"There was a barber and his wife... And she was beautiful…" I hear the demon singing over one of his victims. I grip the grate above me and slowly lift it.

I knew Mr. Todd was wrong inside. I knew he was evil. Mrs. Lovett's screams ring through my head. I promised I would protect her… If only she listened to me.

I climb out of the hole, slowly, not wanting to alert the killer of my presence.

"And she was virtuous…" Mr. Todd sings, covered in blood and tears. I reach down and grab his blade from the ground. "And he was…"

I step behind him and drag his own blade across his neck. His blood drips in a red shimmery curtain onto the dead woman in his arms. He deserved this. After what he did to Mrs. Lovett. After what he did to Mr. Pirelli, and all these strangers in heaps by the fire, and in the grinder, and in the pies.

I drop the stained razor and a sob escapes my throat. I run over to the oven, dropping onto my knees, letting the tears fall freely now. Mrs. Lovett is dead. She is reduced to a pile of ash. My savior, my mum, is dead.

I sprawl out on the ground and sob.

I walked confidently out of the shop, a tray of meat pies in my hands.

"Toby, go grab another tray from the basement, these are selling like mad. Mr. Todd will help you." Mrs. Lovett says with a beaming smile.

"Anything for you, ma'am!" I say happily, setting the tray I have in my hands onto the counter. I spin on my heel and run down the steps to the basement. The darkness devours me as I jog to the oven.

I open the hatch and put on heavy gloves. Pulling out a tray, I turn at a sound to find Mr. Todd smiling widely at me, his face and clothes covered with blood. His throat is ripped open into a bright red valley. He pushes me into the fire.

"Toby! Toby wake up!" Johanna says, shaking my shoulders gently.

I feel my screaming stop and bolt upright. Sweat is trickling down my face, and I am trembling all over.

"Nothings gonna harm you…" She sings softly to me, running her fingers through my hair. "It was just a dream, little one. Everything is fine."

I look into her eyes, and she just nods. Anthony and Johanna have taken me in. They have graciously become the closest thing to a mother and father to me that I have ever had.

That day, after I had ran out of tears for Mrs. Lovett, I slowly walked upstairs, just wanting to get away from the death and despair of the past hour. I had gone into the main shop, only to see a boy sitting on the bench, crying softly. I walked up to him, and he looked up at me. I instantly knew that it was no man, but in fact a girl, in disguise. A girl maybe four or five years older than me.

"What's your name, ma'am?" I whisper, barely audible. Tears pool in my eyes again.

"I am Johanna." She says weakly, her tears momentarily stopped. "Who are you?"

"Toby." I say. Then I look back at the door leading to the basement. "We should leave this place. Evil lives here…"

"The man… he murdered Mr. Turpin…" Johanna whispers. "My Anthony will return soon… and we will run away from here… Where are you to go?"

I pause for a moment. This woman knows about Mr. Todd. She is getting away from here, never to look back.

"I have nowhere to go…" I say wearily, "Mr. Todd murdered Mr. Pirelli… And he murdered my… mum… I would have to go back to the work house…"

Johanna stands, and rests her hand on my shoulder. She leans down to look into my eyes. "You can come along with me and Anthony. No one deserves to be alone after going through what you have little Toby." She says softly and brings me into a snug embrace. We both cry.

So now, I am cuddled into her side, as she rocks back and forth, petting my head. I hear Anthony rummaging around the kitchen- probably to fetch me some tea- awoken by my screams, no doubt.

I have night-mares every night. Usually about Mr. Todd. Or about Mrs. Lovett dying. Or about me dying. Death haunts me every night. But then again, death pretty much haunts me everywhere. Even small, trivial things will bring up painful memories.

Anthony and Johanna both have jobs- Anthony works at a farm, always working long days, and coming home exhausted, sunburned and blistered, and Johanna makes blankets and clothes to sell in the market. They work hard, but it is enough to afford our little flat and to keep food on the table. I don't have a job, because they insist I spend my childhood years being a child. Johanna does in fact stay home a lot- always working her fingers to the bone sewing and knitting- so she teaches me what she knows and tells me stories.

It is a cozy life mostly. We wake up early, and go to sleep early. It's a tiny one bedroom apartment. Two tiny bathrooms and a living room connected to a kitchen. Small, but cozy. It's enough for us. Anthony and Johanna share the bedroom. I sleep in the living room.

Anthony comes in and sits on the other end of the couch, handing me a mug of steamy liquid.

"There you are, Toby," Anthony says with a tired smile and he closes his eyes and his head lolls to the said. He must be exhausted.

"What time is it?" I say to Johanna.

