“Not again, kid,” I said in disbelief and disappointment.

“It’s not like that, uncle,” said my nephew, Jaser. “I haven’t gotten in further trouble. It’s the same trouble from the start.”

“How did you go back so readily? I told you to stay out of harm's way.”

“I did. I did my best,” he explained and sounded cornered, but honest. “Trouble found me back. I thought I was finally out of it. But they came back.”

“They? The vampires? The torviela?”

“No, not those things, uncle. The other things. They are different.”

“You weren’t dealing with leeches to start with?” I felt something getting stuck in my throat.

I began dreading the situation. If he wasn’t already in trouble with vampires, what did that mean? Something else? It couldn’t be demons, right?

“What kinds of things? What about the vampires? How did you manage to get involved with them?”

“That was pure coincidence. They found us a few days before you got to save me. They took everyone from the arcade and brought us together. They didn’t say anything, but I thought everything was related to what you told me. But now – uncle, I don’t know what’s happening.”

He was pleading for his life now. This was serious in a different matter. Something else had gotten a hold of my nephew and the other people we saved. And the vampires had found them and took them in by mistake, they probably didn’t know anything about it until the same day I was told to become Uderach’s champion. They must have realized they had found themselves with a bargaining chip out of pure luck and tried to intercept me.

The interesting thing is that they must have not known who it was. That started to make sense. Not the torviela nor the vampire I invaded knew who my nephew was, and they must have found out when I got there. But we killed them, and the vampires had no idea who my nephew was.

Their hypothesis must have been proven right when I had attacked the mansion as well, and were lucky to have moved them all just a few hours before the skirmish happened.

How lucky! How unlucky!

It was all kinds of coincidental. It was ridiculous.

But what really mattered is what were the things that got my nephew in this situation. He and the other people must have been important if these things were coming back again after my duel to settle things with my nephew, and most likely the rest.

I only pray they aren’t demons.

“Do you know anything about them? Names?” I asked.

“Nothing. They look human, if that tells you anything.”

Oh boy, I thought. Then continued: “Were you asked to do something for them?”

“Yes,” he began. “They wanted me to spread s— something, for them.”

I looked at him trip over his words, and I imagined the worst thing a kid could do in the human world. Drugs. There was no reason for me to push it, I didn’t want to put him in the spot so I decided not to ask him more about it.

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“What would they give you in return?” I asked.

“Money.”

I nodded in understanding.

“Anything else?”

“They said if I did a good job, I might be able to do more work for them. That I could join along. And mom has been struggling lately. I thought if I could do something and get some money.”

“You don’t need to explain. This is between you and me. What matters now is not what you did.”

“Right,” he said. “Thanks.”

“Why did you disappear for so long?”

“We started getting followed by something. We needed a place to hide and we found it in BQ. But it was harder to go outside and I couldn’t go back home. Most of us hid, and those that didn’t, we didn’t hear of them again.”

“And then the vampires found you.”

Jaser nodded while looking down.

Everything was starting to make sense, except for the mysterious thing that followed them. Other than that, I started to get an idea of what was going on, and I wasn’t liking it. I didn’t like it from the start, but now I liked it even less.

The only good thing that came about this was that no demons were involved. A demon doesn’t create deals, it makes pacts. A pact between a mortal and a demon requires them to give them their soul as the price for a favor of equal value. However, a demon must make this pact come through no matter the cost. A demon pact can’t be broken, only modified in the right circumstances. And the demon must make the wish come true before taking the soul.

If my nephew had made a demon pact, then the demon would be stalking him and making sure his wish came true.

On the other hand, other supernatural creatures make deals, and not pacts. Vampires and torviela, make deals to access free will, while the Fey make deals to access mortals freely. To the Fey, mortals mean possibilities. They could either use them to access the mortal world, the soul, and free will.

If vampires and torviela weren’t behind their troubles, and demons hadn’t made a pact, that only meant faeries were behind it. The troublesome part is that they work on a different kind of rule than everyone else. While vampires need to make a strict deal, the Fey only require them to respond in kind to something given to them or be given something in return for something they did. It doesn’t require verbal consent, it only requires it to happen, but sometimes, they need to convince people about things, and that’s how they got behind my nephew.

The biggest problem is that the Fey doesn’t hold money as valuable, unlike vampires, since vampires live in the real world. Faeries don’t see the value in money, and so, for them, giving money is equivalent to offering nothing in return for a favor, which means that they might end up paying these people in a different matter.

On the other hand, it is possible that they were already given something by the faeries without them understanding, and the drug selling was only part of the payment.

The situation was already getting complicated. But at least I know what I’m getting myself into, the only problem is that faeries must receive payment and they will find a way for you to pay them, one way or another. I’m assuming they are now hunting everyone involved and are asking to pay up. That means that they had already given something in advance.

Finally, the thing that stalked them before must have been related to their situation. What’s strange is that they have yet to show up, otherwise Jaser would’ve said something about it.

“Alright, Jaser,” I called him after a few seconds of deep thinking. “I will help you out. Your mom would kill me if she ever finds out I let you suffer.”

“Please don’t tell her,” he begged.

“Well, you need to go home first. She knows you’ve gone missing.”

“How did you find out?”

“Tedet seems to have had a change of heart. It seems he started caring for others.”

“He told mom? I asked him not to do it!”

“Well, he also tells me I look good every day.”

I looked at Jaser expectantly and found myself disappointed that he didn’t laugh at the joke.

I sighed and realized that this may not have been the best moment to make a joke. I need to read and respond better to the atmosphere. Then again, I must have been trying to relax the atmosphere. I felt myself become nervous and if my nephew thinks I’m scared then he will surely panic. I need him to go back home thinking everything will be resolved.

“Alright, kid,” I began. “From here on out I need you to go home. I need to find these things that are bothering you and have a little talk with them.” I winked. “But first things first: we need to deal with your mom. Can you think of an excuse to tell her?”

“You want me to lie?”

“You want to tell her the truth?” His silence followed by his eyes averting mine was enough. Message received, no need to say anything. “You can think about something while we get you home. I’m waiting for Hayier to give me a ride.”