Her reaction confused Vicente.
Shirley tried to keep her voice low by overcoming her fear and nervousness. “Vicente, you have to run. The night watchers found the bodies in your basement.”
“What?!” Vicente could not believe his ears even though it was Shirley who told him this, and Shirley was the person he loved and trusted the most in the world. “Impossible… This is impossible. How did they find it? How did they know?”
There was no way that night watchers could search every single house in an area for their number was too small for this.
Seeing that Vicente was panicking, Shirley told him what happened as briefly as she could. “Andrew felt humiliated, so they found the night watchers to kill you in the interrogation room. My servant heard them plotting.”
“I see, I see… I am not a sorcerer. I never want to… Why are they pushing me…” Vicente felt both angry and nervous. He was at the edge of a nervous breakdown.
Shirley tried to make it short. “Don’t worry. I’ll ask my father to help you. You’ll only have to accept an inspection and the Lord will know you’re not a sorcerer. But you have to hide in the marsh for a few days so that my father can deal with it.”
Her clear explanation and calm tone comforted Vicente.
“Okay. I’ll listen to you, Shirley,” said Vicente.
At this time, he had to count on Baron Brenzell. It happened before that a noble stood out to protect a sorcerer suspect. However, the suspect still went through the strict investigation and made the church believe it was a mistake.
“There’s not enough time for me to prepare clothes and food for you. Be careful in the next few days. If everything goes well on my father’s side, I’ll ask a guard to carve the trees along the edge of the marsh with the symbol we previously agreed on,” said Shirley.
At first, the baron did not agree on Shirley and Vicente being with each other and even cut off the letters between them. So the young lovers had previously decided on some simple symbols to inform each other how they were doing. Now, the symbols had become useful again.
At this time, Vicente suddenly looked very nervous. “I see people coming…”
He had a pair of eyes as sharp as that of cats, and he could see way better than common people. They were now hiding in the garden and being surrounded by lots of plants and bushes, so it was hard for people coming from outside to spot them.
“The night watchers are coming…” murmured Shirley. As Vicente’s fiancée, she had expected that the night watchers would come to investigate, but she didn’t know they would be this fast.
Vicente was very nervous. Once the night watchers walked in, the two of them would be seen!
He couldn’t hide in a room in this manor because the night watchers would for sure search the rooms one by one!
Maybe he should hide here and wait for a chance?
At this time, Shirley suddenly looked up. “Vicente, you stay here. I’ll distract them. Five minutes later, you go to the marsh through the side gate of the manor.”
“It’s dangerous!” said Vicente. In common people’s minds, those night watchers were as horrifying as sorcerers, demons, and evils.
Shirley shook her head decisively and said, “I’m a noble. They won’t do anything to me. Go and hide, now!”
…
Outside of the manor, the leader of the night watchers whose codename was Crazy Hound said to the rest of the night watchers, “You go to different directions and guard all the exits. I’ll go into the manor with Tamer.”
Under this circumstance, the night watcher called Tamer was much more useful than the rest of them because of the many magic creatures he trained.
“Sir, they all say that Vicente has gone to the marsh, and we are here only for figuring out the areas in the marsh that Vicente visits most often. Do we have to make this so big?” A night watcher believed that they should go to the marsh as soon as possible instead of spending too much time in the manor.
Although called Crazy Hound, he was rather cautious. “No matter when, we block off a place and then enter. This is our principle. Can you say for sure that there’s only Vicente in this manor? How do you know his fiancée hasn’t been lured? How do you know whether the baron is secretly supporting sorcerers or not?”
The night watcher who asked the question kept apologizing.
No wonder their leader had taken out the entire team. Crazy Hound was worried that there were nobles involved in this.
“According to the previous investigation, Vicente and Miss Brenzell are very close. If we keep a close eye on her, we probably don’t have to search into the marsh,” Tamer added.
At this time, Crazy Hound sniffed something and suddenly commanded, “Hide!”
The team followed his order immediately and hid in the fields and trees.
Half a minute later, a lady showed up beside the manor gate. She was dressed like a maid, but she wore a black gauze hat. The hanging veil covered her face.
She looked around and made sure no one was around. Then she hurriedly set off for the marsh.
