13   i thought myself as a city

That night, Ronan Lynch thumbs a green pill from his crumpled pile of jeans and remembers Kavinsky's simple recipe: pill, beer, dream. He remembers Mercy's dark expression when he woke her up from a deep sleep, curled into a ball on her air mattress. It was solemn, knowing. Ronan felt like she saw right through him. Shaking off the unsettling feeling, he stretches out an empty arm to Chainsaw, propping up her space for her. She pays him no mind, pecking curiously at a cheese cracker that she'd managed to get her claws on. Chainsaw is careful, stacking objects onto it to ensure that Ronan can't take it from her grasp. Purposefully, she adverts her beady gaze and continues stacking: a bottle cap, an envelope and a sock all hide her precious cracker.

"Chainsaw," he says. It isn't sharp like how he forms his words with the rest of the world. It's slow. It's with meaning.

Chainsaw soars to the bed, wings wide and a shadow against his bedroom wall. She lands with purpose, claws surprisingly light against his skin. Ronan traces her feathers, turning her head left and right as his finger runs across their lines. His phone buzzes, interrupting the quiet.

KAVINSKY: your mom calls me after we spend the day together.

Ronan flicks his phone, the screen falling away. It buzzes again, Chainsaw pecking at the screen. There's no urgency as his hand slowly slides across the covers to flip his phone over.

KAVINSKY: ask me what my first dream was

Ronan presses the green pill into his palm, rolling it across his callused skin. He feels warm, buried within the confines of his covers, sleepy, but safely so. It's never felt like this before, a blanket around his shoulders and a slow descent into a loll of unconsciousness.

KAVINSKY: my favourite forgery is Prokopenko
KAVINSKY: i'm going to eat you alive man

Ronan pushes the pill back into his pocket, a little more alert than before. Realisation settles into his skin, this is why Kavinsky looked at Prokopenko when Mercy was talking to him that night. Why she so viciously launched herself at his body: her feral smile and hands around his neck. Mercy's knuckles whitening as she squeezed. Kavinsky is testing the waters of an unknown ocean, and Mercy's been here before. She knows the recipe. Ronan closes his eyes, and he thinks: My father. My father. My father.

Ronan opens his eyes again, trees barricade the clearing, a rock decorated with a singular handkerchief. Everything lingers with hickory smoke and boxwood, grass seed and lemon cleaner. He shifts his gaze, falling onto the sharp charcoal nose of a familiar BMW, and there's his father, sitting in the driver's seat. When Niall Lynch sees Ronan, he rolls down the window.

          "Ronan," Niall says. It feels like something else, a sigh of relief. A finally.

          "Dad." Ronan says.

          "You figured it out." Niall's grin is a familiar, aching thing. It's wide, blinding and full of teeth—exactly like Matthew's. He holds a finger in front of it. "Remember?"

A melody spills from the open window like falling snow, pooling at Ronan's feet and against the dirt. It's soaring, a floating tune played by the uillean pipes. It smooths out, fading out quietly as it reaches the trees.

          "I know," Ronan replies. "Tell me what you meant in the will."

Niall repeats the phrase at its end, "T'Libre vero-e ber nivo libre n 'acrea."

This Will stands as fact unless a newer document is created. Ronan considers his father silently.

          "It's a loophole," Niall says. "A loophole for thieves."

          "Is that a lie?" Ronan asks.

Niall Lynch wasn't born a truthful man, nor was he raised to be one. His throne was built by the bones of lies, ones that he'd shaped to be his eldest son. His smiles flashes, teeth and ferocity. It lacks the spark of the wild that Mercy's has, but it's the face of a Dreamer nonetheless: calculating, untethered. This is a man who dreamt himself a life. One that led to his death.

          "I never lie to you." Niall says with meaning.

Ronan paws at the ground with the toe of his boot. "I want to go back."

          "Then take it," Niall says, starting the BMW. "But do not go yet. There is someone else."

The BMW's engine roars a song of life, growling at the sprawling shadows. Niall Lynch reaches out a hand from it's bowels, taking Ronan's in his own. His foot is on the gas pedal, waiting to press down.

