Claire was still thinking about Ann and her brother when she and Jim got back to the PRT.
Merlin was waiting for her. "If you're finished playing around with fools, perhaps we can stop wasting time?" the wizard asked.
"What?" Claire said. Next to her, Vista was glaring up at the wizard.
"After months of continually hounding me, it is time to train your talents." Merlin nodded at her. "Follow me."
"I'm coming with you," Vista said.
"Oh really?" Merlin paused. "I know that the PRT doesn't want me to be alone with the Trollhunter, but Claire has been learning from me. Besides, aren't you… a little short to be a knight in shining armor?"
"Merlin," Claire said. "Vista is a part of the team."
"Yes, I've seen their dolls in the…gift shop, is it? Well, she can come along if she remains quiet."
"Don't worry," Claire murmured. "Merlin's always like this."
"How come you didn't kill him?" Vista muttered.
"I heard that!"
Merlin had been granted one of the tinker labs on the rig, although it was mostly empty of tools. Instead, there were circles and runes inscribed upon the floor, and notebooks full of writing, some trollish, some Latin, some that hurt the eye when you looked at them.
Behind her, Vista snorted something that sounded like Myrddin.
"You have made use of your affinity of shadow, much as Morganna did," Merlin said. "But your sorcery, while heavily shadow aspected, does not have to be completely dependent on it. I have focused on that because it comes easier to you, it was more useful, and it wasted less of my time."
Claire rolled her eyes.
"And you will need more skills if you are to be safe, especially if you stop playing the hero in this city." Merlin nodded.
"Playing?" Vista glared at Merlin. "I think we did pretty good. That wasn't playing."
"Really?" Merlin looked over at her. "Ready for anything, are you?"
Space was shivering around Vista as she met the wizard's gaze. Claire put her hand on Vista's shoulder. "Vista, he's like this all—"
"I think I can handle it."
"So, handle it, Vista." Merlin made a motion with his hand, and Claire felt the shiver of an illusion take hold.
Merlin, what are you… Something stepped behind them, and Vista turned around, and suddenly the short ward screamed in fright, space warping around her and Claire, pulling away from the figure that had appeared. As she frantically backpedaled. Behind them, the tiger-striped, nude woman leapt for Vista, her talons outstretched. Vista scrabbled back, but the Siberian vanished into a cloud of glowing vapor, just before her claws touched either one of them.
"I thought you could handle it?"
"Merlin, that wasn't funny!" Claire shouted, one hand on Vista's shoulder as she helped the Ward up. The room returned to normal. "Are you okay, Vista?"
Vista took several quick breaths. "I… yes. You're an asshole!" she hissed at Merlin.
"I am, am I not?" Merlin held up a potion and swirled it in front of him. "But power calls to power, and you, Vista are very powerful indeed. And because of that, if you say you are prepared for anything, you had best be certain you really are prepared for it, because your enemies will not politely knock upon your door and wait for your convenience. There are monsters in this world, and they do not care for youth or innocence."
"What does this have to do with me!" Claire snapped, hand still on Vista's shoulder. You asshole, you fucking asshole… She knew how much Vista wanted to be seen as someone who could handle things, and right now, she could feel the way she was quivering. Merlin if you make Vista cry in front of you, so help me I'll portal you to the SUN.
"The same enemies may face me. I am going to, in a week or so, start to work on developing a method to remove these Grey Boy bubbles, so that the Protectorate can do so on their own." He paused. "But such an act may antagonize the monsters of which I spoke, and if I do not survive, you will need to be prepared to return home and carry on my work… however poorly that might go."
Is it possible for you to not insult someone?
Merlin reached down and picked up a staff made of night black metal. "This is for you. It is not the Skathe-Hrün, but then you do not need that, now that you have mastered that aspect of your magic. Still, since you seem to have a preference for staff-fighting, it might aid you. Normally, you'd make something like this yourself, but we have not the time."
