Looking for Lucy Jo (17 page)

Lana laughed. ‘Yeah I know but we’r
e
goo
d
.’

Running down the escalator, both girls enjoyed the warm air coming from below and laughed together as they sit on a bench to wait for the next train, which was due in a matter of minutes.

Emma’s mobile phone beeped.

‘Let me guess… Diarmuid, right? Looking for a clue?’

Emma shook her head. ‘No, he’s actually not far behind. They’ve just got the next clue. Don’t worry, I’m not going to tell him anything.’ She grinned as she sent him a text and put her phone back in her bag.

‘What’s Barber up to today?’

‘Same thing he’s been up to all week. Trying to get the truth out of Sthenelaus.’

‘How’s that going, by the way?’

‘Not great. The guy is so ill, he can barely talk.’

‘Weird, isn’t it?’

Lana nodded as she looked at all the people buzzing around them. ‘I’m just glad we got him. So many people can sleep easier knowing he can’t hurt them anymore.’

‘Now they just have to worry about Stan.’

‘God, I’d actually forgotten about that creep.’

Jumping up at the sound of the tube coming around the bend in the tunnel, Emma grabbed her sister’s arm so they didn’t get split up in all the commotion. The seats were pretty full, so they stood, Lana trying to avoid touching any surfaces.

Emma pulled a face at her.

‘What?’ she whispered. ‘They’re full of other people’s germs.’

‘You’re wearing gloves.’

Lana poked out her tongue, but when she noticed people watching her, she quickly put it back in and turned away, glancing at a man standing by the door at the far end of the carriage.

‘Hey, is that…?

‘Huh?’ said Emma following her gaze. ‘Who?’

But when Lana turned back, he was gone. She shook her head.

‘It’s nothing, I think I’m just imagining things,’ she shrugged and smiled.

‘
This is Temple. The next station is Embankment
,
‘ said the recorded voice.

The cold hit them as they exited the underground, making them both breathless for a second before they headed off to find a zebra crossing to get to the riverside.

Soon, they were wandering up and down the street looking for ‘someone’s daughter’.

‘It could be anyone,’ moaned Lana, after ten minutes of drawing a blank. ‘What do we do?’

‘We need to think about this,’ Emma said, as they leaned against the wall and looked out across the Thames. They both watched the boats for a moment before their eyes landed on one that looked familiar one just metres away from where they stood.

‘Is that Declan’s boat?’ asked Emma as she grabbed Lana and pulled her along the pier.

Gingerly climbing aboard, Lana almost lost her balance as Emma hopped on with confidence. ‘Jeeze, Em, I nearly fell in the water!’

‘No you didn’t. Come on, let’s see if the clue is here. Someone’s daughter? Who could that be?’

Pushing open the door to the house boat where they’d spent their first few weeks in London the year before, both girls collapsed with laughter at the sight of a cardboard cutout of Daisy. Stuck to her hands were several envelopes.

‘That is brilliant. I wonder whose idea that was,’ Lana laughed. ‘I bet it was Beau’s.’

Rise higher and higher up in the sky

A view from above using a special eye

There you’ll find clue number three

And something to eat and a cup of tea!

‘Oh this one is way too easy,’ said Lana while Emma nodded.

‘Come on, let’s run,’ she said, pulling her sister off of the boat and heading towards the London Eye.

As they sprinted down the road, they spotted some of their classmates looking somewhat confused across the other side of the street. Laughing, the girls ignored them and continued on their way to the famous wheel.

Approaching, they spotted Declan and Aria, in animated conversation sitting on the wall beside the wheel. Both grinned at the sight of them.

‘So you made it this far.’ He smiled as Aria poured them both a drink from a large flask and handed it to them.

‘Yup!’ Emma smiled. ‘We particularly liked Daisy’s cutout.’

Declan chuckled. ‘That was Beau’s idea.’

‘We thought so. So what’s next?’ Lana asked.

‘Drink your tea, eat your sandwich and hop into a capsule. We’ll hand you your next clue when you’ve done one revolution,’ he grinned.

‘Hurry up, Em. Eat fast!’

Emma nodded and both girls munched down their food and gulped down the hot tea before jumping into the capsule.

‘It’s so slow,’ Lana moaned after a couple of minutes. ‘I wanna get going.’

‘Just enjoy it. We’re still in the lead and everyone else has got to do the same task.’

‘Yeah, I guess.’

Looking down below them, there was still no sign of the other teenagers, so Lana smiled and sat down, peering around at the view beyond.

‘It’s pretty special, isn’t it, sis?’ asked Emma.

‘Huh? What?’

‘London.’

‘Oh yeah.’

