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~~~~~ (*****^-^*****) ~~~~~
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Conner and Bree brought Granny Pearl down the steps of the Lumiere des Etoiles casino and journeyed to the train station as fast as possible. They made it just in time and were the last ones to buy tickets and board the train. Their compartment wasn't as nice as the other two had been, but Bree didn't mind, just as long as they were going to Germany everything was right in the world.
The compartment door abruptly slid open to reveal an aggresive-looking train attendant. His eyes narrowed when he discovered Conner and Bree behind the door.
"Passports, please," the attendant demanded.
"Why do you need to see our passports?" Conner asked.
The attendant squinted his eyes at Conner's reluctance. "We've just gotten word of two runaway American teenagers tourists," he said. "It's protocol to check the identification of every passenger on board that matches that description."
Bree tensed up and felt Conner do the same next to her. They had come so close to the portal but there was no way out of this one now. Bree could practically hear Conner's brain trying to think of excuses.
"But these are my grandchildren," Pearl said in perfect English.
Conner and Bree turned their heads so quickly they almost gave themselves whiplash. ^Had she been coherent the whole time?^
"I understand that, madame, but we still need to check their passports," the attendant insisted.
"Fine, fine, fine," Pearl said. "Let me get my purse and I'll find them for you."
She slowly went through her bag: one pen, one piece of hard candy, and one coin at a time. She pulled out wads of tissue and folded-up notes and stamped letters she had forgotten to mail. The attendant grew impatient waiting for her to retrieve the passports.
"Where did I put those passports?" Pearl said. "We were just in Monte Carlo and I put them in my pocket, then when we got back on the train I put them in my suitcase- yes, they're in my suitcase! If you wouldn't mind kindly waiting another moment, I'll have a look for them in my suitcase."
"That's quite all right, madame," the attendant said. He had run out of patience for the day. "I trust you. Please forgive the intrusion." He slid the door shut and they heard the footsteps travel down the hallway.
Pearl put her belongings away and then looked up at Conner and Bree. Both were staring at her with wide eyes and mouths agape as if she was on fire.
"So where are we off to next?" Pearl asked them sweetly.
"Have you been aware of what we've been doing this entire time?" Conner asked, completely mortified.
"I'm old, but I'm not ancient. I can speak English, too, you know," she said.
"And you let us take you around the continent willingly?" Bree asked, just as mortified as Conner.
"Yes," Pearl said. "You seemed like nice kids at the train station in London. I wasn't sure what was going on at first but I knew it would be good fun once we got on the train."
Conner and Bree looked at each other. Both wore the same bewildered expression.
"I ran away on my own adventure when I was your age," Pearl said. "I fell in love with a circus clown named Fabrizio and followed him around the globe."
"Did you get caught?" Bree asked.
"No, and after six months of following him, I finally had the courage to tell Fabrizio how I felt," Pearl said.
"What happened?" Conner asked. "Was he creeped out because you were stalking him? Did he break your heart?"
"No, we were married for sixty-four years- until he died," Pearl said. "Back then actions spoke louder than words. We just did what our hearts told us. These days people act like love is an island- they all want to swim to it but no one wants to get wet."
"What were you doing at the train station in London?" Bree asked after letting her words soak in for a moment.
"I had been visiting my son," she said. "He dropped me off at the station but I wasn't ready to go home yet. I think I'm ready now, though. Disappearing for two days is the perfect amount of time to get your children to value you a bit more. I've enjoyed our little adventure together but I'm very tired and I should probably get off at the next stop and take a train home."
Conner and Bree shook their heads and laughed in unison. "What's your real name anyway?" Conner asked.
"It's Elsa," she said with a big smile. "But I insist you call me Granny Pearl."
Bree liked the idea of having a new grandmother, and it seemed that Conner did as well. "Well, our names are-" Conner started.
"Uh," Pearl interrupted. "If you don't tell me your names, I'll never have to tell anyone I saw you."
Bree thought the woman sitting across from her was way too good to be true.
"You're so much cooler than my real German grandmother," Bree said.
"Now, it's none of my business why you're away from your parents, but promise me you'll stay safe while you're having this adventure of yours," Pearl told them. "It's all fun and games until someone gets hurt."
Bree nodded and saw Conner nodding with her, knowing that that was a promise she couldn't keep.
___
~~~~~ (*****^-^*****) ~~~~~
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The train from Monte Carlo arrived at Munich at six o'clock the next morning, after making a few stops along the way. Bree tried to get some sleep but didn't manage any at all, she did see Conner doze off for a couple of hours, so that was good. Conner and Bree made sure Pearl was safely aboard the train that would take her home before they left the station.
When Conner and Bree left Germany to days prior, Bree wouldn't have thought that they would return so soon. And just like every other city the duo had been to so far, Munich proved to be a world of its own. It was a city of spirals and clock towers and pointed roofs. There were beautiful buildings with stained-glass windows and handcrafted wooden doors. Statues of religious and mythical figures were mounted on the roofs and balconies to keep watch over the busy streets.
