A Rare Breed

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By: The Dragon's daughter

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*Disclaimer* Will you quit rubbing my nose in it already?!

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AU-

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Chapter Two

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Sarah fell onto her bed with a gusty sigh.

She'd just skipped an entire day of school to spend with Jareth.

Hell had officially frozen over. Satan was building a snowman and the war between heaven and hell was being fought with snowballs.

Off in her parent's room Toby began to wail and Sarah automatically rolled to her feet to trot off to comfort him. By the time Karen had grudgingly brought herself to the top of the stairs Sarah had Toby out of his cradle and was bouncing him on her hip.

Toby immediately stopped crying as Sarah's hair caught his eye. He grabbed a handful of it and stuffed the glossy strands into his mouth. Sarah let him have the hair; she could wash it later.

Karen sighed as she saw that Sarah had the crisis under control... until she saw Toby sucking happily on Sarah's hair.

"Don't let him do that!" she cried and yanked Sarah's hair out of his mouth pulling Sarah's hair uncomfortably as she did so. Sarah winced and shrugged as Toby scrunched up his face and began to bawl again. "If it makes him happy, I don't care and he shouldn't choke on it."

"I don't want Toby to develop any bad habits!" Karen said disapprovingly.

"Karen, he's two and a half. It won't make a difference either way if he sucked on my hair when he was a baby. It's not like he sucks on anyone else's hair... unless of course you want to keep him crying?"

Karen threw up her hands. "Fine!" she turned on her heel and left the room.

Sarah shook her head, that was how Karen supposedly 'won' an argument in a mature, 'adult' fashion... she stalked off when her opponent looked ready to hold her ground. That was happening more and more these days, ever since Sarah had returned from the Labyrinth with the knowledge that screaming and whining never solved anything.

Now, whenever Karen seemed to be ready to goad Sarah into a fight, Sarah just couldn't find it in her to sacrifice dignity and give into her. When confronted by cool disinterest Karen usually lost her steam and retreated.

That didn't bother Sarah too much, in fact she found she no longer cared whether Karen was going to like her or not. Karen wasn't even ready to try, no matter what she said to Sarah's father. She'd entered Sarah's life ready to hate her stepdaughter for being an unspoken reminder of the fact that she hadn't been first. Sarah had to wonder about that, her father tended to be attracted to bright, energetic, caring folk. How had he fallen for someone who refused to care about anything that did not affect her personally?

Sarah had learned her lesson in selfishness long ago, thanks to Jareth, and she was willing to understand that Karen had never had someone spell it out to her but she was quite certain that Karen's irrational hatred of her wasn't normal under any circumstances. Sometimes it seemed as if her stepmother was afraid of her...somehow.

Toby promptly returned the sticky lock of hair to its proper place in his mouth. Sarah chortled as Toby reached for the tip of her nose in vain. She caught his chubby baby fingers with her free hand and let him close his grip around the tip of her finger

Oh yes, she had definitely learned her lesson.

"How could I have ever thought of you as a burden?" she cooed to him and strolled out of her parents' bedroom... just in time to catch the argument going on downstairs.

"... I'm telling you Robert! It's her or me! She's taking my own baby away from me!"

"Now, Karen..."

Sarah ducked into her bedroom carefully humming loud enough so that neither she nor Toby could hear the bickering going on downstairs. She was fairly positive that listening to a 'domestic dispute' at this age wouldn't have any ill effects on him but she'd met people who remembered being in the womb.

Toby was one of the brightest babies she had ever seen, not that she had a wide knowledge of children. But considering that he had fairly been immersed in magic as the tender age of twelve months, she wasn't taking any chances on how much he heard and understood of the world around him.

It was the same old fight anyway, ever since Toby had spit out his first word; 'Mama', while looking up at Sarah in adoration Karen had cemented the gulf between her and her stepdaughter. Never mind that Karen essentially made it one Sarah's many jobs to look after Toby all on her own and only paid attention to him when absolutely necessary...

Toby followed the movements of Sarah's face and eyes carefully. A speck of drool collected at the corner of his mouth where he'd been sucking on her hair and Sarah wiped it away with her sleeve.

"What was she expecting?" Sarah asked Toby. "I know you're my baby brother, but as far as you're concerned 'Mama' is the one who feeds you, changes you, and holds you when you've hurt yourself."

Toby spat out the chunk of hair (Sarah quickly flicked it over her shoulder to get it out of reach) and gurgled happily. His eyes sparkled and he clapped his hands.

'Of course!' he seemed to say. 'You're just now figuring this out?'

