Rating: Probably PG-13. There are some adult concepts in this story.
Violence: Not in this one.
Sex: Nope, although a little bird-and bees kinda talk. A few naked girls, but because of the camera angle, you don't see much. :-)

Author's Notes: This is story number two in the series, the first being "The Gift That Keeps On Giving."

I wander even farther away from canon in this one than I did the last. This universe is pretty much taking off under its own power now. My ideas of magic are a mix of Terry Pratchett and the stuff I needed to have happen in order to make the story work. The stuff about the Druids is similar - some actual Druidic History mixed with things that made it fit here.

Thanks again to Rebecca Littlehales, who helped me make it better by pointing out mistakes, inconsistencies and things that needed further elaboration. Thanks also to my pre-readers, a marvelous cheering section any author would appreciate. I hope you all like this series, since I'm having a great time with it!

"Joxer! JOXER!" Xena's voice broke through the hazy fog of Joxer's half-finished dream. "Wake up!"

"Mmmmffp," he responded groggily. He remembered them being attacked, a huge army of nearly invincible foes coming after the three friends in waves. Xena and Gabby were helpless, and Joxer the Mighty Wizard had saved the day.

"Joxer, you've been dreaming. Wake up!"

He shook himself. Memories came back. He had been upset with his powers. Ever since a dying wizard had given him the gift of magic, Xena had been helping him learn to use his new abilities. Day before yesterday, in an effort to change a rock into a rabbit, he had instead produced something that resembled nothing so much as a turtle with huge ears. In a fit of anger, he declared that he'd quit. He wasn't going to be a wizard anymore. He had done no magic since.

Or so he thought. "Look what you've done. For the god's sakes, WAKE UP!" The panic in Xena's voice was unusual.

His eyes flew open and he sat up quickly. The stand of trees that he had seen earlier to the side of the camp was now a clearing, filled with scattered piles of smoldering ashes and several lumps of slag that might have been rocks previously. Huge burned ruts raked the ground. He had seen the remains of razed villages that looked less catastrophic. Guilt suffused his features. "I did that?" His voice died away to a whisper.

Xena had regained some of her composure, and gave a half smile. "And Gabrielle slept right through it. It's a good thing you were facing away from us, though."

The young man groaned, dropping back to his pelt. "Oh, gods, Xena, I could have killed somebody. I could have killed you. Or Gabby."

She patted him reassuringly. "But you didn't. Go back to sleep. We'll talk about it in the morning." The Warrior Princess crawled back to her own bedroll on the other side of the fire beside the still somnolent bard. Soon her breathing was deep and even. Joxer didn't sleep much more that night.

The young man was silent during breakfast, and wandered away soon thereafter. Xena found him in the woods, his staff having followed him. The Warrior Princess still hadn't decided what to make of the staff. Joxer treated it like a pet, Gabrielle like a demon, and the staff itself seemed to be mildly amused by both. It also seemed to have developed a crush on the Amazon's staff, not realizing perhaps that it was not equally equipped. Joxer would leave his stick by his belongings, and come back and find it beside Gabrielle's things almost every day, usually in close proximity to her defensive weapon. Xena wondered if it thought the other staff was simply as blind to its feelings as the Amazon was to the wizard's.

Joxer was pacing, obviously distraught about the damage he had caused in his sleep. Xena couldn't make out the words, but he was apparently talking it out to his staff, which indeed listened well. She almost hated to stop him since he needed to vent the troubling emotions.

"Joxer?"

He whirled around at the sound of her voice, his panic clearly written on his face. "Xena!" he breathed with relief. The torrent of words came pouring out, almost too quickly to follow. "You can help me figure out what to do. I'm willing to stop sleeping, but I'm not sure how long I can keep that up without using my magic, and not using the magic is the whole point, right? Maybe you could tie me up each night, and gag me so I can't do any spells. But I don't know if I really need my hands and mouth to make stuff happen. Maybe there are some herbs you can give me so I won't dream, or..."

"Joxer," Xena interrupted. She knew he was just getting started. "I think you need to start using your magic again, and this won't happen."

His face hardened. "No." She gave him a doubtful look. "I will never be a real wizard, and I don't want to screw up anymore, so no."

The Warrior Princess sat down and patted the log beside her. He was still pacing, and it was starting to make her dizzy. "Sit," she commanded.

