“Good point.”Grevin folded the edges of the blanket on his stomach, his eyes on his hands.“Be careful.”
“I will be.Do you need anything from him, assuming he isn’t a demon-stealer?”
“Not right now, but beware of any herbs from Hafrey, most of them he smokes.”
“These are the non-smokable kind, or at least they shouldn’t be smoked.I wouldn’t put anything past him.”The old wizard has been known to put some unwise choices in his pipe or roll them up in his favorite parchment sheets.“I think I’ll be fine as long as I avoid the bonus mushrooms he’s always trying to pawn off on me.”
“I’d pay to see Jaks try to handle you when high.”
Quentin laughed.“It’s probably not worth the headache the next day.”
“Fair enough.Get your workshop in order.I might need to buy some of your spell balls for emergencies.If someone’s after me, I’d like to have some protection.”
“Will do.I have some pre-made I can send your way.”
“Thank you.”
Grevin’s clear relief firmed Quentin’s resolve to get his friend some of his best orbs as soon as possible.He had a few other things in the works besides the capture orbs he used on Vlad.If he were a one-trick pony, others would soon find a way to get around them.He couldn’t let the bad guys become used to his ways, or the next time he might not be able to save himself.With his recent luck, dangerous encounters had become the norm.
After bidding Grevin goodbye, Quentin headed out to set up his dream lab.
CHAPTER10
Before getting too involved in his research, Quentin, as promised, called the Bounty Hunter agency.A perky receptionist answered.
“Hello, this is Quentin Heart.I’d like to talk to Stacy or leave a message for her to call me later.”He didn’t expect the owner of the agency to be available at his whim.To his surprise, he was sent straight through.
“Quentin dear, how can I help you?”
He quickly summarized his current problems.
“Do you have a bounty for the vampire?”she asked.
“I can’t officially offer a bounty because of Jaks.However, if you were to investigate the vampire that attacked and turned Glenn and a demon escaping from Grevin’s house, that wouldn’t step on anyone’s toes.”
“And if that investigation led to us authorizing a hunt on a rogue vampire?”
Quentin nodded even though she couldn’t see him.“Yes, that would only be a natural conclusion.”He bit his lip.“I can’t outright pay for a bounty, but I have a few newly designed spell orbs I’d be happy to give you for testing.”
A pause on the line.
“We’d be happy to be a test site for your orbs.If we like them, I will personally endorse you to my law enforcement contacts, provided you promise not to share them with any other bounty-hunting organizations in this city.I don’t care about other states, but I don’t want to give the competition an edge.”
“Fair enough.We have an agreement.”
Neither had to say out loud that this agreement would remain verbal.Quentin couldn’t be held responsible for what the bounty hunters did with his orbs or how they organized their workload, even if they corresponded with Quentin’s wishes.As long as he didn’t share the information with Jaks, his vampire lover couldn’t be implicated for invading a fellow vampire’s territory.
“Be careful, Quentin, we’d hate to lose such a brilliant mind.”
“I’ll be careful,” he assured her.
By the time he hung up, both sides were happy with their agreement.Quentin would give them twenty of any invention he wanted tested, and they would have exclusive first rights to use them, with the option to buy more.In exchange, they would investigate whatever Quentin wanted within reason.Stacy had said she trusted Quentin’s judgment, which was a balm to his ego after the day he’d had.
Two hours later, a knock on the door to his workshop pulled Quentin out of his arithmetic nightmare.Braed had briefly shown up and then left after Quentin secured the location with runes, stating he didn’t need a babysitter to watch him work.After double-checking with Jaks, Braed left and took his storm-cloud attitude with him, relieving Quentin of the urge to thin Jaks’s clan and make his mother single again in one fell swoop.
Over the last three hours, he’d been trying to combine a freezing spell with a containment orb, hoping it would trap fire creatures without sending them into shock or death.Several kinds of fire beasts were too valuable to kill, but too dangerous to let run around in the general populace.A magical creature reserve had sent Quentin an email asking if he had a way to capture and transport fire-breathing animals safely.Apparently, they lost several workers each year to accidents involving the transportation of creatures.According to their email, Stacy had recommended him, which was nice of her, considering it was before Quentin had contacted her himself.
It should’ve been an easy combination.The numbers made sense, but something about the rune structure wasn’t meshing with the ice magic.He didn’t want to freeze the creatures so hard that it caused permanent damage, only enough to suppress their fire.It was a careful balance, and Quentin didn’t want to be responsible for the death of an endangered species because he rushed the magic.
