Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMRAJSCYRGQGGSKTJBH30ZG

The bone token felt wrong in Quinn's palm. She'd confiscated it from a dealer in Brixton six months ago, kept it in her desk drawer wrapped in a handkerchief, and never once considered using it. Now she stood at the bottom of a spiral staircase that shouldn't exist, in a Tube station that had been sealed since 1932, watching forensics techs photograph a body that had no business being here. The Veil Market. She'd heard whispers about it for years. Drug busts where the substances defied chemical analysis. Missing persons who turned up speaking languages that didn't exist. Her partner Morris, three years cold in the ground, who'd been investigating something down here when— Quinn pushed the memory aside and ducked under the crime scene tape. The abandoned platform stretched away into darkness, but someone had strung fairy lights along the old ceramic tiles, casting everything in a sickly amber glow. Market stalls lined both sides of the platform, their wares covered with canvas tarps. The air smelled of incense, copper, and something else she couldn't name. Something that made her sinuses ache and her teeth feel too large for her mouth. "Detective Quinn." The voice came from her left. "Didn't expect to see you down here." Eva Kowalski stood near the body, her leather satchel clutched against her chest like a shield. The young woman's red curls were escaping from a hasty ponytail, and her round glasses had fogged in the underground humidity. She tucked a strand of hair behind her left ear—a nervous habit Quinn had catalogued months ago, during a different investigation. "Miss Kowalski." Quinn kept her voice neutral. "Strange place for a museum researcher to turn up at three in the morning." "The British Museum has an arrangement with certain... venues." Eva's green eyes flicked toward the forensics team, then back to Quinn. "We document artifacts before they disappear into private collections. Preservation of cultural heritage." "And do you often preserve cultural heritage at active crime scenes?" "I was already here when it happened. Witness statement's on file." Quinn let that sit for a moment, watching the younger woman's face. Eva Kowalski had credentials that checked out, references that glowed, and a habit of appearing at scenes that made Quinn's instincts prickle. The researcher shifted her weight, adjusting the satchel's worn strap on her shoulder. "Show me the body." They walked together to the center of the platform, where a forensics photographer was packing up his equipment. The victim lay face-down on the concrete, arms splayed at odd angles. Male, late fifties, expensive suit now ruined by a spreading pool of blood. Quinn pulled on latex gloves and crouched beside him. "Preliminary says stabbing," Eva offered. "Multiple wounds to the torso. Robbery gone wrong, maybe—his wallet's missing, watch too." Quinn studied the blood pattern. It had pooled beneath the body, as expected, but the spray was wrong. Stab wounds created specific patterns depending on the angle and force of entry. This spray arced upward, away from the victim, in a way that suggested— "He wasn't stabbed here." Eva blinked. "The blood—" "The blood was placed here. Look at the pooling." Quinn pointed with a gloved finger. "It's too uniform. No satellite drops, no movement patterns. Someone laid him down and poured blood around him like they were filling a mold." "That's... why would someone do that?" Quinn didn't answer. She was looking at the victim's hands now, at the way his fingers curled against the concrete. His nails were clean. No defensive wounds on his forearms, no skin cells under his fingernails from fighting back. A man stabbed multiple times would fight. Would claw. Would leave evidence of his terror in broken nails and torn cuticles. Unless he was already dead when the stabbing began. She stood, her knees protesting the movement, and checked her worn leather watch. Three forty-seven. The full moon had been last night, which meant the market would move soon—if it hadn't already started. Whatever evidence remained in this space had a shelf life measured in hours. "The stall nearest the body," Quinn said. "What was it selling?" Eva hesitated, her hand drifting toward her satchel. "I'm not sure I should—" "Miss Kowalski. A man is dead. I don't have time for institutional politics." The researcher's jaw tightened, but she nodded. "Navigation tools. Compasses, mostly. There's a craftsman who works with—" She stopped, choosing her words carefully. "—unusual materials. Creates instruments for people who need to find things that don't want to be found." Quinn walked to the covered stall, lifting the canvas tarp with one gloved hand. The display beneath held an assortment of brass instruments, most of them scratched and dented with age. One caught her eye—a small compass with a patina of verdigris on its casing. The face was etched with symbols she didn't recognize, protective sigils according to some database she'd consulted during the Morris investigation. The needle spun lazily, pointing neither north nor toward any fixed direction. "A Veil Compass," Eva said from behind her. "They're rare. Worth quite a lot to the right buyer." "Worth killing for?" "Some people think so." Quinn photographed the display with her phone, then turned to study the platform. The forensics team had moved on to the staircase, dusting for prints on the iron railing. She had maybe twenty minutes before someone higher up got word of her presence here and started asking questions about how a Metropolitan Police detective had gained access to a location that didn't officially exist. The bone token was still in her pocket. She'd have to return it to evidence eventually, but not yet. Not until she understood what had happened to Morris in a place very like this one, three years ago, when he'd gone down to investigate a body and never come back up. "The victim's shoes," Quinn said suddenly. "They're wrong." Eva frowned. "Wrong how?" Quinn crouched again, this time at the victim's feet. Italian leather, hand-stitched, the kind of shoes that cost more than her monthly rent. But the soles were pristine. Not just clean—unworn. The leather showed no scuffs, no