Ravish Me, Oh Great Wizard King!!!

There was no time to wonder why Horatio Zaravan did not try to levitate and stop himself from falling at that great height.  They had to reach Zander as quickly as possible.

Up two more flights of stairs and they reached a set of doors.  This was the inner sanctum.

"He's in here."  Erick muttered under his breath. 

Cobalt Osiris nodded and with one kick, had broken the double doors into several large splintered pieces.

Beyond the door was a large chamber.  Hanging silk drapes in blues and pinks fluttered in the breeze that was blowing in from the large open windows. 

There was an enormous round bed that was occupied by the stunningly beautiful Celeste Zaravan. 

She had ginger red tresses that were several shades lighter than Cobalt Osiris's hair, with skin the color of milk chocolate.  On her brow was a pale gold diadem with yellow topaz embedded into the intricate filigree metal. 

Her amber eyes regarded them with a calm that was unnerving.  It was as if she had been waiting for them. 

Her eyes glanced over to the far side where a sound of water could be heard cascading into a pool. 

It was a fountain of sorts. 

A large round ceramic basin filled with some sort of pale blue liquid was being recirculated up into a central column to splash back into the deep basin. 

Chained to the central column like a living statue was a gaunt and unmoving Zander. He was completely naked and submerged to his chest in that blue liquid. His breathing was shallow and uneven. 

He was barely awake. 

His silver-blue eyes were heavily lidded but he tracked the movements of the group coming in so at least he was still somewhat aware of what was going on.

With one swift move, Cobalt Osiris had jumped onto the bed and had a choke hold on Celeste. She smiled but did not move an inch. 

"Be careful there, cousin," she said with a giggle. Her soft red lips pouted in an alluring manner. "Don't do anything to hurt the baby."

Baby? 

For the first time, they noticed that she was wearing a white sheath over a very pregnant belly.

"Yes," She giggled again. "It's Zander's baby I'm carrying, so don't hurt me or he will be very upset with you."

Erick frowned. Something was badly wrong here. 

"Get Zander out of the water," Erick indicated with his head.

"Don't touch him! He can't leave the water or he will die." Celeste cried out. 

Erick moved towards the water. Reaching out with his hands he did a quick auratic scan of the water and Zander. 

The water was not magically charged. It was simply colored water that had been dyed to match the blues of Zander's hair and eyes.

With quick movements, he took off the top layer of his robe and covered Zander with it. With the help of the dwarves and Theo, they broke the chains off his arms and legs. 

"What have you done to my cousin you evil hag!" He growled jumping up. 

"I didn't do anything. He wouldn't come to me gently so Father had to subdue him."  She smiled. "Father doesn't like him because he is the son of the man who stole the woman Father loves the most."

"What the hell did you do to him!"

"I saved him. Father was going to kill him but I asked Father to leave him alive for me. 

She smiled.  Her happiness was shining like a crazy light in her sparkling amber eyes.  "Zander doesn't have any powers left.  Father drained him down to flat-line. He's disabled now.  But at least he's still alive." 

Celeste laughed. "King Zaravan is dead.  He was hurting Zander, and so I killed him.  And because Zander tried to run away, I chained him to the fountain so he wouldn't leave."

Cobalt Osiris's eyes grew hard.  This girl was a stark raving lunatic. 

He raised a hand and aimed it towards Celeste Zaravan's head. 

As he brought down his hand, Erick stopped him. 

"Wait Cobalt. If that child inside her is actually Zander's, we can't hurt her right now. Let's take both of them back and we can figure out what to do afterwards."

Cobalt Osiris thought for a moment and then nodded.  If need be, he could always kill her later and be done with it.  The crime of harming a King of the Northern Realm could only end in death. 

There was no alternative.

As the men secured Celeste Zaravan to be ported back to Celadon, Erick tapped Cobalt Osiris. 

"Now that King Horatio Zaravan is dead, it looks like you're going to be the new king of Topaz."

Cobalt Osiris grimaced.  "This is the worst time to be thinking about something like this."

Erick patted him on the shoulder.  "War is coming.  Take yourself and your family to safety.  Port to my palace in Jade until the war is under control.  After this is over, Topaz needs a healthy king to come back and rebuild the place."

Cobalt Osiris nodded.  "Thank you my friend."

Erick smiled.  "You would do the same for me."

===== 

From the time the Special Ops group left Celadon on Wednesday night, it had now turned into early Thursday morning. 

They ported through into the Main Hall. An anxiously waiting Mira ran up to meet them. 

"Zander!" She cried and ran towards the man who was being carried by Theo. 

There was a female with them, but Mira did not bother to look.  She could care less who it was.  Her husband was severely damaged physically and mentally. 

There was nothing that was more important than getting him the help he needed. 

