21   the amazing devil

A restless feeling lingers underneath Mercy's skin as she makes her return to Aglionby Academy's halls. Tie undone and blazer in disarray, Mercy's smile is stark, sharply lit and Cheshire-like underneath emerald eyes. Being one of the very few female counterparts of the student body, she's always found comfort in solitude—chin to the ceiling as Mercy walks the halls with thunder-like steps and unshakable confidence. Up until now, that is. That night on the windowsill shifted an opening within Gansey and Mercy's friendship: an understanding previously built like a mystery. The little boy with dirt-streaked cheeks and hornet stings; the once marble girl shattered into pieces of rubble. The tide of Aglionby Academy's talkative student body easily parts ways for the striking sight that is Mercy King and Richard Gansey III walking side by side, avidly talking under their breaths about something that appears to be important.

          "I just think that with the existence of Car Pope, there's obviously a very strong existence of Catholicism in the Cars universe at the very least." Mercy says eagerly, gesturing broadly and nearly smacking a young freshman in the face. She pays no mind to them. "Any religion really. Therefore, Jesus is a car, God is a car, the Holy Spirit is a car—"

          "Mercy—"

          "I think that God is a Rolls Royce: treasure by old people and kind of tacky. And Jesus is a Camry. I don't make the rules, it just seems true." Mercy continues, pausing beside Gansey in front of the doorway to the Latin classroom. "Wait, there's definitely other things then right? Like does Sarge not prove the existence of a World War? And how did that work?"

Gansey pinches the bridge of his nose. "How did you get to this point of conversation?"

Mercy shrugs. "The internet is a wondrous thing, Gansey, you should try it."

He makes a face. "I don't think I will."

With that Mercy pushes into the Latin classroom, a wave of fellow classmates following behind, leaving alone Gansey to speak to a teacher in the hallway. Ronan is seated at the desk beside Adam. Though, seated may be an incorrect description—his feet up, arms crossed, chin tilted back and eyes closed—Ronan is clearly more interested in testing the new teacher than school itself. Mercy eyes the Latin written on the board in a dying whiteboard marker, clearly in Ronan's handwriting. She snorts, rolling her eyes and stepping around desks towards Adam and Ronan.

Tad Curruthers cuffs the back of Adam's head from his deaf side, the boy blinking and looking up. A noise of surprise slips past his lips, one that Tad mimics. Mercy steps forward, shoving Tad's shoulder. He looks behind him, glowering at the redhead as she ushers him with another passive aggressive shove. Mercy has no interest in his tomfoolery and Frat boy behaviours. Tad doesn't fight her on it, stepping away with a glare and a drum of his fingers on Ronan's desk. Adam's expression is grateful. She dips her head to him and takes the seat at Ronan's front, leaving the space in front of Adam for Gansey.

The floor creaks as the Golden Boy himself appears in the doorway, snapping Mercy's attention from balancing a pencil on the toes of Ronan's boot to him. With a sigh, Gansey slips into the seat next to her, turning around to face them all.

          "Jesus Christ, I haven't slept a second." Like a lightbulb going off in Gansey's head, he remembers his manners and extends a fist. Adam bumps his own against Gansey's with a small smile. Gansey turns to the boy behind Mercy. "Ronan, feet down."

Ronan puts his feet down.

Gansey turns back to Adam. "Ronan told you all about the Pig, then."

          "Wait, what about the Pig?" Mercy asks.

          "You'd know if you stopped talking about religion and World Wars in Cars." Gansey replies. "Or woke up on time."

Mercy huffs. "I said I was sorry. Besides, I drive myself."

          "Ronan told me nothing." Adam cuts in.

          "I told you about pissing." Ronan says.

          "Lovely." Mercy furrows her nose.

Adam ignores them. "What about the car?"

Gansey glances around the Borden House, almost as if he's seeking change within the building and its contents, but as every year passes it is something that remains the same. Stained navy carpet, crowded bookshelves cluttered with old books in Latin and Greek. Something comforting sinks into his skin.

          "Last night we went out for bread and jam and more tea in the Pig, and the power steering went out." He says.

