hadn’t dared use it. Not yet.

She let out a slow breath, closed her eyes, and whispered to the dark:

“Nice try, Goblin King.”

But even as she said it, her hands trembled.

Chapter Text

It began with music.

Soft at first—barely a hum beneath the quiet drag of her feet over the stone path. Then louder. Rich. Lush. Like violins dipped in honey, like tambourines spun from moonlight. Y/N stopped walking and tilted her head.

She hadn’t heard a song in days.

Curiosity—or maybe desperation—pulled her forward. The stone path curved strangely, arching into a tunnel of ivy where glowing fungi pulsed in time with the melody. She passed beneath them and emerged into something that wasn’t stone or root or the cruel geometry of the Labyrinth.

It was a ballroom.

An impossible ballroom.

Goblins spun in silk. Some tall and graceful, others squat and lumpy. All masked in feathers, beads, bone, and glass. The walls shimmered like frozen waterfalls. Light came from nowhere and everywhere, swirling like warm wind. The ceiling stretched into stars she didn’t recognize.

And they were laughing.

Dancing.

Living.

Y/N stood frozen at the threshold, mouth slightly open. A goblin in a gold-laced mask offered her a drink. Another passed her a cloak of shimmering fabric that melted over her shoulders. She accepted it numbly, intoxicated by the sound of joy.

No tricks, no riddles, no twisted corners.

Just celebration.

It felt like stumbling into someone else’s dream—and not being asked to leave.

She was handed a mask—soft, shaped like a moth’s wings, its edges cool against her fingers. When she slipped it on, the world shifted. Colors deepened. The music thickened. Laughter curved around her like a dance partner’s arm.

“Finally,” said a voice at her ear, smooth and knowing. “You’ve found the heart of the Labyrinth.”

She turned.

There he was.

Jareth.

No crystals. No games.

Just a long, tailored coat, his mask a sleek crescent of dark silver that framed eyes she couldn’t see but felt watching.

“You always have a flair for entrances,” she said, biting back her instinct to roll her eyes.

“And you for disruption,” he replied, stepping closer. “I should thank you. These parties are dreadfully dull without unexpected guests.”

“Do they usually happen in the middle of stone mazes designed to drive people mad?”

He smiled. “They do when I’m in charge.”

Without asking, he offered his hand. It was warm. Real.

She took it.

And then they were dancing.

It didn’t feel possible, but her feet moved like they knew the steps. He guided without force. One hand held hers. The other hovered just at her waist. His touch was barely there, but she could feel it—his presence folding around her like velvet.

The world slowed.

He spun her once, gently. The music wrapped around them, thick and golden.

“I could keep you here,” Jareth said suddenly, voice low. “No more turns. No more tricks. Just this.”

She tilted her head. “What would I be? Another guest at your masquerade?”

He leaned closer, his breath brushing her cheek. “Something more.”

Her heart stuttered.

But before she could speak, the strings of the violins caught—just for a moment. The rhythm faltered.

She frowned.

Another note, this time jagged. The goblin next to her flickered. Not vanished—just glitched, like a reflection in rippling water.

Y/N pulled back.

“What is this?” she whispered.

Jareth’s grip tightened.

“A kindness,” he said, though his voice was more distant now. Strained. “Don’t pull away yet.”

But the illusion was cracking.

The ballroom flickered again. The mask in her hand melted like wax. The laughter warped into shrill notes, the music slowing like a dying music box.

She stepped back from him.

“Let it fade,” she whispered, more to herself than to him.

And it did.

The shimmer peeled away. The goblins vanished like smoke. Her gown disintegrated into rags, and the mask fell in pieces at her feet.

Stone. Cold. Wet.

She was back.

The corridor loomed with its silent, unmoving walls.

She dropped to her knees, breath caught in her throat. Her hands trembled as they clutched the rough ground. The taste of joy still lingered—like a sweet swallowed too quickly and now rotting on her tongue.

