The Dream Thieves (The Raven Cycle, #2)(15)

Gansey said, “The only thing that gives me any joy is imagining the used car dealership he’ll be working in by the time he’s thirty.”

Ronan, head down, kept studying the leather bands. One of his hands was a fist. Blue wondered what the real meaning of Kavinsky’s gift was. She wondered if Ronan knew the real meaning.

“Like I said,” Gansey muttered. “Trouble.”





The Gray Man hated his current rental car. He got the distinct impression it hadn’t been handled enough by humans when it was young, and now would never be pleasant to be around. Since he’d picked it up, it had already tried to bite him several times and had spent a considerable amount of time resisting his efforts to achieve the speed limit.

Also, it was champagne. Ridiculous color for a car.

He would have returned it for another, but the Gray Man made a point of staying unmemorable if he could. His previous rental had acquired an unfortunate and possibly incriminating stain in the backseat. Better to put some distance between himself and it.

After dutifully filling the car with Greenmantle’s machines and dials, the Gray Man went on an electrical goose chase. He didn’t mind terribly that the flashing lights and humming alarms and scattered needles weren’t painting a coherent map to the Greywaren. Henrietta had considerable charms. The downtown was populated by daintily greasy sandwich shops and aggressively down-home junk shops, swaybacked porches and square columns, all of the buildings tired but tidy as library books. He peered through the car window as he passed by. Locals on chairs on porches peered back.

The readings continued to be meaningless, so he parked the Champagne Monstrosity at the corner drugstore, which advertised best tuna fish in town! He ordered a sandwich and a milkshake from a red-lipped lady, and as he leaned on the stainless-steel counter, the power went out.

The red-lipped lady used a meaty fist to thump the now-dormant milkshake machine and swore in a soft accent that made it sound affectionate. She assured him, “It’ll come back on in a minute.”

All of the shelves and greeting cards and pharmaceuticals looked eerie and apocalyptic in the indirect light from the front windows. “Does this happen a lot?”

“Since this spring, yes, sir. Goes out. Gets them surges, too, blows out them transformers and everything catches fire. Turns on the stadium lights, too, down at Aglionby, when nobody’s there for a game. Sure all those terrible boys are gone for the summer. Well, most all of them. But you’re not staying, are you?”

“A few weeks.”

“Then you’ll be here for the Fourth.”

The Gray Man had to drag up a mental calendar. He didn’t celebrate many holidays.

“You come down here and see the county show,” she said, giving his half-blended milkshake a dispirited twitch. “You get yourself a nice view of the fireworks from the courthouse. Don’t be fooled by those other ones.”

“The ones people do at home?”

“The Aglionby ones,” she said. “Some of them boys blow up all kinds of things they shouldn’t be getting into. Terrorize the old ladies. Don’t know why the sheriff don’t stop him.”

“Him?” The Gray Man was interested in how the plural Aglionby ones suddenly became a singular him.

She seemed to be in a reverie, watching cars go slowly by the big pane-glass windows. Eventually, she continued, “Probably it’s HEPCO’s fault; they knew their wires was old, but do they replace them? No.”

He blinked at the sudden shift in conversation. “HEPCO?”

“Beg pardon? Oh, Henrietta Electric Power Company.” Only, with her accent it sounded like Henretta Lektrick Poywurr Cuhmpuhnnay. As if invoked by her voice, the electricity came back on. “Oh, there it is back again. Told you there’s no need for worries.”

“Oh,” the Gray Man said, with a glance at the crackling fluorescent lights overhead, “I wasn’t worried.”

She chuckled. It was a deeply satisfied and knowing sort of laugh. “I reckon not.”

The tuna fish was good. It was the only one he’d had since he arrived, however, so he couldn’t say whether it was the best in town.

He kept driving. Victorians turned into fields as he crossed over the interstate, past steepled barns and white farmhouses, active goats and deceased pickup trucks. Everything was painted in the same color palette, ruddy greens and deep-green reds; even the rubbish looked as if it had grown from the sloping hills. Only the mountains looked out of place, blue ghosts on every horizon.

Much to the Gray Man’s surprise, Greenmantle’s meters seemed to be coming to a consensus.

They led him onto another back road. Ramblers and mailboxes poked through the soil.

His phone rang.

It was his brother.

The Gray Man’s stomach wrung itself out.

The phone rang only twice. Missed call. His brother had never intended for him to pick up; he merely wanted this: the Gray Man stopping the car, wondering if he was supposed to return the call. Wondering if his brother was going to call back. Untangling the wired threads in his gut.

Finally, a Labrador retriever barking at the door grounded him again. He shut the phone into the glove box, out of sight.

Back to Greenmantle’s devices.

They led him to a yellow house with an empty carport. With the EMF reader in one hand and a cesium magnetometer in the other, he climbed into the heat and followed the energy field.