Birdie in Prague: The Birdie Abroad Series, #3

By Heidi Williamson

Studying abroad this summer? Backpacking through Europe? Going on vacation with your parents?

 

See what it's like to be there through the eyes of American teens in this heartfelt fiction series. You'll delight in the magic and mystery that unfold, in both the past and the present!

 

Wait? What??!!

 

Birdie is done shifting through time. Done putting her friends in danger. And done with the enchanted piece of glass causing all the trouble. It's time to get back to a traditional summer abroad with her mom and enjoy the charming city of Prague like a normal tourist.

 

But first, she needs to destroy the aventurine. If only she could find the time. Her mom's new obsession with her dad's old friend means a change in plans, a change that includes Birdie spending way too much time with his handsome son.

 

Just when she thinks she may never succeed, an old friend arrives to help. But as the summer sun beats down on the cobblestone lanes, she can't shake the feeling that someone is waiting... and watching their every move.

 

Birdie in Prague is book three of the Birdie Abroad series, where adventure meets a bit of romance!

NOTE: The overall plot builds with each installment, but the books are standalone stories that can be read out of order.

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"Step into a world of alchemy and magic, science and wonder." —Marty McEntire, Europe for Americans Travel Guide 

• Language: English
• Publisher: FlyAway Ink Creative
• Release date: Jun 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9781734900989

Book preview

cover-image, Birdie in Prague EPUB

BIRDIE IN PRAGUE

Book Three of the Birdie Abroad Series

Heidi Williamson

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyediting by The Blue Garret

Book Cover Design by ebooklaunch.com

Published by Flyaway Ink Creative

Copyright © 2023 Heidi Williamson

All rights reserved.

For everyone who

just keeps going...

Chapter One

On a sweltering July morning in a crowded cobblestone square, Birdie Blessing tilted her head at the much-loved astronomical clock on the building in front of her, unable to stem a creeping disappointment.

She’d heard the Mona Lisa was small and the Leaning Tower of Pisa not worth a special trip, but she’d had higher hopes for this mechanical wonder of the Middle Ages.

It wasn’t a miniature clock or a tiny watch face or anything like that. It was outdoors, after all, and meant to remind passersby of the time, assuming they could decipher the overlapping faces, dials, hands, and symbols and make any sense of it at all.

She could certainly see the clock. There was no need for binoculars or zoom lenses or even squinted eyes to make out the colorful timepiece, which was installed just above the first story of the Old Town Hall. Someone with a stepladder could probably touch it.

Birdie closed her dry eyes against the prickle of the morning sun, relaxed her slender shoulders, and wiggled her toes in her dirty sneakers.

If anyone had cared to ask, not that anyone would, she couldn’t have described anything about the clock other than its diminutive height, or related any of the finer details of the timepiece she’d barely glanced away from since she’d planted herself in front of it thirty minutes before.

She’d simply stood there, weary and waiting, the cobblestones radiating heat against her bare legs, as other tourists jammed the space around her.

Not that it mattered if she fell in love with the old clock or paid any attention at all to the glockenspiel-like show that was about to begin.

All that mattered – all that really mattered – was that she’d arrived. She was in Prague, a tourist in the Czech Republic, just like the others crowded around her smelling of sunscreen and soap. She’d made it – out of Burg Rheinfels, back to her mom, back to their ordinary summer abroad – as if nothing had happened at all.

She bit the inside of her cheek to convince herself it was true and to cut the thick fog of too little sleep and too much travel.

But try as she might to settle into the scene around her, to convince herself that she was safe, that the aventurine in her suitcase would never again find its way into someone else’s hands, her mind refused to complete the journey.

The specter of licking flames and beating drums haunted her thoughts and, despite the sun and heat of summer in Prague, she could feel the damp chill of underground passageways crawling along her arms, the weight of a black cloak on her shoulders, the shadow of death closing in.

Someone jostled against her, startling her back to the cobblestone square. She opened her eyes in time to catch sight of a bumbling stranger as he pushed his way through the crowd to get closer to the clock. She swallowed hard as she pulled up the hem of her wrinkled T-shirt to swab his sweat from her arm.

Disgusting.

But real. And proof that she was here in Prague, just another tourist in the crowd, no matter how much her mind refused to believe it.

So why did nothing seem real?

Was she the only one who felt this way? Were the other campers she’d met in Germany struggling to shake off what happened to them at the castle ruin? To pretend everything was normal? To go about their business as if all they’d done was attend a boring history camp?

She adjusted her stance as more tourists squeezed into the square.