A number of tourists were wandering around their capsule, taking photos of the various landmarks that could be seen from their vantage point. A woman brushed by Emma as she stood up to get a better view of St. Paul’s Cathedral.

‘We should go there, Lana. We’ve never been before.’

‘Huh? The cathedral? Why would we go there?’

‘Because it’s beautiful,’ the woman interrupted.

Lana and Emma both looked at her and cringed at her face. She was about fifty years old, with small beady droopy eyes and a nose that was far too big. Her thin lips were stretched into a smile that made her look more like the Joker than anything else.

Lana shivered as she reached for her sister’s hand.

‘Yes, I’ve heard that it is,’ Emma replied with an attempted smile.

‘Did you know that it was the tallest building in London up until about thirty years ago?’ the woman asked, stepping closer.

Both girls shook their heads, Lana pulling Emma backwards.

‘No, we had no idea,’ Lana spoke loudly. ‘Thanks for that info,’ she said, with a fake smile, pulling them away towards the door. ‘Did you feel that?’ she asked.

Emma nodded. ‘Evil. Pure evil.’

‘We should get off.’

‘I wish we could,’ Lana agreed.

‘It’s just a few more minutes,’ Emma whispered, looking over her shoulder at the frightening woman who stood looking away from them.

Counting down the minutes until they could step off, both girls held each other’s hand tightly, waiting patiently without saying a word.

Not soon enough, they’d reached ground level.

Lana let out a sigh of relief as they hopped off and ran as quickly as they could towards Declan and Aria, who were standing chatting to a small group of their classmates.

‘Declan!’ Lana shouted.

Lifting his head, his expression changed almost immediately and he stepped forward. ‘You alright?’ he asked.

‘Yes, but it was weird,’ Emma breathed as the three of them turned to scan the crowd.

‘What, what was weird?’ asked Rupert.

‘There was an evil woman in the capsule with us.’

‘What did she do?’

‘Nothing, really.’

‘So how did you know she was evil?’ he asked.

‘We could feel it.’

‘Oh, right, okay.’

‘She was freakishly ugly, though,’ Lana said, scrunching her face up in disgust.

‘Sorry, Lana. What did you just say?’ asked Aria, who had overheard the conversation.

‘She was freakishly ugly.’

Aria’s face turned white.

‘What? What’s wrong?’

‘Can you describe her?’

‘Beady brown eyes that seemed to droop down into her cheeks, and a huge nose,’ Emma described.

‘But she had the most perfectly done hair,’ Lana added. ‘And beautifully manicured fingernails.’

‘Oh dear,’ Aria whispered. ‘It sounds like Madge.’

‘Right, this treasure hunt is officially over,’ Declan announced.

‘Oh no,’ Lana pouted. ‘It was fun.’

‘Sorry, guys, but if Madge is out there, stalking any one of you, then it’s too perilous. Until we know how dangerous this woman is, we need to get the rest of the kids together and back to Praxos ASAP.’

‘Really? But she’s just one woman? What harm can she do?’ Lana pulled a face.

Declan turned to face Lana and raised his eyebrows. ‘She’s a Skull, kiddo. And, like I said, we don’t know just how dangerous she is. And we don’t know who she’s working with, either. I know you’re all keen to help and we appreciate that, but we mustn’t forget that you are all just sixteen years old. Let’s re-group, find her, and then maybe we can continue the treasure hunt afterwards, got it?’

‘Yeah, Declan. We got it,’ Lana groaned.

Climbing onto the private bus that had been organised to take them safely back to Praxos, Lana took one last look around to see if she could spot Madge Sophokles, but the woman seemed to have vanished.

‘How did she know that we’d be on the London Eye?’ Emma asked, as Diarmuid slung his arm over her shoulder and shrugged.

‘You know, earlier I thought I saw Stan,’ Lana leaned forward and whispered to Emma.

‘What?’ she cried. ‘Why didn’t you say anything?’

Lana put her fingers to her lips and grimaced. ‘I thought it was just my imagination.’

‘You’ve got to tell Declan.’

‘He already knows.’

‘Huh?’

Looking towards the front of the bus, Declan was staring at her, his eyebrows raised as he walked towards them.

‘See?’

‘Yep,’ Emma replied.

‘You should have told me the moment you thought you saw him.’

‘I didn’t think it was real, Declan. Sorry.’

‘If you see anything else remotely suspicious, tell me, okay?’

Lana nodded and slid down in the seat as Declan turned around and returned to the front.

A couple of minutes into their journey, Lana yelled at the top of her voice, ‘Declan, I see him, I see him.’

Sure enough, Stan Sophokles was standing on the other side of the road with a grin on his face.

‘Keep driving,’ Declan instructed.

‘What?’ Lana squealed. ‘We should go and get him.’

Shaking his head, Declan stood staring back at him, deep in concentration.

