it was just a basement home theater in a big, flimsy suburban mansion.

Ronan’s shapeless anger always got worse at night,

But Calla reached up to fold her hands over the top of the pocked metal. Her eyes were closed, so she couldn’t know what it was, but she said, “He’s not alone when he leaves the car behind.”

Adam’s fingers found the stone. It was the same at every fray in the line: a stone or a body of water that confused and diffused the ley line’s direction. Sometimes Adam had only to turn a stone to feel the ley line immediately snap into place, clean as a light switch.

Ronan didn’t move. If he moved, the touch on his spine would stab him — a wound like this pill. No coming back.

himself, a version that could be lit and hurled away.

They were all a little uneasy. It was impossible to tell if this slumber was natural or supernatural, and without that knowledge, it didn’t seem impossible that it might happen to them, too.

The mixture smoked and popped, the celery seeds twitching like popcorn and the orris root smelling of burning violets. The smoke of them was meant to clarify psychic impressions.

“There aren’t terrible ideas,” the Gray Man said. “Just ideas done terribly.”