A Grimm Warning (The Land of Stories, #3)(46)

They landed in London’s Heathrow Airport and found seats by the gate for their connecting flight home.

“Oy, governor! Oy, governor!” Cindy said in a horrible cockney accent to all the British people that passed them by. “That’s how you say hello here,” she whispered to the others like she was filling them in on a secret.

“No, it’s not,” Bree said, embarrassed for her.

The Book Huggers had been giving Conner dirty looks ever since they left Berlin but Conner was unaware of it. He had been staring off into space the entire time, clutching Betsy to his chest as if he were expecting someone to rip the suitcase out of his hands.

“How are you feeling, Mr. Bailey?” Mrs. Peters asked him as she read a newspaper.

“Better,” Conner said, without looking up.

“I’m so sorry you missed out on all the other activities; you would have enjoyed them,” his principal said.

“Next time” was all Conner could reply.

The gate’s intercom buzzed as an announcement was made. “Attention, all travelers leaving on international flight 527, we will be boarding the plane in ten minutes, starting with our first-class passengers.”

“Oh wonderful,” Mrs. Peters said, and folded up her newspaper. “We’ll be in the air on our way home in no time.”

Conner knew it would be difficult to use the piece of magic mirror once he was on the plane. He decided to try reaching Alex one more time before boarding.

“I’m going to use the restroom before we get on the plane,” Conner announced to the girls. He hurried across the waiting area to the nearest bathroom with Betsy in his arms.

The Book Huggers rolled their eyes at Conner just like every time he had said or done anything on the trip. Bree watched Conner as he went, curious about why he needed his suitcase to use the restroom.

Conner entered the men’s room and looked under all the stalls to make sure he was alone. He locked himself inside one, put the toilet lid down, and had a seat. He opened Betsy on the floor in front of him and retrieved the piece of mirror. He pressed the glass with his finger and watched it shimmer for a few moments but had no luck reaching Alex. He was so frustrated and disappointed.

However doubtful he was about getting a different result, Conner decided to tap the glass one more time before calling it quits. The glass shimmered for as long as it always did and right when Conner was about to put the piece of mirror away, his heart dropped. A face appeared in the mirror—but it wasn’t the person he was expecting.

“Oh, C-Dog, thank God it’s you,” Mother Goose said. “Listen, we need to talk. I need your help.…”

Conner was so excited to finally be in contact with someone he almost fell off the toilet. “Mother Goose! It’s so good to see your face!” He was in hysterics.

“If I had a gold coin for every time someone said that, I would be in debt,” she cracked. “Listen, I have to talk to you about something very important.”

She seemed just as flustered and worried as he was, but Conner figured her concern could wait, compared to the news he had to share.

“No! I have something I need to tell you that’s more important,” he said. “Something major has happened and I need to tell someone in the fairy-tale world about it!”

Mother Goose eyed him strangely. “Kid, are you in a bathroom?” she asked. “Because if so, I think you should maybe talk to a doctor about this and not me—”

“I’m in a bathroom because I’m trying to hide!” Conner said. “I’m in Europe on a class trip! This was the only place I could get privacy!”

“Europe?” Mother Goose asked. “Okay, kid, calm down and slowly tell me what’s going on before you have an accident.”

Conner took a deep breath and started from the beginning. “I was in Germany for this thing with my principal and a couple other kids. The University of Berlin found three brand-new fairy tales in a time capsule left by the Brothers Grimm. They included careful instructions not to publicize or publish the stories until two hundred years later. We and a bunch of other people went to the cemetery where the Brothers Grimm are buried, and there was a special reading of the stories. The first two weren’t important but I think the third one was a warning in disguise.”

“A warning?” Mother Goose asked. “A warning about what?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out,” he said. “The story was too similar to real life not to have a bigger purpose.”

“Tell me what the story was about,” she prompted.

“It was about a pair of brothers who told stories just like the Brothers Grimm. They got their stories from a fairy who lived in a secret castle, just like the Brothers Grimm got their stories from you, and from Grandma and the other fairies. One day a greedy king forced the brothers to provide him with a map to the secret castle so he could conquer it. A magical bird that also lived in the secret castle, who I’m assuming is supposed to be you, gave the brothers an enchanted map to give to the king, so that it would take him two hundred years to get to the castle, leaving the people and magical creatures lots of time to prepare a defense. The brothers in the story were afraid the magical bird would forget to warn the others in the secret castle about the approaching king so they wrote a story about it, hoping the story would reach the secret castle before the king’s army of thousands did.”