The Raven Boys

They didn’t have to be different things, did they?

"Glendower," Whelk said out loud, trying it out. The word echoed off the bathroom walls, hollow and metallic. He wondered what Gansey — strange, desperate Gansey — was thinking he’d ask for as a favor.

Climbing up off the bathroom floor, Whelk picked up all the notebooks. It would only take a few minutes to copy them in the staff room, and if anyone asked, he’d tell them Gansey had asked him to.

Glendower.

If Whelk found him, he’d ask for what he’d wanted all along: to control the ley line.

Chapter 19

The following afternoon, Blue walked barefoot to the street in front of 300 Fox Way and sat on the curb to wait for Calla beneath the blue-green trees. All afternoon Neeve had been locked up in her room and Maura had been doing angel-card readings for a group of out-of-towners on a writing retreat. So Blue had taken all afternoon to contemplate what to do about finding Neeve in the backyard. And what to do involved Calla.

She was just getting restless when Calla’s carpool pulled up at the curb.

"Are you putting yourself out with the trash?" Calla asked as she climbed out of the vehicle, which was blue-green like everything else in the day. She wore a strangely respectable dress with dubiously funky rhinestone sandals. Making a lackadaisical hand motion at the driver, she turned to Blue as the car drove away.

"I need to ask you a question," Blue said.

"And it’s a question that sounds better next to a trash can? Hold this." Calla wrestled one of her bags off her arm and onto Blue’s. She smelled of jasmine and chili peppers, which meant she’d had a bad day at work. Blue wasn’t entirely certain what Calla did for a living, but she knew it had something to do with Aglionby, paperwork, and cursing at students, often on weekends. Whatever her job description was, it involved rewarding herself with burritos on bad days.

Calla began to stomp up the walk toward the front door.

Blue trailed helplessly after her, lugging the bag. It felt like it had books or bodies in it. "The house is full."

Only one of Calla’s eyebrows was paying any attention. "It’s always full."

They were nearly at the front door. Inside, every room was occupied with aunts and cousins and mothers. The sound of Persephone’s angry PhD music was already audible. The only chance for privacy was outside.

Blue said, "I want to know why Neeve’s here."

Calla stopped. She looked at Blue over her shoulder.

"Well, excuse you," she replied, not very pleasantly. "I’d like to know the cause of climate change, too, but no one’s telling me that."

Clutching Calla’s bag like a hostage, Blue insisted, "I’m not six anymore. Maybe everyone else can see what they need to see in a pack of cards, but I’m tired of being left in the dark."

Now she had both of Calla’s eyebrows’ interest.

"Damn straight," Calla agreed. "I wondered when you were going to go all rebellious on us. Why aren’t you asking your mother?"

"Because I’m angry at her for telling me what to do."

Calla shifted her weight. "Take another bag. What is it you propose?"

Blue accepted another bag; this one was dark brown, and managed to have corners. There seemed to be a box in it. "That you just tell me?"

Using one of her newly freed hands, Calla tapped a finger on her lip. Both her lips and the nail she used to tap were deeply indigo, the color of octopus ink, the color of the deepest shadows in the rocky front yard. "The only thing is, I’m not sure that what we’ve been told is the truth."

Blue felt a little lurch at that. The idea of lying to Calla or Maura or Persephone seemed ludicrous. Even if they didn’t know the truth, they’d hear a lie. But there did seem to be something secretive about Neeve, about her scrying after hours, where she thought it likely no one would see her.

Calla said, "She was supposed to be here looking for someone."

"My father," Blue guessed.

Calla didn’t say yes but she didn’t say no, either. Instead, she replied, "But I think it’s become something else for her, now that she’s been here in Henrietta for a while."

They regarded each other for a moment, co-conspirators.

"My proposition is different, then," Blue said, finally. She tried to arch her eyebrow to match Calla’s, but it felt a bit lacking. "We go through Neeve’s stuff. You hold it, and I’ll stand next to you."

Calla’s mouth became very small. Her psychometric reflections were often vague, but with Blue beside her, making her gift stronger? It had certainly been dramatic when she’d touched Ronan’s tattoo. If she handled Neeve’s things, they might get some concrete answers.

"Take this bag," Calla said, handing Blue the last of them. This one was the smallest of all, made of blood-red leather. It was impossibly heavy. While Blue worked out how to hold it with the others, Calla crossed her arms and tapped her indigo-nailed fingers on her upper arms.

"She’d have to be out of her room for at least an hour," Calla said. "And Maura would have to be otherwise occupied."

Calla had once observed that Maura had no pets because her principles took too much time to take care of. Maura was a big believer in many things, one of them personal privacy.

"But you will do it?"

"I’ll find out more today," Calla said. "About their schedules. What’s this?" Her attention had shifted to a car pulling up at the end of the walk. Both Calla and Blue tilted their heads to read the magnetic sign on the passenger door: FLOWERS BY ANDI! The driver rummaged in the backseat of her car for a full two minutes before heading up the walk with the world’s smallest flower arrangement. Her fluffed bangs were larger than the flowers.

"It’s hard to find this place!" the woman said.

Calla pursed her lips. She had a pure and fiery hatred for anything that could be classified as small talk.

"What’s all this?" Calla asked. She made it sound as if the flowers were an unwanted kitten.

"This is for …" The woman fumbled for a card.

"Orla?" guessed Blue.

Orla was always getting sent flowers by various lovelorn men from Henrietta and beyond. It wasn’t just flowers they sent. Some sent spa packages. Others sent fruit baskets. One, memorably, sent an oil portrait of Orla. He’d painted her in profile, so that the viewer could fully see Orla’s long, elegant neck; her classic cheekbones; her romantic, heavy-lidded eyes; and her massive nose — her least favorite feature. Orla had broken up with him immediately.