She didn’t cry.

But she wanted to.

She felt him before he spoke.

Jareth knelt beside her. No mask now. No glittering cloak.

Just him.

“I didn’t want you to fall apart,” he said quietly.

“You tried to trap me in a dream,” she replied, not looking at him.

“No,” he said. “I tried to let you rest.”

She laughed bitterly. “Same difference.”

A beat of silence passed between them. She could feel his gaze, heavy, contemplative.

He stood.

“When the time comes,” he said softly, “you may wish you’d taken the dance.”

And then he was gone again—like mist, like music, like something her fingers couldn’t quite hold onto.

Y/N remained on the stone floor, heartbeat slowly settling, her limbs heavy with illusion.

But inside her chest, something beat harder than before.

Not because of the ballroom.

Because of the choice she’d made to leave it.

Chapter Text

She was beginning to suspect the Labyrinth had a heart—and that it beat only to spite her.

Y/N dragged herself up the slope of a spiraling stair that led nowhere. The air was heavy with fog that curled low to the ground, clinging to her boots and limbs like fingers. Every step was a question. Every turn, a dare.

It had been hours. Days. Longer, maybe. Time was a muddy thing here.

She ached in places she didn’t know she could ache. Her thoughts came in fragments now, pulled thin by hunger and silence. Her humor—once sharp enough to cut through any trick—was dull at the edges.

And still, she didn’t stop.

Not until she found herself in a courtyard with no doors. No sky. Just walls that curved inward like the throat of something ancient and patient.

She stood at the center and whispered to the stones, “Well? Where’s the next riddle? The next trap?”

Silence.

And then a voice—not from above, not behind, but from within the fog.

“You’ve made it farther than most.”

She didn’t jump. She refused. But her hands did curl into fists.

“Jareth,” she said flatly.

He stepped into the clearing without fanfare, his boots silent on the damp ground. No tricks this time. No sudden flourishes or spinning crystals. Just the Goblin King, dressed in shadow-stitched finery, his hair wild as wind, his expression unreadable.

“Disappointed I didn’t bring a chorus of goblins?” he asked, tone light, teasing.

“I was hoping for a full marching band,” she shot back.

“Ah. I do like percussion.”

Silence stretched between them. She crossed her arms, half to shield herself, half to keep them from shaking.

“What do you want?” she asked.

His voice dropped low. “To offer you something.”

She narrowed her eyes, even though she knew it didn’t matter. The fog blanketed the edges of the courtyard so thickly she couldn’t see beyond her own feet.

“A way out?” she asked.

“No,” Jareth said. “A place to stay.”

She faltered.

“You could be queen of all you see,” he continued, stepping closer. “This Labyrinth—my kingdom. The goblins, the riddles, the wonders… all of it. Yours. If you choose it.”

Her laugh cracked out of her like a stone skipping over a still lake—brief, sharp, and bitter.

“That’s not a lot,” she said, voice rasping. “Considering I can’t see a damn thing through this fog.”

He tilted his head. “Ah. But the fog isn’t what blinds you.”

Something in her chest twisted.

“You think you’re clever,” she whispered. “Offering a crown to someone who doesn’t even know where she is. You want me to stay, not rule.”

“I want you to have a choice,” Jareth said, and for the first time, she heard something new in his voice—something quiet and not entirely armored.

He was close now.

Not touching her, but near enough that she felt the warmth of him, the pull of his presence like a tide that tugged at her bones.

She shook her head. “This place messes with people. Twists them around until they can’t remember who they were before. You think I don’t see what’s happening to me?”

“You see more than most.”

She turned away from him. “I won’t be your pet.”

“You wouldn’t be,” he said simply.

“I won’t be your prisoner.”

“You aren’t.”

Her breath caught.

“I won’t be alone.”

That silence again. Heavy. Real.

Then, softly, he said, “You wouldn’t be.”