          "Ronan," he says.

It sounds like, turn around. 

Mercy King is standing on the rock, handkerchief in hand and her boots stable against the surface. Her black turtleneck tucked into long pants, she doesn't need to worry about the summer heat here. She flashes Niall a smile. They bow their heads in acknowledgement before Niall takes off in his charcoal BMW, shark-nose disappearing into the orange-pink sky of the horizon. It's an acceptance; a passing on of responsibility. Cabeswater is Ronan and Mercy's now. Ronan watches Mercy carefully. A leg hanging over the rock, she lets herself drop. Landing with a huff, she dusts off her pants and adjusts the rock's handkerchief. Ronan doesn't understand its importance but doesn't question it. He raises a brow.

          "I know you think we don't need to be here," Mercy says. She holds out a hand, stretching it out, palm to the sky. Like a child, she spins, grinning with that familiar glint. "But here we won't be interrupted."

Ronan makes a noise. "You knew."

          "I knew some parts," Mercy admits. "But you never asked the right questions."

Ronan growls. "Why didn't you tell me?"

          "I just explained." Mercy says simply. "It's important that you ask the right questions. I can't explain everything to you. Everybody must figure it out for themselves. Whether they're this or that. Here or there. Up or down. Either way, for me this works ... differently."

          "How do you know?" Ronan questions.

Mercy smiles, jagged and familiarly un-human. "Well, you begin at the beginning, of course, and go on till you come to the end: then stop."

Ronan purses his lips. He recognises Alice's Adventures in Wonderland interlaced with her own words. There's a likeness between it and Cabeswater: where reality bends to time and time bends to reality. Nothing feels real but nothing is fake. It's a smudge against earth's great big canvas—a carved out place to call their own. Mercy is unsettling. Her voice rings: you never asked the right questions.

          "What is the beginning?" He asks.

Mercy sighs. She fiddles with a white medicine bottle. The cap pops to reveal it's empty. "I don't wholly know. There's pieces, tiny glass crystals of the entire mosaic that I've been given that introduce parts of the story. But it doesn't begin here."

          "Where does it begin?" Ronan questions.

          "Where else but Wales." Mercy says. "My family came here with Glendower and have stayed ever since. My ancestor was originally brought here as an advisor. But something went wrong along the way."

          "What went wrong?"

Mercy purses her lips. "I don't know. Most Kings die before they can tell."

Ronan frowns. "What about Circe?"

Mercy's expression darkens. "Maybe. Once this is all over." She waves a hand. "But we have to get through Kavinsky first."

          "How?" Ronan asks.

          "I don't know." Mercy says. "But we're going to try."

It sounds like: Wake up.

There's a white Mitsubishi out the front of Monmouth Manufacturing, and Mercy wants to set it aflame. The knife graphic taunts her, sharp and intimidatingly black against the white paint. In the front seat, Ronan thumbs the keys in the ignition. There's a note, resting on the dashboard and held there by a golden locket. An exact replica of Mercy's golden locket. It glints, Mercy frowns as she snatches it into her palms and presses a finger to it's smooth metal. It's a good forgery, but no Dreamer could ever replicate the inside. She cracks it open, smooth red velvet where a photo is meant to be placed. Wrong. Mercy looks over Ronan's shoulder, reading the note: This one's for you. Just the way you like it: fast and anonymous. And a locket, for our girl. She cringes, her skin crawling.

Gansey frowns. "I think he needs to come to terms with his sexuality."

Ronan, dropping the leather bracelets he'd been chewing, says, "There is no coming to terms with having three balls."

          "And a small dick," Mercy adds. She throws the locket back on the dashboard, feeling ill. "It's a taunt. It's the world."

Gansey's brow furrows, not understanding, but recognition flashes on Ronan's face. He makes a sound. Ronan's phone buzzes. They crowd around the screen, three foreheads pressed together.

KAVINSKY: ballsack.

RONAN: shitstack.

KAVINSKY: coming to 4th of July?

RONAN: would you stop if you knew it was destroying the world?

KAVINSKY: god that would be awesome

Ronan frowns, pocketing his phone.

