The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater Read Free Book Online

handsome accent of old Virginia money. It was a mystery to Adam how he could not seem to see both versions of Gansey at the same time.
    “I didn’t hear you knock,” Gansey said unnecessarily. He knocked fists with Adam. Coming from Gansey, the gesture was at once charming and self-conscious, a borrowed phrase of a another language.
    “Ashley, this is Gansey,” Declan said, in his pleasant, neutral voice. It was a voice that reported tornado damage and cold fronts. Narrated side effects of small blue pills. Explained the safety procedures of this 747 we’re flying in today. He added, “Dick Gansey.”
    If Gansey was thinking Declan’s girlfriend was expendable, a renewable resource, he didn’t show it. He merely said, voice just a little chilly as he corrected, “As Declan knows, it’s my father who’s Dick. For me, it’s just Gansey.”
    Ashley looked more shocked than amused. “Dick?”
    “Family name,” Gansey said, with the weary air of someone trotting out a tired joke. “I try my best to ignore it.”
    “You’re Aglionby, right? This place is crazy. Why don’t you live on the school grounds?” Ashley asked.
    “Because I own this building,” Gansey said. “It’s a better investment than paying for dorm housing. You can’t sell your dorm after you’re done with school. And where did that money go? Nowhere.”
    Dick Gansey III hated to be told that he sounded like Dick Gansey II, but right then, he did. Both of them could trot out logic on a nice little leash, wearing a smart plaid jacket, when they wanted to.
    “God,” Ashley remarked. She glanced at Adam. Her eyes didn’t linger, but still, he remembered the fray on the shoulder of his sweater.
    Don’t pick at it. She’s not looking at it. No one else notices it.
    With effort, Adam squared his shoulders and tried to inhabit the uniform as easily as Gansey or Ronan.
    “Ash, you won’t believe why Gansey came here, of all places,” Declan said. “Tell her, Gansey.”
    Gansey couldn’t resist talking about Glendower. He never could. He asked, “How much do you know about Welsh kings?”
    Ashley pursed her lips, her fingers pinching the skin at the base of her throat. “Mmmm. Llewellyn? Glendower? English Marcher lords?”
    The smile on Gansey’s face could have lit coal mines. Adam hadn’t known about Llewellyn or Glendower when he’d first met Gansey. Gansey had needed to describe how Owain Glyndr — Owen Glendower to non-Welsh speakers — a medieval Welsh noble, had fought against the English for Welsh freedom and then, when capture seemed inevitable, disappeared from the island and from history altogether.
    But Gansey never minded retelling the story. He’d related the events like they’d just happened, thrilled again by the magical signs that had accompanied Glendower’s birth, the rumors of his power of invisibility, the impossible victories against larger armies, and, finally, his mysterious escape. When Gansey spoke, Adam saw the green swell of the Welsh foothills, the wide glistening surface of the River Dee, the unforgiving northern mountains that Glendower vanished into. In Gansey’s stories, Owain Glyndr could never die.
    Listening to him tell the story now, it was clear to Adam that Glendower was more than a historical figure to Gansey. He was everything Gansey wished he could be: wise and brave, sure of his path, touched by the supernatural, respected by all, survived by his legacy.
    Gansey, now fully warmed to his tale, enchanted again by the mystery of it, asked Ashley, “Have you heard of the legends of sleeping kings? The legends that heroes like Llewellyn and Glendower and Arthur aren’t really dead, but are instead sleeping in tombs, waiting to be woken up?”
    Ashley blinked vapidly, then said, “Sounds like a metaphor.”
    Perhaps she wasn’t as dumb as they’d thought.
    “Maybe so,” Gansey said. He made a grandiose gesture to the maps on the wall, covered with the ley lines he believed Glendower