She hated how her throat tightened at that. Hated how much she wanted to believe him. Her hands trembled, and she dug her nails into her palms just to feel something.

“I don’t belong here,” she whispered.

Jareth’s voice was quiet behind her. “Don’t you?”

She spun on him, eyes shining—not with tears, not yet, but something just beneath them.

“Why me?” she demanded. “Why pull me into your maze? I didn’t wish myself away. I didn’t ask to be stolen.”

“No,” he agreed. “But you stayed. And you fought. And you made it farther than anyone I’ve seen in a long, long time.”

She stared at him. “Because I want to go home.”

“Where they didn’t want you?” he asked. “Where you were an afterthought—easy to discard with a single, careless wish?”

That stung.

And that, she hated most of all.

“I don’t want your pity.”

“I don’t pity you,” Jareth said, stepping forward again. “I admire you.”

Her voice dropped. “Is that why you’ve been watching? Playing games? Waiting for me to crack?”

“I’ve been waiting,” he said, “to see what you would choose. Not because you’re broken. But because you’re not.”

She exhaled shakily. “You’re not making this easy.”

“I never do.”

She looked up at him, the weight of her exhaustion pressing against her shoulders. “I can’t accept. Not now.”

He nodded once. Not angry. Not disappointed.

But she heard it in his voice when he replied, soft as the fog around them.

“I’ll wait.”

And just like that, he was gone again.

No fanfare. No tricks.

Just the echo of a promise in the mist.

Y/N sank down onto the cold stone, her arms wrapped around her knees, her heart hammering like it was trying to remind her of what was still hers.

She had refused.

But her voice had wavered.

And Jareth had noticed.

Chapter Text

She found the corner by accident.

A gap behind a leaning stone arch, hidden between twisted hedges and narrow passageways that didn’t seem to appear on any path she’d walked before. It wasn’t much—just a hollow beneath the worn lip of a crumbling wall, where moss had claimed the cracks and silence had made its home.

Y/N slipped inside without thinking. She was past thinking. She was past strategy, past jokes, past every brave thing she’d said to keep herself from unraveling. Her legs gave out beneath her, and she folded into herself with a ragged breath.

The fog hadn’t lifted. It never did. But here, at least, it felt still.

For the first time since she’d stepped into the Labyrinth, there was no trick waiting. No riddle. No goblin offering soup made of nightmares. Just quiet.

And her.

Alone.

The sound came without warning. Not a sob—not at first. Just a choked breath that caught in her throat and stayed there, bitter and heavy.

She curled tighter, pressing her forehead to her knees. Her fingers dug into the dirt and moss at her sides. The cool dampness grounded her, even as everything inside tried to float away.

“I didn’t ask for this,” she whispered.

It was the truth, at last. Stripped of wit. Stripped of defiance.

“I didn’t ask for this,” she said again, louder this time, as if saying it twice would matter. “I didn’t do anything.”

Her voice cracked at the edges. Her chest shook. The tears finally came—hot, unwanted things that blurred the lines between fury and grief.

They’d wished her away. Someone she trusted—someone who knew the words and used them like a blade.

And now here she was. Running through an impossible maze with no time, no map, and no way back. Her friends were gone. Her world was gone. And she’d been holding herself together with stubborn sarcasm and spite.

Until now.

Until the silence grew too wide to bear.

She didn’t hear him arrive.

No swirling gust of wind. No dramatic flurry of feathers or shimmering orbs. Just the faintest shift in air. The way the quiet bent itself differently around her.

She didn’t lift her head. Didn’t try to hide her tears.

And he didn’t speak—not at first.

Jareth stood near the arch, silent as the stones. Something in his expression had gone still, the usual curl of amusement softened into something unreadable. He watched her, not as a king surveying a subject, but as a man watching something break and realizing—perhaps too late—that he didn’t want it broken.

When she finally spoke, her voice was hoarse.

“I didn’t ask for this.”

A pause.

