babble horde

Sarah sat hunched over, her tongue peeking between her teeth in concentration, as she carefully added a stroke of watercolour to the paper. Tilting her head, she pondered whether she should leave well enough alone or fiddle with it and risk destroying the work.

Bishop looked up from his work. “Nice nudibranch.”

Sarah blinked owlishly at him. “A what now?” She dropped her brush into the water jar and nudged it further away in the hope that she wouldn’t mix it up with her glass of drinking water. Again.

“You’ve really caught the bright colours.” Bishop nodded to her work. “Your snorkelling trip paid off.”

Sarah hadn’t known what the sea slugs were called, but it didn’t seem right that something so vibrantly coloured could share a name with its terrestrial counterpart even if they were both molluscs.

She’d been snorkeling with Jareth and a handful of goblins in a small sheltered bay. Sarah had expected they’d visit a reef and see coral, but this was more like a deep rock pool. It had seemed void of life when she’d first entered the water until she started to pay attention.

Huge boulders that had long ago fallen from the surrounding cliffs lined the bay and provided shelter for many sea creatures. The obvious of which were the urchins that clung to the rocks, she kicked herself away from them as the gentle swell pushed her near their spikes.

Octopus and eels were spotted lurking amongst the boulders, where they blended into their surroundings, conversely with the kelp that was sporty neon bright slugs. Sarah wanted to touch them, but Jareth had explained that they used stinging cells as a defense mechanism.

As she floated above the sea bed, she watched a small squid dart out over the sand, gasping as they changed colour and seemed to vanish before her eyes.

It took a little while for the fish to get used to their presence. They mostly stayed a safe distance and went about their day, except for the one small fish that must have been attracted to the silver shimmer of air bubbles trapped in her mask. It planted itself right in front of her eyes and moved with her, evading her hand when she reached out, before returning to stare at her. She had to surface to distract it and diving down once more, had been unprepared to see a blue grouper.

“The fish was almost as long as I am tall and it kept nudging me.” Jareth pried an urchin off a rock and it was enthusiastically devoured by the grouper. “I can’t believe a fish has trained divers to feed it.” She’d also learned that aside from urchins, groupers also took an interest in the goblins who had leapt from the inner tube they were floating in to play with the big fish. Jareth had been quick to port them Underground before they became a snack.

“Probably for the best not to see if goblins are edible.”

---

labyfic — drabble #245: jolt
Part of the Balance!verse

“I’ve noticed several slightly singed goblins this morning. Should I be concerned?”

While they didn’t appear to be injured, their clothing and armour showed signs of fire damage. It was, of course, possible that they’d tripped into an open fire, but that seemed to be something that was unlikely to happen to more than one goblin at the same time. A more likely explanation was leaned strongly in favour of arson, but she would have heard if that was the case and the perpetrators would be neck deep in the bog rather than roaming free.

Jareth looked up from his reading. “Pyromania is not a trait exclusive to humans.”

Sarah leaned against a bookcase, arms folded across her chest. “Well, that’s terrifying.” Goblins were chaos, but when they found something that caught their interest, they could be ingenious. Sarah shuddered at the thought of goblins being clever with fire. If that was a possibility, she didn’t understand why the Kingdom wasn’t ashes. “How is anything still standing?”

“We have an arrangement.” Jareth steepled his fingers. “If they wish to indulge their urges unbogged, they may only act Above.”

Sarah frowned. “That’s just making it someone else’s problem.” There was too much potential for loss of life when fire got out of control, not just to people and their property, but the damage inflicted on the surrounding environment and wildlife could be catastrophic.

Jareth shook his head. “They follow strict rules. They can’t start a fire, but they can interfere with a human fire bug.” He materialised a crystal and held it out. “This is their latest escapade.”

Staring into the crystal, Sarah could see an intoxicated young man setting out fireworks. “He shouldn’t be setting up there. That grass is tinder dry.”

“If the grass caught alight, even a light breeze would fan it towards homes,” Jareth agreed. “There’s been a run of extremely hot days, a total fire ban is in effect and fireworks are illegal in his region.”

“That sounds like a disaster in the making without goblin interference. Where do they come in?”

