“Who?”Lars asked the question Quentin hadn’t dared.
“I got into debt and smuggled some illegal goods for some black magic dealers.Turns out they were running a human smuggling ring and using my herbs to keep the kids sleeping.I wasn’t going to be a party to that, so I turned them in, then I went underground.I don’t know how Mearson found out, but she threatened to turn me in if I didn’t get the demon.I broke Grevin’s circle.”Hafrey picked at his nails.“I didn’t get the chance to bind it before it attacked Grevin.Once Grevin was down, it possessed me.I had no control.I don’t know what happened to Grevin.”Tears dripped down Hafrey’s cheeks.“I saw him text you before I left.Is he, is he all right?”
“Yes.He’ll be scarred, but he’s healing.”Quentin didn’t know what to say to the sobbing wizard before him.Hafrey was usually a cheerful, mellow soul.It changed Quentin’s view of him to learn he had such a troubled past.“Hafrey, if Dean Mearson hired you to get the demon, why did you bring it home instead of taking it to the dean?”
“I didn’t have a choice.Once he was inside of me, he read my mind and didn’t like what he saw about Mearson and refused to go to her.I couldn’t fight him.I was a passenger in my own body.”Hafrey shuddered.
“We’ll have to address this carefully,” Quentin said.“I can’t go up to Dean Mearson and ask her if she’s possessed.They would have me kicked off campus.”
“How did she get it out of you?”Lars asked.
“She had a blue gemstone, a demon gem.She did some sort of ritual chant and ripped him out.”Hafrey rubbed his chest as he spoke.“Don’t hurt the demon when you find it.It’s not his fault that he’s here.”
Quentin frowned.“Hafrey, what do you think we are going to do with the demon?”
“Kill him,” Lars and Hafrey said in unison.
“I was planning on banishing him back home, with Grevin’s help, but we need to find him first.”
“It would be easier to kill him,” Lars said, folding his arms across his chest.
“It would, maybe.Hafrey, did the demon tell you his name?”
Hafrey sighed.A long, desperate sound.“No.”
“Damn, that would’ve been too easy.”Quentin groaned.
“See, that’s why we should kill him,” Lars crowed.“If we don’t know his name, we can’t banish him.”
“Grevin can.He’ll know who it is.”Quentin had complete confidence in Grevin.
“Why bother?”Lars’s forehead wrinkled like he didn’t understand why they would waste their time sending the demon back when they could just kill him.
“You really hate demons, don’t you?”He’d never seen this side of his father in their admittedly short relationship.
“They are the antithesis of nature.They should all be destroyed.”
Wow, that was more prejudiced than he’d been expecting.
“Don’t give me that look, they destroy all life.”
The worst part was that Quentin couldn’t even argue against that fact.“Still, we should try to send him back first.If he’s as powerful as I expect, it would be in our best interest to banish him because he might be impossible to kill.”
“At least you’re being practical,” Lars said.
“Why did you suspect me?”Hafrey asked.
“There are only a few people who have access to Grevin’s wards.”
Hafrey’s face fell.“I probably don’t anymore.”
“No, you probably won’t.”He didn’t mention that Grevin hadn’t tweaked the wards yet.Quentin did not doubt that as soon as he returned home, Grevin would take care of that.
Hafrey coughed up a bit of blood.
“Are you sure you’re all right?”Quentin silently vowed to send Jaks’s doctor over when he had a minute.
“I’ll be fine.My body is recalibrating from the possession.”