‘What’s he doing?’ whispered Emma.

‘I think he’s trying to read his mind,’ Diarmuid replied.

But then another bus passed between them and when it had gone, so had Stan.

Declan cursed under his breath and said something to the driver, who nodded. The bus began to slow and the front door opened. Without stopping, Declan jumped off and ran back towards where Stan had been.

‘No,’ shouted Lana. ‘We can help.’

But the door closed and the bus sped up.

Aria stood and walked towards them. ‘Don’t worry, Declan will be fine.’

‘But why can’t we go too?’ Lana complained.

Aria shook her head. ‘He gave explicit instructions that you are all returned to the academy as quickly as possible. Let the adults deal with this.’

When Aria walked back to her seat, Lana turned towards Diarmuid and Emma with her mouth open. ‘Let the adults deal with this? Who does she think she is? We’re not children. Jeeze.’

‘She’s also not English, Lana. She probably didn’t mean it like that.’

Lana raised her eyebrows and crossed her arms, sitting back in her seat. ‘Yeah, whatever.’

oOo

Declan arrived back just a few minutes after they did and he didn’t look happy. Looking at him expectantly, he shook his head and headed straight to Eleanor’s office.

‘What should we do?’ asked Emma before he disappeared out of sight.

‘Erm, just go chill out in the white room for a bit,’ he yelled.

The class did as they were told, taking the elevator down to the main Praxos hall before heading towards their so-called chill out room, where large white beanbags were scattered around the carpeted floor.

Flopping down into one of them, Emma sighed. ‘So what happens now?’

Nobody answered, they all just shrugged.

‘There must be something we can do. I hate just sitting around, doing nothing.’

‘I know, babe,’ Diarmuid said, handing her a small bottle of water.

‘Thanks.’

‘Maybe we should sneak out and try to find them ourselves?’ suggested Lana.

‘Eleanor and Declan would go mad if we did that again,’ Emma half-smiled.

‘Do you have a better idea?’ Lana asked.

‘Not really.’

‘Exactly.’

‘How about trying to have a vision?’ Liam suggested from across the room.

‘I need something that belongs to them to do that, or at least touch something that they’ve touched.’

‘Unless we’re under water, together,’ Emma whispered.

‘Where do we go for that? I’m not going into the Thames again. No way… that’s so gross.’

A few of the others sniggered.

‘Public swimming pool?’

‘Too many people around,’ Diarmuid replied.

‘And just as gross,’ Lana added.

‘I wish there was a Praxos pool,’ sighed Emma.

‘Actually, there is,’ said a voice from the doorway.

Everybody’s head turned to find Wilbur, standing holding a large tray full of snacks and drinks.

‘Wilbur, you’re the coolest,’ Liam said, hopping up and rushing over to grab a chocolate bar.

‘What do you mean there’s a Praxos pool, Wilbur?’ Emma asked.

After placing the tray on one of the large tables next to the wall, he turned and smiled. ‘We’ve got our own swimming pool you could use to try and, erm, have a vision.’

‘Where is it? Is it here? Why didn’t we know about it before?’

Wilbur chuckled. ‘Because it didn’t exist before. Eleanor had it built during your Christmas holidays, not that you had much of one and…’

‘And it was meant to be a surprise,’ said another voice as Eleanor appeared. ‘Your last treasure hunt clue today was going to lead you to it. Unfortunately, certain Skulls prevented that from happening. So, why don’t you all follow me and I’ll show you where it is.’

Delighted voices filled the great hall as they walked through it and headed down into one of the darker tunnels past the archives. Soon they came to a large oval wooden door. Eleanor turned the handle and pushed it open to reveal a room that looked like something from an aquarium. Directly in front and above was a massive glass pool, illuminated from beneath. It was stunning.

‘How do we get in?’ squealed Emma.

‘There are steps at the far end, over there,’ Eleanor stated. ‘And changing rooms down there,’ she pointed to the right. ‘You’ll find all the necessary swimwear and towels in there, too.’

‘Eleanor, this is just magical,’ Lana grinned.

‘It is, isn’t it? I wanted it to be special for you all. I hope you enjoy it. However,’ she added before anyone could disappear. ‘This wasn’t built purely for fun, we will be using this room for training too, and sometimes it may have to be utilised for alternative practises. But more on that later. I understand you and Lana wish to attempt further visions, Emma?’

Emma nodded. ‘We just want to help find Madge and Stan so we can all stop worrying.’

Eleanor smiled. ‘Thank you. We want the same thing, so please use the pool, but be careful. I’ll have one of the Mentors come down to keep an eye on you. Good luck,’ she said as she disappeared out the door.

