She finally stops. Wheezing a little, she turns and looks at me.

‘It really is you. You’re really okay.’

My tears start again, and then hers. She pulls me in for a hug. We stand there for a long time, not moving, not speaking.

She finally pulls away. ‘Your hair?’ She reaches out to touch it. ‘IMET?’

I nod.

‘How? No, don’t answer! Is it—’ and she hesitates— ‘is it Lorders?’

I shake my head. ‘They don’t know where I am. And it wasn’t them that tried to kill me, but for some reason of their own they’ve said I died. I don’t understand why.’

‘So it wasn’t their bomb, then. David said it wasn’t, but…’ And she shrugs, no need to fill in the sentence. She didn’t believe him. Why would she believe her estranged husband, after all he put us through?

‘No. It was AGT.’

She pales. ‘They’re after you?’

I shrug. ‘They think I betrayed them to the Lorders.’

‘Did you?’

I shake my head. ‘Not on purpose. Lorders tracked me to them.’ I don’t say the rest of it: that I went against Nico’s plans. That I wasn’t there with her and the rest of her family, next to Prime Minister Gregory, so Nico could detonate the bomb I unknowingly wore. That instead I left to bust out his prisoner, Dr Lysander: my doctor. The one who invented Slating. If he finds out I’m still alive, Nico’s desire for revenge would have nothing to do with logic: to him, it’d be personal.

‘Then maybe it is a good thing the Lorders have said you are dead. Maybe the AGT will believe them.’ She reaches a hand to my cheek. ‘I’m so glad you’re all right, but you shouldn’t have come here. It’s too dangerous. And how’d you know where to find me? I didn’t even know I was coming. I just went for a walk, and my feet brought me.’

‘I didn’t. I thought you’d be at work; I was going to try there. I couldn’t leave with you thinking I died.’

She grips me in a fierce hug. ‘Have you got somewhere safe to go?’

‘I think so. I’ll try to get word to you later.’

‘Don’t. It’s safer that way.’

‘What about Amy? How is she?’

‘She’s distraught. But I can’t tell her about you. At least, not now.’

My tears are starting again. Amy has been my big sister since I was assigned to her family after I was Slated. No matter that it has only been a matter of months, Amy’d never do anything to hurt me on purpose. But could she keep such a big secret from the world?

‘She’s safer if she doesn’t know,’ Mum says. ‘I’ll look after her.’

‘I know. All right.’

‘Dr Lysander called, sent flowers. She seemed genuinely distressed about you.’

Another twist of pain inside. She doesn’t deserve to not know the truth, but there is no safe way to tell her.

Mum stares at me so long it is like she is memorising my face, then kisses my cheek. ‘I better go. Wait a while before you follow.’ She grips me tight one more time, then turns. Half runs back down the path.

I lean against a tree, hugging my arms around myself.

So much pain: hers, Amy’s, mine. And that whole charade of a funeral. For what? Why did the Lorders pretend I died?

After a while I trudge back through the woods. When I reach the church, I hang back by the gate, but there is no one in sight. I retrieve the bicycle and start the miles back to Mac’s.

Before long, thick heavy white flakes fall from the sky, swirling gently about me. I hold my hands out to catch them as they fall; they settle on my hat, my hair, changing brown to white. Obscuring my disguise; obscuring all of me. Pedalling gets harder as the snow thickens on the ground, and after a while I get off and push the bike.

When I finally get back to the house, I’m soaked and half frozen. A relieved Mac has me sit in front of the fire.

Skye is glued to the window, her eyes darting with each snowflake. ‘She looks a little freaked out by the weather,’ I say.

‘That’s nothing: when there is a thunderstorm, she shakes and hides under the bed. Speaking of hiding, Aiden called while you were gone.’

‘And?’

‘I told him you went for a walk.’

Mac’s face says it all. ‘I gather he didn’t believe you, and isn’t happy about it.’

‘How’d you guess? So, did everything go well? Did you say what you had to say?’

‘Yes.’

‘Feeling ready to move on now?’

‘Can I warm up first?’

‘You’ve got until tomorrow morning. Aiden’s coming at nine. Trains are back on, and tickets have been sorted: there’s a computer file for you to study tonight with details of your new life.’

There is one more goodbye I need to make. Late that night, after Mac’s gone to sleep, I stand on a chair in the kitchen and get the owl sculpture down from the top of the fridge. I put it on the table and run my fingers lightly across its beak, the outstretched wings. All made of scrap bits of metal, but in a brilliant synthesis: it looks and feels so real. Ben’s mother made it, made it for me at his request from a drawing I did. It seems so long ago. Now she is dead, killed along with her husband, by Lorders. Just for asking too many questions about what happened to Ben.

I run my fingers along the back until I feel the faint edge of paper. Grip it between two fingernails, and pull.

I unfold the note that holds Ben’s last words to me; his last words while he was still my Ben.

Dear Kyla,

If you have found this, it means things have gone very wrong. I’m sorry to cause you pain. But know that this was my decision, and mine alone. No one else is to blame.

