The race was over before anybody even noticed what had happened. Hagatha winning by a nose, but it didn’t take long for The Cacklers to figure out they were one short. Particularly not when they spotted Errol and the rest practically turning the place upside down looking for her.

Of course that all came to nought, so they decided to try following her trail, which led to the realisation that the trail lead into a wall. The only positive side of this was there was no Princess shaped smear on the wall, which meant she hadn’t hit it. But they still had an issue, even if she wasn’t dead Princess Rosalind Von Harmsworth was missing, AGAIN.

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Charles and Bradley were pissed off, not only had they not won the race, people were ignoring them. All over the little pauper in the white robes. Did they not know who Charles even was?

The witches she was travelling with were searching desperately for her, and now somehow even the guards were involved in the search. That made absolutely no sense, she had signed the disclaimer and taken the risks just like he had. Yet if he had gone missing they wouldn’t have formed a search party. (His lackeys may have conducted a different kind of party had that happened, though they would never tell him that of course.) So just what on earth was going on? Could it be that she was some kind of noble travelling incognito? No no, of course not what kind of noble flies around on a broomstick?

Still something was going on and Charles was going to get to the bottom of it no matter what it took.

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Sir Leeroy had called in several sniffer dogs, and figured out which wall was the barrier to The Princesses location, then that done and in the absence of a plan a he resorted to plan B. B in this case meaning battering ram, there was no door to where The Princess was then he would bloody well make one. Taking a good run up he charged the wall, only to have another move and trip him up. The end result sounded rather like a brass band falling off a cliff, (but with less complaining from the conductor about the coronets still missing the bloody beat. It always happens, it is an absolute rule.)

Of course that didn’t deter him for long, and he headed out towards the knights academy, there was bound to be some breaching equipment in there somewhere, because was he hell failing his duty because of a bloody wall.

Three hours later.

Sir Leeroy was still slamming a ram against every wall in his path, (and there were many, many, many walls.) Around them a fairly sizeable crowd had gathered, most of whom were placing bets on how long it would be before he gave up, before the next wall gave, and if he would go completely doolally. (In case you were interested in the answers by the way, they were 1. NEVER, 2. about ten minutes and a few swear words, and 3. about the same time he became a guard for The Princess, that girl would drive anybody up the wall, even if said somebody was attempting to go through it.

Hestia, Hagatha, Wormy, Song, Errol, and Elvira had all taken turns having a crack at it too. They’d even brought in the big ballistas, by pointing Alba at the wall and setting them loose, much to the horror, and eventually amusement of the assembled audience. (Of course Alba had no idea what was going on, or why they were being asked to beat up a wall. But they were always more than happy to wreck something under any excuse they could find.) But it is so hard to successfully fight back when architecture goes bad (as any poor sod in any civic planning department in the multiverse will be happy to tell you, at length, in painstaking detail. Whether you asked or not.) So as soon as they took down a wall a new one would form, rebuilt, better, stronger. They had that technology.

Eventually, at about the time when everybody had sat down to catch their breath they noticed something strange. The walls, they were changing. Bricks were protruding with a message, which was very short and to the point.

“SOD OFF” it said.

“We can’t do that, you have The Princess, we can’t leave her to die in here.”

“SHE WON’T.”

“What do you mean she won’t?” Sputtered Sir Leeroy, “you don’t exactly have a reputation as a deathtrap for being nice to your guests, is she unharmed.”

“YES AND SHE WILL STAY THAT WAY, JUST HAD QUESTIONS FOR HER.”

“You had questions for her? What kind o0f questions?”

“NOTHING MUCH JUST NUNYA”

“Nunya?” Sir Leeroy asked, while in the background Elvira snickered. She could see where this was going.

“NUNYA BLOODY BUSINESS, NOW CAN YOU READ? I SAID SOD OFF.”

Sir Leeroy was pissed off, and he was not finding it enjoyable being stonewalled by literal stone walls. “OK listen here, we need to know she will stay safe, if we can’t be sure of that then we will continue trying to break in forever if that is what it takes. So do we have a promise that she will be unharmed?”

“OK OK GOOD GODS, DID YOU SIT ON A SPEAR DURING TRAINING OR SOMETHING BECAUSE YOU REALLY HAVE A STICK UP YOUR” It seemed that took up the last of the space on the wall. The Maze then erased it to make room for more text if needed.

“So when will The Princess be returned? We do need her back unharmed, that includes not having any extra appendages. Mysterious powers or the like, the last thing that girl needs is more complication.”

“WOW IT IS REALLY STUCK UP THERE ISN’T IT? I PROMISE SHE WILL BE RETURNED INTACT WITH NO UNEXPECTED ADDITIONS BEFORE MORNING.”

That seemed to satisfy Sir Leeroy, who settled down to wait for her return.

Elvira gently nudged the wall, and whispered. “You know if you used lower case sometimes you’d have room for more words”

“AND WHERE WOULD BE THE FUN IN THAT?” The Maze replied.