          "Glad I stayed home then," Mercy mutters under her breath.

Gansey gives her a look, continuing, "Then the radio went out, the lights. Jesus. Ronan was singing that awful murder squash song the whole damn time and he only made it through half a verse before I had absolutely nothing. Had to wrestle it out of the road."

          "Alternator again," Adam discerns.

Mercy pokes Ronan. "You did a shit job then."

          "Bite me."

          "Children." Gansey chides. He turns back to Adam. "Right, yes, yes. I opened up the hood and saw the alternator belt just hanging there ragged. We had to go get another one, and it was just an absolute zoo to find one in stock for some reason, like there was a run on this precise sizing. Of course, putting on the new belt by the side of the road was the fast part."

          "You were smart to figure it out." Adam says.

Mercy ruffles Gansey's hair, smacking obnoxious kisses in the air between them. "Give him a big gold star."

Gansey pushes her off, but there's a beam to his disposition. "Oh, I don't know."

          "Keep it up, and you just might be a mechanic after you graduate." Ronan says. "They'll put that in the alumni magazine."

          "Ha and—"

Gansey cuts himself off to swivel to face the front of the room as the new Latin teacher makes his way to the front of the room. Mercy's eyes immediately narrow, a predator eyeing their prey as an ill feeling ripples through the bones underneath her skin and muscle. Her spine shivers, she shoves down the feeling and sits ramrod straight with her feet crossed on the desk. Gansey doesn't tell her to put them down, too focused on the teacher.

Mercy is unimpressed by the confidence that oozes off of their new pickings: snub nose, dark tousled hair and bright white teeth, there's a distinct boyish charm to him that slightly unsettles her. But it's nothing she hasn't seen before. He's a mere echo of the figure that haunts her. The new teacher rids himself of his coat as he studies Ronan's handiwork on the board, turning to face them with confidence. Mercy challenges him with a dark look as his gaze sweeps over her.

          "Well, look at you." He says. "America's youth. I can't decide if you are the best or the worst thing I've seen this week. Whose work is this?"

It's silent.

He claps his hands. "Vocabulary's impressive," he says, tapping his knuckles against the board, "But what's going on with the grammar in here? And here? You'd want a subjunctive here in this fear clause. 'I fear that they may believe this'—there should be a vocative here. I know what's being said here because I already know the joke, but a native speaker would've just stared at you. This is not usable Latin."

Simmering anger radiates off of Ronan behind her. She clenches her fist around her pencil, feeling it creak underneath her touch.

Their new teacher swiftly turns. "Good thing, too, or I'd be out of a job. Well, you little runts. Gentlemen," he looks at Mercy, "and Lady. I'm your Latin teacher for the year. I'm not really a fan of languages for the sake of languages. I'm only interested in how we can use them. And I'm not really a Latin teacher. I'm a historian. That means I'm really only interested in Latin as a mechanism to — to — rifle through dead men's papers. Any questions?"

Mercy eyes him with contempt. There's an off feeling to his existence; a specific itch underneath the flicker of his smile and inside the pearl-white of his teeth. Her expression tight, in the corner of her eye, Mercy watches Adam put up his hand.

The teacher signals to him.

          "Miserere nobis," Adam says. "Timeo nos horrendi sesse. Sir."

Have mercy on us — I'm afraid we are terrible.

The teacher's smile widens. That itch flickers once again.

          "Nihil timeo," he replies. "Solvitur ambulando."

Mercy knows that the nuances of his first statement, I fear nothing, has escaped most of the clueless looking boys in their seats, as has the second statement.

Ronan smiles, lazy and dangerous underneath the light of the classroom, and speaks without raising his hand. "Heh. Noli prohicere maccaaritas ad porcos."

Don't throw pearls before swine.

He does not add sir.

Mercy feels a sense of pride within herself for her fellow Dreamer.

          "Are you pigs, then?" The man asks. "Or are you men?"

          "Sumus id quod eligimus esse." Mercy replies.

