Three Sentence Ficathon

Worth it, think you, to teach the mortals - such fleeting creatures - such fleeting lessons? the Labyrinth asked, groaning down to her bones as Jareth winced - his own magic ached with the fractures the girl had lashed into it - and extended himself, rebuilding their world around themselves.

"It is our purpose and our way." Jareth said mildly, sinking down a corner that rippled from rough sandstone to crystal to vines to moss-covered granite as he settled.

And when they fail? the Labyrinth asked, and Jareth conjured a crystal, using it to peer in at the village - one he and his Labyrinth kept the mortals running the challenge far from - inhabited by all those once-human-children, grown and changed now, safe where they had been unwanted or unvalued.

"That is also our purpose," Jareth said softly, and smiled sharply; not all who failed to reclaim their child, or failed the Labyrinth, left with the promise of their dreams - not all left ever, their blood and life seeping into the Labyrinth, "and our way."