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His arm stretched out across the table in front of him His thumb was splinted

"Could someone cut this hospital bracelet off?" he asked There was soallant and hectic about the deliberately offhand way he asked it "I feel like an invalid Please"

Handing him a pair of scissors, Persephone re your thu to hit someone"

"You didn’t tell me to tell him," Blue retorted

"Okay," Maura said froers "There are a few things going on here, obviously Someone just tried to kill you" This was to Gansey "You two are telling me that your friend was killed by the man who just tried to kill hi me that Neeve had a phone call with the man who killed your friend and just now tried to kill Gansey" This was to Blue, Persephone, and Calla "And you’re tellingto do with hih Maura had spoken to each of theo through s," Neeve replied

Blue expected her row taller "And with good reason, obviously I can’t believe you didn’t tell me the truth If you wanted to play around on the corpse road, why didn’t you just ask? How do you knoould have said no? Instead, you pretended like you were actually committed to --"

She paused and looked at Blue

Blue finished, "To finding Butternut"

"Oh, God," Maura said "Calla, this is your fault, isn’t it?"

"No," Blue said She had to try very hard to pretend that the boys weren’t all looking at her in order to say this "I think I can be mad here, too Why didn’t you just tell me that you didn’t really knowsecret?"

"I never said I didn’t really know him," Maura replied, voice hollow She had an expression on her face that Blue didn’t like; it was a little too emotional

Blue looked at Persephone instead "How do you knoouldn’t have just been happy with the truth? I don’t care if e anything right now"

"His name wasn’t really Butternut, was it?" Gansey asked Adah the kitchen "I think this has all been oversi for Blue’s father It’s just not all I was looking at"

Calla snapped, "Then why all the secretive behavior?"

Neeve looked very pointedly at Gansey’s splinted thuer Surely you all feel the pull of secrecy as well, or you would have shared everything you kneith Blue"

"Blue is not psychic," Maura said crisply "Most of e didn’t pass along were things that would only beinto the corpse road"

"You also didn’t tellat his thuether Suddenly, Blue realized what looked different about hilasses They were the thin, subdued sort of glasses that you usually didn’t notice until they were pointed out They made him look at once older and eneral at the h she would never, ever tell him, she preferred this Gansey to the wind-tossed, effortlessly handso, when I asked about the ley line, you withheld that information from me"

Now Maura looked a little chastised "Hoas I supposed to knohat you would do with it? So, where is this ton Whelk," Adaed a wry look

"At the hospital, the police toldfor him Henrietta police and state police," Gansey said "But they said he wasn’t at his house and that it looked like he’d packed"

"I believe he’s what you call on the lam," Ronan said

"Do you think he still has interest in you?" Maura asked

Gansey shook his head "I don’t know if he ever cared about me I don’t think he had a plan He wanted the journal He wants Glendower"

"But he doesn’t knohere Glendower is?"

"No one does," Gansey replied "I have a colleague" -- Ronan sniggered when Gansey used the word colleague, but Gansey pressed on -- "in the UK who told me about the ritual that Whelk used Noah for It’s possible he’ll try it again in a different place Like Cabeswater"

"I think we should wake it up," Neeve said

Again, everyone stared at her She seemed unperturbed, a sea of calm, hands folded in front of her

"Excuse me?" Calla demanded "I’m pretty sure I heard it involved a dead body"

Neeve cocked her head "Not necessarily A sacrifice isn’t always death"

Gansey looked dubious "Even assue place What would the rest of the ley line be like if oke it up?"

"I’ht now that it will be woken, though," Neeve said "I don’t even needbowl to see that" She turned on Persephone "Do you disagree?"

Persephone held herher mouth "No, that’s what I see as well Someone ake it in the next few days"

"And I do not think you want it to be Mr Whelk," Neeve went on "Whoever wakes up the corpse road will be favored by the corpse road Both the one who sacrifices and the one who is sacrificed"