We are who we choose to be. She smiles with a hint of wickedness and levels him with a grating gaze through the gap between her boots on top of her desk.

Adam cuts in briskly. "Quod momen est tibi, sir?"

          "My name," the man erases Ronan's lettering from the board in a wide arching movement, "is Colin Greenmantle."

Mercy's feet hit the ground with a thump, choking down her reaction.

Fuck. 

Mercy's skin itches as she pulls her truck into Fox Way, parking in front of Blue's house. Gansey and Ronan arrive right behind her, emptying from the Pig as her boots hit the road, rocks crunching underneath her feet. As they enter the living room, Calla, drink in hand, is being attacked by a familiar man in grey with Blue, Persephone and all the furniture pressed against the walls. Mercy smiles, shaking her head with an inkling of fondness that she's never felt before. She hears Gansey's messenger bag drop to the floor behind her, She looks, catching his eye and smiling slightly before sliding across the room to take the place beside Blue who is eating yoghurt.

          "Show me again." Calla says. "I didn't see it, I don't think."

          "I'll do it a little harder," Mr. Gray replies, "but I don't want to actually break your arm."

          "You were nowhere close." Calla assures him. "Put your back into it."

Sipping her Manhattan, Calla lets him grasp her hand and wrist again, swiftly turning her entire arm so her shoulder tips downward sharply. She snatches at her drink and laughs. "That one I felt."

          "Now do it to me," Mr. Gray says. "I'll hold your drink."

          "I'll take it." Mercy interjects, snatching the drink from Calla's hand before Mr. Gray can. She takes a small sip, cackling at Calla's glare.

          "Watch yourself, Little Spider." Calla says.

Mercy sticks out her tongue. Blue pries the glass from her hand and sets it on the table. Together, the two girls stand side by side as they watch Calla try out the move with success.

          "What else?" Calla asks.

          "I can show you how to unhinge my jaw, if you like." Mr. Gray offers kindly.

          "Oh, yes, that — well, there is Richard Gansey the Third," Calla says, catching sight of him. "And the snake." She looks at Mercy, eyes narrow. "Little Spider. Where is Coca-Cola?"

          "Work." Gansey replies. "He couldn't get off."

Persephone waves, hiding behind her tall, pink drink and Blue offers Mercy a spoonful of yoghurt that she accepts.

          "Does the name Colin Greenmantle mean anything to you?" Gansey asks Mr. Gray, wasting no time even though he's already aware of the answer. A childish part of him craves for the man to say no, his breath hitching as he crosses his arms.

Mr. Gray passes Calla her drink from the table, wiping his palms on his slacks. "Colin Greenmantle was my employer."

          "He's our new Latin teacher."

          "He doesn't seem very special. Easy to deal with." Mercy adds, mouth morphing into a vicious smile.

          "Oh, dear." Persephone says. "Would you like a drink?"

Gansey takes a moment to realise she's speaking to him. "Oh, no, thank you."

          "I need another one." She says. "I'm making one for you, too, Mr. Gray."

Mr. Gray nods gratefully.

          "I'll take one." Mercy voices, waving her hand slightly. "Thank you, Persephone."

Mr. Gray crosses the room, expression vaguely haunted as he comes to stop in front of the window and studies his car resting outside its boundaries. The white Mitsubishi is a glowing beacon, almost pulsing like an unsteady heartbeat in the dying light. Ronan stands behind him, eyes cast over the brightness with folded arms.

It takes a long moment for Mr. Gray to break the silence. "He's the man who asked me to kill Ronan's father."

Mercy's fingers tighten into fists and the whole room seems to take a shuddering breath.

          "I'm going to kill him." Ronan says sharply, finally breaking his long lasting silence. It's poignant and preening with vengeful anger.

The Gray Man swiftly turns and Mercy's across the room before she realises, a prowling and guarded presence behind Ronan's tall shoulder.

          "You will not. Do you hear me?" Mr. Gray is forceful. "Do you hear me? You cannot."

          "Oh, can't I?" Ronan asks, dangerously low. Volume does not equal intimation or threat, Ronan Lynch is proof of this fact.