scratches, no evidence of a single step on concrete or cobblestone or carpet. "He didn't walk here. He didn't walk anywhere in these shoes." "Maybe they're new." "New shoes in a three-thousand-pound suit that's been tailored at least twice, based on the wear patterns at the elbows?" Quinn shook her head. "This man dressed well because he took care of his things. He wouldn't buy new shoes and wear them to a black market in an abandoned Tube station." "Then someone changed his shoes. After." Quinn met Eva's eyes. The researcher was pale behind her freckles, her hand still resting on her satchel. The bag was fuller than usual, Quinn noticed. Bulging with more than books. "What did you see tonight, Miss Kowalski? Before the body was discovered?" "Nothing unusual. Vendors setting up. Buyers browsing. The compass maker was arguing with someone about a custom order—" "Describe them." Eva's hand moved to her hair, tucking the same strand behind her ear again. "I didn't get a good look. Hood up, long coat. They were angry about something. The compass maker kept saying he needed more time, that the materials weren't ready." "And then?" "The lights went out. Just for a second—a flicker. When they came back on, everyone was running toward the stairs. Someone was shouting about a body." Eva swallowed. "I stayed because... because you're supposed to stay at crime scenes. That's what they tell you." Quinn studied her. Eva Kowalski was lying about something, but the skill of it was impressive—enough truth mixed with the deception that most detectives wouldn't notice the seams. But Quinn had spent eighteen years learning to read people, and the last three learning to read this particular case. "The compass maker," she said. "Where is he now?" "Gone. He was gone when I looked for him after the lights came back." "Convenient." "I'm telling you what I saw, Detective." Quinn straightened, pulling off her gloves and tucking them into her pocket. The forensics team was wrapping up, loading equipment into cases that would be logged and filed and eventually forgotten. The body would go to the morgue, where some pathologist would scratch their head over wound patterns that didn't match any known weapon. The case would be marked unsolved, added to a stack of files that nobody wanted to touch. Unless Quinn touched them first. She walked back to the covered stall, her eyes tracing the pattern of compasses and instruments. The Veil Compass sat in its place, needle still spinning. But something else had caught her attention—a bare spot in the display, a perfect circle in the dust where something had recently sat. "There was another compass here. Tonight." Eva went very still. "Was there?" "You can see the outline. Same size, same shape as the Veil Compass. Someone took it while the lights were out." "The murder, then. It was about theft." "No." Quinn turned to face her. "The murder was about distraction. Someone needed thirty seconds of darkness to take something from this stall, and they manufactured chaos to get it. The body was already dead—killed somewhere else, dressed in new shoes and an altered suit, staged to look like a crime of passion." She paused, watching Eva's reaction. "Someone with access to this market. Someone who knew exactly when the lights would go out. Someone who's standing in front of me right now, lying through her teeth about what she saw." Eva's chin lifted. "That's quite an accusation." "It's not an accusation. It's an observation." Quinn stepped closer, close enough to see the pulse jumping in Eva's throat. "You're not a killer, Miss Kowalski. But you know who is. You've been protecting them since before Morris died, haven't you? Since before any of this started." The name landed like a stone in still water. Eva's composure cracked—just for a moment—and Quinn saw something beneath it. Fear, certainly. But also recognition. The researcher knew about Morris. She knew what had happened down here three years ago. "I can't help you, Detective." Eva's voice was barely above a whisper. "Not with this." "Can't or won't?" "Does it matter?" Quinn reached into her pocket and pulled out the bone token. It was warm against her fingers, humming with a frequency just below the threshold of hearing. Eva's eyes went wide. "Where did you get that?" "Evidence lockup. It belonged to a man named Simon Chen. He disappeared five years ago, and his partner filed a missing persons report that got buried by people who didn't want it found." Quinn turned the token over in her palm. "I've been collecting these. One from every case that didn't make sense. One from every body that turned up in places like this with evidence that didn't add up." She met Eva's eyes. "Morris had one in his pocket when he died. The department said it was a gambling chip. But you and I both know better." Eva's hand moved to her satchel—not to tuck her hair, but to grip the strap like a lifeline. Inside that bag, Quinn suspected, was something far more valuable than books. Something that had been taken from this stall while the lights were out. Something that could lead her to answers she'd been chasing for three years. "The market moves at dawn," Eva said finally. "Whatever you're looking for, you have two hours to find it." "And you?" Eva turned toward the staircase, her footsteps echoing on the ancient concrete. She paused at the bottom step, looking back over her shoulder. "I'll be at the museum. My access codes are unchanged." She climbed the first step, then stopped again. "Detective? Morris was a good man. He deserved better than what happened to him." "What did happen to him?" But Eva was already gone, disappearing up the spiral stairs like smoke through a vent. Quinn stood alone on the platform, surrounded by covered stalls and fairy lights and a body that had been dead before it arrived. She looked down at the bone token in her hand. It was still warm. Two hours until dawn. Two hours to search a market that didn't exist for evidence of a crime that defied explanation. Two hours to find out what had happened to Morris, and why Eva Kowalski had been protecting whoever killed him. Quinn pocketed the token and walked toward the compass stall. The Veil Compass sat waiting, its needle spinning toward something she couldn't see. Not yet.