the raven cycle

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

Gansey was just a guy with a lot of stuff and a hole inside him that chewed away more of his heart every year.

Adam was not always alone, but he was always lonesome.

He asked, "Why did you go to Cabeswater without me, Adam?" Here it was, finally. The truth was a complicated thing. Adam shrugged.

In the passenger seat was Adam Parrish, the third member of the foursome that made up Gansey’s closest friends.

And here was Ronan, like a heart attack that never stopped.

When Ronan thought of Gansey, he thought of moving into Monmouth Manufacturing, of nights spent in companionable insomnia, of a summer searching for a king, of Gansey asking the Gray Man for his life. 𝘉𝘳𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘴.

Ronan sat back, his eyes closed, swallowing. Adam watched his chest rise and fall, his eyebrows furrow. He felt as bright and dreamy and imaginary as the light through the window.

Ronan said, “I already lived through hell.” “You have no idea what hell is,” the Gray Man said, but not unkindly.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about Adam Parrish and his band of merry men,” Mr Gray admitted. “And this dangerous world they tread.”

Adam laughed out loud and she discovered that she was starting to really like this laugh that burst out of him and seemed to surprise him every time.

"Hey, tiger," Gansey said.

When it came to it, it wasn’t like there was an option. The Lynches would always save one another’s lives, if they had to.

"You better wait in the car with your fancy face.” Gansey was too aware of his face’s fanciness to protest.

This was the worst: being blindfolded and tied in the back of a car and knowing that the soft, gasping sound was Ronan Lynch choking for breath every time he waded back to consciousness.

Now Gansey’s imagination had run ahead to imagine a future where Ronan might have to exist without him, without Declan, without Matthew, and with a freshly broken heart. “He’s not as tough as he seems.”

There was something newly powerful about this assembled family in this car. They were all growing up and into each other like trees striving together for the sun.

“Well, look at you,” he said. His eyes lingered on Gansey, on Adam, on Ronan. “America’s youth. I can’t decide if you are the best or the worst thing I’ve seen this week.”

The tie he tied on now, though — the tie was a Christmas gift from Gansey, permitted because Adam had already had a tie when Gansey bought it, so it couldn’t be charity.

It boasted a handmade label marked with Ronan’s handwriting: PARRISH’S HONDAYOTA ALONE TIME. The other side was A SHITBOX SING-ALONG.

“Not now, Cheng. The king’s a little busy.” “I wasn’t talking to you, Lynch. I need someone with a soul.”