Video

[pratservant]

[Merlin's sitting at the foot of a bed, a large laundry basket beside him. The actual laundry is folded beside it so that the basket can instead hold a duck - one of Freya's, looked after by him until she's able to do it herself.

Which will be soon. He keeps telling himself this.

The other duckling waddles across his lap, pulling at the fabric of his trousers. Merlin's watching it idly as he speaks.]

I guess all worlds have monsters. Mine has all sorts, ones with scales and fangs and stingers. The worst hurt people with swords.

[a pause]

Or magic.

[Yeah, those are definitely the worst monsters.]

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the word gets tossed about as much as it does. There's no escaping it.

[Obviously he's seen the posters, but suddenly doesn't want to think much about them anymore, doesn't want to think about the fear and intolerance he thought he'd left behind. So he hides his introspection behind curiosity instead.]

Uhm. What kinds of monsters are there where you're from? We can decide if they're worse than serkets. Or those...cat thingies.

[Behind him, the other duck has finally made it out of the basket, and busies itself with plucking the buttons off a clean shirt.]