“It’s Shirley. She can’t hide from my nose.” Crazy Hound grinned to Tamer.
Tamer also put on a creepy smile. “She must be informing Vicente. She can’t ask her maids or guards to do it.”
Very likely her maids and guards would sell her out if she decided to do so.
“You’re right. It seems that the task will be pretty easy.” Crazy Hound had the brutal smile on his face, for they would win the reward from the Inquisition as well as from Andrew. If they could make this even bigger and involve more people, they would earn even more!
When Shirley had walked some distance away, Crazy Hound whistled and gathered the team again.
“We follow her. Tamer, you stay here and watch the manor, just in case,” commanded Crazy Hound.
“Yes, leader,” said Tamer politely. He had many “pets”. Although he could not monitor the entire manor, guarding the main gate and watching the baron should not be a problem.
Crazy Hound decided to lead the entire team for fear that Vicente had got his helpers. They secretly followed Shirley through the green field, thin trees, and finally arrived at the marsh filled with miasma.
At this time, Crazy Hound’s eyes suddenly opened big, for he saw that Shirley had started walking back!
What did she do? How did she inform him?
No! They were fooled by her!
Crazy Hound was furious, but he knew that it would have been too late if he led the entire team back. So he and his team directly jumped out and closed in on Shirley.
“Who are you! What do you want!” Shirley shouted.
Crazy Hound said gloomily, “Miss Shirley, where’s Vicente?”
“I don’t know. How do I know? He hasn’t come back from the marsh yet,” said Shirley as calmly as she could.
“Then why are you here?” Crazy Hound was about to lose control.
Shirley responded coldly, “Come to find him. But when I see the marsh, I know there’s no way that I can find him in this place. I’m a noble lady! So I’ve decided to go back. He should just die in there.”
“If you don’t change your mind, I’d have to take you back to the inquisition.” Crazy Hound’s eyes started looking red.
“Dare you! I’m a noble!” said Shirley aloud.
Crazy Hound sneered, “So what? As long as a noble has anything to do with a sorcerer, he will also be put on the gallows.”
“Take her!” commanded Crazy Hound. “She’ll know what an interrogation is like in the inquisition!”
“You crazy dogs! My father will protest to the Church. You will be severely punished!” Shirley screamed for she could not believe her ears.
“Go ahead!” Crazy Hound was not going to change his mind.
…
“The night watchers took Shirley to the inquisition?!” asked Baron Brenzell in great shock and anger.
After confirming the information, he had gone outraged. “Those lunatics! They don’t even obey the laws! I’m going to see the viscount!”
He then rushed out furiously.
After half a day, the baron came back with an extremely shocked look on his face. Facing his wife, who kept asking what was going on, the baron finally said, “I don’t know. I never expected this. The Church didn’t care about nobles’ opinions at all. They… They even threatened me. They said they’d take me in as well if they find anything against me.”
“Are they out of their minds?! The nobles will protest together!” The baron’s wife could not believe it.
Brenzell shook his head dispiritedly. “Protest? How? We can’t defeat the Church.”
…
In the interrogation chamber, the screams of a young lady lingered.
“She still hasn’t said anything?” asked Crazy Hound.
The interrogator replied gloomily, “Not yet. She’s more staunch than anyone I’ve seen. We’ve pretty much done the most severe damage to her body, but she still won’t say a word.”
“Use divine spells then,” said Crazy Hound in despair.
The interrogator was shocked. “She’ll die. She’s a noble.”
“It’s okay. She’s just a noble,” said Crazy Hound. The attitude that the Church showed today had further supported Crazy Hound and made him even crazier. In his mind, a noble lady who was willing to marry a sorcerer was by no means innocent, and neither was her family. He believed that the Lord would also be on his side.
The interrogator finally put on an evil and cunning smile. “Alright. It’s time for the nobles to understand who they are. They’re only dogs raised by us.”
He walked into the interrogation chamber in long strides. The screams slowly turned into bloodcurdling cries like a nightmare. Eventually, even the cries had disappeared.
“Dead. What a pity. She had a pretty beautiful face.” The interrogator walked out with the look of excitement still on his face. Obviously, he enjoyed the process.
It was all quiet now in the interrogation chamber, as if the girl named Shirley had never even been sent into this place.
