“Agreed,” Oliver says. He wipes sleep from his eyes and extends a hand to Maxine, who pulls him up from the floor. “Let’s go.”

The hallway is washed gray in the watery light of dawn seeping in from the skylights overhead.

The six of us peek our heads out the door but are met only with the sleepy silence of a city before its residents have risen.

Maxine looks to the right, then the left, then back to us. She nods once. We follow her.

We do our best to quiet the clacking of our footsteps against the stone floors, but Maxine, Lena, and I are wearing spindly, delicate little heels, so our efforts don’t do much.

My heart is on the verge of jumping out of my skin. I once cried when a teacher scolded me for writing my cursive Ds incorrectly. I don’t have much of a stomach for openly breaking the law, no matter how many times I’ve done it now.

I know the story we’ve rehearsed. If we run into any guards, we’ll simply pretend to be drunk and young and lost.

We’re nearly to the exit when we hear the footsteps. Panicked, I glance to Maxine and Lena. “Do we run?” I whisper.

Male voices float down the hallway, angry male voices. “We’ve searched all night,” one of them says.

“There are miles of galleries, they very well could still be here,” another responds.

Finn curses under his breath.

They’ll round the corner any moment and see us. We’re in a hall of white marble statues with no hallways to duck down. Our only option is to fight or hide.

“Go,” Anais hisses.

“What?” Maxine replies.

Anais takes her by the chin and kisses her on the cheek, leaving Maxine stunned and blushing. “I’ll distract them. Better they suspect me than you. My great-grandfather can get me out of any trouble. I fear you may not share such luck. Take the key, and go.” Anais takes off running before we can stop her.

Seconds later, one of the voices yells, “Wait! Stop!” and I know they’ve spotted her. We take our opportunity and run for the exit.

We crisscross through the corridors we studied so diligently on the map until we find the steel double doors that lead to the back service entrance.

Oliver extends both arms to push them open, and they swing out onto a back alleyway.

“Will Anais be all right?” Lena asks once we’re out into the fresh air.

Maxine nods, unbothered. “I have no doubt.”

We share looks of disbelief between us. Then I start to laugh. Maxine follows, then Lena, then the boys until we’re nearly doubled over, tears in our eyes, like we’ve just heard the funniest joke ever told.