There was a time when Sarah Williams was just like every other girl. Well. Almost as every other girl. That, however, was until she travelled to a fairy-tale land to save her brother, and as she walked along the dirty alley and the rain started to fall on her head she cursed her former self for about the sixth millionth time for being such a stupid brat.
After she had gotten Toby back, she had been thrilled to know. What in the real world could harm her when she knew there was something else out there? When she had her real friends come and visit her whenever she needed them. When she knew magic was real.
Well, as it seemed, a lot of things could. And they didn't hesitate to do it either. Pretty soon she had realised that goblins weren't the only creatures who roamed the aboveground. Trolls, fairies, imps and whatever the thing with green scales were. They were everywhere. Ordinary people just couldn't see them, and at the beginning she had enjoyed knowing what other people didn't, to see why the water glass continued to tip over and why the socks in the washer always came out in a different colour. But then the creatures started to realise that she saw them to. And then all hell broke loose.
At first, they just looked at her. This in itself made her feel uncomfortable. The silent ominous way that they glanced at her from a distance when she caught their eyes made her skin crawl. But then they started to get closer and closer. She started to ask her friends over to keep guard while she slept after she woke up with a troll standing in the corner of her room. Smiling. And not in a good way.
When one of them tried to grab her when she left home and she, screaming, tugged her arm away from it and ran inside again, it was impossible for her to pretend that everything was all right. Karen noticed of course and how could she explain that a magical creature was trying to kidnap her? Yeah right. She couldn't. This was also when she started to worry about Toby. What if the imps figured out that he had been below? Sarah had realised that other children also saw the creatures if they were still small, but what if they realised he had been underground? What would stop them from simply taking him? That and the realisation that if they got to know it would be because of her. Toby seemed normal, because every Toddler could see them. Hoggle explained that it would grow away. That it always did. But what if she made them realise that he had been wished away.
So she had to go. She just left one night. She cried when she stroked Toby over the head. He opened his eyes and looked at her. For once he was quiet, as if he understood the severity in the situation. When she turned to leave he made a noise. She closed her eyes hard and turned to look at him again. He waived at her and she laughed against her will and picked him up and gave him a hug. She didn't look back once she had left.
Four years had gone since that day and Sarah still cursed the day she made that stupid wish. She had since learned that trolls and imps where the least of her troubles. There were darker beings at play in the world, beings that need not grab her with hands or claws.