          "Well?" Gansey asks.

          "Wouldn't bet on negotiations." Ronan says.

          "Told you," Mercy replies." Kavinsky doesn't care. He doesn't have any regard for the boundaries of Coedwig." She waves a hand. "Cabeswater. Whatever you want to call it. He will take and take as he always has. Talking doesn't work with him."

          "How do you know?" Gansey presses.

Ronan and Mercy exchange a look.

          "Because I've been here before." Mercy says simply.

Before Gansey can ask what she means, Maura, Calla and Blue pull into the parking lot of Monmouth Manufacturing in their tiring Ford. Calla throws open the passenger door, a single foot out on the pavement. She jerks her head.

Mercy looks between Ronan and Gansey. "I'm not sitting on anyone's lap." 

Mercy climbs from Ronan's lap in the tired Ford onto the pavement of the Pleasant Valley Bed and Breakfast parking lot with a scowl. She's silent as they make their way through the obnoxiously decorated Bed and Breakfast, breaking off at a hallway and down the stairs to the basement area. As they enter a kitchen area, Calla sets out on a mission to inspect every cupboard and draw within the space. Maura disappears through a doorway, entering another section of the basement while Blue stands there, posted between her and the rest of the room. Fiddling with beads, Ronan shifts on his feet with Mercy beside him. As far away from Blue as Gansey could possibly be, he brushes an exposed beam with soft fingertips on Ronan's other side. Calla taps the beak of a bird-themed cookie-jar, the sound ringing in Mercy's ears.

          "Why are we here, man?" Ronan asks, eloquent as always. "There are more goddamn roosters here than a Hitchcock movie."

          "Are you referring to The Birds?" Gansey asks. "Because I don't recall any chickens in it. It's been a long time, though."

They look to Mercy.

She shrugs. "I've never seen a Hitchcock movie."

Mercy leans back against the entrance door frame, arms and ankles crossed. She's a tall, lengthy creature—unfitting in the kitchen's yellowy space. In all black, her and Ronan both look out of place. In the corner of her eye, she watches Ronan check his phone out of boredom. Mercy sighs, training her attention on a curious Chainsaw who gnaws at a spare piece of plastic. She frowns, snatching it from Chainsaw's grasp. The bird lets out a caw of protest before puffing up, cantering up and down the line of the counter. Mercy lets her mind wander, sifting through endless loops of forest and shadows as she taps her fingers against her wrist underneath the leather of her band. She's thinking about everything other than where she is: blonde hair in the corner of Kavinsky's photo, Ronan's handfuls of green pills, the locket and Mitsubishi in Monmouth's parking lot. Mercy's forehead creases, feeling invisible vines wrapping around her throat and slowing her breathing. She's on the verge of panic.

          "Lynch, King," Gansey says. "Are you even listening?"

Mercy snaps out of her trance.

          "No," the two Greywaren answer in tandem.

Chainsaw shreds a roll of paper towel. Mercy chirps, and she pauses. Ronan snaps his fingers, and she moves. Chainsaw settles on the table, claws clicking against the wood. Her eyes gleam with annoyance. I was having fun, they say. Mercy's lip quirks.

          "Why are we here?" Gansey directs the question at Calla.

Calla echoes him, "Yes, Maura, why are we here?"

Maura slips out from the doorway, the image of the end of a bed and a grey suitcase peaking through the threshold. A tap sounds, pipes whining with unseen effort as they filter water within it. Maura wipes her hands on her pants, settling into the kitchen. "Because when Mr. Gray comes out here, I want you to look him in the eye and convince him not to kidnap you."

          "Your usual daytime activities," Mercy mutters snidely to herself.

Gansey elbows Ronan.

Sharply, Ronan looks up beneath hooded eyes. "What, me?"

Mercy uncrosses her arms. "Well it's not me, is it?"

Ronan glares at her. "Why?"

          "Because I'm not stupid enough to be known." Mercy sticks out her tongue.

Gansey reaches behind Ronan to smack her upside the head. She yelps as Maura rolls her eyes and Blue frowns from across the room.