"I can't believe how close these countries are and yet they're so different," Conner said.
"And you really don't know a place until you've been there," Bree said. "You can look at a hundred pictures and a dozen maps, but unless you've been to the city and felt it's pulse, you really know nothing about it."
Conner looked at her with a very astonished face as if he hadn't expected her to say something so insightful. With no time to lose, they brainstormed how they were going to get from Munich to Neuschwanstein Castle. Conner pulled out his money and counted it, seeing if they had enough.
"I've got some bad news," he said, looking up at Bree with an unhappy face. "We're almost out of cash. I've got enough for food for a couple of days, but that's about it. I don't know how we're supposed to get to the castle now."
"Don't worry, I've got an idea," Bree said. "Let's find a hotel and pretend we're staying there. Then we'll trick them into giving us what we need."
"Let me guess, this happens in your crime books, too?" Conner asked.
"No, I figured this one out myself," Bree said proudly. "My grandma lives in a condo in Atlantic City next to a bunch of hotels-there were summers I never paid for lunch once."
They walked up and down the stone streets until Bree found a large and fancy hotel ideal for her plan. The hotel was painted yellow and had the flags of several different countries displayed around its front revolving doors. They pushed through the doors and Bree got in line to speak with someone at the front desk.
Conner waited a few feet behind her; she had told him she was confident enough to do this alone. She actually had him wait there because she knew he would mess it up.
"Guten Morgen, gnadige Frau," the man at the concierge desk said.
"Guten Morgen, it's good to see you again," she said, even though they had never met before. "I was wondering if I received any messages while I was out."
"Oh?" the concierge said. He looked awfully confused as if he had never seen her before. "What room number?"
"It's 723," Bree said as if she had told him a hundred times already, this man was easy to fool.
"And what's your name?" he asked.
"Bree Campbell," she said honestly, acting as if it had hurt her that he hadn't remembered. "But you should know, the room is under my stepfather's name."
"Herr Hueber is your stepfather?" he asked.
"Oh. it that the name he checked in under?" Bree said with a massive eye roll. "Please ignore him, he's from Milwaukee. Every time we go someplace new, he likes to trick the locals into thinking he's one of them. He probably checked in with some ridiculous accent, too. Now about those messages-"
"Oh yes, of course," the concierge said and went through the papers on his desk. "No messages for room 723."
Bree pouted and stuck out her bottom lip, she had done this many times before. "Not even from Jacob?" she asked sadly.
"No, I'm sorry," he said.
"That's a shame," she said, then got down to business. "Well, since I'm here, I was wondering if you could tell me the easiest way to Neuschwanstein Castle. My dad has to work all day and I have nothing to do."
"There is a two-hour bus that can take you there," he said. "Unfortunately, it has sold out for today ad tomorrow."
Bree's mind automatically thought of plan B.
"Does this hotel rent bikes?" she asked.
"Yes, madame," the concierge said. He seemed pleased that he was finally giving her good news.
"Terrific. I suppose a bike ride around the countryside will have to do," she said.
"One bike?"
"Make it two, please," Bree said.
"And charge it to the room?" he asked.
"Yes, please," Bree said. "And if you coul please leave a note for my dad telling him I went on a short bike ride I would appreciate it."
"Yes, I'd be happy to," the concierge said. "I'll have those bikes brought to the front of the hotel right away."
"Thank you so much," Bree said.
Bree heard tapping from behind her, she turned around and saw Conner whisper, "We need to know how to get there,"
"Oh, and one last thing," Bree said to the concierge. "Would you mind highlighting how to get to Neuschwanstein Castle on a map for me? Just in case I can convince my dad to take me there himself when he's finished with work?"
The concierge nodded, and highlighted the route for her on a small map. She thanked him again and then waited with Conner in the front of the hotel for their bikes to be brought out.
"You're really good at that," Conner said. "Like, scary good."
Bree's head was lost in the map. "Okay, judging from this map, the castle is eighty miles away......meaning we're gonna be on these bikes all day," she said.
"Oh no," Conner said, looking down at his suitcase sadly, he couldn't take it with him. "What am I suppose to do with Besty?"
"Just check her at the front desk and tell them you're with me," Bree said, handing him her bag to store as well.
"I guess this is where we part, old girl," he said sadly. He put his bag down, pulled the piece of mirror that he used to contact his sister with, and walked inside the hotel to check it with Bree's.
While Conner took Besty inside the hotel, Bree realized how much of an attitude change she had had. She had really had to work hard to put a cover up, and that was not her. She was the queen of deception, and now she was having to work much harder at it? Why? It seemed that the more time she spent with Conner, the more her attitude changed. She was happy, cheerful, and nice. He really brought out a nicer side from her. It was nice to have someone around that helped her be her and brought out the nice side in her. Conner really had made an impact on her, whether she liked it or not.
