Jareth was bored. Ruling over these simpleminded little creatures had become an uninteresting and very tiresome chore. Their minds had become so accustomed to their simple forms, that there was not much left of them to control. This once lovely city had become wild and unkempt.  Chickens and cats without owners ran loose around the city, sniffing garbage left by careless homeowners. It was becoming as bad as the junkyard beyond the city doors.

            Jareth watched all of the goblins performing cleaning chores within his throne room with disgust, and his eyes came across one that turned his tide of thought.  In a corner of the room sat a goblin female, whose countenance interested him upon occasion.  She even intermittently caused him a feeling of amusement.  Her name was Sooty, for she was covered in the dust from the coals that she carried daily to each of the fireplaces of the castle.  Unlike the other goblins, her face was not completely deformed and barren of a smile… in fact, it was a kindly face, one of peace and understanding. It often perplexed him, for how could one bear such a countenance in this hellish place?

            He did not hear the words she spoke as she combed a young goblin child's hair…

            "The mood has come upon him again, my child.  Do not disturb him."

            He smiled at the young girl she was tending to. Also another lovely part of his kingdom…she offered him amusement daily as he gazed at her innocent face.  She was an enigma, a fluke creation of the heavens…even her life was a wonder to him.

            A sharp pain went down his spine, and he pulled his mind away from his examination of the goblin to concentrate again on problems at hand.

            He looked to his right at the covered painting that took over a large portion of the wall.  The subject of the painting was not visible, but he thought upon it often, knowing by now each detail present upon the canvas.  He swallowed with difficulty…something was at work inside of him.

            The plan…his mind constantly went back to the plan…  A plan concocted to do something to improve his current standing.  Anything was an acceptable action, but nothing was everything else unworthy of acceptance.  The boredom, the constant buzzing of flies as they fed off the carcasses of boiled chickens, the sound of illtuned banjos as numbskulls eased their own boredom by playing them.  It was a sorry sight that had to be remedied.

            And the burning in his chest had grown… a desire to have something that was not his, a desire that had not been satiated for several upon several years; it had come over him again, and he longed to quench it.  She was only a part of it.  At least, having her as his own was only a fraction of his driving force.  He thought he could do without her if it weren't for the wonderful pout she gave when he put an obstacle before her.  That little pout of frustration, that feeling of mistreatment she claimed each time she puckered her lips.  He loved to torture her, just to see her poke her chin up in the air in that haughty way she had, in order to tell him that he wasn't phasing her in the least.  He remembered gazing into her eyes long ago, seeing the flames his spark had ignited within her teenage emotions, and tingling at the thought of making her become so fraught with indecision that even her pout and haughty chin could do nothing to remedy her feelings.

            Torturing her, offering cruelty was an unnecessary cure for his viral boredom, but it was a very large part of his plan.  He had been torturing her for some time now, without her knowledge, and all to gain an end.  Weakening, she had watched things fly by that she had viewed as sacred, and then, in a puff of anxiety, he would take away her memory of the loss.  Piece by piece she became a small refuge of memory, all the more easy to control for his own purposes.  She would be the one to renew his power, and then he would allow her to share it, as a beautiful example of his will.

            He swallowed with difficulty.

            A tremendous feeling of fear and uncertainty came over him.  His control was slipping in a situation of no worries.  He knew his plan would work, and everything was going so well…it was not the plan that inspired this feeling, but he was unsure of the true source.

            He doubled over in pain, but quickly recovered, managing to slip past the gaze of the few goblins in the room as he ran into the hallway.  Something gargantuan and beautiful fluttered in his mind and eluded him, replacing itself, and almost covering itself with the anger and disdain.  He pulled himself alongside the wall, bracing himself with the stone structure as he moaned, not in pain, but in remorse.

            The magic was rebelling again, but why would it rebel now?  Had he not been thinking about the plan for some time now?  Why would it suddenly agree to his scheme?  What did it want from him?

            He clutched his amulet to his chest and spat, "I have control over myself…I have control over her…I will have control over you."