“Keep watching,” Jareth’s smile revealed his sharp teeth.

Sarah saw the man set smaller fireworks in a circle. In his inebriated state, they were aimed anywhere but up. She thought he may have planned to set them off at once, but he stumbled as he lit the first firework. As the fuse burned down, Sarah noticed the firework being moved, just as it went off with a flash.

As expected, its trajectory was not up, but much lower. It shot over the grass, cleanly entered an unexpectedly open car window and zipped about the interior, igniting the firework stash that had yet to be unloaded.

Sarah saw the young man staring dumbfounded at his car’s demise. She could hear distant sirens and guessed that a nearby neighbour had notified authorities.

“While contained, the goblins did manage quite a spectacular show.”

“With no damage to anyone beyond an idiot and his car. I am impressed.”

---

labyfic — drabble #243: scorched
Part of the Balance!verse

It had all started while Sarah was in the studio and had been working with Bishop on a tile commission. He’d asked what she was thinking about based on her goofy smile as she grabbed the wrong colour glaze.

“Sorry,” Sarah carefully placed the bottle down and sighed happily. “Jareth is distracting me and he’s not even here.” She waved a hand around. “He brushed past me as we were getting ready and smelled so amazing that we only just made our first meetings of the morning.”

“That explains the mild panic from one of your assistants,” Bishop chuckled.

Sarah felt her cheeks warm and looked to the ceiling to calm herself. She could smell all the familiar things she associated with the studio, except for one. “You don’t smell.” Sarah held up her hand in apology. “Sorry, I don’t mean that I expect you to smell bad.” She groaned as Bishop snorted at the hole she was digging. “I mean, that I can’t smell you at all.” She cocked her head to the side in thought. “For that matter, I can’t smell Rook either.”

Aside from the odd occasion when the woman had changed forms as she came inside from a run in the rain and left a slight tang of petrichor in her wake, Sarah was certain that was the only time she’d smelled anything distinct from the woman. While she may only have considered the issue when living Above if someone was wearing a strong perfume or had been working out, since moving Underground, she was starting to be able to identify people by their scent before she saw them.

“It’s a security adaptation that started off as a way to confuse and intimidate people when we’re guarding Jareth.” Sarah raised an eyebrow. “We mimic your scent. Specifically, me and Angel do, while Rook and Erich smell like Jareth.”

Sarah frowned. She supposed that perhaps if you got used to your own scent and didn’t notice it, then it could explain why she didn’t recognise Bishop as having a distinct scent. However, as illustrated by her morning’s late start, Jareth smelled so good she would climb him like a tree. While more than happy she didn’t have that reaction to Rook, she didn’t understand why.

“I suspect you’re reacting to more than just smell, but it’s just the familiar part of the equation that you’ve noticed.”

Sarah conceded that this was likely, but did wonder at how useful scent mimicking could be.

“It provides entertainment when the castle has to host inebriated guests.” While they were comfortably housed away from others, there were always some who thought they could seize the chance to ride a Goblin King. “They do get a jolt when your or Jareth’s scent leads them to one of us in shadow form.”

Sarah held her sides in laughter. “I really do not want to know who you’ve frightened.” It did, however, explain why some people had been twitchy when she encountered them later.

---

labyfic — drabble #241: expectation management
Part of the Balance!verse

Sarah wasn’t happy with any of her designs for a range of ceramics about to come out of the kiln. She had gone looking to see if she could find inspiration elsewhere.

She had thought that helping Thadie would provide a useful distraction, but she hadn’t expected to travel beyond the city.

“What are we doing out here?” Sarah asked as she watched several goblins lay out large tarpaulins on the meadow, while others unpacked covered baskets.

Thadie had been quietly enigmatic about their task beyond telling Sarah that it would be mostly supervisory.

With the tarps readied to the goblins' satisfaction, they stood in a group, chattering excitedly as they watched the road. Sarah followed their line of sight to see an approaching coach.

