The legacy of the dark blood

Chapter 41

The momento of truth

He knew that even without Nick's sudden appearance the monstrous being would not have managed to stand up, something he himself had admitted. This was enough to infer that the officer wasn't coming to their aid, less so after he pointed his semi-automatic rifle at them after taking his gaze off the monster's incinerated body. The mere image of the officer was enough for Liz and Bernard to respond by aiming their guns at him as well.

"Does it look all right to you?" asked Nick, exchanging a threatening glance with Liz; Bernard, while keeping his guard up, looked at him seriously "To go chasing people like that, did you really think I hadn't noticed?"

"It's over," Liz threatened him, "It's time for you to pay, you fucking miserable bastard.

In the face of Liz's insults and those of all his companions, Nick never showed any signs of upset, although he did respond with violent acts when given the opportunity.

"That's where you're wrong, you meddling American," Nick challenged her, accentuating his words more and more, "This is just the beginning," the officer looked at them carefully while he lightly touched the trigger of his rifle, likewise, Liz raised her pistol even more trying to point it at his head "Don't be stupid, it would take you longer to pull the trigger than me to leave you both looking like a sieve. Just wait until your case goes to the European courts."

"Oh, shut up," exclaimed Liz, taking one of her hands off the gun and pulling the letter attributed to Nick out of her pocket, "We already know the whole truth, after all, you let us know it yourself."

Liz tossed the letter towards Nick, who, without responding in any way to Liz's accusations, caught it before it fell to the ground. With the letter in his possession, he read it briefly and replied to it.

"Interesting," he said without removing his serious expression and pursing his lips, "do you really think that someone will take this letter as evidence to frame me?" Nick asked, approaching the Americans without letting his guard down "I know about your stupid leader, Rowland told me everything before you came to meddle" he said raising his voice towards the end "You know that fraud is a very serious crime, besides, if I had anything to do with Holzmann, believe me I would not have written it to you in a letter" he said throwing the note to the ground with abruptness "As soon as the alliance between Warren, Rowland and Mr. Allen comes out through the media, I assured you, you two will be dead."

"Enough of this bullshit" Liz challenged him by stepping forward pointing at Nick, refusing to believe that the letter was really a forgery "We... know of your interest in the goblet."

"Of course, supergirl," Nick replied unhappily, "I kind of work for my organization. The Holzmanns are after the relics for something serious and it's our duty to prevent them from doing so, very different from your colleagues, driven by greed, but their thirst for money led them to their doom."

"How interesting," Liz scoffed without giving credit to what the agent was saying, "In your note you mentioned that you were here and that you had Max, and oh surprise, we found you, and we also know about Max. By the way, I took a picture of that letter, so don't even think that shredding it will hide the evidence."

"I'm here as part of the investigation. I communicated with Captain Bunde before I came here and he spoke with Chris before you entered the cemetery, I'm surprised you don't know that" he answered changing his serious expression to a more threatening one "Even so, I think that from now on the affairs of our institution are none of your business".

"You're a fucking liar!" Liz shouted at him "Chris didn't mention anything about it to us. You came here for the relics of the statue. Besides, we saw you a moment ago shooting at the bells to wake up that beast," she sentenced, although as she looked at Bernard for support she remembered that none of them identified the silhouette who shot at the bells, except that he was a member of the German police commando.

"By the way, that ring you have on your right hand is very interesting, where did you get it, or better yet, where did you steal it from?"

Liz looked sideways at her ring, and was surprised to discover its resemblance to the one worn by the duchess, the only difference was the color of the inlaid stone; in her case it was pearl colored and the Holzmann's wife's was sapphire colored. That ring was definitely not Anneliese Holzmann's ring, but it was still a replica in a different color, but what puzzled her the most was to remember that Chris had given it to her as a symbol of friendship and trust, and it reminded her of her fiancée Lena.

"I asked you a question, where did you get that ring?" he asked, raising his voice even more.

"Chris gave it to you," said Bernard, realizing that Liz was not able to verbalize her thoughts.

"How convenient," growled Nick, "Those are the stones the Holzmanns use to summon the beasts to their bloody festivals." After his last word, Liz remembered how the duchess used it to call the palace guard, something similar had been done by the Holzmann executioner in the cemetery, "By the way, I heard the shots and the bells, also your fight for life with the bone breaker; I guess you saw someone in our uniform, but you assumed immediately that it was me. I only came to control the situation, but I see you guys got it first."

"Who else could it be?" Liz asked, shooting Nick a heartbreaking look "other than you, who else has...? "Without finishing her sentence, she remembered that Chris also wore that uniform and was inside the palace. He also remembered that since he had cleared the entrance to the palace, it had not been possible to communicate with him, and not precisely because of technical failures.

"Chris...," Bernard mumbled in bewilderment, "he said he would call for reinforcements to the palace, maybe it could have been one of....

"There's no one else from the group here!" Nick interrupted him abruptly with a frown, "As I also assure you, there are no reinforcements on their way; all the survivors of the attack are concentrated in an asylum a few kilometers from here, and I know this because I have recently spoken to them. Curiously, none of them have received any notification from Chris since Commander Eberhard asked him for a status report, but it all seems to make sense now" she mentioned getting closer to the agents while pointing her rifle at them "Captain Bunde was right, there was a traitor among us, it seems to me that Schreiber tricked both of you and has been playing with you all this time" Liz remembered that Schreiber was Chris' last name. The officer had been very kind to them since their first meeting; she could not believe that they had really been tricked, she remembered the rescue of their execution by the hangman or other times. Why didn't he kill them when he had the chance, she wondered. She remembered, however, all the times she had almost died since they had returned to town with him "Sure, he knew I was here, and maybe he tricked you into chasing me while he was running away or doing his own thing."

"Chris..." Liz moaned in bewilderment as she looked at her ring. Bernard couldn't assimilate the information correctly either.

"Well," sighed Nick, not wanting to continue the conversation with the Americans, "If you believe me or not, I don't care. From this moment on, I will do what Captain Bunde should have done with you from the beginning. You go your way, and we will go ours" after uttering those words, Nick extracted a set of old keys from his belt and threw it to Bernard abruptly "There are your keys! If you want to release Rowland and the others, do it, from this moment on, that's your damn problem."

Nick lowered his guard as he contemplated the meditative expressions of the Americans. He then subsequently left the area, leaving them behind.