‘Thanks for your help. But—’

‘I understand you’re looking for a chess partner. Anita, is it?’

I almost stop dead in my tracks. Len? He is Aiden’s MIA contact? He winks. ‘You’ve been a hard girl to track down.’

‘Were you following us today?’

‘That was a bit of luck. Finley borrowed my car; I got out of him that you were going with him. The car keys have a tracker. So, what’s up?’

First, a promise. I fish through my pockets for the photo of Madison I’ve been carrying about ever since I put that note up. ‘Can you put Madison on MIA?’

He hesitates. ‘I can. But there’s little point,’ he says, his blunt words softened by the sadness in his eyes.

‘Do you know where she’s gone?’

‘Don’t know; guess. There’s a women’s working prison, out Honnister way. At the slate mine. She’s probably there, where most taken around here end up.’

I breathe a sigh of relief. ‘Prison: then she’s alive.’

‘Sometimes that isn’t best: no one ever leaves that place. But quick before we run out of time. What were you up to today that had Lorders so interested?’

But before I have to decide what I should or shouldn’t say, hellos are called out as another group of walkers catch us up. They stay with us all the way to where our cars are parked.

‘Need a lift, old man?’ Finley asks.

‘Cheeky brat,’ Len says. ‘As a matter of fact, I do. And seeing as it is my car, I’ll drive, thank you very much.’

Finley reluctantly hands over the keys.

‘How’d you get here?’ I ask.

‘Over hill, over dale.’ Len grins.

My jaw drops. How many miles was that? He looks ancient and was walking rings around us.

As we pull onto the road, Len glances at me in the mirror ‘You’re one of the Parks’ new potential apprentices, aren’t you? I take the group on a walk first day, so I’ll see you Monday. We’ll talk then.’

A slight emphasis on then. He doesn’t want Finley to know anything.

Finley is whistling as Len pulls onto the road, heads for Keswick. ‘You’re awfully cheerful,’ I say.

He looks at me sideways. ‘We just stuck it to them, didn’t we? Know you’re not going to tell me why they were after you, but I don’t care why. Any time a Lorder doesn’t get what they want, I am happy.’

I know what he means, but I’m not feeling it. Have we really got away with anything? All through the drive back to Keswick I keep scanning the road ahead, half expecting a road block.

And my camera is burning a hole in my pocket. Aiden has to have these photos. The proof is there: Lorders are breaking the law, they are Slating little children. No one could ignore this. Is it the one thing that’ll finally make everyone stop, stand together, say no more to the Lorders?

There is panic inside that I have the only copies, here, in my camera. If the Lorders ask those boys the right questions, they’ll know their Levos were photographed. They’ll be desperate to find me. And if they work out who I am…I’m dead.

This is way past self-preservation. I have to stay alive. I have to get these photos to Aiden.

We have to get the word out, and make it stop.

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

* * *

‘Can we talk?’

Stella smiles to see me, looks so absurdly happy that I’m seeking her out, that a sinking feeling stirs deep in my chest. ‘Of course, come in,’ she says, and I walk into her office and turn the lock behind me. She raises an eyebrow. ‘This looks serious. Is everything all right?’

‘No. Not really.’

‘What is it?’

And I don’t know what to say. The less I tell her, the better for her, really. But despite all the need for caution, I just can’t do it to her; I can’t disappear with no word. Not again.

Stella gets up from behind her desk, goes to the sofa against the wall. I sit next to her.

‘Go on. You can tell me anything.’

‘You don’t want to hear this. I’m sorry, but I have to leave.’

She shakes her head. ‘Leave? You’ve barely got here. Why?’

‘I’m pretty sure my cover is blown; or, if it isn’t, it will be soon. They’ll come for me if I stay.’

‘Oh, Lucy. No. I’ll come with you. I’ll—’

‘No. Really, you can’t; it’s too much of a risk. I’ll be safer getting away on my own.’

A range of emotions cross her face and I brace myself for the storm, but before it gets going, it disappears. She sags back on the sofa.

‘When?’ she whispers.

‘I don’t know. Soon. As soon as I can arrange something. It won’t be forever, I promise: I’ll get in touch. Some day I’ll come back and see you, when things are different.’

‘Oh, Lucy. No. It’s not fair.’

‘Life’s like that,’ I say, sharper than I mean to. But really, when has life been fair to me? Even when I finally thought I was returning to a family that was mine, I found out it was all lies.

‘This isn’t because of me, is it?’

‘Of course not.’

‘Tell me everything. Maybe I can help.’

I shake my head. ‘I’m sorry, it’s safer if you don’t know.’

‘You don’t trust me,’ she says, her voice bitter.

‘It’s not that! But why should I? You’ve lied to me my whole life,’ I say, the words spilling out of me before I can call them back.

She recoils. ‘You’ve worked it out, haven’t you.’

‘What?’

‘That I haven’t told you everything.’

