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"I was listening to what I’d recorded while I was driving back Nothing, nothing, nothing, and then:stopped"

"Coincidence?" Ronan asked "I think not"

It was meant to be sarcastic Gansey had said I don’t believe in coincidences so often that he no longer needed to

Gansey asked, "Well, what do you think?"

"Holy grail, finally," Ronan replied, too sarcastic to be any use at all

But the fact was this: Gansey had spent the last four years working with the thinnest scraps of evidence possible and the barely heard voice was all the encouragehteen months in Henrietta had used some of the sketchiest scraps of all as he searched for a ley line -- a perfectly straight, supernatural energy path that connected spiritual places -- and the elusive to its path This was just an occupational hazard of looking for an invisible energy line It was … well, invisible

And possibly hypothetical, but Gansey refused to consider that notion In seventeen years of life, he’d already found dozens of things people hadn’t known could be found, and he fully intended to add the ley line, the tomb, and the tomb’s royal occupant to that list of items

A museum curator in New Mexico had once told Gansey, Son, you have an uncanny knack for discovering oddities An astonished Roman historian commented, You look under rocks no one else thinks to pick up, slick And a very old British professor had said, The world turns out its pockets for you, boy The key, Gansey found, was that you had to believe that they existed; you had to realize they were part of soave themselves up to those who’d proven themselves worthy

The way Gansey saas this: If you had a special knack for finding things, it meant you owed the world to look

"Hey, is that Whelk?" Ronan asked

A car had slowed considerably as it passed theliree that the driver did look a lot like their resentful Latin teacher, an Aglionby aluton Whelk Gansey, owing to his official title of Richard "Dick" Campbell Gansey III, was fairly immune to posh naivable about Barrington Whelk

"Hey, don’t stop and help or anything," Ronan snapped after the car "Hey, runt What went doith Declan?"

This last part was directed at Adam as he climbed out of the BMW with Ronan’s phone still in hand He offered it to Ronan, who shook his head disdainfully Ronan despised all phones, including his own

Adaht"

Unlike Ronan, Adareat care to be certain it was impeccable He was slim and tall, with dusty hair unevenly cropped above a fine-boned, tanned face He was a sepia photograph

"Joy," Gansey replied "You’ll be there, right?"

"Am I invited?" Adam could be peculiarly polite When he was uncertain about so, his Southern accent always made an appearance, and it was in evidence now

Adaht Unsurprising If it had a social security nuht with it

"Don’t be stupid," Gansey replied, and graciously accepted the grease-splotched fast-food bag that Adaot it," Adan credit or blaainst the Ca one of the leather straps on his wrist Gansey said, "Tellthe strap from his teeth, Ronan scoffed "Please"

"No pickle, either," Adaht two s to place between the gas can and his khakis; he made the entire process look commonplace Adam tried so hard to hide his roots, but they carinned, the warh his that appear in the vicinity of ley lines?"

"Black dogs," Adaently "Demonic presences"

"Camaros," Ronan inserted

Gansey continued as if he hadn’t spoken "And ghosts Ronan, queue up the evidence if you would"

The three of the sun as Adam screwed the fuel-tank lid back on and Ronan rewound the player Yards and yards away, over the mountains, a red-tailed hawk screaain and they listened to Gansey say his na, the war his cheeks