Rod and Modwis leaped to catch up.
Lady Aggravate gave a howl of indignation, and her guardsmen closed ranks with a shout—or tried to. Beaubras slammed into them like a tank with a sword in place of its cannon, all but sending up a bow wave as he plowed through their ranks.
"Where to, O valiant and noble one?" Rod puffed, blocking a halberd and cutting off its head with the riposte.
"To the tower," Beaubras called back. "My Lady Haughteur would seek the highest chamber.''
"So would everyone else here." But Rod couldn't say it loudly enough to be heard; he was too busy blocking chops and thrusts, and occasionally finding time to wonder why none of the guards was receiving so much as a scratch. A spear point jabbed at him; he struck it up, caught the guard by the front of his doublet, and tossed him back overhead (he was amazingly light). The guard sailed by with his mouth forming a perfect "O," and Rod stabbed up as he went by, experimentally—but the guardsman rose up just enough to miss the point of Rod's sword. He brought it down in time to chop off a halberd head and, on the riposte, to thrust full into the halberdier's midriff—but the man started to turn back, and the sword tip slid past his tunic without the slightest tear. Rod recovered and called out, "How come I can't stab any of these guys?" Not that he really wanted to, but it was frustrating.
" Tis because they dwell in High Dudgeon, and are therefore not of a piece with the world," Modwis huffed.
There was no time to figure out what he meant, because Beaubras smashed through a door at that point (quicker than Modwis's technique, but not advisable for sneak attacks) and charged for the stair. Strangely, they seemed to be going down, not up. Rod and Modwis followed, backing down step by step, fending off thrusts and chops. At least the guardsmen couldn't quite hit Rod and Modwis, either. One missed his footing and fell, shooting upward, with an echoing wail. There was a crash from the landing above, echoed by a low and growing moan from the guardsmen. They lowered their weapons and stopped their advance.
"Can we trust them?"
"Aye," Modwis said with grim certainty. "They have failed in their purpose. They have no need to attack now."
"Well, we're still taking a chance—so, when I say 'Run,' we'll both barrel up the stairs. Okay?"
"As thou sayest," the dwarf grunted. "Save that our 'up' hath become 'down.' "
"Down we go, then. Okay—run!"
They turned tail and shot down the stairs like rockets, but the guardsmen made no move to follow.
Rod managed to catch the doorjamb and swing into the room not too many steps behind Modwis, and saw a spectacle of breathtaking beauty and sadness. Beaubras knelt, head bowed, before a lady who stood by the win-dow, clad in a gown of shimmering iridescence—with a collar that rose up in points, along her cheeks to her eyes.
"It's a gown of her own tears," Rod gasped.
"And a sorrow her own making," Modwis explained.
"My lady," Beaubras murmured, "wherefore dost thou weep?"
"Oh, I weep with humiliation, Sir Beaubras! For all here do delight in belittling me!"
"The churls! How dare they!"
"They cry that they are affronted by my effrontery in coming hither," the lady explained, "and do therefore treat me with contempt and condescension. This chamber is of a piece with it—they pretend to exalt me, yet truly place me beneath them. Oh, how grievous is mine error! And how miserable my penance!"
"They who seek to dwell in High Dudgeon must needs beware of finding their places," intoned a gravelly voice, and they turned to see Lady Aggravate in the chamber door.
"Thou shalt rue the day thou didst thus to my Lady Haughteur!" Beaubras cried, springing to his feet.
Lady Aggravate laughed, a harsh and unpleasant bark, but Beaubras's lady moaned, "Oh, call me 'Lady Haughteur' no longer, but rather 'Lady Bountiful'—for surely never again will I think myself above my fellow mortals, nor deny aught that Charity may require!"
Beaubras turned, a delighted smile on his face, but Lady Aggravate screeched as though she'd been mortally wounded. "How durst thou speak so within my keep! Out, out and away! Be gone from High Dudgeon!"
"Thou shalt not so address my lady!" Beaubras bellowed, turning on Lady Aggravate; but she only grinned wickedly, malice and delight competing in her gaze. The knight flushed and stepped toward her, balling one iron fist, but Modwis caught it, crying, "Nay, good knight!
Dost not see? She hath near to caught thee, too, in her net of wiles! For surely, thou dost approach her in High Dudgeon!"
Sir Beaubras blanched, but Rod heard a different voice in his ears. "Rod! I have detected a disturbance! Come down from that cliff immediately, for your own safety's sake!"
"What kind of a disturbance?" Rod muttered, though his nerves screamed panic. "A mob? An upheaval in public opinion?"
"No, on the Richter scale! Come out, quickly!"
"Out!" Rod shouted. He grabbed Lady Bountiful's arm in one hand and Sir Beaubras's in the other. "Up the stairs and out the door, wherever we can find it—and now!"
"Wouldst thou have me run from conflict?" Sir Beaubras protested.
"No. You can walk. Besides, there won't be any conflict if you go fast enough."
He had the right idea, for once—Lady Aggravate saw them coming and dodged aside with an outraged squawk, and the guardsmen were no longer in any mood to argue. They broke before the knight's charge, and the courtiers scattered before them.
"Which way out?" Rod panted.
"Through the Great Hall, then the antechamber!" Lady Bountiful answered. "Yet wherefore must we flee in such haste?"
"You want to stick around?"
Modwis was cranking up the portcullis by the time they got to it. Beaubras lent his weight, and Rod blocked off the porter. "Six feet is enough!"
Modwis locked the winch, and they stormed out. The porter leaped back to his job, and the portcullis clashed down behind them. Rod didn't slow, though—he led the way across the causeway at a pace that he hoped wouldn't tire a knight in full armor. But when he glanced back over his shoulder, he saw he was worrying about nothing— Beaubras was right behind him, Lady Bountiful in his arms. Finally, they reached the far side and the foothills, but Rod called, "Not yet! Keep going! A hundred yards from the causeway, at least!"
"But wherefore do we flee?" Beaubras panted.
"Just a hunch." Rod finally slewed to a halt and dropped down on the grass. "We should be safe here…"
You should, with a hundred feet to spare, Fess assured him.
"Yet whence cometh this premonition of thine?" Lady Bountiful sank down to sit beside him.
"You wouldn't want to know," Rod muttered.
"I assure thee, I would." Beaubras stood over him, frowning. "To leave without chastising that vile dame was galling, and to accept her slights thus was woefully less than honorable. Wherefore have I fled, Lord Gallowglass?"
"Because somehow, all of a sudden, I knew this castle didn't have long to stand. Look at the cleft in the cliff!"
They turned back to look, just as the earth began to tremble, and the cleft beneath the castle began to vibrate along its edges. The vibration grew greater and greater, till the whole cleft was in turmoil, tossing and heaving the castle at its top like a load of potatoes on a lumpy road. The rumbling reached them, then the wholesale roar as the cliff abruptly split asunder, and the whole keep of High Dudgeon came thundering down into a heap of rubble.
They stood staring, appalled, as the earth stilled beneath them and the thundering died away.
Then Beaubras said softly, "Gentlemen, uncover," and removed his helmet.