It was the kind of vehicle Sarah would have expected a dignitary to arrive in, especially when she’d travelled in an open cart of supplies with Thadie and the goblin workers. She was more than a little surprised when a tiny goblin exited the coach and without a word, walked over to stand in the middle of the nearest tarpaulin. Before Sarah could question the actions, a rain of petals fell from the sky directly over the goblin. With a resigned sigh the goblin muttered something to another goblin who had hurried over to take notes.

As the petals formed a mound almost burying the goblin, the rain ceased. The tiny goblin waded through the petals to the next tarpaulin and the rain commenced once more.

“Those petals are a different colour.” Sarah also noted that they appeared larger in size than the first batch. As she watched, a group of goblins rushed in to gather up the tarpaulin and carefully decant its contents into one of the baskets, this was carefully labeled and the cleared tarpaulin returned to its place.

“Around this time of year Petal gets a wide array of different flora in her precipitation,” Thadie nodded to the basket. “That was Jacaranda, the next one is a dark red, possibly a rose varietal."

Sarah understood Thadie’s interest in collecting botanicals for her work with pigments, it was the goblin who was creating the collection that raised questions. “Why?” She waved her hand in the direction of Petal who had moved onto a third tarp.

“The nearest we can guess is that she intercepted a curse targeting a child.” Thadie shrugged. “Petal was brought to the infirmary unconscious and suffering short term memory loss.” Sarah grimaced in sympathy. It took a concerted effort to injure a goblin. “It wasn’t until she walked outside that the rain of petals started. She mostly keeps to the castle unless someone needs a fresh supply of mulch.” Thandie smiled fondly at the little goblin. “On the upside, it has given her an encyclopaedic knowledge of plants so we work together a lot.”

As Sarah watched the process repeat, she imagined a swirl of windswept flower petals twisting around a vase and silently thanked Petal for her efforts.

---

labyfic — drabble #239: gift
Part of the Balance!verse

Sarah flopped into a chair, flinging an arm over her eyes dramatically.

“Rough day?” Jareth didn’t look up from his work.

“It wasn’t difficult, so much as…” she waved her hands around. “It just seemed to be never ending. My slate of meetings is almost back on track after the recent problems, but they’ve had to shoehorn a lot more into the day to try and clear the backlog. I just want to soak in a hot bath and not think about work until tomorrow. How was your day?”

Jareth set his papers aside and stretched. “Not dissimilar to yours. This spate of overly packed schedules is running everyone ragged.”

Sarah nodded in agreement. “I feel like I’m close to snapping. My magic has started sparking and I’m struggling to keep it in check. I almost set fire to someone’s hat today. I caught it in time, but may have singed some feathers.”

“They’ll likely blame the goblins for the damage rather than a stressed Goblin Queen,” Jareth chuckled. “Before you immolate any more millinery, I’ve had our meeting secretary reschedule anything that isn’t urgent. He’s been over compensating for the mess his departed assistant caused.”

“I’d almost forgotten he created this mess,” Sarah groaned. “How long did he last before running screaming from the goblins?”

“It didn’t quite go that way.” Jareth grinned sharply.

“Do not tell me that it was the goblins who ran away.”

“They didn’t run. They just got bored and wandered off. Goblins can be surprisingly studious when something grabs their interest, and choosing to teach them how to tie knots proved popular until they exhausted his knowledge.”

Sarah covered her mouth in shock. “How did he think that would be a good idea?”

“I think we’ve established that forethought is not his strong suit.” Jareth echoed Sarah’s baffled expression. “The goblins proved to be excellent students and put their skills to work by very neatly tying their teacher up and leaving him in a basement storeroom. While any vocalisations may have reverberated nicely within the room, the castle interiors are solid enough to ensure his yodelling would not have travelled beyond the room.”

“I might feel more concern for his wellbeing if I wasn’t exhausted.” Sarah wasn’t proud of her lack of concern, but there needed to be consequences for inconveniencing so many people. “How long was he trapped?”

“About a day. One of the kitchen staff came down to fetch something and quickly backed out of the room thinking she walked in on shibari gameplay.”

Sarah raised her eyebrows. “The goblins were that good?”

“They have their strengths and it seems he was a decent teacher”. Jareth shrugged. “He’s in the infirmary at the moment suffering from dehydration and rope burns.”