          "Yes, you." Maura says, looking at Ronan sharply. "Mr. Gray was sent here to retrieve an object that lets the owner take things from dreams. The Greywaren. As you know, that's you."

          "No shit."

Gansey smacks Mercy a second time. She bites her tongue.

Calla adds, "And, unbelievably, it falls to your charm to convince him to have mercy on you."

Mercy snorts, and Ronan smiles, a nasty thing. Calla grins back, equally as slippery with poison. Mercy reaches out to Chainsaw, the redhead softly scratching underneath the bird's chin. She preens, and flaps towards her shoulder. Chainsaw's weight is heavy, but lighter than imagined. Her claws dig into the fabric of her t-shirt.

          "He's not the only one looking," Blue says suddenly. She slips a small pink switchblade from her pocket. "Is he? That's what all of these break-ins are."

          "I'm afraid so," Maura replies.

          "Are the—"

Ronan interrupts Gansey, "Is he the one who beat up my brother? I should buy him a card if he is."

          "Now, Ronan," Mercy chides. Her grin is wicked but light-hearted. "You could dream him one."

Ronan's lip quirks and Mercy considers it a victory. She presses her fingers into her sternum, wondering if Mr. Gray's research ever brought him near the King family. Near her history. Near her. Circe King is still alive, judging by Illusion's insistence on crossing their dreams: chaining Mercy down with vines that grip her ankles like iron to watch as her mother sorts through a new batch of coloured pills every night. Mercy frowns, tuning back in.

          "What happens to Mr. Gray if he doesn't come back with something?" Gansey asks, it his final question.

Maura's expression is grim. "Let's just use death as a short version of the consequences."

Unhelpfully, Calla adds, "But for decision-making purposes, assume it's worse than that."

          "He can take Joseph Kavinsky." Blue mutters.

Mercy raises a hand. "Here, here."

          "If they take that other boy," Calla says, "they'll be back for the snake."

Ronan takes the jerk of her chin in stride, sneering. The Gray Man stands in the doorway behind Maura. Mercy's spine immediately straightens. Something radiates off the man: built unassuring, there's something behind his eyes that puts Mercy in a state of unease. She sidles up to Ronan smoothly, standing with her shoulder slightly in front of his. A barrier between two strengths; a snapping guard dog with bared teeth. Her eyes flash, energy unchecked and Chainsaw tense on her shoulder. She stares at the Gray Man, eyes low and ready to strike. Ronan remains tall.

The Gray Man breaks the silence. "If I don't return with the Greywaren on the Fourth of July, they're telling my brother where I am, and he will kill me. He will do it very slowly."

A ferociousness stirs within Mercy. She flicks her fingers, menacingly poised. "So will I."

The Gray Man knows that this girl wouldn't go down with a fight. He surveys her, cold and calculating. "So there's another."

          "I bite more than the other two." Mercy bares her teeth.

Gansey shifts on his feet, speaking very softly from Ronan's other side, "Please."

          "Brothers," says the Gray Man. He isn't speaking of the three Lynch siblings. "I don't care for birds." A moment passes. "I'm not a kidnapper."

          "Are you sure your brother will be able to find you?" Gansey asks.

          "I'm certain I won't be able to go home again," the Gray Man says. "I don't have many things there, but my books.... I would have to stay on the move for quite a while. It took me years to lose him before. And even if I leave, it won't stop the others. They're tracking the energy abnormalities, above and beyond what runs through Henrietta, and right now, they point right at them." He looks at Ronan and Mercy. "But they only know about him."

          "Could you dream a Greywaren?" Blue asks.

          "No," Mercy snarls firmly. "Don't you dare suggest that again."

Ronan spares a glance to Mercy. "It's killing the ley line as it is. You want to see Noah again? I'm stopping."

          "And I don't have any tissues left." Mercy adds.

What that means, Blue can't quite figure out.

          "You could lie," Calla suggests. "Give them something and tell them it's the Greywaren and let them think they aren't clever enough to figure out how to work it."

          "My employer is not an understanding man." Says the Gray Man. "If he ever discovered or suspected a ruse, it would be very ugly for all of us."