Then, softly:

“Nor did I ask for you,” Jareth murmured, “but here we are.”

Her breath hitched.

She looked up at that, half-expecting mockery. A glint of cruelty. But his tone had held no sharpness.

She wiped her face with the heel of her hand. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Jareth stepped forward slowly. No magic now. No illusions. Just the sound of his boots against stone, the rustle of his coat as he moved closer. He crouched beside her, his knee brushing the moss, and rested one gloved hand on the wall beside her—close, but not touching.

“It means,” he said, voice low, “that I didn’t plan for you. That I didn’t expect you. But the Labyrinth brought you here all the same.”

She snorted, bitter and wet. “Because someone wished me away.”

“Because something answered,” he corrected gently.

Y/N frowned. “You sound like you think this place has a will of its own.”

“It does.” His voice had that velvet lilt again—soft and strange, as if he spoke truths that didn’t belong in mortal mouths. “It listens. It shifts. It chooses.”

She scoffed. “Great. An enchanted maze with opinions.”

Jareth tilted his head, a breath of a smile pulling at one corner of his mouth. “It liked you, I think. It doesn’t often play fair with strangers.”

She gave a hollow laugh and wiped her nose. “Could’ve fooled me.”

Silence settled again.

This time, it didn’t feel cruel.

After a moment, Jareth spoke—quieter now, almost as if speaking to himself.

“You’re clever. Not because you solve things. But because you endure them.”

She turned her head toward him. “You make it sound like surviving is admirable.”

“It is.” He looked at her, truly looked—and for a moment, his mask slipped. “You think I don’t see what this place does to people? How it wears them down until they forget their names?”

“And what,” she whispered, “does it do to you?”

His expression didn’t change. But something in the air between them did.

He didn’t answer.

Instead, he said, “You still haven’t asked what the crystal does.”

She blinked. “The one you gave me?”

He nodded. “It does nothing… unless you want it to.”

She drew in a shaky breath. “Another trick?”

“A choice,” he replied. “You’ve had more of those than you realize.”

She turned that over in her mind. Her hands were steadier now. Her chest a little lighter.

“You’re… not what I expected,” she said.

“And you are far more than I expected,” he answered, almost too quiet to hear.

They sat there for a long time, side by side at the edge of the world.

He didn’t touch her.

But he stayed.

And for the first time since entering the Labyrinth, she wasn’t afraid of the silence.

Chapter Text

They sat in the aftermath of unraveling.

The moss beneath her was cold but not unfriendly. The silence was no longer hollow but thoughtful. Jareth lingered, half-seated against the crumbling wall, his presence a quiet gravity—no crystal or illusion, no shifting theatrics. Just him. Just her.

Y/N’s voice was raw when she broke the silence.

“I meant what I said,” she murmured. “You have been cruel.”

Jareth didn’t flinch, didn’t scoff. He inclined his head slightly, the motion subtle but deliberate, like a courtier conceding a point in a dance.

“I know.”

That caught her off guard. No rebuttal. No deflection. Just acknowledgment.

She turned toward him slowly, keeping her hands pressed to the cool earth, anchoring herself. “You took me from everything I knew. You let the maze twist around me. You watched me fall apart and called it entertainment.”

He hummed, not in disagreement but thought. “You’re not wrong. But you are… mistaken about one thing.”

“Oh?”

“It was never entertainment.” His voice was softer now—no velvet curl of mockery, no grand flourishes. Just truth. “It was distraction. There’s a difference.”

She frowned. “Distraction from what?”

Jareth’s gloves whispered against his leg as he shifted slightly. “From being alone.”

The words hung there like dust motes in still air. Fragile. Honest.

Y/N let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. It didn’t excuse everything. But it… explained something.

“All this,” she said, gesturing toward the unseen sprawl of the Labyrinth beyond the hedges, “and you’re lonely?”

He tilted his head up, as if scenting something far beyond them. “This place is mine. Every stone, every whispering corridor. But it is not company.”