‘What else haven’t you told me?’ I demand, even as some part of me realises this isn’t supposed to be going like this; I’m supposed to be trying to mend things a little before I go, but I can’t stop myself from asking. What more could there possibly be?

‘It wasn’t my fault!’

‘What wasn’t your fault?’

‘She made me do it, don’t you see?’

‘Who – your mother? What did she make you do?’

‘She was blackmailing me, all these years, into keeping quiet. I was a prisoner back then! She had me under lock and key the whole time I was pregnant, to stop me from talking; she kept Danny away, made him think that was what I wanted. Maybe my baby would have lived if I’d been at home. But then when she brought you…she knew she had me. Right where she wanted me. I couldn’t say anything, could I? Or you’d be gone. So she finally let me go.’

‘What are you talking about?’

‘No. That’s enough. If you want to know any more you have to tell me your secrets, too.’

‘I just did. I came here to tell you I was going to have to leave. I shouldn’t have told you, it was dangerous to tell you, but I did it.’ I stand up.

‘Wait. Don’t leave like this. Please. I’ll tell you. But you have to promise to never tell anyone.’

I pause. I’m seething, again. Something about Stella and I just – I don’t know. She makes me crazy. But she’ll be so sad when I’m gone.

I take a deep breath, and sit. ‘Okay. Tell me.’

‘I found out some things, put them together. Stuff my mother did years before against the government.’

‘Against the Lorders?’ My head is reeling. No way: she is Lorder through and through.

‘No, not exactly. There are factions, you see. In the government. Mother is on the hardline side; the last Prime Minister wasn’t. He had to go.’

‘Wait a minute. Are you talking about Armstrong?’

‘Yes. He and his wife, Linea.’ She sighs. ‘They were so lovely, and—’

‘You knew them?’

‘Linea and Mother were friends at school years ago. Linea confided in her that her husband was planning to expose some of the nastier side of the Lorders, and resign. He never got a chance.’

My head is reeling. ‘No way. Mum’s parents?’

She frowns. ‘Mum? What do you mean?’

‘After I was Slated, that was the family I was assigned to. Sandra Armstrong-Davis.’

Now it is Stella’s turn to look shocked. ‘You were with Sandy? I didn’t know.’

‘You knew her?’

‘Of course. We used to have holidays together, years ago when we were children. We haven’t kept in touch. I couldn’t. Not after I knew what really happened to her parents.’

‘But they were assassinated by AGT.’

‘Yes. But the AGT were told where they’d be. The information was leaked: it was a set up.’

‘Your mother was behind that? Oh my God. You have to tell. You have to!’

‘No. I can’t! I never can, not any more. It’s too late, far too late. What would it even mean now? After all this time. No.’

‘Listen to me. Astrid was blackmailing you using me. If I’m not here, and she doesn’t know where I am, she can’t blackmail you. Can she?’

‘It’s not that simple any more. It’s everyone: all the girls here. She’d use them against me.’

I try. So hard. To tell her that if people don’t say what they know, that if we don’t stand up against the Lorders, things will keep getting worse. That it is in our hands to do something. She isn’t listening, I can tell.

But how can I complain when all those times with Aiden, I didn’t listen, either?

What I don’t say is, what if she had spoken out all those years ago? Told everyone that the Prime Minister was going to resign and expose the Lorders, that they were assassinated by their own government to keep them quiet. Maybe the Lorder stranglehold we have today would never have taken place.

I stand to go.

‘Wait. My last request. Can I have your camera?’

‘My camera? Why?’

She shakes her head. ‘I’ll give it back. I just want copies of your photos: those of you and us.’

I hesitate. ‘Okay. I’ll bring it down.’ I leave the room wondering if she could see the telltale bulge that said the camera was in my pocket the whole time.

Back in my room I fiddle with the camera’s interactive screen until I work out how to make folders; I password protect the ones of the orphanage. I long to email them to somebody, anybody, but don’t dare without a non-government computer. They’d be monitored and stopped for sure, and then they’d have my location.

I bring it back down, thinking I’ll wait while she downloads the photos. Hesitant to let it out of my sight.

‘I’ve got something for you.’ She holds out her hand, and in it, a key. ‘Your dad’s stuff. Photos, all of it. I wanted to get rid of it, but somehow couldn’t bring myself to do it.’

‘Where?’

‘In the old boathouse. Do you remember where it is?’

‘I think so. Thanks.’ I clutch the key in my hand.

‘Go on, have a look while I go through the photos on your camera. I’ll give it back to you at dinner.’

I hesitate, unsure if I should let it out of my sight, but the key in my hand is pulling me another direction. I grab my coat and put my boots back on, groaning a little at sore feet from so many fast miles covered today. Slip out the side door, run down the garden towards the lake.

Do I remember the boathouse? I try, really hard, but nothing comes to me beyond flashes of a kayak, sliding into the water. I wander the paths along the water’s edge. There are several outbuildings along the water next to the racks of kayaks, and another further along, almost hidden by overgrown plants and overhanging trees. As soon as I see it in the moonlight, I know: this is the boathouse.