“Is he driving them nuts too?”

“Surprisingly enough, he’s been exceedingly polite, possibly due to coming from a family of healers.”

Sarah threw her hands up in frustration. “Why would they force him into administration instead of letting him follow his interests?”

---

labyfic — drabble #237: stone
Part of the Balance!verse

It had taken Jareth weeks to uncover the reason that inebriated, young men kept turning up in the Labyrinth when they hadn’t been wished away.

Their drunkenness was both a blessing and a curse. In the state they had been found, they were all happy to hold conversations with inanimate objects, so being returned Above barely dented their alcoholic stupor. Alas, it made questioning them an impossibility if you were hoping for useful information.

Sarah sat in the bower beside Jareth. “You have to admit it was genius.” She sipped her tea to hide her amusement.

“Yes, yes, very clever.” Jareth waved a hand in annoyed dismissal.

The goblins had managed to create a game that seemed to be a cross between a scavenger hunt and a game of chutes and ladders. Sarah had been horrified that Jareth called it snakes and ladders and was relieved the goblins hadn’t taken that name literally or their wayward visitors may have had more of an adventure than a drunken debate with a goblin where wildly different concepts of fouls were in question.

The ladders tended to be actual ladders that let a participant find an item or skip ahead. It was the snake or chute part where they had gotten creative by using fairy circles as portals to penalise a player.

“I don’t understand why they had portals leading Above.”

Jareth pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “I don’t think they do either.”

The problematic chute was supposed to take a player Above, with a second fairy circle in clear sight that would return them to a more distant locale in the Labyrinth to add time to their journey. This was not a problem if you were playing Underground, but it was a different matter if you stumbled in from Above.

“In their defence, it was hidden.” The fairy circle really wasn’t easy to find. Unfortunately, the goblins had failed to anticipate that placing their portal in a park near a popular pub would prove troublesome. Or that more than one person who had been kicked out at closing may have taken a detour through the park, before stumbling off the path to redistribute the evening’s intake of lager in the shrubbery. Heavily intoxicated humans were typically not aware of their surroundings enough that they would notice a fairy circle, and for that matter, they didn’t seem to realise their accidentally stepping through a portal would make hailing a ride home more difficult than usual.

“Fortunately, they were all still in possession of identity documents that allowed me to transport them home.”

Jareth had removed the Above chute from the game and any grumbles were silenced when he threatened to return it, but link it to the bog.

Sarah found it a little sad that there were several young men who had had the greatest adventure of their lives and, not only didn’t realise it while it was happening, but would never remember the time they stumbled into another world.

---

labyfic — drabble #235: bottle
Part of the Balance!verse

Sarah walked into the studio, placing a basket on a free surface before donning her work apron. “I brought dinner.”

Bishop set his work aside and took a still warm pastry from the basket. “You already ate with Jareth?”

Sarah shook her head. “I grabbed something while the kitchen prepared the basket.” Jareth was working on a commission with Rook. When she’d asked if he had time to join her for a meal he’d flashed her a mad grin with his arms wide and made grabby hands in her direction. As said hands were covered in paint, she took that as a negative and had to agree with whatever obscenity that Rook had growled at him. “Jareth is otherwise occupied.”

“How goes his current project?” Bishop helped himself to another pastry and opened the bottle of cider that had been tucked in with the baked goods.

“I think it’s nearly done.” Sarah picked up a piece from a tray of vases. It had a round body, with a small mouth and a white glaze. “You’d think having two people working on the same artwork would be problematic. Their style is almost identical, but I can tell it apart now. This work has a violence to it and Jareth’s side is like he snuck up and slit someone’s throat.” She shuddered at how the work had impacted her.

Bishop foraged in the basket and happily found a muffin. “Where Rook’s side leans more towards bludgeoning someone?”

Sarah nodded. “Exactly. Their victim is still dead, there’s just a different mess to clean up. I really don’t think they have a high opinion of the commissioner, but those who can afford their work Above always seem to be unpleasant.” She picked up a brush and glanced at Bishop. “You really want me to cover this in ink?”