"About four." She says, her voice sleepy, her mouth stretches with a big yawn. We typically wake at seven.

"You two can go back to bed. I will be okay." I say quietly. She looks at me, unsure.

"Okay, love, we will be in our room if you need us. If you get scared, don't hesitate to wake us." She plants a delicate kiss on my forehead and stands. She looks at her lover, who has fallen asleep on the other end of the couch.

"Anthony," she says in her small voice. She shakes his shoulder gingerly. It makes me smile to see them. You can see without a doubt that they are in love. They aren't officially married- Johanna is just seventeen, and Anthony is nineteen- although they act just like they are. "Anthony, let's go back to bed."

His eyes open for a second, and they focus on her face, a smile tugs at the corners of his mouth. She smiles tiredly back at him. She holds her delicate, rose-petal hands out to him, and he rests his hard, blistered hands in them. He stands unsteadily and puts his arm around her shoulder.

"Goodnight Toby," Johanna says, and Anthony leads her back to their room.

I don't have a hope of sleeping. I would hate to leave reality and escape into my brutal past. I clutch my mug of tea and sip carefully. I have nearly three hours before my patents awake again. Which means three hours of sure boredom, unless I find something to do.

I slowly stand and walk to the other side of the room, ignoring the slight chill from the wood floor. There is a large cabinet that I use to keep my things, and Johanna uses it for storage, too. I grasp the twisting brass knob and pull open one of the large wooden doors. I see some of my clothes folded on two of the shelves. I look at the very top shelf. I see a box, on top of what I believe to be a few picture frames.

I walk briskly over to the kitchen, passing the cage of our birds. They are really Johanna's birds; three beautiful things, always singing. I stop and look at them again. My favorite, Nelly, tilts her head and pipes out a single, beautiful note. I smile, then turn away, picking up a chair. I try to carry it over to the cupboard as quietly as I could, to not wake my family. Standing up on the chair, I reach up and grab the box.

Surely it is Johanna's. She has the most things out of any of us, as she had a proper home before we left. It was more like a cage. Just one room that was all hers, but it was large and she had many things to call her own. That's much more than neither I nor Anthony could say.

I climb slowly off the chair, holding the slightly dusty box close to me. I sit the box on the couch as I grab the chair and walk it back to the kitchen, before running back eagerly and closing the cabinet as quiet as I can. I sit on the edge of the couch and place the box on my lap. I blow off the thin layer of dust and take off the lid.

I smile as I pick up a small hand mirror. Old, I can tell. It's easy to see it hasn't been cleaned or used in a while. I turn the mirror over in my hands, seeing the beautiful silver back with metal roses putting from the surface. In the center, carved in delicate writing, is the name Johanna Lucille Barker.

I place the mirror back into the box, and grab a small and fragile-looking porcelain doll. It is old, worn, and the dress is musty and torn, the hair is tangled and knotted, and the porcelain is smudged with what looks like ash… or mold. But anyhow, it's beautiful. I place it down on the couch beside me, as my eye catches the sight of one of the other things in the box.

I reach in and pick up a small wooden box. It is, surprisingly, well maintained, and only a tad bit of dust sits idly in the crevices. I open the box, and immediately gasp as I see five gleaming silver objects. My mind is running ahead of me and put it together. These are Todd's blades, It tells me.

A choked sound escapes my throat as I realize what this means. I am holding the weapons responsible of so many people's deaths. A tear crawls down my cheek, as my heart thuds horribly fast in my chest. I feel like I am hollow.

My hand moves without me and grabs one of the gleaming razors, and I stuff it under the cushion I'm sitting on. I have the box closed and back in the box before I know what happened.

I cringe when I realize what I just did. I stole a blade. I stole a razor that has slit many throats. I hid it. What can this mean? How will I use it? Why did I even take it?

I push the questions out of my mind as I see the last item in the box. My hands are still shaking with horror, but I pick up a picture frame. The frame is silver- and old, rusted in places. The picture inside is what really caught my eye though. It's fading, but you can see a family. A man, a woman, and a baby, held closely to the mother. This must be Johanna's family. The woman looks impeccably like her, and the man… I squint, and lean in, trying to get a good look. It's funny, the man looks so familiar. If only I could put my finger on it…

The frame falls from my grasp, landing with a clatter back into the dusty box.

Sweeney Todd.

A/N And there you have it- the first chapter of my first Sweeney Todd fic. I'm working hard on the next chapter, so it should be up fairly soon. Please leave a review- it brightens my day, and makes me want to write even more :)

I do not own Sweeney Todd or any of the characters, just my story.