The Raven Boys

It’s Noah, she thought. Drawing energy from me. That’s what I feel.

On the glass, the word took shape.

MURDERED

It began another word. There was not enough space left between the D and the new word, and so the second word partially obliterated the first.

MURDERED

And again, again, again, across each other:

MURDERED

The writing continued until the driver’s side glass was clear, entirely swept clean by an invisible finger, until there were so many words that none of them could be read. Until it was only a window into an empty car with the memory of a burger on the passenger seat.

"Noah," Gansey said, "I’m so sorry."

Blue wiped away a tear. "Me, too."

Stepping forward, leaning over the hood of the car, Ronan pressed his finger to the windshield, and while they watched, he wrote:

REMEMBERED

Calla’s voice spoke in Blue’s head, so clearly that she wondered if everyone else could hear it: A secret killed your father, and you know what it was.

Without any comment, Ronan put his hands into his pockets and strode deeper into the woods.

Noah’s voice hissed in Blue’s ear, cold and urgent, but she couldn’t understand what he was trying to say. She asked him to repeat it, but there was silence. She waited in vain for another few seconds, but still — nothing. Adam was right: Noah was getting less and less.

Now that Ronan had had a few moments’ head start, Gansey seemed anxious to get going. Blue understood entirely. It seemed important to keep them all within sight of one another. Cabeswater felt like a place for things to get lost at the moment.

"Excelsior," Gansey said bleakly.

Blue asked, "What does that even mean?"

Gansey looked over his shoulder at her. He was, once more, just a little bit closer to the boy she’d seen in the churchyard.

"Onward and upward."

Chapter 45

"For the love of God," said Whelk when he saw Adam standing beside the bowl he had just kicked. Whelk held a very large and efficient-looking knife. He was scruffy and unshaven and looked like an Aglionby boy after a bad weekend. "Why?"

His voice held genuine aggravation.

Adam had not seen his Latin teacher since he’d discovered he’d killed Noah, and he was surprised by the rush of emotion the sight of Whelk caused. Especially when he realized that this was once again a ritual, with yet another sacrifice in the middle of it. In this context, it took him a moment to place Neeve’s face — that night at 300 Fox Way. Neeve gazed at him from the center of the circle made from points on a pentagram. She didn’t look quite as afraid as he thought someone tied in the middle of a diabolic symbol might be expected to look.

Adam had several things he thought about saying, but when he opened his mouth, it was none of those things.

"Why Noah?" he asked. "Why not someone horrible?"

Whelk closed his eyes for a bare second. "I’m not having this conversation. Why are you here?"

It was obvious that he wasn’t sure what to do with the fact of Adam — which was fair, because Adam had no idea what to do with the fact of Whelk. The only thing he had to do was keep him from waking the ley line. Everything else (disabling Whelk, saving Neeve, avenging Noah) was negotiable. He remembered, all at once, that he had his father’s gun in his bag. It was possible that he could point that at Whelk and convince him to do something, but what? In the movies, it looked simple: Whoever had the gun won. But in reality, he couldn’t point the gun at Whelk and tie him up at the same time, even if he had something to tie him with. Whelk could overpower him. Maybe Adam could use Neeve’s binding to …

Adam withdrew the gun. It felt heavy and malevolent in his hand. "I’m here to stop this from happening again. Untie her."

Whelk said again, "For the love of God."

He took two steps to Neeve and put his knife against the side of her face. Her mouth tightened, just a very little. He said, "Just put down the gun so that I don’t slice her face off. Actually, throw it over here. And make sure you put the safety on before you throw it or you might end up just shooting her anyway."

Adam had a sneaking suspicion that, if he’d been Gansey, he would’ve been able to talk his way out of this. He would straighten his shoulders and look impressive and Whelk would’ve done whatever he wanted. But he was not Gansey, so all he could think to say was, "I didn’t come here for anyone to die. I’m going to throw the gun out of my reach, but I’m not going to throw it into your reach."

"Then I cut her face off."

Neeve’s face was quite placid. "You’ll ruin the ritual if you do. Weren’t you listening? I thought you were interested in the process."

Adam had the curious, discomfiting sensation of seeing something unusual when he looked at her eyes. It was like he saw a brief flash of Maura and Persephone and Calla in them.

Whelk said, "Fine. Throw the gun over there. Don’t come any closer, though." To Neeve, he said, "What do you mean it won’t work? Are you bluffing?"

"You may throw the gun," Neeve told Adam. "I won’t mind."

Adam tossed the gun into the brush. He felt terrible as he did, but he felt better when he wasn’t holding it.

Neeve said, "And, Barrington, the reason why it will not work is because the ritual needs a sacrifice."

"You were planning on killing me," Whelk said. "You expect me to believe that it doesn’t work the other way around?"

"Yes," Neeve replied. She didn’t look away from Adam. Again, he thought he saw a flash of something when he was looking at her face: a black mask, two mirrors, Persephone’s face. "It must be a personal sacrifice. Killing me wouldn’t accomplish that. I’m nothing to you."

"But I’m nothing to you," Whelk said.

"But killing is," she replied. "I’ve never killed anyone. I give up my innocence if I kill you. That is an incredible sacrifice."

When Adam spoke, he was surprised by how clearly the contempt came through. "And you’ve already killed someone, so you don’t have that to give up."

Whelk began to swear, very softly, as if no one else were there. Leaves the color and shape of pennies drifted down around them. Neeve was still staring at Adam. The sensation of seeing someplace else in her eyes was now undeniable. It was a black, mirrored lake, it was a voice deep as the earth, it was two obsidian eyes, it was another world.