“Then why build it?”

He looked at her now, his voice the barest thread. “Because glass and stone don’t leave.”

Her chest ached.

He continued, almost as if confessing to himself. “I tried to fill it—with riddles, with trickery, with masks and mirrors. But nothing ever stays, not really. They either solve the maze and leave… or lose themselves and become part of it.”

“And you?” she asked, quiet. “Have you lost yourself?”

He gave a bitter sort of smile. “Long ago.”

She let the silence stretch again, this time without fear. Something about the way he spoke—so careful, so quiet—made her feel like shouting would shatter him.

And the strangest thing was… she didn’t want to.

Jareth sighed and leaned back against the mossy stone. “You’re not like the others.”

“Because I haven’t begged yet?”

“No,” he said. “Because you haven’t broken.”

“I just did,” she replied.

“No,” he said again, firmer this time. “You cracked. You’re still here. You still speak. You still challenge me, even as you ache.”

She swallowed hard.

The ground beneath her felt less solid, though she hadn’t moved. The Labyrinth was responding again—walls that once loomed now seemed to lean away, giving space. The air felt… less heavy.

“You feel it too, don’t you?” she whispered.

He nodded once. “It’s tied to us.”

She exhaled. “What a miserable thing to be bound to.”

“Not always.”

She turned her head toward him. “Then what is it, Jareth? A prison or a home?”

He hesitated—and that, more than anything, struck her.

“I haven’t decided,” he admitted at last.

And that was real. Raw. Not kingly. Not cruel.

Just a man beneath magic and mask.

She rubbed her arms absently, her skin chilled from the damp air. “I don’t want to be alone anymore.”

The confession came out without thought, without shame.

Not desperate. Just honest.

Jareth turned toward her, something shifting in his breath.

He didn’t speak. Not right away.

Instead, he rose slowly and extended a hand—pale glove, long fingers, steady wrist.

She looked at it for a long moment, then reached up and took it.

He didn’t pull her to her feet. He didn’t press her hand to his chest in some theatrical gesture of claim. He simply knelt back down beside her and drew her gently into his arms.

Not possessively.

Not triumphantly.

Protectively.

He held her like she might vanish if he let go—like she was something that hadn’t belonged to him and never should, but he would guard it all the same.

Y/N tucked her forehead against his shoulder and exhaled shakily. His coat smelled faintly of ozone and dry earth, of old books and something electric. His arms around her were warm, steady.

Neither of them spoke.

And beneath their silence, the Labyrinth sighed and reshaped itself. The stones relaxed. The air cleared just slightly. A path not taken bent closer.

For the first time since she’d arrived, the maze seemed to shift with her instead of against her.

It wasn’t trust—not yet.

But it was a beginning.

And for now, that was enough.

Chapter Text

She felt it before she reached it.

The pull beneath her feet changed—no longer twisting or teasing, no longer nudging her in circles with invisible hands. Now, the Labyrinth guided her forward. A gentle tug, like the last thread being drawn tight in a long-unfolding pattern.

Her steps were slower than when she began, but steadier. No longer desperate. No longer furious. Just determined.

The air shifted as she passed through a final narrow arch, one carved from smooth ivory stone, vines curling around its base like lazy serpents. The space beyond was still—not silent, but deep, as though the walls themselves were holding their breath.

She had reached the center.

It wasn’t grand, not in the way she expected. There were no thrones, no goblin fanfare, no illusions of splendor. Just an open courtyard, a circle of smooth, moon-colored stone. The sky above arced vast and dim—no sun, no stars, just soft grey light.

And him.

Jareth stood at the far edge, hands clasped behind his back, long coat whispering with the wind. When he turned to face her, his voice was warm with amusement and something else, something quieter.

“You made it.”

She stopped just inside the circle. Her body ached, her boots were worn, and her voice felt rasped from use, but she held her chin high.

“Was there ever a real way out?”

