The storm was raging over the island but there wasn't a drop of rain. It was as if… no, he quickly corrected himself on that thought. There was no 'if' about it. The source of the storm was so greedy that it refused to even let the rains fall. Honestly he was surprised the winds were allowed to escape from the cyclone that was forming in the sky but they were and he just knew that the villagers were currently cursing him for ever coming there and convincing them to not provide the yearly tribute.

He didn't care. Let them rage at him. It had provided him with the taunting bait to bring his foe to him and now it was time to settle things.

"Give me wings, old friend," he said as his Dragonite nodded, allowing the trainer onto his back. They launched themselves into the storm and for anyone else that would have been a death sentence. The winds would have torn them to shreds or sent them plummeting to the earth, screaming in terror as the universe spiraled about them in utter madness.

But he didn't encounter any of that. Because he was welcomed and wanted by the source of the storm and while the winds hit him they weren't the terrible tearing sensations one might have expected. No… they were drawing him forth, taunting him to fly harder and higher, to reach the end of the path and finally come face to face with his foe.

And sure enough, its body itself a maelstrom, was He Who Claimed All.

"Voldemort," the trainer said but not bothering to raise his voice, knowing the winds would carry his words. The ghost turned its gaze upon him, the green energy that made up its features twisting into a mocking grin.

"Ah…old friend. It has been so long since I saw you, Merlin."

"Far too long yet not soon enough for me, Voldemort," the trainer declared, his Grumpig Hogwarts looking around Merlin's shoulder and glaring at the phantom pokemon.

"Is that all you have to say to me, my friend?" Voldemort taunted. "It has been quite some time since we last saw each other and we have both changed greatly. I see you finally trimmed away that horrid mustache. And I… well, you can see how I've grown since we last met."

Merlin nodded, darkness flashing through his eyes. "You have gotten rather bloated. Increasing the tributes to twice a year has caused you to gain quite a bit of weight it seems."

"Ah, but I carry it so well!" the ghostly being stated, voice coming all around Merlin. It was like he was in a crowd of people, each one speaking a word. Some were harsh and brutal, others sweet and innocent, some seductive and others cruel. All of them though were people whose lives had been stolen by Voldemort, forced to die and have all they were consumed by him in order to gain his demented 'protection'. "I do think it makes me look rather regal, don't you agree?" The smile Voldemort's cloudy form wore slowly twisted into a more darker and sinister sneer. "Are you the reason I have been denied my next meal? I think you are."

"I am," Merlin said, seeing no reason to deny the claim when it was true.

"Always the meddler, Merlin. Always sticking that beaky nose of yours in matters that don't concern you."

"You will always concern me," Merlin snapped.

"You're desperation to be near me is so very… confusion. I have offered you many times to be a part of me, to be closer than all others." Voldemort began to move around Merlin, the pale purple cloud that was his main body slowly pushing in closer, eddies and swirls within his gaseous form leaking out like greedy fingers trying to caress Merlin's shoulders and back. "You and I… we could do so much together." He paused. "Like we did before…"

"There was never any 'us', Voldemort. You might be able to trick others with your lies, making them question their own memories, but I know that you and I have never been anything other than bitter rivals."

"Love and hate… they are the same emotion merely focused in different ways. And they can cloud one's mind, make them forget what matters… what happened." Voldemort's face… if it could be called a face… moved to come uncomfortably close to Merlin's. "We keep running into each other, keep circling each other. It is a mating dance, my old friend… why can't you accept that you long to be with me."

"I long to see you destroyed," Merlin growled. "I long to see you torn apart and every soul you've fed on to add to your own bulk be freed so you return to the small, shriveled up thing you once were. You and I? We will never join together. Never be one. And more importantly than that I am going to smile as you at last know pain and agony. That you understand a fraction of what you've done to the people of Avalon."

"You speak many words," Voldemort said, a tendril coming closer to Merlin's cheek, forcing the trainer and his Dragonite to back away, Hogwarts glowering at the Spiritomb. "Oh don't look at me like that, Grumpig. Don't be jealous that your trainer will do more to find me than he ever would you. All the attention he pays to me… it is something special between the two of us. And while you have no hope of ever feeling that yourself I ask that you don't blame him…"

Hogwarts fired off a Psyshock attack but it merely rippled along Voldemort's phantom form, doing nothing as it bounced harmlessly off into the atmosphere.