          "Colin Greenmantle is untouchable," says the Gray Man. His hand hangs in the hair, fingers wide and spread. "He is a spider clinging in a web. Every leg touches a thread, and if anything happens to the spider, hell rains down."

Ronan says, "I have already lived through hell."

          "You have no idea what hell is." Mr. Gray says, not unkindly. "Do you think you're the first son to want revenge? Do you think your father was the first he had killed? Before coming down here from Boston, he would have attached sixteen little threads to people like me, to computer programs, to bank accounts. The spider dies, the web twitches, suddenly your accounts are wiped clean, your younger brother becomes an amputee, your older brother dies behind the wheel of a car in D.C., Mrs Gansey's campaign immolates over faked scandalous photos, Adam's scholarship vanishes, Blue loses an eye—"

Mercy resists the urge to spit at the Gray Man's feet.

          "Stop." Gansey looks sick. "Jesus, please stop."

          "I just want Ronan to understand that he cannot do anything stupid," Mr. Gray says. "To kill Greenmantle is to end your lives as you know it. And what good will revenge do you?"

          "Says the killer," Ronan says with a snarl.

          "Says the killer, yes, but I'm good at it." Mr. Gray replies. "Even if he was not a spider in a dazzling web, would you be willing to go to prison for the satisfaction of killing him?"

Without a word, Ronan bangs through the front door, slamming it closed behind him. Mercy moves but Gansey catches her arm. She wrenches it from his grip and her lip curls viciously. Persephone hands Mr. Gray his drink, placing Mercy's on the table and steps aside with her own.

Whirling on Mr. Gray, Mercy glares at him hotly. "Greenmantle is not the only spider to have stuck his legs in this web. Many people have tried. Many people have failed. Stronger spiders have hit their knees, and even stronger spiders have died."

          "What makes you so sure?" Mr. Gray says flatly.

Mercy's mouth twists into a wicked smile. "You don't know much about Henrietta's history do you?"

Quietly, Blue and Gansey utter between themselves, the former shoving the yoghurt container with the leftover fruit in Gansey's hands before standing next to Mercy.

          "He's the one who came for a reading last night, wasn't he?" She asks.

          "Yes." The Gray Man replies. "As I thought. And now he is teaching Latin to the boys and Mercy."

          "Why?" Gansey questions. "Why us?"

          "Not you," Mr. Gray replies. "Me. Clearly, he didn't believe my story of fleeing with the Greywaren. He came to this house looking for Maura, because he thinks she is important to me. He has infiltrated the school because he has found out that you and I are acquainted. He wants me to know he knows I am still here and he wants me to know how much he knows about my life here."

          "What do we do?" Gansey asks.

          "He's not your problem; he's mine." Mr. Gray says.

Mercy snorts. "Funny. He's in our school. Our classroom."

          "Ronan has to look at his face every day. How is that not our problem?" Gansey adds tensely.

The Gray Man says, "Because it's not you that he wants. I will address it. Your problem is to let me address it."

          "But—"

          "Mercy, enough." Gansey says.

Her jaw slams closed but her glare is still hot. Gansey sinks into the comfort of the couch, hands wiping his face down. He looks up to Calla gently taking Mr. Gray's wrist and slowly pretending to break his arm. Little by little, the Gray Man trades with her, taking her palm in one hand and her wrist in the other, turning it with slow precision. Mercy stands behind the couch, nails digging into the fabric in violent frustration. After a few moments, Calla curses and holds her shoulder.

          "Sorry." Mr. Gray says. He doesn't say it to Calla, the utterance directed at Gansey and Mercy in front of him. "I'll find out what he wants."

          "Don't get killed." Voices Blue immediately.

          "I don't intend to."

          "I think it's good you've nearly found that king." Persephone says from behind her drink.

          "Have I?" Gansey asks.

          "Surely." Calla says. "It's taken you long enough. Mercy."

Mercy looks up.

          "It might be time, Little Spider."

The redhead clutches at the gold locket on her chest and sucks in a deep breath. She isn't ready for it to be time.