Sarah snorted at her own imagination and set Toby down in his 'play pen'. The playpen was actually an old wicker laundry basket padded with towels that were too shabby for Karen to have in her bathroom yet had been too nice to throw away. There was a cotton sheet stretched over them so that the rough terry cloth of the towels wouldn't rub a rash on Toby's sensitive skin.

He gurgled happily again as Sarah went to her bookshelf and carefully examined her collection of children's fairy tales...

"Hmmm."She thought out loud. "What romantic drivel will I contaminate your young mind with today, Toby?" she turned to her infant half brother with a mischievous grin on her face. "What will make Karen the maddest?"

Toby squealed with delight and waved his tiny fists in the air.

Sarah spun dramatically to face the shelf. "Let's see... The Children of Lir?" she paused to think. "No, that's legitimate mythology. Karen wouldn't mind that so much. Um... ah, here's The Little Mermaid , the real version!" she paused in reaching for the book. "Nah, the Grimm Brothers' tales are a little gory for you. The Demon's Beauty Contest? Nah. Ah! Here we are!" Sarah's fingers found a slender red book that slid easily into her hands. "The Labyrinth." She murmured.

Toby's giggles ceased and he watched her with strangely serious eyes.

Sarah strode over to the basket and squatted down in front of him. "I think I should read this story to you every now and again, I don't want you ever to forget The Labyrinth." She whispered. "That was a once in a lifetime experience, Toby, I think it would be good that neither of us forgot it."

Sarah sat herself down on the window seat and pulled Toby's basket closer to her. "You know, Jareth visited me at school again today." she told Toby, who was a marvelous listener for someone his age or maybe because of his age. He never interrupted and he never gave unwanted advice.

Toby grasped the edge of the basket and heaved himself to his unsteady feet. "Up!" he demanded with his limited toddler's vocabulary.

Sarah's eyebrows lifted, although she should have known better than to be surprised by now. Toby's vocabulary seemed to be growing by leaps and bounds, even if he never spoke to anyone but her except for that one incident in front of Karen.

Sarah obediently lifted Toby into her arms and settled him into her lap where he cuddled into the crook of her arm and looked up at her expectantly.

'Okay, now you can talk.' He told her with his eyes. 'I'm where I need to be.'

Sarah laughed... only to be cut off by a crash from downstairs and the sound of Karen shouting in the distance. "She's -your- daughter, Robert!"

Really, could Karen be any more transparent?

Sarah scowled and opened the book. "Once upon a time there was a beautiful young girl who lived in a place not far from here, her mother had deserted her when she was but a young child and her father had remarried a cold woman who brought a son into the family..."

***

Robert prided himself on being a gentle man where his wife and family were concerned; he had never raised his hand to anyone except maybe to deal a few well deserved swats to Sarah's rear after some of her more dangerous escapades as a child.

The expensive carpet that covered the hardwood floor of the living room was littered with the shards of the Waterford crystal vase that Linda had left behind for Sarah to inherit. Karen stood among the debris glaring at him with her arms crossed over her chest.

"I don't know what it is you want me to do, Karen." Robert said helplessly. "I can't just send her away, she's my daughter."

"I refuse to have that creature in my house a minute longer!" Karen hissed. "She's contaminated Toby with her unrealistic patter long enough and she's stealing my son from me! Do you know what's like to see your own child call another person by the title that is yours by right!?"

Robert frowned. "Karen, if you wanted Toby to be close to you then maybe you shouldn't have made Sarah take over his care, it's only natural that he see the person who loves him and..."

"I love him!" Karen protested angrily. It was a sore point between them that Karen considered Sarah no more than a live-in nursemaid for Toby.

'You have a funny way of showing it.' Robert thought scathingly. He was beginning to wonder what he had ever seen in this spiteful woman. She hadn't been like this even a year ago, it seemed like a mask had dropped sometime over the past few months...

"Send her to her mother, send her to boarding school, kick her OUT! I don't care, I never want to have to see her again!"

Robert felt his mouth settle into a grim line. Maybe he had just been blind to it; it had been Karen's cool grace and elegance that had drawn him to her. She was nothing like Linda... he squeezed his eyes shut. Nine years still hadn't dulled the pain much; he still missed the dark mystery and exotic fire that was Linda.

"It's her or me, Robert." Karen repeated.

Now the cool, graceful, lady-like woman he'd hoped would erase Linda from his heart was demanding that he choose one of his children over the other. How had he never seen this side of her before?

"Well if that's what you want, Karen, I suppose I have no choice." He said quietly. "I'll go upstairs and tell Sarah."

A triumphant sneer spread across Karen's ice queen features, her shoulders eased back, and her chin lifted a fraction of an inch. "I'm glad we agree, Robert."

Robert chuckled mirthlessly. "So am I, Karen."