"You have no hope of harming me, little piglet," Voldemort said. "I am invulnerable. I am… immortal. I am perfection and that is why your master seeks me out!"

"No," Merlin said and it was now his turn to smile. "That isn't why I have sought you out today."

"Oh?" Voldemort said, intrigued. "And why have you come to me today, Merlin, if not to give the same pathetic speech about how you will save this village or this caravan or this tribe of shoeless dirt farmers? Especially when you know it isn't true… that we will fight, I will send you running away, and then I am going to eat every soul of those that followed you." The cocoon that was Voldemort's form tightened around Merlin and his Dragonite, preventing them from moving more than a few feet. All the politeness left the Spiritomb's amalgamation of voices, leaving only taunting that cut through the soul. "Because that is what is going to happen. You denied me a meal but you won't pay the price for that. Instead I am going to go to those that put their faith in you. I am going to defeat you but I will let you live, old friend, and in front of your broken body I am going to eat not just my normal tribute but every villager. And I will make sure they know as I consume the men… the women… the children… that you are the blame. That you are the reason they are dying. And they will join with me, unable to move on, unable to see what lies beyond the veil of death. They will fuel me forever… because… of… you."

Merlin reached into his pocket and pulled out a smooth rock, runes carved into it.

"You do remember this, don't you?" He asked as he held up the rock, waved it back and forth. "Your Keystone. Your precious tether to the world. What kept you and so many others like you from being torn apart by the winds of the world." He dangled it out, it clear his threat was to drop it.

But Voldemort didn't budge. "Destroy it. I have grown so powerful that the Keystone no longer affects me." But there was a light tremor in his voice, a hidden fear he refused to speak upon. "I will survive and I will make sure the last thing you see before you witness the shocked faces of those that pledged themselves to you is me laughing."

"No… I believe I will see your shocked face as you realize you haven't dealt with your type immunity and weakness as well as you thought," Merlin said.

"…type immunity and weakness?" Voldemort said, confused. "I am Darkness and the Undying merged into one. Nothing can hurt-"

A blast of pink energy radiated through Voldemort, causing him to scream in a thousand voices even as Merlin quickly recalled his Dragonite and sent out his female Unfezant. It wasn't the fastest Pokemon in the world, or the most nimble, but it didn't have to be. He'd used Dragonite to lure Voldemort into thinking he was preparing for a frontal assault; had he come in on his Unfezant then the Spirtomb would have realized that Merlin was up to something. It was the equivalent of his friend Arthur using a battering ram on a gate while the rest of his company stuck up the walls of a castle and slaughtered the soldiers in silence.

Voldemort trembled and shook, his gaseous form breaking apart as Merlin zipped through an opening and saw that the dark clouds the Spiritomb had been creating were coming apart, revealing the night sky and the stars that twinkled overhead. But most important was the moon, whose pale light was fueling the attack that was causing Spiritomb such pain.

"Its called Aromatisse," he said as he looked at the bird-like Pokemon with its purple and pink coloring and fluffy feathers that had popped out of his cloak. "A rather interesting Pokemon that apparently stowed away from Kalos. The noblewomen there love it because it is able to produce rather lovely scents… but I prefer it because I have found that it hurts Dark types greatly while Ghost Types aren't immune to their attack. And this lovely lady… she packs a rather nasty punch."

The Aromatisse nodded and fired off another Moonblast that had Voldemort folding in on himself.

"It hurts, doesn't it? Probably more than what any other Pokemon has even gone through. That's because you've never understood pain. Never allowed yourself to feel it." Merlin sneered. "How does it feel now?"

Voldemort let out a scream and fired a Shadow Ball at Merlin but he had Unfezant rise up, her belly taking the hit that just oozed off of her. And as it did so he saw bits of the Spiritomb break off and turn into steam that rose in the air…

…no, not steam.