Once he settled in she tried to explain. "Joxer, you probably noticed your body is changing. Gabrielle mentioned that you have a temper now she never noticed before. You seem to be eating a lot more these days, but you aren't gaining any weight. I think the problem last night has something to do with all that." His puzzled gaze implored her to go on. "I think it's a little like when you went through adolescence. Your voice changed, your appetite changed, and, uh, mmm. other things happened as well." She looked at him hopefully, not really wanting to spell out the details of what she suspected. But her subtlety was lost on the young wizard, and she sighed. "Joxer, when you became a teenager, you probably started thinking about sex. And with all that built up desire and no outlet, sometimes your body took care of things for you, at night, right?" Xena was blushing, not a common occurrence for her, and looking everywhere except at the man beside her.

"Oh, I know all about having desires but no outlet," Joxer all but growled, gazing unconsciously towards the campsite as if he could see the bard standing there. Suddenly, the meaning of what he had just heard hit him like a ton of boulders. "You mean I'm having a magical wet dream?" He gulped and looked at Xena, realizing what he had just blurted out, then looked away in relief when he saw she was as uncomfortable with the subject as he now was. He shook it off and steeled himself with determination. "I can't accept that. I'll stay awake tonight, and tomorrow we'll figure out a way to control this without my having to do magic. I'll stay a distance from your camp tonight, so I won't be any danger to you guys if I do fall asleep. But I refuse to be a wizard anymore."

The day passed uneventfully. They were heading vaguely towards the coast because Xena just felt they should, and they made a good distance's travel during daylight. Gabrielle questioned both Joxer and Xena about the changes to their previous campsite, but neither one would even look her in the eye, let alone answer her. In fact, neither seemed much in the mood for conversation. The bard settled into an almost jealous pout, which neither of the others noticed. That fact deepened it. When dusk set in, camp was made, and true to his word, Joxer set up a long ways from the women. This Gabrielle didn't bother to question, since her companions were obviously not talking to her today.

The young man spread his pelts on the ground in an isolated clearing far enough away from his friends to keep them safe. He made a small fire and sat and thought about his problem and the possible solutions. He knew he could stay awake for one night, but that was a short-term fix. Maybe if they found a hypnotist in the next town. He'd heard stories of how they could manipulate a person's mind to make them do whatever they were told. That was an idea he could share with Xena tomorrow. Xena. Yeah, sure, magic is like sex. You forget, Xena, even if I do it poorly, at least magic is currently a part of my life. But that was not a fruitful path of thought to travel. He'd decided after his last visit to Meg that doing that sullied somehow the love he felt for Gabrielle, and he wouldn't do it anymore. So maybe Xena's comparison wasn't so far off, after all. There were some parallels.

"Joxer, I need you," the sexy feminine voice cooed in his ear. "Let me help you with that shirt." He felt fastenings being undone, and he smiled widely. Then he opened his eyes, and realized that he had been asleep, and those really were Gabrielle's hands all over his now exposed chest.

"Gabby, stop!"

The bard pouted. "You don't want me Joxer?"

"NO! I mean, yes, but not like this. You're, uh, oh, damn! The dreams. Xena had to bring up sex today."

"Xena brought up sex? With you? I thought she was my friend. Taking my man like that."

"No, Gabby. Stop it. Not that way, not her and ... no, NO. I need to change you back. Let me think." He concentrated the best he could while slapping her hands away from the laces of his trousers. Finally, he articulated a spell that got her to go back to her own bedroll, go to sleep, and hopefully forget all about what had just happened. Joxer didn't sleep again that night, either.

When Joxer failed to show up for breakfast, Xena went looking for him. She found him in the same, much larger clearing surrounded by rocks of various shapes and sizes, and more than a few stunned-looking small creatures of indeterminate species. She sniggered. "Did you decide I was right?"

Her smile fell away when she saw the strained and exhausted face that looked back at her. "Xena," he pleaded in a voice heavy with fatigue, "is there somewhere I can go where people can teach me what I'm supposed to be doing? I mean, really? People who've done it themselves?"

She made a lightning quick decision. "We'll find the first ship to Britannia as soon as we reach the coast, Joxer. Right now you need to sleep."

He stared at her blankly, too tired to argue. She gathered his pelt and took him by the hand, bringing him back to the campsite where Gabrielle was cleaning up after the meal. Tucked in by the Warrior Princess, the budding wizard slept straight through to the next morning.

Hands on him, a beloved voice. "Joxer, wake up." No panic in the voice, and no seduction in the hands. "You've been asleep for a whole day and night, now wake up!" Irritation. Things must have been normal last night. He opened his eyes.

"All day and all night?"

Gabrielle nodded. "Xena found you in the woods surrounded by stuff you must have conjured or something, half-dead from exhaustion. She brought you back here. That was early yesterday."

"That long and all I did was sleep? Nothing, uh, weird happened?"