Lana and Emma both squealed with delight as they followed the others towards the changing rooms.

oOo

Aria sat beneath the large pool of water, watching as some of the teenagers swam by, waving at her. She waved back, smiling, before she noticed the two sisters slowly descend into the depths. Intrigued by their close bond, she thought of her brother Luis and smiled.

The girls turned to face her and gave her a thumbs up before they held hands and closed their eyes.

‘It’s pretty cool, isn’t it?’ said a shy voice to her side.

‘It certainly is. You’re, erm, Nisha, right?’

Nisha nodded and sat down.

‘You’re not swimming?’

‘I’m not much of a swimmer, really.’

‘You’ll be safe in there with the rest of them.’

‘What I meant to say is, I can’t really swim.’

‘Oh.’ Aria smiled. ‘Well now that there is a pool here, you can be taught. It’s not too difficult, you know.’

‘I guess so.’

They sat in silence for a couple of minutes before Nisha opened her mouth to speak, then bit her lip and closed it again, shaking her head.

‘Is everything alright, Nisha?’

‘Erm, do you know what my ability is?’

Aria shook her head.

‘I can see and speak to dead people.’

‘Oh?’ It took a moment for Nisha’s meaning to sink in and Aria slowly turned to face the teenager. ‘Is there something you need to tell me?’

Nisha dropped her head and looked sad.

Taking a large breath, Aria’s eyes grew large. ‘Is it… is it… John?’

Nisha nodded.

‘Oh God,’ she gulped. ‘Is he… here?’

Nisha shook her head, ‘He came to me last night, and the night before, while I was sleeping.’

Tears began to fall down Aria’s cheeks. ‘When? How?’ she cried.

‘Well, that’s kind of the confusing bit. I’m not sure exactly. He doesn’t seem like the other ghosts I’ve seen before.’

‘In what way?’

‘I’m not sure, I’m still pretty new to this. I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you, but he wanted me to tell you…’

‘What, Nisha? What did he want to tell me?’

‘He said something about being trapped, that he can’t get out, he can’t let go.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘I’m sorry, I don’t either.’

‘Oh Nisha, don’t be upset. Thank you for telling me. Is there any way you can reach out to him?’

Nisha shook her head. ‘I’ve tried since this morning, but nothing happens. It’s like he can only reach out to me, and maybe only at night. I don’t know what to do.’

‘Maybe I should be with you tonight and you can try again then. Is that okay with you?’

Nisha nodded.

oOo

After their third failed attempt, Emma opened her eyes and pulled Lana’s hand, gesturing that they should get some air. Lana nodded and they swam to the surface. All their classmates were sitting on the edge of the pool with their feet dangling in the water.

‘Well? Anything?’ asked Diarmuid.

Shaking their heads, Lana and Emma pulled themselves out of the water and began drying themselves with oversized towels.

‘I don’t get it. Why did it work in Portugal and not here?’ she said, flopping down on a chair beside the pool.

Emma sighed. ‘I wish I knew. Maybe we were closer then? I dunno. I’ve no idea how this works.’

‘This sucks,’ groaned Lana.

Aria and Nisha walked round and up the steps so they stood in front of the class. ‘No luck?’

Everyone shook their heads.

‘I wonder… Why didn’t I think of this earlier? I wonder if this would help?’ she said, taking off her wristwatch and walking over to Emma. ‘This was a gift from, from Sthenelaus. I’ve no idea why I’m still wearing it.’ Aria cringed.

Lana’s eyes widened. ‘That’s gotta work,’ she said, jumping back into the water and splashing everyone.

‘But, it’ll get ruined,’ Emma said, without thinking.

‘I really, seriously, don’t care.’ Aria smiled. ‘I should have thrown it away before now, anyway.’

Scrutinising the watch carefully, Emma’s brow furrowed. ‘What’s this?’ she said.

Diarmuid leaned forward and gasped. ‘No freaking way!’ he yelled and grabbed the watch, throwing it into the water.

‘Diarmuid! What are you doing?’ asked Emma.

Nobody said a word for a few seconds. They just watched the wristwatch sink to the bottom of the deep end.

‘Diarmuid?’ asked Lana.

‘That’s how they knew everything. She obviously suspected you, Aria.’

‘What are you talking about, babe?’ asked Emma.

‘That wasn’t just a watch. It was a listening device.’

Aria’s hands flew to her mouth. ‘Oh my goodness. I must tell Eleanor immediately.’ She turned and ran down the stairs, opening the door and disappearing. The others listened to her footsteps growing further away.

‘Oh man… this is bad. This is real bad,’ Liam said. ‘You girls need to use that watch and have a vision like… pronto.’

Emma nodded her head, turned and kissed Diarmuid on the lips, and dived back into the water. Lana took a deep breath and followed her sister to the bottom of the pool.