In that moment, Blue was a little in love with all of them. Their magic. Their quest. Their awfulness and strangeness. Her raven boys.

and then Adam, who had become Kavinsky, said, “Scio quid estis vos.” He put the tattoo in his mouth and swallowed it. Ronan woke with a start, ashamed and euphoric. The euphoria wore off long before the shame did. He was never sleeping again.

Adam could not decide if this was the worst thing that had happened to him, or if it felt that way because he had been so recently and senselessly happy that the comparison was making it so.

𝘔𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘺 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘙𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘒𝘪𝘯𝘨. The last tree fell, and the forest was gone, and everything was absolutely silent. Blue touched Gansey’s face. She whispered, “Wake up.”

“It means I never get to be my own person. If I let you cover for me, then I’m yours. I’m his now, and then I’ll be yours.” It struck Gansey harder than he thought it would.

Who was this person who could dream a dream into a concrete shape? No wonder Aglionby bored Ronan.

“Don’t make me wish I’d come without you.” This, finally, made it through the steel to Ronan’s heart. His head ducked.

“I guess now would be a good time to tell you,” he said. “I took Chainsaw out of my dreams.”

Need was Adam’s baseline, his resting pulse. Love was a privilege. Adam was privileged; he did not want to give it up.

“Can you believe,” he asked tragically, “that I grew up in a place like this?” Adam did not tell Gansey that he usually couldn’t forget.

“You guys have a death list?” Ronan broke in. “That is fucking dark. Am I on it?” “Some days, I wish,” Blue said.

“Which one’s he again? The pretty one?” Blue and Gansey exchanged a look. Blue’s look said, 𝘐’𝘮 𝘴𝘰, 𝘴𝘰 𝘴𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘺. Gansey’s said, 𝘈𝘮 𝘐 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘵𝘵𝘺 𝘰𝘯𝘦?

Ronan was not going to Henry Cheng’s under any circumstances. All that smiling and activism gave him a rash. Ronan was certainly going to Adam’s.

“I don’t have a brother, ma’am,” Adam replied. But Blue saw his eyes dart to Gansey.

Ronan was always saying that he never lied, but he wore a liar’s face.

Adam finally lifted his head. “Then you better cover my eyes.” Gansey looked puzzled. “What?” "Because,” Adam said bitterly, “otherwise they’ll betray you.”

He had not known to be born afraid, but he’d learned.

Gansey grinned at them both. He was hard to resist in this form: glowing with rows and rows of white teeth, a college brochure in the making.

Gansey’s ley line heart had been gifted, not grown.

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.

boys around them laughing and calling to one another, making space for the three of them because this had been a thing for so long: Gansey-Lynch-Parrish.