The Magical Tingle

As they descended the steps down to the level they had cleared to enable them to step over to the rooftop's gazebo Maelyn informed Anton, "Just so we're clear, the way this works is you're gonna need to remain on the basalt at least at first while I'm evaluating the scene and making sure we're not going to disturb any evidence. Once I record the surroundings I will wave you over. At that point I will examine the body. But, like when I'm recording everything with the gazebo area and in each new room we enter, you're gonna have to keep back to insure you don't contaminate the scene. We clear on this?"

"yes. I understand and agree." Anton replied, "I would hate for my curiosity to ruin a major discovery now that we have access to such an important place!"

"I'm glad you understand this!" Maelyn gladly returned, "It's been like fighting with a brick wall trying to get that through Harmon's head!"

"I will make sure he follows your protocol." Anton promised, 'And I will make sure that he waits until you clear the room before he nears anything in the room."

"THAT will help a LOT!" Maelyn exclaimed in aggravation, "Cause your impatient son wants us to go straight to the throne room so he can lay hands on that crystal dragon thing! I even had to get one of my students to teach Joseph how to clear the blocks you saw them carrying up instead of us having to chip away smaller pieces so that they can clear that front gate and dig a tunnel to the entrance so he can get to that throne room without waiting for us to go through every room floor by floor before we get to that throne room! And that's not mentioning how hard it was for me to get it through his thick skull that he couldn't touch that crystal dragon until we had examined it and checked it for any past fingerprints, any DNA, chemical residue maybe left on it, and the whole nine yards!"

"I will make SURE he keeps control of himself!" Anton assured her, "In fact, if you DO get that tunnel complete, or when you get down to the main floor, please let me know and I will be the one observing as you enter the throne room. After all, as Prime Minister, the thing that signifies when a king has been chosen and when that king approves or disagrees with something should be handled by the one who has been in charge of the kingdom while we haven't been able to anoint a new king."

"So you're ok with Allison clearing the front gates and helping to dig that tunnel to the front door?" Maelyn asked to make sure, "Because Second Minister but Prime Pain Harmon has been adamant about her not being able to see the palace and having to stop when they got within a foot of the roof and is only allowed to SHOW Joseph how to clear the gates!"

"Unfortunately I have to partially agree with him." Anton answered, "She'll need to stay at least three feet from the palace when they get close to the steps leading to the front door. But I will allow her to help your helper Joseph to clear that tunnel."

"well thank you for that at least!" Maelyn replied then told him as they got to the bottom of the steps, "Alright now it's showtime! Remember not to step over until after I have recorded the scene!"

Looking down and seeing how thin the edge of the basalt was, Anton nervously asked, "Will this rock hold me up? I don't want to cause it to collapse on the roof and I end up getting hurt!"

"Don't worry about that." Maelyn reassured him as she started scanning the area more closely, "An inch of basalt is strong enough to hold up with all three of us standing on it. So unless you've got enough gold stashed away in your pockets to weight over five hundred pounds you're good."

"Unlike my greedy son, I keep my gold in a secure vault. But thank you for letting me know I don't have to worry about falling or damaging the palace." Anton responded then asked, "I see that this ...basalt... has a gap between it and the roof. Is it SUPPOSED to be that way? Did it shrink when it hardened or something?"

"It doesn't condense when it solidifies." Maelyn educated him, 'And, somehow, those scale things on that roof either expanded in the heat to repel the lava, or had some type of property that repelled the lava because it has imprinted the same pattern that we've seen in hollow areas of other sites we've encountered. The only difference between this roof and those other areas is this roof has those scales on it that match the patter but the other hollow areas do not."

"That's because the roof has old dragon scales that had been shed but the hollow areas were probably where the people were dragons while the lava was piling up and transformed back into their human bodies when they passed away." Anton confidently informed her, "I thought you would have known that being descended from the servants of the Queen and with all of the legends Kathy Tamm and Abjul have shared with you!"

"Sorry but I follow where the science leads." Maelyn told him, "And I'm not going to believe in these mythological dragons that there is NO fossils of until I see the proof of one!"

"Well, maybe you will find your proof while uncovering all of this lava rock from the palace of the kingdom that was ruled by dragons!" Anton suggested with a smile.

With her being done with scanning all of the pillars and the ceiling of the gazebo, Maelyn replied to his suggestion, "Well Abjul and even Harmon and Kathy have told me that this body here is the body of Queen Ielania and my eyes might be messing up on me, but I don't see a dragon body lying here. She looks fully human to me!"

"I believe you will discover more than your science can explain!" Anton confided, "And when you do I will GLADLY explain it to you!"

"We'll see." Maelyn muttered then asked, "Most of my work on this body is going to be over here on the front where she is facing. So if you want to be able to see better what I am doing you can step over here behind me. The floor remains strong enough to hold us and I didn't see anything other than traces of ash on it."

Hesitantly Anton stepped over and asked as he made his way over behind her, "What all are you going to be doing? I thought you would just need to identify her and catalogue what she has on her,"

"I have to do that part, but I also have to take a DNA sample along with examine to make sure she died of the lava filling up the whole cube and causing her to suffocate from a lack of oxygen or something like that." Maelyn informed him then, noticing some blood, told him as she examined the area more closely, "Like how she was stabbed! I've got blood here right next to where her heart should be so she might have been murdered as the lava was coming down the mountain!"

"What?!" Anton exclaimed, "We've never heard of something like that! And we've even had stories from all of those that were at the castle and survived! None of them said anything about this!"

"I'd like to read them then if possible!" Maelyn asserted, "Because many times they might HAVE told folks about it, but described what they saw in ways that weren't clear because of all of the other chaos and trauma they went through that day."

"I will direct Bree to make them available." Anton agreed then cautioned her, "But don't expect to find out more than what we have already told you. Cause we have already been spending the last five hundred years scouring every word for every clue to what happened."

"I'll keep that in mind." Maelyn replied then described, "And looks like as far as jewelry she has the crown on obviously, but she also has an Onyx dragon talisman that must be a necklace but she's holding it gripped in her hand! And I'm kinda surprised to not see any rings or bracelets on her hand! Every member of royalty I've examined at other digs or have met in person while alive have had at least one or two rings or bracelets!"

"That is probably because wearing her talisman as a necklace was the only jewelry she had on when the lava started to flow down the mountain to engulf the palace!" Anton helpfully suggested, "Or maybe it was stolen when she had gotten stabbed?"

"If so, then why would they leave the necklace?" Maelyn asked as she checked her hands for any signs of having worn jewelry before her death, "Cause if these dragon talismans were as popular back then as they are in this kingdom right now, they could have sold it for a good bit since it's pure crystal onyx of solid black instead of looking like usual onyx and have streaks running through it!"

"I don't know." Anton shared, "I'm not sure, but I think back then only royalty were allowed to wear the talismans because I think it was a symbol of their royal status or something."

"Well, either way, I'm gonna have to borrow it for a bit." Maelyn told him as she carefully slipped the necklace from between her fingers so she could then slowly lift the talisman out of her fist without damaging her fingers or hand. After freeing it and placing it in her gloved hand to examine with her handheld microscope, she then gasped and shared, "I'm definitely gonna have to do a FULL energy scan of this thing! It's been screwing with our scanners and now it's giving me a tingly feeling even through this glove!"

"Are you sure you're not feeling the MAGICAL energy?" Anton teased as he leaned over her to also get a closer view.