Bishop’s eyes lit with mischief. “Trust the process. Paint it black, then wipe it off. Just the top half.” Sarah raised an eyebrow. “You’ll see the demarcation line once you start to clean it.”

With a shrug, Sarah pulled on her gloves, dipped a brush in the ink and steadily painted around the vase from the lip to midway down. Setting aside her brush, she used a damp cloth to carefully remove the ink. She chuckled in delight at the now darkened spiderweb of fine cracks that covered the top of the vase. “It’s almost magical seeing the effect appear.”

“It is fun the way the ink brings out the crackle glaze,” Bishop agreed. “We’ll ink this batch and then give them a clear glaze to seal it. The morning crew will fire them.”

Sarah reached for another vase. “It’s definitely more elegant than Jareth’s commission.”

“Alas, refined homewares do not make the kind of prices that his work does,” Bishop snorted.

“The obscenely wealthy do seem more prepared to be parted from their money for violence rather than beauty.” Which, Sarah conceded, likely had a lot to do with the contempt Jareth held for them.

---

labyfic — drabble #233: expensive
Part of the Balance!verse

There were Above traditions that Sarah sometimes missed, but she had no intention of foisting them on the Underground. Aside from enjoying the local celebrations that were wonderful in their own ways, experience had taught her that some things were best left alone.

The first time she’d shown her brother how to carve pumpkins she’d been delighted when her drooling goblin entourage had been so enthusiastic about devouring the pumpkin innards she had been scooping out. She should have anticipated that she would then have to negotiate to prevent them from immediately eating the rest of the pumpkin.

In the end she had managed to explain that carved pumpkins sat outside houses as a form of protection until Halloween passed. The goblins accepted this logic in their typical goblin manner and the moment the clock struck midnight, they not only ate Sarah’s carved pumpkins, but all of those in a several block radius of her parents home. As there was no mess or property damage, most of the neighbours assumed they’d been removed by a keen gardener for composting.

Then there was the ritual of trick or treating. They had been surprisingly quick to grasp that they could get away with showing themselves provided they followed the rules of knocking on a door, saying the magic words and brandishing a receptacle.

Escorting Toby through the streets always came with more than the usual complement of goblins on Halloween. A number that grew in subsequent years to the point that the overflow started attaching themselves to other groups of children in the area. Even after Toby had outgrown the practice, Irene let her know that children dressing as goblins never seemed to wane, despite the ever changing fads of other costumes.

The veto on eating the pumpkins had also been extended to the goblin’s hauls of treats. Between the end of collecting and the midnight deadline, there was an active market in trading treats, with some preferring one type and others trying to collect a full set. Sarah was just happy that a large number of highly sugared goblins refrained from indulging Above.

The chaos was only marginally higher than any other day Underground. While having a heap of child sized creatures bounce off the walls Above might have been missed when their own children were similarly under the influence, even the dimmest of humans would eventually notice the headcount of children in their family had increased.

The goblin’s ongoing participation in the annual festivities did adapt over the years as decorations became more elaborate. The neighbours may have considered an increase in their budgets a little onerous when the trade off was limited to the removal of pumpkins, but when their seasonal lawn ornaments and lights were neatly packed up and left at their doors the next morning, they were most appreciative.

Sarah didn’t know if the practice had spread beyond the neighbourhood or how it was explained to new arrivals, but it seemed to have reached a happy medium.

---

labyfic — drabble #231: drooling
Part of the Balance!verse

“You’re back early.” Jareth smiled warmly as Sarah entered the music room. “Did you get any sketching done?”

Placing her sketchbook and pencils on a table, Sarah flopped into a chair and stared at the ceiling. She listened to Jareth tuning an instrument, not dissimilar to a guitar that had more strings than seemed practical, while she gathered her thoughts.

She’d initially rejected Jareth’s suggestion to sketch designs for the ceramics project she was planning due to her lacking drawing skills. However, once he explained that she didn’t need to create the perfect rendition of a flower or landscape, she just needed to take note of a pleasing shape or a particular combination of colours that would translate well to her project, she could see the potential.