"Thanks," Claire said. She held the staff, and it seemed to vibrate. "It's not just a staff."
"Good. You felt that. You can change its shape, shrink it down, and more importantly, you can call it to you, especially after practice." Claire tried some experimental sweeps with it. It was less ornate than the old staff, but… "There's something different about it."
"It includes a spell matrix," Merlin said. "I've seen you use your innate talent for shadowmancy, and attempt to work basic spells out the hard way, but only a Wizard can conjure spells on the fly. For now, you will have to learn how to embed spells within the matrix of the staff, or an expendable crystal, and thus trigger them."
"Great, when do I do that?" Claire asked.
"When you finish your reading. I have transcribed the basic works and grimoires,as well as those I stored in my otherspace." Merlin gestured and Claire held out her arms.
"Magic of the mind," a heavy tome landed in her arms. "The Wisdom of Stone and Spell." Another one, even bigger. "Meditations on magic—that one is in archaic Latin, so here are some language primers… Alchemy for the apprentice…" More and more books came, until Claire couldn't see over them. She felt her legs start to buckle, until the books stopped. Claire looked around them, to see Merlin staring at her, one eyebrow raised, other books floating around him like a constellation.
Why is he—Then Claire turned red. Really red. She opened a portal, and floated the books into her room at their house.
"You remembered you were a sorceress," Merlin said, and the more books came. When they were finished, thee were at least a hundred books in Claire's room, and Merlin looked at her and nodded.
"That should hold you for a few weeks, maybe let you learn some hedgemagic, so that we can start working on the important material…"
"A hundred books in a few weeks?" Claire said.
"Oh, I'm sorry, weren't you the girl bragging about how you learned trollish? This should be easy. I didn't even give you the Taoist books. But if you feel the work is too much for you talent…"
"No. I. Am. Fine." Claire bit out.
"Very well, enjoy your clubhouse," Merlin said, and then turned and dismissed them both.
"What an Asshole!" Vista said once they were out, garnering a disapproving look from a secretary, laboring under the weight of Armsmaster's account statements.
"He is." Claire looked down at Vista. "That was a really stupid stunt, what with the Siberian."
"I wasn't scared, I was j-just a little startled that he'd pull something like that."
"I know, trust me, we got to learn a lot about Merlin on our trip out East." Claire paused and made certain they were alone. "You know, Dennis and Chris have been bragging about how they dominate all comers at Protectorate Smash. Wanna prove 'em wrong?"
"I—Sure," Vista said, and by mutual agreement, nothing more was said about Merlin.
Merlin finished preparing his materials. Breaking the bubbles was easy enough—for him. Creating a method that Armsmaster could incorporate, along with Dragon, would be harder, but it was not his role to personally clean up the messes of the world.
"Of course," Merlin said. "You should have wondered how I knew to make your staff, Fair Claire, and why I gifted it to you now." He stared down into a bowl, the glowing fluid lighting the room.
Telling the future was not easy. A vision could mislead. Trying to warn someone almost always led to worse fates. It was not like the strangely soulless 'precognition' of this world, nor did it lend itself to easy solutions. When Merlin had been young and foolish, he'd seen prophecy as a way to order the world, to change things to his liking.
How very many had died for that hubris.
Merlin chuckled. "Indeed, I wonder what they would say if they knew that this was me at my most humble."
He raised his hand, and the vision formed. Claire, standing alone on a pile of rubble, clad in armor, holding up the staff, power gyring from it. Her stance spoke of pain, exhaustion, and defiance. Water swirled around her and stormclouds lay heavy upon the sky.
And looming over her was a figure out of nightmare. Four glowing orbs, three on the left and one on the right, no mouth or nose to give it a sense of humanity.
Leviathan.
"But where is the Trollhunter?" Merlin asked. "He would not leave her to stand alone against this foe, not if he was able to join with her." He gestured and the vision vanished. "Well, no matter, what can be done is done." With that, he turned to start packing what he would need when he met Armsmaster and Dragon.