Souls.

"That cost you how many of your ill gotten gains."

Voldemort tried to flee but Merlin had Hogwarts fire off a Dark Pulse, making the dark phantom come to a stop just in time for Aromatisee to hit him with a new attack, this one coating the winds with her power. It wasn't as strong as the Moonblast but it spread out more, tearing into Voldemort's body and taking away more chunks of it, releasing more souls.

"That is the problem with you, Voldemort. You think you are so large, so powerful, but you do so little with the souls you take and that in the end makes you JUST SO SMALL!"

"Stop… stop this!" Voldemort pleaded.

"No," Merlin said coldly. "You're reign of terror ends now. I am going to rip every soul from you and then I am going to send you after them into the afterlife. You will never trouble another person of this world ever again. Do you understand, Voldemort? This is your end. This is where you DIE!"

"No… NO!" Voldemort screamed even as more and more souls were torn from him. He twisted his ethereal form around himself, tighter and tighter and at first Merlin thought he was trying to protect himself, much like a child would curl into a ball when confronted by a nightmare. But then Voldemort's body began to take shape, forming not into a cloud but something else. Something decidedly human-like.

Merlin froze before holding his hand out, stopping his Aromatisse from firing another attack.

"My… love?" a decidedly female voice asked. Voldemort's form was short, with the hint of breasts and long tendrils of hair that came to his feminine form's rear. He slowly uncurled himself as he reached out to Merlin, the same woman's voice asking, "Merlin?"

"Nimue…" Merlin whispered before his face hardened. "Let her go!"

Turning his head Voldemort revealed that while the body might have been that of Nimue the face was his own: the same green cut eyes and jagged mouth. "She's here in me…" he said in a deeper voice. "Waiting for you Merlin… this is why you have chased me all this time. This is why you refused to be like all the rest."

"You killed her."

"She was a tribute… it was her duty to feed me."

"She was MINE!" Merlin snarled, trembling with rage. "You took her from me and now I will rip her free!"

"She's dead, old friend," Voldemort said, panting slightly, pressing a purplish hand to his belly. "Her body has rotted away."

"But I will free her soul."

Voldemort smiled at that. "No… I can't hold the others but I will cling to hers! I will die with her in my grasp Merlin and you will know that you will never see each other in Arceus' embrace. She will go to the Reversal World with me and there she will know ever torture that awaits me! And the only way you will be able to be with her is to turn your back on the creator as I have!" Voldemort threw back his head and let out a choked laugh. "We are destined to be together! Can't you see? NOTHING you do can stop that."

"There is one thing," Merlin said darkly, knowing that for the good of Avalon he should attack Voldemort again. What was the cost of one soul if it meant that countless generations would never suffer again? That they would know peace and not the terror that came from Voldemort's reign?

Except… it was not just any old soul.

Merlin, gritting his teeth and with tears in his eyes, hurled the keystone at Voldemort's feminine form.

The Spirit hated the Keystone. Loathed it because it was a weakness. It was something he had to protect and so long as he was linked to it the stone made him vulnerable. To break away from it was like ripping chunks of him apart, like he'd been caught on mortal meat hooks and was being torn by them as they pulled in all directions. And every time he managed to pull himself away it grew worse. Because the Keystone used Voldemort's own power against him, leaching away his strength to help create the very prison he tried to escape. And he knew that at some point, most likely very soon, he wouldn't be able to escape again. That the Keystone would be far too strong and he would be trapped, forever linked to it and at the mercy of the blasted thing. No more being able to wander where he pleased. No… his freedom would be gone and the Keystone, which was the one item in all the known world that he couldn't affect, would be all he knew.

And yet… when he had been at his weakness, when the threat of the final death called to him and he saw Giratina calling to him to meet his eternal punishment… the Keystone anchored him to the world of the living and gave him the chance to live on. It was parent and lover to him and for all his hate he found himself again and again rushing towards the keystone, if only to make sure it was there. The final backup in case all else failed. If it were to be destroyed so would he find himself and he couldn't allow that.

