The Dream Thieves (The Raven Cycle, #2)(14)

Blue turned it slowly to read each side: hyacinthus, celea. One side was blank.

Gansey pointed to each side for her. “Latin, Coptic, Sanskrit, something we don’t know, and … this is supposed to be Greek. Isn’t that funny that it’s blank?”

Derisively, Ronan said, “No. The ancient Greeks didn’t have a word for blue.”

Everyone at the table looked at him.

“What the hell, Ronan?” said Adam.

“It’s hard to imagine,” Gansey mused, “how this evidently successful classical education never seems to make it into your school papers.”

“They never ask the right questions,” Ronan replied.

At the front of the restaurant, the door opened. It would fall to Blue to seat the new party, but she lingered by the table, frowning at the box.

She said, “I have a right question. What is the language on this side?”

Ronan’s expression was petulant.

Gansey tilted his head. “We don’t know.”

Blue pointed at Ronan, who curled a lip. “He does. Somewhere in there. I know it.”

“You don’t know shit,” Ronan said.

There was the very briefest of pauses. It was true that this sort of venom was not unusual from Ronan. But it had been a very long while since it had been used so forcefully on Blue. She drew herself up, everything prickling.

Then Gansey said, very slowly, “Ronan, you’re never going to talk to Jane like that again.”

Both Adam and Blue stared at Gansey, who concentrated his gaze on his napkin. It wasn’t what he said but how he looked at no one when he said it that made the moment strange.

Blue, feeling oddly warm around the cheeks, told Gansey, “I don’t need you to stand up for me. Don’t you” — this was directed at Ronan — “think I’ll let you talk to me like that. Especially not just because you’re mad I’m right.”

As she whirled toward the front, she heard Adam say, “You’re such a dick,” and Noah laugh. Her spirits sank as she saw who stood at the hostess stand: Joseph Kavinsky. He was unmistakable: the sort of raven boy who was clearly an import from elsewhere. Everything about his facial structure — the long nose; the hollowed-out, heavy-lidded eyes; the dark arch of his eyebrows — was completely unlike the Valley faces she’d grown up with. Like many of the other raven boys, he sported massive sunglasses, spiked hair, a small earring, a chain around his neck, and a white tank top. But unlike the other raven boys, he terrified Blue.

“Hey, baby doll,” he greeted Blue. He was already standing too close, moving restlessly. He was always moving. There was something erratic and vulgar about the full line of his lips, like he’d swallow her if he got close enough. She hated the smell of him.

He was infamous, even at her school. You wanted something to get you through your exams, he had it. You wanted a fake license, he could get it. You wanted something to hurt you, he was it.

“I am not a baby doll,” Blue said icily, picking up a laminated menu. Her face was burning again. “Table for one?”

But he wasn’t even listening to her. He rocked on his heels, jerking his chin up to see who else was in the restaurant. Without looking at her again, he said, “My party’s already here.”

He walked away. Like she’d never been there.

She wasn’t sure if she couldn’t forgive Kavinsky for always managing to make her feel so insignificant, or herself, for knowing it was coming and being unable to guard herself against it.

She stuffed the menu back in the hostess station and stood there for a second, hating them all, hating this job, feeling strangely humiliated.

Then she took a deep breath and filled up table fourteen’s tea.

Kavinsky headed directly to the large table in the back, and the postures of the other boys all changed drastically. Adam looked at the table with a studied disinterest. Smudgy Noah ducked his head down into his shoulders, but couldn’t take his eyes off the newcomer. Gansey stood, leaning against the table, and there was something threatening rather than respectful about it. Ronan, however, was the one who had transformed the most. Though his casual position — arms crossed — remained the same, his shoulders were knotted with visible tension. Something about his eyes was ferocious and alive in the same way that they had been when he’d launched the plane in the field.

“I saw your POS out front,” Kavinsky told Gansey. “And I remembered I had something for Lynch.”

Laughing, he dropped a dry, tangled pile in front of Ronan.

Ronan eyed the gift, one eyebrow raised in glorious disdain. Leaning back, he pulled one of the strands to reveal that it was a collection of wristbands identical to the ones he always wore.

“How sweet, man.” Ronan lifted it higher, like spaghetti. “It goes with everything.”

“Like your mom,” Kavinsky agreed with good humor.

“What am I supposed to do with them?”

“Hell if I know. I just thought of you. Regift them. White rabbit shit.”

“Elephant,” murmured Gansey.

“Don’t bring politics into this, Dick,” Kavinsky replied. He slapped a palm on Ronan’s shaved head and rubbed it. Ronan looked ready to bite him. “Well, I’m out. Things to do. Enjoy your book club, ladies.”

He didn’t even look at Blue as he left. Him not hitting on you is a good thing, she told herself. She felt invisible. Unseeable. Is this how Noah feels?