Ted sighed in good nature. "My, you're tenacious. I suppose I had better appease your curiosity, if only to regain your much-needed focus for the trials ahead.

Merlin's a legendary wizard where I'm from. Dead, of course, for almost a millennium. Born from an incubus, a most unfortunate siring. Hence his connection with the supernatural. I imagine he's under a different set of rules." And thus, Ted's reluctance to get into the nitty-gritty. He'd relent easily enough to some prying, but no way Jose is he going to explain what an incubus is.

"Which brings us to its verboten nature. Indeed, the main reason I cannot, should not, must not use it is simply because I was instructed not to, by one whom it behooves me to obey. There are reasons, naturally. Preventatives against an array of darkness probably too dark for polite conversation. But the obedience comes first; that's the important thing. Will that do?"