Normal. Now that was a concept growing more foreign by the day. The truth was she’d needed more time with the campers who’d become her friends. Another day, another hour even, to process what had happened, to celebrate their survival, to plot the aventurine’s demise. Instead, they’d been pulled apart and swept away to their old lives.

Louisa would be back in her German village, never to be a camp counselor again, of that Birdie was certain. And the Hennessy kids – Rich, Raina, and Ryan – were making their way to Munich. The twins, Sam and Sophia, had surely left for their next stop. And Kayla would be back in Ohio with her grandparents by now, telling tales her friends would never believe.

Birdie twisted her lips. Good riddance.

They’d scattered to the wind and, if they were lucky, the memories would fade, the fear seep away as time passed.

Except for Friedrich.

The statue in Sankt Goar would be a constant reminder, a knife twisting in his heart day after day, proof that his fairy tale would never come true.

There, see there, son? A lanky man with a British accent slid into place beside Birdie. He held a guidebook high in his left hand as he pointed to the clock with his right. He began to lecture a bored-looking boy of about nine, whose mother held him straight by the shoulders, forcing him to stare where his father pointed. The statues at the top of the clock represent the vices. Do you know about them? The vices?

The man cocked his head to study the statues for a moment before he continued.

The boy caught Birdie looking at them and crossed his eyes. She smothered a giggle and faced the clock to keep from giving him away.

Quite stereotypical for the time, aren’t they? Hmmm. The boy’s father scanned the page of his guidebook. Yes. Clearly inappropriate. Well. The vices were greed, vanity, and hedonism. Do you know what those words mean? He didn’t wait for the boy to answer. And then there’s the skeleton. You know that one, son. The skeleton with the hourglass represents death. He’s proper creepy, isn’t he? Watch him now. He starts the show.

Death stood jauntily with one hip higher than the other as he eyed the gathering crowd for his next victim, waiting with practiced patience for just the right moment to remind them of their fate.

Birdie tried again to focus on the show that was about to start.

She should have stayed in bed.

Her mom was back at the hotel, busy working on her latest designs. She hadn’t wanted to go out, so Birdie had come to see the ancient clock alone. She was driven by an urge to get some air after being cooped up in a rental car, an airport, a plane, and a taxi before arriving in Old Town late the night before. She’d dozed off during the short flight from Germany, but once they’d arrived at the hotel, she’d found it nearly impossible to sleep. The heavy curtains were drawn, and when she’d closed her eyes in the dark room, she’d felt as though she couldn’t breathe, as if she were trapped in a shallow tunnel, crawling along on her hands and knees.

She shivered despite the sun and checked her watch.

It wouldn’t be long now, assuming Death could keep time.

As the clock ticked another minute closer to the top of the hour, dozens of people raised their phones in anticipation. Birdie shifted a bit to see around them, wondering what it was about the timepiece that drew them here hour after hour, day after day. What medieval miracle hid within the bells? A clue to time itself?

Birdie sighed. If only that were true.

A hush rippled across the square as Death tipped the hourglass, his expression unchanged, his movements mechanical and unstoppable now that they’d begun. As the hourglass tilted, it tugged a cord, causing a bell to ring, its sound melancholy in the silence. On the other side of the clock face, Greed jingled a bag of coins.

A pair of windows above the statues slid open, revealing rudely carved men with garish smiles who stared at the crowd below. The wooden men rotated through the windows, so steadily that Birdie felt an urge to turn away, to make them stop.

See son, see there, the father said, his voice low as he leaned close to the boy’s ear. Those are the apostles. Count them, there should be twelve.

All around her, phones remained raised in the air, each capturing the same video of the apostles finishing their parade and settling back into place. Then a rooster crowed, and the hour began to toll.

Bong.

She did turn away from the clock then, but quickly realized she was hemmed in until the time finished ringing out.

Bong.

She scanned the square, noting a few elderly women loitering near a weathered monument, eyeing purses and backpacks rather than the show. Closer to where she stood, two middle-aged men with patchy beards snaked through the crowd, slipping through the swarm of distracted visitors unnoticed.

Bong.

A security vehicle stood several yards away, but the guard leaning against it appeared half asleep.

Bong.

The air shimmered in the heat, and the number of tourists seemed to expand, the heavy scent of sweat and bodies growing almost unbearable. Then the tolling doubled, as if two bells were chiming at once.

Bong.

Birdie glanced at the clock, her heart racing.

Bong.

One bell. It was only one bell. A single chime.

She let out a breath as the tolling continued, reaching eight, which, she realized, was not right. Unless she’d completely lost track of everything, it was nine o’clock.