"I sorta thought you sleeping for all that time was weird, but outside of that? No."

He pushed up to a sitting position, noticing the Warrior Princess emerging from the woods behind the bard. "Xena, I guess you were right. About the," he waved his hands, "outlet thing. It worked."

She nodded grimly. "And you were right - you need someone who knows more about what's going on than I do to train you. We'll go to Britannia and find the wizard I used to know. He'll know what to do with you."

The bard stood up. "Why do I have the feeling there's half this discussion I've missed somewhere?"

Xena lifted an eyebrow at her best friend. "Because there is?" she responded teasingly.

Gabrielle lifted her eyebrow back. "Gonna tell me?"

"NO!" answered male and female voices together, Joxer's far more panicked than Xena's. The bard sighed. She hated this feeling that they had secrets from her. For some reason this thought unearthed a memory of a half-forgotten dream involving her, Xena, Joxer, jealousy, and - no, she was sure she'd forgotten that dream; she *needed* to forget that dream. Gabrielle shook her head to clear it.

Gabrielle threw a glance over her shoulder at the warrior wizard, who was far enough behind he couldn't hear her. They had been traveling for the better part of the morning, and most of the time he had been right beside them. She glared at her best friend. "Britannia? You do realize that requires we take a ship? Unless of course you think his magic is strong enough to get all three of us there by itself?"

Xena gazed down from Argo's back. "I hate to think of where we might end up if he tried to get us there with magic just now." She turned her eyes back towards the young man. He had conjured up three beanbags and was juggling them, the staff propelling itself dutifully beside him. "He doesn't have that kind of control yet. But his potential is great - don't get me wrong. Someday he may be capable of that."

"But Xena, power of that magnitude rivals that of the gods!"

"Perhaps it does. Before Eire invaded the country, the gods in Britannia were never a very big deal partly due to the wizards and witches and their power. The incursion of the Celts just reinforced this. Druidism is simply a religion that was started by the mages long ago. Some have even speculated that our gods were the parents of the mages, who started out as demi-gods but interbred enough to dilute the bloodline, and that Dagda, father of the Druidic gods, and Zeus are actually one and the same. And of course, there is Math ap Mathonwy, who, although recognized as a Celtic god, is really just the ultimate wizard."

"So, in a way, Joxer is a god now?" Gabrielle was as troubled by this idea now as she had been when it had first occurred to her.

"Yes, and no. He could have powers to rival those of the gods, if properly trained. However, he will never be immortal, although he could live into his hundreds - several hundreds. A lot depends on the strength of the wizard that gifted him. I have a feeling he was very strong, and that's why it's so important that Joxer's training be properly conducted."

"So we have to," the bard forced out the word, "sail to Britannia to help him." A beanbag flew forward from a poorly aimed toss, and the new wizard chased after it, just managing not to plow down the bard in his haste. "You are so lucky I like you," she snarled at him, leaving him nodding in agreement, although he didn't know why.

Gabrielle stewed while Xena negotiated their place on the vessel to Britannia. "I hate sailing, makes me sick," she mumbled over and over.

Xena and Joxer approached. "I can take care of that, you know, Gabrielle," Xena said, interrupting the bard's miserable litany.

The younger woman's eyes grew wide with fright. "And have me eating all kinds of crap in the meantime? I don't know which is worse!"

"What's the problem?" Joxer queried.

"You've never sailed with us before, have you? She gets deathly ill," Xena explained.

"When we took the boat to Sysiphus' Island she was fine, but I guess she really wasn't herself then, either, was she?"

Xena smiled sardonically. "None of us were. Plus, that was a much smaller boat, and a shorter trip."

"Excuse me," the unhappy bard broke in, "but I'm still here. Anyone want to acknowledge that? Besides," she said, in morbid tones, "They want us to get on the boat."

Joxer walked behind the bard up the gangplank, deep in thought. Just before they boarded, he reached ahead and touched her, mumbling in that strange language he still occasionally used. Gabrielle spun on her heel, hand poised to smack him, but drew back when she noticed the staff appeared to be watching her. "What did you do to me?" she asked the wizard, irritation inher voice.

"Nothing," he said innocently.

"I felt something when you touched me."

He frowned. "Yeah, you felt me touch you. Go on - we can't stand here all day."

She glared at him once more for good measure, then stormed the rest of the way up to the ship to join Xena. The wizard grinned, staff in hand, humming as he followed her aboard.

The water had been calm, and the winds had been brisk. They were nearly to the tip of Italia before Gabrielle realized she hadn't felt the slightest bit seasick. That was when the storm started.

Conclusion >>>