When Ronan thought of Gansey, he thought of moving into Monmouth Manufacturing, of nights spent in companionable insomnia, of a summer searching for a king, of Gansey asking the Gray Man for his life. Brothers.

I take it we're friends now," Henry said. "We must be," Gansey replied. "Jane says it should be so.""It should be so," Blue agreed.

Now is the time to make sure we have the strings of all the balloons we want to keep before they all float away.

Even though Ronan was snarling and Noah was sighing and Adam was hesitating, he didn’t turn to verify that they were coming. He knew they were. In three different ways, he’d earned them all days or weeks or months before, and when it came to it, they’d all follow him anywhere.

Violence was a disease Gansey didn't think he could catch. But all around him, his friends were slowly infected.