Three Months Later

They stayed behind for a moment. They had gone as far as they could in the car, but from here on, they would be going on foot.

"I've always thought of these mountains as my friends," Georg said "Standing there protecting us."

He looked ahead forlornly, and in a somewhat choked voice, continued:

"But now…"

The children were already climbing ahead; the boys up the front, leading the way, Marta and Gretl with their hands clasped in Liesl's. He was so worried for them; in addition to the fact that they were running for their lives, any number of tragedies could befall any one of them.

He felt as if the mountains had become his enemies.

"They will protect us," Maria assured him. "We just need to have faith. And believe in ourselves."

Georg looked at his wife. In the cold air, her cheeks were pinker than normal, but despite the potentially perilous journey they were about to make, her smile was as bright and as enthusiastic as ever.

And Georg knew that for the most part, that was genuine.

She didn't care that forty-eight hours ago they had been in Paris, on their honeymoon.

She'd gone from a struggling postulant, to an overwhelmed governess, to the wife of a famous war hero, in the span of a few months. And now, in less than a week, she'd lost all of it.

The Anschluss had finally arrived. The Chancellor had yielded to Hitler and their entire world was in upheaval. He'd been planning for months, how they would handle their departure from the country. It had always been a case of when, not if.

He hadn't expected it happen like this; escaping over the mountains on foot, with the Nazis tailing them.

But the biggest surprise of all was that he was doing it with Maria. That she – not Elsa Schraeder – was the second Baroness von Trapp.

Even if she hadn't technically lost it, Georg knew Maria didn't mind losing that title. She'd hated it from the start. Whenever somebody had called her 'Baroness' she either cringed, or looked around confused, like she didn't think they were addressing her at all.

He didn't mind it either. He didn't care that none of his titles were likely to mean anything for quite some time. He had his family.

He had known for a long time that he'd be leaving Austria one day. But all the planning and forewarning in the world couldn't prepare someone for this.

But, since Maria came into his life, a lot of things that seemed impossible before now seemed possible.

They were going to get through this. He knew it.

"It was all because of a mountain," mused Maria.

"What was that?" Georg asked.

"That's how it all started," she replied. "It was the mountain that brought me to the Abbey. And then the Abbey sent me to you."

"It was the mountain that led me to you," she told him solemnly.

'To my family,' she thought happily.

One year ago, if someone had told Maria that she would be on her mountain with her family – with her husband – she wouldn't have believed them. She had no family, and the only person whose bride she'd ever be was Christ.

But looking up the path at the seven amazing children she already thought of as her own, with the comfort of Georg beside her, nothing felt more right.

With everything that had transpired since the beginning of the summer she had both lost and found her home.

"I guess it was the same for me," he pondered.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"The night you left," he explained. "I couldn't let you get away; couldn't imagine what our lives would be like without you."

Maria nodded slowly,

"I knew I had to find you," he carried on. "And I knew you'd be on the mountain. It was your special place. Your mountain."

"If I hadn't known about it…" he sighed; Maria could see the glimmer of wistfulness; the heartbreak that could've been, "…you might not be here."

Her husband was right. If not for one tiny thing, everything could've been so different. Who knows where she would be if he hadn't come and found her that day.

But things happened the way they did for a reason, and Maria could imagine no better future for her than one by Georg's side.

Ideally, they would've lived happily in Salzburg for the rest of their lives, surrounded by the children and their beloved mountains.

But this wasn't an ideal world. And Maria would never dream of asking Georg to compromise his principles for the sake of pretend safety. Even if he were to accept the offer from Berlin, they could never be truly safe, of that much she was certain.

All that would be left was a guilty conscience.

She smiled, and they both looked up at the track that climbed ever higher; invisible and unknown.

The children had noticed they weren't following them, and had stopped to look back.

"We need to go, don't we?" it came out like a question but they both knew it really wasn't one.

Georg nodded. "Yes."

With one final smile, Maria took her husband's hand and, with him at her side, began to climb up the path.

The mountain had led them to each other. And now they were going over the mountain together.