Mercy shakes her head. "The energies from it wouldn't be convincing enough anyway. We'd need something more powerful." Illusion and their pills flash in her mind. "But we don't have that."

          "What would they do to me?" Ronan asks. "If you turned me in?"

          "No," Gansey says firmly.

          "No," the Gray Man agrees.

          "Over my dead body." Mercy snaps, softly but with meaning into the air between them.

          "Don't say no," Ronan insists. "Fucking tell me. I didn't say I'd do it. I just want to know."

The Gray Man hauls his suitcase onto the table, opens it and places the gun on top of his folded clothes before closing it again. "He is not interested in people. He is interested in things. He will find the thing that makes you work, and he will remove it. He will put it down to where you are and show them that thing was inside you. And then they will admire the other things in the other cases beside you."

Ronan remains unflinching. Mercy has to iron-out her expression, subconsciously shifting closer. Chainsaw moves from her shoulder to his.

          "It's possible he would make an exception for you." The Gray Man continues. "But it would only be that he'd put all of you in the class box. He is a curator. He will do what he needs to do for his collection."

Ronan still doesn't flinch, Mercy curling her fingers into his leather bands. She can feel the soft roughness of his skins underneath them, pressing her grey-stained fingers into the skin.

Then the Gray Man says, "He told me to kill your father as messily as I could and leave the body where your older brother would find it. So that he would confess to where the Greywaren was."

Mercy's sharp intake of breath is the only noise in the room. There's a single moment where you could hear a pin drop: her stomach plummeting at such a visceral enemy to be against, and at such a visceral amount of pain flickering within the depths of Ronan's shark-eyes. His mind is perfectly blank as he hurls himself at the Gray Man and Chainsaw shoots like a tiny black, feathered rocket into the air. A cry lurches from Mercy's throat. Ronan manages to land three or four punches before the Gray Man throws him across the breakfast table. Ronan whips his nose, slamming into his stomach like a bullet.

          "You must be joking!' Calla cries out. "You! Pretty one! Stop him!"

Gansey only watches with crossed arms. "I think this is justified."

The Gray Man wrenches Ronan into a headlock. "I understand. But it wasn't personal."

          "It. Was. To. Me."

Mercy's heart is racing, a drum in her ears as the blood rushes. Don't cry over spilt milk. And suddenly, the King girl explodes.

          "No!" She yells, ears ringing.

Mercy's hand strikes out without even thinking. It hits no target except thin air, but it didn't need to. Vines, curling and lurching from the ground beneath their feet, break through the plethora of concrete, dirt, stone and other materials to crack the surface and rip through the kitchen floor. The first two attack the Gray Man, wrapping around his ankles and securing him to one spot. They crawl up his legs, winding around his chest and pinning his arms to his sides. The rest push a heaving Ronan back, creating a barrier between him and the Gray Man. Silently, Blue hands him Chainsaw, almost subconsciously as her jaw drops in surprise. Mercy's chest aches and her arms are weak, still up and holding it all together like a puppeteer. Black ichor drips from her nose and ears, falling down her chin onto her black clothing and into the wild-red of her hair. She's never done this before. It's too much. But Mercy holds.

          "That's enough." She says, voice weak but tone firm.

The Gray Man stops his struggling, and Mercy lowers her arms. The vines don't return to the ground. They fade to nothing. It's as if they never existed. Confusion courses through Mercy but she's too exhausted to ask any questions.

          "I'll never forgive you." Ronan says in a hoarse voice. "No matter how much you do for me, I'll never forgive you."

The Gray Man pants, dusting off his slacks. "They never do."

Mercy's head feels woozy, the world spinning against the current of time. She shakes her head but that only makes it worse. Stumbling slightly, Gansey catches her, holding her up by her waist. Mercy doesn't push away.

          "On the Fourth, unless I think of a better idea, I will call my employer and tell him that I have the Greywaren." The Gray Man says into the silence. "And then, I'll tell him I'm keeping it for myself and he can't have it."

There's a long, drawn out pause. Mercy can't figure out how long it lasts, black ichor oozing onto Gansey's shoulder.

          "And then what?" Maura asks.

The Gray Man looks at her. "I run."