Jareth’s mouth curved, not quite a smile. “There’s always a way out. You just have to be willing to see it.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “More riddles.”

“No,” he said, stepping forward slowly. “No more riddles.”

They stood like that for a long moment, the echo of her journey settling around them like falling ash. Her body still bore the remnants of the maze—scraped knees, tired limbs, a heart too bruised to pretend it wasn’t changed.

She was different now. She could feel it in her bones.

She had begun this journey screaming, daring the maze to crush her. But now… she stood at its center and it had not swallowed her whole. It had reshaped her, yes. But it had not taken her.

Jareth studied her with the intensity of a man peering into a mirror and finding something unfamiliar reflected back.

“You’ve done more than solve my Labyrinth,” he said quietly.

She arched a brow. “Did I break your favorite toy?”

He chuckled under his breath, genuine and low. “You broke something, certainly.”

She didn’t know how to answer that, so she didn’t. Instead, she walked to the center of the circle and sat down. Cross-legged. Grounded.

Jareth blinked. “This is… an informal conclusion.”

“I’m tired,” she said flatly. “You want to monologue? Do it while I rest.”

He snorted. “Charming.”

She looked up at him—wary, but not bitter. “You going to try and tempt me again? ‘Be my queen’ and all that?”

Jareth tilted his head, thoughtful. “I could. I still believe you’d be magnificent.”

“And yet,” she said, “I’m still not sure.”

He moved then, slowly, and sat beside her—not looming, not leering. Just… near. His presence was quiet thunder, an old storm long exhausted.

They sat in silence for a while. It wasn’t awkward. It was steadying.

Finally, he spoke. “Do you know what’s at the heart of the maze?”

She tilted her head, curious. “The punchline to your grand game?”

“No,” he said. “It’s where I wait. Always. For whoever makes it through.”

She looked at him carefully. “And has anyone ever made it?”

He was quiet for a long time. “Not like you did.”

Something in her chest twisted. She let her voice drop, serious now. “Then what happens to them?”

He didn’t answer. Not directly.

“You stayed yourself,” he said instead. “You adapted. Changed, yes—but not into something false. You gave this place hell, and it gave you something back.”

She exhaled, slow. “I think it gave me… myself.”

He turned to look at her. “And I think it gave me you.”

That stopped her cold.

She didn’t answer right away. Her hands pressed to the smooth stone beneath her. She could feel her heartbeat in her fingers.

“I don’t want to be someone’s prize,” she whispered.

“And you aren’t,” he replied just as softly. “You’re someone I’d choose—again and again, even when you don’t choose me.”

That silenced the ache in her.

No demands. No commands.

Just… the truth.

She looked down at her hands. Then to the space between them. Then she reached out.

It was small—so small. But her fingers found his.

His hand closed around hers gently. No tightening. No claiming. Just warmth.

Jareth didn’t speak. Not at first. His thumb brushed the back of her knuckles once. A whisper of contact.

When he finally did speak, it wasn’t a declaration or an offer or a plea.

It was a question.

“Will you stay?”

And she—exhausted, uncertain, but no longer afraid—took a breath, and nodded once.

“Yes.”

She didn’t say “forever.”

She didn’t say “queen.”

But she said yes.

And in the heart of the Labyrinth, something shifted again—not loudly, not visibly. But deep, deep down, the stones stilled. The maze exhaled. A throne stood empty no longer—not because it was taken, but because it was shared.

Chapter Text

Time passed—but not as it does in the world above.

In the Labyrinth, time was a more fluid thing. It stretched and coiled, turned somersaults and folded in on itself like paper. The days came and went in no particular order, but within the strange, shifting hours, Y/N found something she hadn’t expected:

A rhythm.

It was not a life of ordinary things. There were no market days or ticking clocks, no routine to tether her to predictability. Instead, she woke to goblins playing horns entirely out of tune, or to silence so deep it hummed in her bones. She dined with talking hedgehogs and mischievous sprites. Some days she walked through endless halls that rearranged behind her. Other days, the castle stood still as stone.