Love, Ben

No matter his words, at the time I thought it was my fault that Ben wanted to cut off his Levo, and all that followed: his seizures, his mum telling me to leave. The Lorders taking him, and not knowing if he was alive or dead. Then he was found by MIA: changed somehow by the Lorders, so he didn’t even know who I was. That last time I saw Ben I tried, I really tried, to get through to him: to tell him to resist the Lorders. There was a moment when I saw something in his eyes; I thought he believed me, that he understood. All I can do for Ben now is hope.

And the other thing I worked out well after the fact was that Nico had been working on Ben to cut off his Levo, to try to provide the trauma that would trigger the return of my memories of being with Nico and the AGT. But even with that, it is still my fault. If it weren’t for me, Nico wouldn’t have had a reason to go near Ben, would he?

I stare at the note in my hands. Should I take it with me? I’m tempted. But somehow it belongs where I found it the first time, where it has been hiding ever since. I fold it up and carefully slip it inside the owl, and put the owl back on top of Mac’s fridge. He’ll keep it safe.

Maybe one day, Ben and I will come back for it. Together.

CHAPTER FIVE

* * *

The next morning, snow is thick on the ground: the lane is impassable. After a call from Aiden, Mac says he’ll walk down the lane with me to meet him on the main road.

I hesitate by the door, reluctant to leave what I know, for what I do not; a place where I feel safe, for…what? Mac meets my eye. ‘You’ll be back.’

‘Will I?’

‘Oh yes. Skye would be very upset if you don’t visit again.’ He opens the door, and Skye bounds out and off the step, then skids to a stop, startled as the snow comes almost all the way to her nose.

I step out, gather some into my gloved hands and hold it out for her to sniff. ‘It’s snow,’ I explain. I roll it into a ball, and throw it forward. She jumps to chase, leaping in and out of the snow instead of running through it, then looks very puzzled when the snowball is indistinguishable from the rest of the snow where it landed.

Mac laughs and insists on carrying my small duffle bag of belongings. We plunge down the lane, snow well past our knees.

‘So,’ I say. ‘Did Aiden still sound annoyed?’

‘He is at me.’

‘Oh. Sorry.’

Mac shrugs. ‘He’ll get over it. Once he sees that you’re all right.’

When we reach the main road, thankfully ploughed, Aiden’s van is already there.

‘Thanks for putting up with me. For everything,’ I say. Where would I be now without Mac’s place to run to, to hide away in?

Mac gives me a hug and opens the van door, then holds Skye when she tries to jump into the van next to me. I wave through the window, blinking furiously, trying to keep myself together until they are gone from sight.

Aiden nods once when I say hello, then keeps his attention on the icy road, and keeping us on it. The silence is as frosty as the winter morning until he pulls in front of the train station.

‘Aiden, I’m sorry. But I had to see Mum before I could go. Don’t blame Mac: he couldn’t have stopped me. Don’t let us say goodbye like this.’

He catches my hand in his. Face serious, his deep blue eyes stare into mine. ‘Kyla, please be more careful in future. Don’t let anything slip. Your life, and those of others, depend on you not getting caught.’

‘Don’t let anything slip: like getting my name wrong?’

‘Exactly.’

‘Like you just did? I’m Riley now, remember?’

A trace of a smile crosses his face. He reaches into a folder, then hands me a plastic card. ‘Here is your train ticket. Don’t lose it.’

I roll my eyes, tuck it in my pocket. ‘I’ll try not to.’

‘Have you got your ID?’

I give him a look, but he doesn’t relent. I sigh, fish into my bag and hold out my new ID card so he can see it, then tuck it away again.

‘And have you got your story straight from the file I sent? Tell me.’

‘I’m Riley Kain. I’m eighteen, and my birthday is 17th September, 2036. I’m from Chelmsford, an only child. My parents are both school teachers. I’m going to Keswick and staying at some place for under-twenty-ones along Derwentwater, called Waterfall House for Girls, and I’m signing up for CAS: the Cumbrian Apprenticeship Scheme. Whatever that is. Do I really have to do that, by the way?’

‘You can’t just visit; you have to be there for a reason.’ He smiles properly this time, and the tight knot of tension inside me eases with it. ‘I did consider a hospitality job, majoring in dish washing: we’ve got a connection in a hotel there. So things could be worse.’

‘Thanks. But you haven’t told me one kind of big bit of information.’

‘What is that?’

‘How do I find who reported me missing?’

His lips quirk. ‘I’ve told you before: it’s need-to-know.’

I stare at him, indignant. ‘Who needs to know more than I do now! Aren’t you going to tell me?’

‘Can’t I leave it as a surprise?’

I glare.

‘Just kidding. It’ll be easy to find your mother, Stella Connor. She runs Waterfall House. She knows you are coming; she knows you are her missing daughter.’

My mother. My actual, real mother: the one who gave birth to me, not one assigned in a Lorder insta-family. She was the one who reported me missing, just like I thought. My mother…the one I can’t remember.

Aiden squeezes my hand, as if he can see the thoughts that are keeping me from speaking. ‘Get going. Don’t look like security worries you, or they’ll pay extra attention. Just sail through the gate like you haven’t a care in the world.’

‘Okay,’ I manage to say. But I’m still sitting in the van, and Aiden is still holding my hand.

‘Kyla – Riley, I mean – take care of yourself. You know what to do if you need help, if anything goes wrong?’