Kensy ran swiftly, her footsteps soundless on the damp ground. She turned the corner and her heart sank. It was a dead end. She was about to double back when, by chance, she glanced up. There, on the other side of the tightly woven hedge, stood an oak tree perfect for climbing. If she could reach it before he rounded the bend, she’d stand a chance.
Kensy dove onto the ground, her fingernails jamming with dirt as she clawed her way underneath the foliage. With one final push, her legs slithered through. She launched herself at the bottom branch, swinging up and over while trying not to rustle the leaves, then flattened against the trunk and adjusted her night-vision goggles. Her breath created tiny clouds in the darkness.
All was still but for a single silhouette that crept around the corner and down the path. Kensy grinned as she lined him up in the crosshairs. She closed her left eye and squeezed the trigger.
A loud yelp followed by a burst of salty language filled the air.
Kensy stuffed her fist into her mouth to suppress a fit of giggles. Now was not the time to give herself away. She crouched down, straddling the thick bough, and whispered into her headset. ‘Man down!’
There was a whir and a thunk as the pitch-black maze was illuminated by floodlights hidden in the canopies of the surrounding trees. Kensy lifted her arm to shield her eyes and sprang to her feet.
Song’s voice came through as clear as crystal from the control room, where he had been monitoring the activity. ‘Well done, Miss Kensington,’ he said, the smile in his voice audible. ‘Your team has emerged triumphant this evening. Please make your way back to the house and we will celebrate with a feast. Mrs Thornthwaite has been very busy.’
‘Woohoo! Thanks, Song.’ Kensy did a little victory dance on the tree branch and almost lost her balance. She hoped nobody saw her. ‘Hey guys, we did it! Finally!’
There were whoops of joy – some from close by while the rest came over the airwaves.
‘Not fair!’ Dante moaned. The lad had been sure he’d had the girl cornered. ‘Kensy’s outside the perimeter. Isn’t that against the rules?’
‘It is not,’ Kensy argued. ‘This tree is clearly on the boundary line. There’s no need to be such a sore loser, Moretti.’
‘If Miss Kensington was clever enough to see a vantage point then, I am afraid, Master Dante, that she has done nothing illegal,’ Song informed the lad, receiving another groan in response.
Kensy leapt from the tree, clearing the hedge and landing hard on the ground inside the maze just as Autumn charged around the corner. Dante had already taken off.
‘Go us!’ Autumn exclaimed. She removed her headgear and high-fived Kensy.
Even after an hour and a half of intense combat training, the girl was a model of perfection. Autumn’s silky black hair remained neatly tied back in a low ponytail with a red ribbon – unlike Kensy’s messy locks, which, after scrambling under the hedge, were now sprouting several leaves and a couple of twigs.
The pair were soon joined by Harper and Max, but the rest of their team were still deep inside the labyrinth. Via their earpieces, the children could hear their opponents complaining about how many bruises they were going to have tomorrow.
‘Stop your whining, Carlos,’ Autumn ordered. ‘At least I had the good grace to shoot you in the bottom. You got me in the head last time, but you didn’t hear me going on about it like a sooky la-la.’
It was true. Carlos had aimed at the girl’s shoulder, but somehow the projectile clipped the edge of Autumn’s helmet. The bullets were made of soft rubber and, although the children were fully covered in their sensory slimline body armour, concealed beneath their clothes, the pellets still packed a punch. It was all part of their training – Mr Nutting and Miss Witherbee, the children’s PE and English teachers respectively, were also in charge of weapons instruction and maintained there was a purpose for using rubber bullets instead of something messier but less invasive like paint balls. They reasoned that the children needed regular reminders of the harsh and at times fatal realities of their impending life of service.
Kensy looked at her brother, who possessed an uncanny knack of navigating the maze without running into the usual dead ends. ‘Can you get us out of here, Max?’
‘Sure – follow me,’ the boy said.
He jogged to the end of the row and turned left, with Kensy, Harper and Autumn in tow. It was a little while before the rest of the group joined them at the entrance. While en route, Max had been called on by a couple of the kids who were horribly lost to offer his guidance. It wasn’t too long before everyone was accounted for.
‘Congratulations, Kensy.’ Sachin’s dark eyes glinted with good humour. He offered the girl his hand. ‘Your team was on fire tonight.’
There was a murmur of agreement from the rest of the kids. Max hoped his sister wouldn’t gloat too much. She had a tendency to do that, which rubbed some people up the wrong way and understandably so.