She glanced around the crowded square again, terrified she’d slipped into the past with the shimmer. But she had not. The glass was safe in the hotel room, buried deep in the underwear pocket of her purple hand-me-down suitcase. The boy and his parents were still beside her, taking it all in.

And then, as quietly as the show began, it was over. Death made the last move, settling against the wall to begin the search for his next mark.

The tourists lowered their phones and shuffled away, guidebooks in hand. The men who’d snaked through the crowd congregated with the women near the monument, watching them leave.

Birdie remained rooted to her spot as everyone else departed, welcoming the morning breeze that meandered through the square, cooling her skin. Her fingers trembled as she checked the pocket of her shorts, assuring herself the glass wasn’t there, that she was safe.

Safe.

But she knew it was false security. She’d never truly be safe, not until the aventurine was gone. After Burg Rheinfels, she’d promised herself the beautiful piece of copper glass with its sheen of golden sparkles would never fall into anyone else’s hands again. She would destroy it, somehow, alone. She couldn’t tell anyone else about the legend, and she couldn’t keep slipping back and forth through time herself, or worse, taking her friends with her, putting so many lives in danger.

Destroying the aventurine was up to her and her alone.

The square had emptied, and she turned to go, to leave Death to the next wave of tourists who would jam the cobblestones at the top of the hour. She navigated a passage between two sprawling outdoor cafés to reach the sidewalk, which was shrouded by an old stone arcade that encircled much of the square. She welcomed its shade as she drifted to a curving lane that led away from the clock and toward the hotel.

She slowed when she reached a street market, lured by the sugary scent of a trdelník stand tucked between a fruit stall and a booth selling porcelain souvenir plates. She cursed her empty pockets as she watched a young man roll the soft, sweet strips of dough onto a wooden spindle and set it to crank round and round to bake. His mop of dark hair reminded her of Ben, who’d been there at the beginning, when she first discovered the legend of the aventurine.

But Ben was gone too, like the others, off to Berlin with his uncle, on a mission to visit breweries across the continent before they made their way back to Texas.

She realized she’d stopped walking altogether and was zoning out in the middle of the busy market street, staring at the young man. He tilted his head at her, clearly wondering if she’d lost her mind.

She blinked a few times and turned toward the hotel.

She needed sleep.

And she needed it now.

While some tourists may find it difficult to fit Prague into their fast-paced European itineraries, those with more time will find the well-preserved city worth the trip.

—Marty McEntire, Europe for Americans Travel Guide

Chapter Two

The Hotel Astronomical was, despite a name that conjured images of stars and space travel, an exquisitely renovated medieval mansion squeezed among a row of Renaissance facades on a white cobbled lane near the Old Town Square. Marty McEntire’s Europe for Americans Travel Guide had called it a worthwhile splurge, and Birdie’s mom had said it was one of just a few they would spring for during their summer abroad.

Birdie was sweating and parched as she leaned into the heavy revolving door and entered the sprawling lobby. She was greeted by the perfume of a dozen towering bouquets and a nod from the front desk clerk, an elegant woman in her mid-twenties wearing a neat black suit and a name badge that read Trina.

"Dobrý den, Miss Blessing."

Dooby… Birdie flushed, tongue-tied as she tried to repeat the greeting. Trina had checked them in the night before using perfect English, but it felt wrong somehow to respond in English to a Czech greeting.

Birdie squared her shoulders and approached the desk. She tried again. Dobrý den. Um, excuse me?

Trina smiled and continued in English. Yes? May I help you with something?

I was wondering if breakfast is still being served?

Trina glanced at the monitor in front of her. Unfortunately, no. Service is concluded for this morning.

Birdie’s shoulders sagged. She was exhausted. Hungry and exhausted, and there was no way she would fall asleep with her stomach growling. She yawned as she contemplated what to do.

Trina’s face grew bright. Hold on. She slipped behind the half-wall that separated a private area from the lobby, then popped back around with a packet of cookies in her hand. For you.

Thank you. Relief washed over her as she accepted the small treat. Thank you so much.

Prosim, Trina replied.

Birdie’s confusion must have been apparent.

You’re welcome, she translated. Enjoy.

Birdie cradled the packet of cookies as she passed through the lobby and crossed the formal breakfast room, which had been cleared of dishes and reset to perfection. Her target was the grand, curving staircase at the far end, beneath which a wall of glass doors opened onto an inviting courtyard lush with climbing vines and wrought-iron tables and chairs.

Even as tired as she was, the stairs seemed a far better option than the coffin-like elevator in the lobby, with its black metal grate that concealed a space tight enough for one skinny person and a suitcase. She’d squeezed into it with her mom the night before, and had no desire to repeat the experience.

As she grasped