So as he saw the Keystone flitter through the air, twirling end over end, Voldemort couldn't help but suddenly rush forward, Nimue's form disappearing as he reached out and wrapped himself around the Keystone. At once he felt the runes carved into the rock latch onto him, drawing upon his strength to reforge their ties. He clung to the keystone even as he howled his hatred at being caught in the situation. He found his focus being pulled within the stone, his entire world zeroed in on the blasted thing, rolling around it even as it began to fall…

Merlin didn't even wait to see what Voldemort would do; he knew from his research exactly what Voldemort's actions would be and as such he rushed towards the cloud, not startled at all as it began to dissipate until all that had been the great terror of Avalon was reduced to a faint glow around the keystone as it began to tumble towards the ground far below. The trainer knew if he merely let the stone fall it was very likely that would be it for Voldemort. If the stone was destroyed with Voldemort bonded to it the trauma would kill him. The phantom would disappear from the land of the living, sent to his final death, and all those that he had killed would be avenged.

And yet…

Nimue's smile flashed in Merlin's mind. The way she would giggle when she ran through the long grass and the wind would catch her hair. How they had spent nights during their youth sitting under the moonlight and watching the Butterfree swarms do their mating dances. How warm her hand felt when it was clasped in his own.

Merlin reached out and caught the keystone, cursing himself for his own weakness.

~A decade later…~

"Helga… Helga…"

Helga Hufflepuff frowned, looking up from the Wooloos that she had been tending to. One of them had gotten a bad limp and she was trying to figure out just what was the problem. She ran her fingers along the wee one's head, murmuring softly as she tried to comfort her poor little Pokemon. The rest of the herd let out bleats to try and offer their own support to one of their own. That was why Helga loved Wooloos, as unlike other pokemon that tended to gather in herds they didn't abandoned the injured to the predators. No… they would gather around and desperately try and protect the injured one even if it meant their migration slowed to a crawl.

"A moment, if ya could!" she said in a low but firm voice. "I need to make sure that this one is fine." She lifted up the right front leg and frowned, slowly trickling her fingers along the Wooloo's limb, watching to see how it would react. It was fine, it was staring at her, it was doing well, it suddenly winced- "There we are, wee one. There is our problem." She began to part the wool that ran along the leg, trailing her fingers along the exposed skin, before finally finding the stiff object that was buried in the leg. She lightly scratched at the skin, cooing softly when the Wooloo whined, and brought her finger up to see that there was indeed old scabbed blood under her nail. "Oh, ya poor lass. Lean on me, will ya?" She shifted, a powerful shoulder propping the Wooloo up, and then carefully scratching around the foreign object a few more times before pressing her fingers on either side of the puckered flesh and squeezing, the Wooloo screaming out in pain. It hurt her ears and more so her heart to cause her pain, but with her other hand she quickly ripped the object out.

Blood and pus squirted onto her fingers but she squeezed for a few seconds more to make sure anything that might have remained in the wound was flushed out before pressing her shirt against the wound, applying pressure until it stopped leaking.

"There we are," she said with a smile, wiping her hand clean on her pant leg, before actually looking at what she'd yanked out of the Wooloo's leg. "Hmmm," she said, turning the large dark green thorn in her hand. "Now I know I warned ya not ta nibble on them there Roserades' petals. Told ya that they didn't like it when they woke up ta find bite marks on their leaves. Now…" she held up the thorn, "I know ya wouldn't go doin' anythin' I told ya not ta do. So ya mine tellin' me what this is?"

"…woooo?" the Wooloo said, trying to look as innocent as she could.

"Git out of 'ere ya fluffy liar!" Helga scolded, giving the Wooloo an affectionate pat on the back. It happily limped over to the rest of the herd, though the young woman could see that the Wooloo was already doing better than it had been only minutes earlier. "Silly bugger."

"You did good, Helga."

The young woman turned and smiled as she looked at the mudsplattered traveler who was currently watching her with a half smile on his lips. "Thank ya kindly, Mister Merlin."

"Just Merlin, Helga. Or teacher."