The woman tried to say something, but Erick silenced her with a wave of the finger and someone carried her off to another room. 

The bogwarg carried Zander towards the divan and gently laid him down. 

"Oh my God!  Baby, what have they done to you?" Mira cried as she touched his face and his body. 

A quick check showed no bones broken, but there were plenty of contusions everywhere.  Someone knew how to extract the maximum amount of pain for the minimum amount of damage. 

Mira's eyes spilled over, but she kept herself in check.  His silver blue eyes were still tracking her every move even though he was catatonic. 

He was barely conscious. 

She wasn't even sure if he knew who she was.  Whatever he had endured had stretched him almost beyond the breaking point. 

What was more urgent was that he was burning up with fever and he was severely dehydrated.  He needed immediate medical attention. 

Mira turned towards Daran. "I need to get him back to Earth so I can treat him. He is in desperate need of medicines and treatments.  Please help me!"

Daran nodded. He knew what Mira could do medically, with her alchemy magik on Earth. 

"It is two hours till dawn, Your Majesty. If we port to the bog within the next hour, we can make the next portal opening."

Mira nodded. She ran back over to one of the celadons. "Get me some clothes for King Zander.  And call some healers to come NOW!" 

She pointed to another group of celadons.  "You!  I need a basin of cool water and some wash cloths.  Hurry!"

She turned back to Theo. 

"I need you to come with me to protect the King. Be ready to leave in half an hour." 

He nodded and went off to get ready. 

As Mira sat by Zander's side, wiping his body down with the cool water, she could feel the messy jangled waves rising again, pounding against her temples. 

Without batting an eyelid, she began her usual methodical application of smoothed neural waves of constructive interference.  Within minutes, the jangled waves had calmed back down to smoothed neural waves.

Zander breathed a sigh of relief.

Mira's hands paused.  Why was it affecting him?

"Erick!" 

"Yes sweetheart?" 

"Do you know anything about neural waves that hit randomly and out of the blue, causing painful headaches?" 

"I'm not sure I understand. Can you tell me more about it?"

Mira began describing the painful jangling of neural spikes that she had been experiencing.

Erick asked a few clarifying questions but for the most part, he simply listened to her explaining about how she controlled the headaches by simply expending a bit of energy and concentration.

"Do these crazy spikes of amplitude happen at random times or does it come regularly?" 

Mira thought for a moment.  "It's very random, but it happens quite frequently.  After a while, it began to turn into a kind of mind game.  I got really good at smoothing out the peaks and valleys so that I could do it in my sleep." 

"Does what you do change the displacement of the amplitude?"

"Come again?  Speak in idiot speak, not your High Wizard vocabulary." 

Erick sighed.  "Does what you do change the shape of the wave?"

Mira nodded.  "Of course!  Since I had to add a stronger energy in order to tame the messy jangled waves, the result is always a much stronger wave pattern." 

His jaw dropped when Mira told him that Zander had actually breathed a sigh of relief when she had applied constructive interference to her neural pathways to alleviate the headache pain. 

His eyes narrowed.  "It must have something to do with the necklet he gave you…" but then Erick saw something which made him wince.  "No.  It is the crown."

He pointed to Zander's forehead.  The crown that he and Mira shared had been burned by magik.  It was now fused into his bony skull. 

His skin had healed around it, but there was no way to remove this crown without breaking apart his skull-case.

"Oh my God!"  Mira could not help the tears streaming down her face.  "My poor, poor husband!  I am so very sorry, my darling." 

She reached up and touched his crown.  The sudden zap of energy shocked and startled both of them. 

Zander opened his eyes and for a moment, there was a glimmer of awareness that he was looking at her. 

But just as quickly, the awareness left and once again, his eyes returned to that dreadful vacant look. 

"I don't understand, Erick."

"I understand all too well."  Erick sighed.  "This set of crowns the two of you wear is a relic from thousands of years ago.  It was worn by the very first King and Queen of Ashrya."

"So it's ancient magic?"

Erick shook his head.  "On the contrary, it is very recent magik.  Do you remember who the last people to wear these two crowns were?"

Mira blinked.  "King Leo and Queen Kalara?"

"Yes."  Erick exhaled.  "Uncle Leo had flatlined by the time my aunt became his wife. 

Mira nodded.

"My aunt is a First Class Transmutational mage.  She transmuted these two crowns and infused them with powers so that she could attempt to recharge Uncle Leo's energies."

"But it didn't work."  Mira wiped her tears.

"Only because he had completely flatlined and there was no way to start the magik spark again once it has completely died." 

He turned to her, his eyes sparkling.  "In your case, you've been recharging Zander every time he approached flatline due to what they did to him."

He smiled grimly.

"You saved him!"