The Dream Thieves (The Raven Cycle, #2)(83)

It was not toilet-papered trees and whispered bribes, front-lawn hacky sack and faculty affairs, gifted vodka and stolen cars.

It was not Aglionby Academy.

Sometimes, the difference between that utopia and reality exhausted Gansey.

“All right, now,” Gansey said. “This was great. You giving this phone back to Ronan at any point?”

There was silence. It was a slick sort of silence, the sort that would make bystanders turn their heads to note it, same as a loud laugh.

Gansey didn’t quite care for it.

“He’s going to have to try harder,” Kavinsky said.

“I beg your pardon?”

“That’s what Lynch says, too.”

Gansey could hear the crooked smile in Kavinsky’s voice. He asked, “Do you ever think your humor veers too much on the side of prurient?”

“Man, don’t SAT at me. Here’s what’s up. The Ronan you know is no more. He’s having a coming-of-age moment. A — a — bildungsroman. Goddamn me! SAT that, Dick-dick-dick.”

“Kavinsky,” Gansey said evenly. “Where’s Ronan?”

“Right here. WAKE UP, FUCKWEASEL, IT’S YOUR GIRLFRIEND!” Kavinsky said. “Sorry. He’s totally pissed. Can I take a message?”

Gansey had to take a very long minute to compose himself. He discovered, on the other side of the minute, that he was still too angry to speak.

“Dickie. You still there?”

“I’m here. What do you want?”

Kavinsky said, “Same thing I always want. To be entertained.”

The phone went dead.

As Gansey stood there, he suddenly recalled a story about Glendower, one that had always bothered him. Glendower was a legend in most ways. He’d risen in rebellion against the English when every other medieval man his age was giving old age and death the stink eye. He’d united the people, defeated impossible odds, and ridden across Wales on rumors of his magical powers. A lawyer, a soldier, a father. A mystical giant who’d left a permanent footprint.

But this story … some of the Welsh weren’t convinced that throwing sticks at their English neighbors would improve Wales’s dire straits. In particular, one of Glendower’s cousins, a man named Hywel, thought Glendower was out of his lawyerly mind. In the way of most families, he expressed his difference of opinion by raising a small army. This might have put off most princes, but not Glendower. He was a lawyer and — like Gansey — a believer in the power of words. He arranged to meet Hywel alone in a deer park to talk it all over.

Gansey was untroubled with the story up to this point. This was the Glendower he’d follow anywhere.

Then, the two men spotted a deer. Hywel lifted his bow. But instead of shooting the animal, he let the arrow fly at Glendower … who had cleverly worn chain mail beneath his tunic.

Gansey would’ve preferred the story to end here.

But it didn’t. Instead, unharmed by the arrow and enraged by the betrayal, Glendower pursued Hywel, stabbed him, and finally stuffed Hywel’s body inside an oak tree.

All the stabbing and stuffing and utter loss of temper seemed rather ignoble. Gansey wished he hadn’t ever found the story. There was no unreading it. But now, after hearing Kavinsky’s slow laugh on the other end of the line, imagining Ronan drunk in his absence from Henrietta, picturing the Camaro in any state other than how he’d left it, Gansey thought he finally glimpsed understanding.

He was at once closer and farther from Glendower than he’d been before.





Ronan woke up in a movie theater seat.

Of course, it wasn’t really a movie theater; it was just a basement home theater in a big, flimsy suburban mansion. In the light of day, he could see that it was done up with the works. Real movie seats, popcorn machine, ceiling projector, shelf full of action flicks and porn with uninventive titles. He vaguely recalled, with less acuity than a dream, watching an endless video of Saudi Arabian street racing on the big pull-down screen last night. What was he doing? He had no idea what he was doing. He couldn’t focus on anything except one hundred white Mitsubishis in a field.

“You didn’t throw up,” Kavinsky noted, from his perch two seats away. He held Ronan’s phone. “Most people throw up after drinking that much.”

Ronan didn’t say the truth, which was that he was not a stranger to drinking himself senseless. He didn’t say anything at all. He just stared at Kavinsky, doing the math: One hundred white Mitsubishis. Two dozen fake IDs. Five leather bracelets. Two of us.

“Say something, Rain Man,” said Kavinsky.

“Are there others?”

Kavinsky shrugged. “Hell if I know.”

“Is your father one?”

“Is your father one?”

Ronan got up. Kavinsky watched him try all three of the insubstantial white doors until he found the bathroom. He shut the door behind himself and peed and splashed water on his face and stared at himself.

One hundred white Mitsubishis.

On the other side of the door, Kavinsky said, “I’m getting bored, man. You want a line?”

Ronan didn’t answer. He dried his trembling hands, got himself together, and stepped out. He sat against the wall and watched Kavinsky do a line off the top of the popcorn machine. Shook his head when Kavinsky raised an eyebrow, an offering.