She shook her head at that, rising to her feet and wiping the dust from the knees of rough spun pants. Even though she didn't stray far from her home she was just as mud splattered and worn down as Merlin, who made it his life traveling all of Avalon, seeing all the mysteries that existed within it. She was wearing a loose shirt, switched up the front that hid much of her bulk and muscles, the entire thing covered in various stains from her work seeing to the local pokemon that lived about the plains. Her pants were covered in mud as well and the soles of her boots, the one nice thing she owned, were so covered in muck that it added an extra inch to her height; those that joked she needed it received one of her meaty hands in their jaws.

"I haven't become your student, Merlin."

"Yet… you haven't become my student YET."

She let out a scoff but followed him as he began to trudge towards the tent she'd pitched on the far end of the clearing, a fire already going. She spotted Hogwarts tending to a fire and saw some fish hanging, ready to be descaled and cooked. "Tryin' ta bribe me with food, are ya Merlin?"

"Will it work?" he asked.

"…maybe," she muttered. "Normally I run out of time ta grab much and have ta make do with fruit…"

"Well, you are getting meat tonight. And some greens. The forest over there has plenty of good wild vegetables for cooking. I am thinking a stew."

"You are evil," she growled but still followed him all the same.

"He is," a voice whispered somewhere to her left and she turned to see though that only Merlin was next to her. "Cruel and wicked. He hides so much from you-"

"Ya hear that too, right?" Helga asked.

"Hear…" Mrlin paused and gave his bag a violent shake. "Shut your mouth now, you vile glob of ectoplasm!" He looked up at Helga and let out a sigh. "Voldemort."

Helga shot him a dark look. "You swore the last time we met you were going to be rid of him. That you were going to see him destroyed once and for all."

"I was," merlin said, sounding far less like the weary traveler he was and more like the impatient children that Helga would sometimes tend to throughout the nearby villages who swore to stop picking at their scabs and getting dirt in them only to come to her with infections in their wounds and tears in their eyes from the hurt.

"But?" Helga asked, stopping and putting her hands on her hips. Merlin merely continued to look forward, refusing to meet her eyes. "Damn you old man, she's gone."

"She isn't gone!" Merlin growled through grit teeth. "She's in there, with him."

"Ya don't know that!" Helga complained.

"I know it."

"Why, because the bastard told you that? He's a liar… haven't you realized that? Didn't ya tell me that yourself when we first met? He lies, he schemes, he will make any claim he can if it means that he gets his way. What is ta say that your lass ain't gone?"

"I know she's in there. A part of him. And I'm going to figure out how to save her…"

"You can't, Merlin," Helga said, grabbing him and forcing him to look down at her. Even though he had nearly a foot on her in that moment Helga was the one that towered over him in that moment. "I git the desire. I lost me mum to the pox… I'd love for someone ta tell me that there was a way to get her back. But there ain't… same with your Nimue. She's gone and clingin' ta that rock…it ain't good for ya."

Merlin let out a sigh. "I know… I know. I am trying but…"

"What… what do the others say?"

"Godric offered to destroy it for me but I couldn't risk it… Voldemort only needs someone that won't heed my warnings to escape and with Godric… he's a good man, I wouldn't have taken him on as my student if he wasn't but-"

"The wee lamb isn't the brightest at times," Helga said with a smile. "Rowana?"

"I… might have had her begin looking into the keystone…"

"She's nearly as bad as Godric!" Helga said, stomping her foot. "She gets so buried in her work that she don't think none about what might happen! Remember when she thought she'd figured out how ta breath underwater and nearly drowned because 'I only needed a few more minutes Helga ta make it work?" I love the lass like she be me sister but…" She took a calming breath. "Salazar?"

"Keeping Rowana from doing something stupid."

"Well, bless Arceus above for that."

"We'd have a better time of that if you were there to help Salazar and me with them."

"Ya mean if'n I was there ta make sure Salazar weren't alone in watchin' over ya three?" Helga challenged before finally continuing forward. "…I have conditions."

"Of course!" Merlin said quickly, hurrying to catch up with her. Ever since he'd met her nearly half a decade ago Merlin had been trying to convince Helga to join with him as his student. He had known at once that not only could he help her… but she would help him in all he wanted to do. How he wanted to elevate Avalon, to make it far grander than it had ever been. To take what Voldemort had done, abusing the relationships between humans and Pokemon, and repair all the damage. To make the bonds between mankind and Pokemon well once more.