“I was down at the river by the arch.” A great tangle of Wisteria had been trained across the river to provide small animals a way to safely access both sides. Sarah wasn’t certain if it was made up of multiple plants, grafts or was some Underground variant, but when it was in flower, it was a spectacular riot of multicoloured, pastel blossoms that dipped down into the water. The way some parts of the display contrasted or blended together had resulted in her devising several colour swatches.

“I didn’t expect to see otters.” They had been swimming in the river, but they kept hopping out to tumble together on the grass.

Jareth plucked a string and adjusted a tuning peg on his instrument. “Someone kept wishing them away. Over the years we’ve managed to gain a stable population.”

“They’re adorable.” Sarah smiled as she recalled the way the otters had been happily playing together on the bank. “After a while of watching them, one would break off and scamper over to greet me.” They stood up on their hind legs, stretching out a forepaw towards Sarah, and were delighted when she extended her finger to touch them. It felt like they were shaking hands and they eventually all greeted her before resuming play.

While she couldn’t capture the otters in all their glory, she found that their sleek curves gave her the inspiration for shapes that she could incorporate into her work.

“It sounds like you had a productive session.” Jareth set his guitar aside on a stand and selected a small mandolin.

“I am pleased with the sketches.”

Jareth raised an eyebrow in encouragement as he started tuning the mandolin.

It had been an idyllic scene until Sarah heard rustling from the Wisteria. She’d assumed it was an animal using the tree to cross, but the otters had all silently slipped into the water. A violent commotion under the Wisteria had the petals shaking loose to wash away in a scattered rainbow. “The otters slid out of the water again with their lunch. I expected them to eat fish, but they had caught something else.” The sound of the adorable creatures happily crunching fairies was something that would haunt her dreams.

---

labyfic — drabble #229: flowing
Part of the Balance!verse

Sarah was curled up in a wingback chair, indulging in one of the surprisingly large number of spicy romances that had made their way onto the castle’s library shelves.

“Something amusing you?” Bishop had kicked off his boots and had his feet up on an ottoman.

They’d been trading snippets of their reading material. Bishop’s was an adventurous tale of piracy with an all female crew and he was delighted about the accuracy of the descriptions of life about the ship. Sarah’s book was a reverse harem trope involving tradesmen.

“It just reminded me of the first time I heard about this kind of thing.” She indicated her book. “I was back home during a school break.” Irene had been catching her up on the gossip, the highlight being a local man getting caught splitting his time with a secret second family.”

Bishop scoffed. “That seems like a lot of hard work.”

“Right?” Sarah shook her head. “That’s what Irene said. Then she added that it would be easier the other way around and how she wouldn’t mind having multiple men.”

“Irene is a dark horse,” Bishop chuckled.

“She needed one to cook, another to clean and one to handle the garden. Of course, she wouldn’t complain if they performed their chores in as little clothing as possible.”

“She played you well.” Bishop was laughing at the image of a scandalised Sarah.

“While I was spluttering about that little bombshell, she hit me with having no interest in touching them, but it would be nice to have some eye candy to rev her motor, her words, before she ravaged my father.”

“That little minx,” Bishop was shaking with laughter.

“Her delighted cackle brought Dad out of the den and then she looked at him like he was edible.” Sarah shuddered.

“What happened next?” Bishop leaned his elbow on the arm of his chair.

“I noped out of there and took Toby to a movie.”

“That’s one way of getting some alone time.”

“At the time I would have appreciated a less traumatic method, but it’s funnier now.”

Chuckling interrupted their conversation and Sarah took the opportunity to admire her husband.

Jareth and Rook were sitting cross legged on a lounge with an elaborately embroidered square of silk as a game board between them. Sarah thought the aim was to move one side of the board to the other, but she still wasn’t certain if each player competed separately, they worked together, or they were at odds against each other.

The game play involved a die and a mismatched deck of leftover cards. She had no idea why the five of cups indicated a crocodile infested river, why a roll of the dice determined throwing a chicken in and why a reverse Uno meant that goblins would clear the way.

“I swear the rules change every time they play. It’s like Calvinball.”

Sarah snorted in response. “I love him to bits, but I couldn’t deal with more than one of him.”

---

labyfic — drabble #227: double
Part of the Balance!verse