***

"...And she fell and she fell and she fell, it seemed as if she would fall forever! Suddenly, arms burst from the walls of the shaft and caught her before she could fall any further. 'Help!' she cried and the hands across from her formed a face with their fingers. 'What do you mean 'help?' we are helping!' it said. Another one formed to it's right. 'We're helping hands!' it said proudly..."

The door to Sarah's room banged open. Sarah snapped her gaze to the entrance where her father stood. He was breathing hard from the short jog up the stairs and his eyebrows were lowered in a fierce grimace.

"Pack your things, Princess. As many clothes as you can fit into your leather bag and all your favorite things, pack Toby's things too." He informed her curtly. "We'll be staying in a hotel tonight."

Sarah blinked. "What's wrong, Dad?"

He smiled tightly. "I'll explain later, Hon. If Karen stops you, don't talk to her just keep on doing what you're doing. If she gives you trouble, call for me."

Sarah slipped the copy of the Labyrinth into her pocket and hoisted Toby onto her hip. "Okay, dad. Do you know where Toby's sling is?"

Robert nodded curtly. "Downstairs, I'll bring it up to you. Don't go to the car until I come and get you. Lock the door and don't let your stepmother in under any circumstances."

Sarah frowned as suspicion blossomed like a bloody flower in her mind. "Dad, is this about the..." she got no further than that when Robert's eyes blazed.

"Do as I say, Sarah." He commanded. "I told you I would explain later and I will."

Sarah nodded slowly, "Yes, Daddy." She complied and went to her closet to retrieve the aforementioned leather bag.

Robert left the room and Sarah heard him snap the inside lock shut as he left. She sat back on her heels and looked at the shut door. He had just locked her door from the inside! Why would he do that? She could just open it from in here...

... Unless he wasn't locking her in but locking someone else out instead.

"This is bad news, Toby." She told her brother gravely as she tossed the bag onto her bed and began selecting some of her more favored articles of clothing in it... there wasn't too much of it. Sarah preferred to keep her laundry to a minimum so she selected an array of blouses, pants, and skirts that mixed and matched in a pleasing manner. As an afterthought, she tossed in her ivory colored costume dress and matching slippers.

Although there was plenty of space in the bag after her clothes and certain feminine toiletries, she was a little afraid that she wouldn't have enough room for her most treasured possessions.

The copy of The Labyrinth fit in her pocket well enough and the book ends that resembled Hoggle fit well enough in the bag without taking too much space. The slender blue statue of Jareth went beside it wrapped in a shirt and the music box her mother had given her received similar treatment. The book of Where the Wild Things Are that depicted Ludo in several places was an awkward fit but not too bad.

Sarah tossed her Sir Didymus plushy into Toby's basket and he wrapped his small arms around it solemnly, however when Sir Lancelot followed suit he ignored it. Sarah didn't waste too much thought on it, but some part of her acknowledged that and noted it as odd. Normally all other toys were discarded when Lancelot came into sight, it was as if Toby recognized the way she...

'No way.' Sarah told herself as she tucked Lancelot into the bag since there was room for him. 'He's just a baby...'

Sarah decided to concentrate on packing. She just happened to have some of Toby's things in here that for one reason or another hadn't made it back downstairs when she had last taken Toby on an outing.

There was the oversized carryall with several changes of clothes in it as well as a canister of formulae and all the proper diaper changing paraphernalia. What she didn't have was a proper blanket for him or his baby bag, which carried some of his food and bottles. Both of those were downstairs; the blanket was in the wash and the bag was hanging off the coat rack.

Sarah's eye fell on the downy church hill weaver's throw on her armchair. She snatched it up and stuffed it into the carry all. It would do.

Sarah cast an eye across the room... there were so many thing she loved here. She rubbed her arms, why did she have the feeling that she was never going to see them again?

Two of the photos of Sarah's mother that Sarah kept in her desk drawer made it into her bag and just as she was closing it there was a soft knock on her door.

"It's me, baby." Came her father's voice. "Are you ready?"

"Yes, Dad." Sarah answered cautiously.

"Can you let me in?"

Sarah unlocked the door and Robert tossed in Toby's shoulder sling. With practiced ease, Sarah looped in over her shoulders and slid her younger brother inside. "I need Toby's baby bag." She told her father.

Robert nodded. "Karen is in the kitchen right now, go out the front and get into the garage from the side door. Wait for me in the car."

Sarah nodded and her father left again, she noticed he had his old olive drab army duffel slung over his shoulders and that he was heading for the kitchen.

"Looks like he came to his senses, Toby." She whispered and slung her own bag on.

As she left her room to escape the house she didn't notice the slim red book fall out of her pocket and hit the rose colored carpet.

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End Chapter Two