But Helga, unlike the others, had been stubborn. Godric had instantly agreed to work with Merlin, captivated by the tales of the wanderer… though he had gotten a bit frustrated when he'd learned that Merlin's idea was a school and not a traveling band of adventurers fucking every tavern maid they could find. Salazar had been next, sharing in Merlin's vision of a school to teach people how to be proper partners with Poekmon. He had lost much of his family… not to Voldemort but to famine and disease brought on because of improper management of the lands. He knew that if only those in charge of his village had actually understood how to live with the Pokemon that made their homes within the forests around their village rather than declaring war upon them… they would have survived. Merlin's dream meant that no child would have to suffer as he had. Rowana had been a touch more difficult but in the end her desire for knowledge had outweighed her hatred of change and she had finally agreed to join him on the island where he had worked to build his school.

Helga though? Helga had fought him. She had no family but that was out of her choice, not because of tragedy. He didn't know all the details but he knew that Helga and her family had disagreed on many things and in the end she had decided to live alone. Even her name, Hufflepuff, had been chosen by herself, something she boasted of with great pride. Whatever her original name had been she refused to reveal it, choosing instead to use a family name of her own creation. It was… something Merlin himself could understand, though that independence had caused him problems in trying to recruit her to his cause.

"Where is this school? Are you still thinking of doing it on the shores of the Black Lake?"

"I was," Merlin said, "but Salazar discovered caverns on one of the largest islands on the lake. They go deep… under the bedrock of the lake bottom. And yet the stone is very strong. Rowana looked it over and despite her… annoyance at him learning of something before she could-"

"That is putting it mildly, ain't it?" Helga said with a laugh. "That girl… she still bitter even now that I know how to call a Pokemon better than her. Track'em too. Don't matter that she's smarter than me in so many ways… the lass can't handle it if she isn't the best at everything." She shook her head. "So you are makin' your school on the island then?"

"I am," Merlin said. "There is good stone there, fresh water, and the lake itself will provide us protection." He wasn't foolish enough to believe that there wouldn't be problems. Avalon was a place of constant chaos, with this minor lordling with a scrap of land believing himself to be a king that could do anything he wished and his neighbors not taking kindly to such thoughts. "Godric is designing it."

"Godric?" Helga asked, amused.

"He's brash, that one, but he has a good eye for structure. He understands how stones must be laid… it was he who confirmed to us that the island could support a mighty castle even with the caverns hollowing it out like a Combee honeycomb."

Helga nodded at that. "Then my first demand: the other islands are mine."

"Yours?"

"Mine," Helga said. "Godric can design the castle and have towers that pierce the sky. He can make any towns on the main shore if he wishes as well. Salazar will prowl the caverns. Rowana will claim the first room you build and make it her library. And you… well, it will be your island, your school." She stopped and shot him a flinty look. "But the other islands are mine. Forbidden to any save me and mine."

"And just what will you do with those islands?" Merlin asked, curious.

"You wish to teach people how to commune with Pokemon? Then you need Pokemon. Not merely subjugated and trained… but wild Pokemon in natural homes where they might feel safe. Much of the strife that comes from humans and Pokemon interacting is brought about because the Pokemon have been pushed from their original homes by thoughtless villagers that have no idea how to live WITH them. We will teach that… but we must start by giving Pokemon safe places to live."

Merlin reached up and stroked his chin. "Agreed. The islands are yours."

"Second… grow a fucking beard."

"P-Pardon?"

"I'm tired of seeing that mole on your chin," Helga said. "Grow a beard… it will make you look wiser."

Merlin rolled his eyes at that. "Very well. And your last demand?"

"Voldemort dies." Merlin swallowed but Helga shook her head. "I mean it… I want the bastard dead. You can't create a school with him lingering about. Destroy him, Merlin… that is my final demand."

"…very well," he said, striking an accord.

He broke that promise even as he accepted the compact.