And yet… she belonged.

Not at first. Not easily. The Labyrinth tested her still—gentler now, but ever watchful. There were moments of doubt, when she questioned if she had simply traded one cage for another. But those moments always passed, like storms, and when they did, she found him there.

Jareth.

The Goblin King.

No longer her captor. No longer a riddle she had to solve. Now, simply… hers.

He hadn’t changed—not really. He was still maddeningly clever, still prone to vanishing for hours or days with no warning, still capable of appearing at her shoulder in a blink with a bemused smile and some dramatic flourish of cape or crystal. He still spoke in half-truths and poetry more often than plain language. He still walked like a secret no one else was allowed to know.

But he was always there when she needed him.

Not once did he try to put a crown on her head. Not once did he push her to be anything she wasn’t.

And yet, the Labyrinth whispered its approval. Slowly, where once the halls had jeered at her, they now bent in her favor. The walls no longer shifted to confuse her but to open paths she might enjoy—through flower-strewn courtyards or warm echoing chambers where goblins practiced musical numbers that never ended well.

The goblins, for their part, had taken to her entirely.

They followed her like children. They hung ribbons from her chair at meals and brought her cracked teacups and buttons they thought might be “royal offerings.” They didn’t kneel. They didn’t bow. But they loved her in the honest, clumsy way only goblins could.

When she laughed—and she laughed often—it rang through the castle like sunlight breaking through fog.

And Jareth…

Jareth watched her like a man watching a dream unfold.

He didn’t say the word love often. But he spoke it in other ways. In the way he always passed her the first bite of whatever strange dish the cook had concocted. In the way he tilted his head when she spoke, utterly attentive, even when she was just muttering nonsense. In the way his hand always found hers when they crossed the long halls, or the small of her back when she paused too long beside a stained-glass window.

She caught him once—half-asleep in the library, an open book draped across his chest, and her name whispered on his lips before he stirred.

Another time, when she danced alone in the throne room, barefoot and laughing to herself, she felt his presence appear behind her without a sound. He didn’t interrupt. He didn’t ask to join. He simply watched, silently, as if her joy alone had rebuilt something long broken in him.

He was still the Goblin King. Sharp. Eloquent. Dangerous when he needed to be. But to her, he was also something else—something quieter. A partner. A protector. A man with magic at his fingertips and a strange, fierce devotion in his chest.

She had not taken a throne. Not in the way he once offered. There was no crown on her head. No proclamations. No grand ceremony.

But when she sat beside him in the great hall, goblins sprawled on the floor in chaotic heaps and music drifting in from nowhere in particular, the Labyrinth felt… whole.

As though it had always been waiting for them.

As though she was the missing piece—not captured, not coerced—but chosen. And choosing.

She had once begged to be sent home.

Now she was home.

Here, in a castle of crooked towers and impossible stairways. In a realm where time forgot itself and riddles bloomed like flowers. In a world built of stone and glass and whimsy, ruled by a king who had once been unbearably lonely—and who now, at last, was not.

Late one evening, as storm clouds rolled lazily across the sky and lightning blinked in the distance like a sleepy eye, Jareth stood beside her at the balcony.

“You’ve changed everything,” he murmured.

She smiled, resting her hands on the cool marble rail. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

He turned toward her, one hand reaching out, gentle as dusk. “Quite the opposite.”

And there, with the wind in her hair and goblins singing something horribly off-key below, she turned to him—her sharp, strange king—and whispered, “Then let’s keep changing it. Together.”

He kissed her then.

Not as ruler to subject. Not as captor to prize.

But as Jareth.

As hers.

And the Labyrinth—wild, watchful, ever-changing—stirred around them.

Not to trap.

But to embrace.

And in its heart, two thrones stood—neither empty, neither alone.

Only full.