Conner came back outside just as a man from the hotel came from the back with two bikes. They each got on a bike and started their long trek to Neuschwanstein Castle. Bree took the task of leading. She steered her bike with one hand while constantly looking down at the map in the other.
___
~~~~~ (*****^-^*****) ~~~~~
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It took them an hour or so to pedal away from the Munich traffic and enter the German countryside. As soon as they did, the magnificent Alps came into view. They were unbelievably tall, as if they had been painted against the sky. Their sharp and jagged peaks were sprinkled with snow like the white in an old man's beard. They stood imperially like soldiers guarding their homeland.
As they rode deeper into the scenery, the ground rose with the alp's altitude. Bree looked in wonder at the grassy hills around her. She was convinced Germany was the greenest place on earth.
Occasionally a village appeared beside the road. Each was more picturesque than the last, with their orange roofs against the high backdrop of the azure sky behind the Alps. The scenery was so beautiful it didn't seem real.
Clouds began to roll in from beyond the mountain peaks and covered the countryside like a thick fluffy gray ceiling. It was hard to tell where the mountains ended and the clouds started.
After a few hours of biking, Conner and Bree stopped in a tiny town called Oberammergau to get a bite to eat. Every one of the cottage-like homes were painted with murals of fairy-tale and religious art as if they were one and the same. Conner and Bree stopped to admire an adorable house painted with iconic scenes from the story of Little Red Riding Hood.
"I could never tell Red about this," Conner said. "She's already got a huge head; I can't imagine how she'd act if she knew that she was painted on the buildings of the Otherworld, too."
They were delighted to see how well-represented fairytales were in the center of town. There were statues of trolls and Humpty Dumpty, shops filled with toys and trinkets and puppets of all the classic storybook characters, and there was even a small inn called Hotel Wolf, where Conner and Bree chose to eat.
"I feel like we're eating in the Red Riding Hood Kingdom," Conner said over lunch.
"If these people only knew what we knew," Bree said.
Conner's eyes shifted to his food and he moved some around with his fork. "Yeah...," he mumbled sadly.
"What's the matter with you?" Bree asked in a concerned manner.
He seemed hesitant but continued anyway. "I would never want anything to happen to my sister or my grandmother or anyone in the Land of Stories," he said. "But there's a part of me that hopes the portal does open, so I can see them all again."
Bree smiled gently, she really felt badly for the boy. "I don't think there's anything wrong with that," she said. "We'll just try to think of the situation as a win-win. If the portal is closed, your friends are safe, and if it's open, at least you get to see them again."
"Yeah, while they're being attacked by thousands of French soldiers," Conner said.
"Maybe the soldiers changed their minds while they were in the portal," Bree said. "Two hundred years is a long time for self-reflection; they could have re-thought their whole universe domination thing."
"Maybe." He shrugged. Bree knew that Conner knew that it was a slim chance, but it was always good to be optimistic.
They finished eating and continued their journey to the castle. It was impossible to keep track of time since the sun was hidden by a curtain of clouds. A few hours later, just as their bums and feet started aching from biking all day, they arrived in the village of Hohenschwangau.
Conner and Bree stopped for a moment and looked at Neuschwanstein Castle's towers poking out from behind the trees. It felt like a giant was peeking out at them.
"We made it!" Bree said cheerfully. "And it only took us nine and a half hours!"
"Only?" Conner asked, groaning as he dismounted his bike. "I think I'm going to have a bicycle-seat-shaped dent in my butt for the rest of my life."
Hohenschwangau was an incredibly tiny place and consisted mostly of restaurants, inns, and souvenir shops for tourists visiting Neuschwanstein. The village was also home to another, smaller and older castle that sat on a hill across from Neuschwanstein. It was square and golden and almost completely forgotten by the travelers roaming the village.
Glass kiosks lined in the center of the village sold tours of Neuschwanstein. A long line of tourists waited outside for buses that took them up to the castle.
"Okay, I think I've got a plan," Conner said. "We'll go on a tour of the castle and stay in the very back so we're easily forgettable. When no one is looking, we find a place to hide. Then at night when all the guides and guests have gone, we give ourselves a tour of the castle and try to find the portal."
"That sounds like an excellent plan!" Bree said.
They chained their bikes to a bike rack and went to purchase their tickets. But just as they walked up to the kiosks, a sign written in many languages was hung in the window:
ALL TOURS OF NEUSCHWANSTEIN CASTLE
ARE SOLD OUT FOR THE REST OF THE DAY
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~~~~~ (*****^-^*****) ~~~~~
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THANKS FOR READING!!!
BYE BOOK-HUGGERS!!!
TLOSGEEK2-OUT!!!