‘We couldn’t let you beat us three nights in a row,’ Kensy replied, and checked that she’d flicked the safety catch on her weapon. ‘It helped that Alfie shot you in the first five minutes.’
The burly lad grinned. ‘I was very proud of that.’
Sachin rubbed his shoulder. ‘You couldn’t have taken a step back, maybe? I’m going to have a welt there for weeks.’
Alfie shrugged and carried on grinning. ‘You were right in front of me and you know what Nutters says – he who hesitates is lost.’
‘Or she, but you don’t need to hesitate to be lost,’ Inez said. ‘If it wasn’t for Max’s instructions, I’d be camping in the maze tonight. I don’t know why I have no sense of direction whatsoever. I really need to work on that.’
The others chuckled. It was true – Inez was hopeless. One day during Pharos lessons at school, she’d managed to make her way to Dame Spencer’s office at the Beacon, several blocks away, when she’d meant to take the secret lift to the lab.
The group headed back towards the storage shed to put away the equipment.
‘Can you believe it’s Christmas the day after tomorrow?’ Autumn said wistfully. She hooked her arm through Kensy’s and gave the girl a squeeze. ‘I’m forecasting snow.’
Kensy cast her eyes upwards and frowned. There was a bite to the night air, but there wasn’t so much as a hint of frost on the ground. ‘Really? It doesn’t seem cold enough.’
‘Trust me,’ Autumn said with a wink.
Kensy rolled her eyes. ‘Sure – of course there will be snow. I mean, after everything else that’s happened in the past month, why wouldn’t there be snow at Christmas, right on cue?’
Autumn turned to her friend with a quizzical look.
‘It’s just that one minute you think you’re an ordinary kid with regular parents, whose dad tells the worst jokes and then . . .’ Kensy paused, afraid that the trembling in her throat would make its way into her voice.
Autumn pulled the girl into a hug. ‘We’ll find them,’ she said softly. ‘Don’t ask me how I know it – I’ve got a good feeling, and my good feelings are usually right.’
Kensy nodded and looked across at her brother. The thing was, the twins knew their parents were alive – they just didn’t know where they were or why they’d suddenly gone to ground or, worse, if they’d been abducted. When the twins had first travelled to London, they’d received a couple of cryptic messages and then the confirmation, including an instruction to tell no one and to only trust Fitz. Not even Dame Cordelia Spencer – their extraordinary, and until recently top-secret grandmother, who also happened to be the head of Pharos – had any idea about the contact. Cordelia had, however, authorised a full-scale operation that involved agents all over the world searching for her son and daughter-in-law. Ed and Anna had been in touch with the twins each week since their first contact, but with no more than a few words to let the kids know they were alive. While Kensy and Max felt guilty keeping this information to themselves, for the moment it simply had to stay that way.
Thankfully, the past month had been so busy they’d had little time to dwell on the situation. On the day they learned the truth about the organisation and their grandmother they had been presented with two leather-bound books by Song and Sidney, Cordelia’s twin butlers. These had now been studied from cover to cover, revealing much about Pharos and its workings. A spy agency above all others, Pharos had been founded in the ancient lighthouse of the same name in Alexandria, Egypt, by a group of concerned citizens committed to keeping their city safe from crime and evildoing. Over the centuries, its secrets had been passed down through generations until the leadership was bestowed upon their grandfather, Dominic Spencer. His wife, Cordelia, somewhat reluctantly took over as head of the organisation following Dominic’s untimely death.
Pharos transcended governments, working for the greater good across all countries and cultures. By comparison, the likes of MI6, ASIS and the FBI seemed little more than parochial PR companies, although there was no denying they did some good work on occasion. Pharos had remained under the radar since its inception and it was Dame Spencer’s responsibility to see that it stayed that way. She had spent much of her adult life running the Beacon, a well-respected broadsheet in England. It was a huge business in itself as well as a perfect cover for the agency’s clandestine operations. Despite being bombarded with information, Kensy and Max both knew there was still so much to learn.
Carlos looked across and noticed that, even though he was on the winning team tonight, Max hadn’t said a word for the past five minutes. Everyone else was chattering excitedly, but he seemed far away. Carlos nudged the lad. ‘What’s up?’
Max offered a weak smile. ‘It’s going to be strange having Christmas without them.’
‘Well,’ Carlos said, ‘if past years are anything to go by, it will still be a celebration you’ll never forget – especially if my dad and Mr MacGregor hit the dance floor again.’
Max raised an eyebrow. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You’ll see.’ Carlos grimaced. ‘Embarrassing doesn’t even begin to cover it.’
Max grinned. ‘Sounds like something to look forward to.’