Run: 2026-02-19-01KHT0D6DT3VV2CAT195XKRV8E

Rain slapped the tarmac above Camden like an old grudge. Harlow Quinn stepped over the caution tape and let the pungent wetness settle on the inside edge of her nose, that London marinade of diesel, old iron, and the breath of the river. Two constables stood by the broken gate to the old underground station, both booted and battered from the ankle up, both too tense for two in the morning. Harlow clocked it as she walked by: scared, not bored; not tired, but wired. She took the stone steps two at a time, shoes echoing against ancient walls mottled by a century of grime. Her torch found the glint of sweat on the chin of DS Mather, who waited among the loose bricks and the puddles mapped like countries on the cracked linoleum. “You’re late. Didn’t want to touch anything before you saw,” Mather spoke with his hands braced on his knees, the way you do when you’ve just seen something no one warned you about. Harlow peered over the DS’s shoulder at a figure curled on the platform edge. The light played over the outline: a young man, maybe late twenties, navy suit stained dark along the wrists. Fingers splayed, the palms up, as if offering something. Blood blossomed beneath his head in a shape almost deliberate. “Who called it in?” Harlow’s tone smoothed over the question, making it sound less like accusation, more like routine. “Cleaner, on his way in at midnight. Said he heard singing down here. Came from the old market side.” The Market. Beneath the city, closer to secrets than to sunlight. Harlow’s temple ticked. She glanced at Mather, reading nervousness in the way he shifted weight between feet. “Already ran CCTV from the High Street. Last sighting of our boy here was at the kebab shop at eleven. Still had the bag when he came down.” Mather frowned. “Gone now. Thought mugging, but—” He pointed at the man’s chest. “Gold watch, wallet untouched. Even his phone.” Harlow squatted next to the body. Her own leather watch pinched the skin as she moved. Close up, the dead man’s pupils looked blown. No sign of panic, though — more resigned. His tie lay neat as if he’d fixed it before lying down to die. “Anything missing, then?” Harlow’s eyes swept the tiles. “Only that bag. Security badge inside. He’s Simon Barrett, works at the HMRC up the road. Never been nicked, no angry exes I could find.” “Doesn’t look like a struggle.” Harlow traced the spill-pattern of the blood — low head trauma, maybe, but no obvious bruise above the ear. The platform edge just close enough to be tempting, but he hadn’t fallen; there was no outstretched hand, no scrapes on the shoes. She straightened and wandered, slow as tidewater, further down the platform. The old Veil Market gates loomed, chained with three different locks — not standard council issue — and tarnished with something that stunk of burnt rosemary. Harlow smirked. Ritual ward, or someone’s idea of one. Mather’s voice floated after her. “Looks like suicide to me. No signs of another party — you see his hands? Clean. Nails short, no skin under them.” Harlow crouched again, this time near the threshold to the Market: a patch of stone cleaner than its neighbours, ridged and faintly iridescent under the lamp. Her glove traced the faint scuff marks — boots, by the tread — stopping at a speck of burnished green. She pinched it up. Verdigris, soft as if fresh. Mather hovered behind, watching as she pocketed the flake. “Suicide doesn’t fit,” Harlow murmured, almost to herself. “Ever seen a jumper steady his tie first?” She jerked her chin back at the dead man. “And look at his face. No smear, no panic.” Leaning in close, she let her torch sweep low, slow over the body’s right pocket. A tiny brass circle peeked above the seam, chain snapped short. “Bag’s gone,” she murmured. “But he kept this.” She popped the pocket edge with a gloved knuckle and slid the object out. It caught the light, etchings swirling over the glass — a compass, face spattered with marks that darted when her hand shifted. Not north at all but twitching toward the sealed Market gate. Mather peered. “Kids’ toy?” His laugh rang too loud. “Not unless kids are scribbling Latin these days. These are protection sigils.” Her eyes narrowed. “You ever see tech like this at a Finance office?” Mather scratched his cheek. “We’ve had hackers pull weirder outta the Thames.” Harlow ignored him and examined the compass. Its patina told a story: thumb-worn, not polished, meant to be held, relied on. The needle quivered now, locked on the gate and trembling. The Market hadn’t moved, then. She sucked in the taste of the air. Myrrh, rust, something citric and fainter beneath. Not the usual rot of abandon. A fresh spritz, intentional. She glanced sidewise. “Anyone check the rails?” He jerked a thumb behind them. “We did. Nothing down there — apart from a fox. No trace, and the far tunnel is caved. Kids don’t play here.” Harlow kneeled and sniffed the ground. Burnt wax. “Mather. Get a sample kit down here. See that yellow residue? Candle drippings. Singular line, like a sigil. They traced it up to the lip of the platform, then stopped. No pooling, no spatter. Carefully set, not dropped.” Mather squinted, then pulled his mobile for a flash. “Who ever waxed poetic with altar candles before topping themselves?” Mather shrugged again, voice low. “People do strange things. You see that cathedral jumper last month? He emptied a bag of salt before he went over.” Harlow let the silence stretch. Her lips pressed into a line that would have cut stone. Above the Market gate, a faint scratch pattern looped along the lintel — new, sharper than the scattered graffiti nearby. She traced with her glove. A half-familiar emblem, like an open mouth swallowing a star. “Simon Barrett came for something. He brought a badge for access, then a bag. He left both somewhere between here and there.” She jabbed toward the gate. “And kept in hand what he needed most.” Mather’s mouth twitched. “That thing, you mean? Looks old as sin.” She let the compass rest between thumb and forefinger. The needle strained, desperate toward the Market’s chained door. “Not a toy. A tracker. Pointing somewhere it shouldn’t.” Her palm prickled; the sigils caught her skin, cold and electric. She pivoted slowly, letting the compass needle shift, hunting for a pull elsewhere, but it always swung back to the Veil Market. “Whoever he met took the bag,” she observed, voice blunt. “Couldn’t take this compass. Or wouldn’t. Knew better, maybe.” Mather grunted. “Ritual killing? You think he’s some cult muppet?” Harlow closed her hand around the compass. “No blood spatter, no forced trauma. No sign of a struggle on his head — just a single neat wound, nothing that would make this much mess unless you wanted to leave a message.” She glanced at the pattern the blood had made: a five-pointed star, accidental unless deliberate. She pointed. “You telling me that’s happenstance?” Mather frowned, the light catching sweat along his brow. “You think whoever did it arranged —” “He was dead before he hit the floor. Upright, dosed or hexed or whatever they do here. Then dropped, staged right at the Market’s mouth, for us to find. Bag’s gone, badge gone — someone wanted him hushed, but not vanished. This is a doorstop. A warning.” She tucked the compass into a bag, then scanned the tracks once more. Her brown eyes drilled through the dark. Mather waited, shifting in place. She looked up, voice flat. “Pull records for every visitor to this market since last month. Get forensics to dust the lock, and tell them to test for more wax. Someone’s playing rules we don’t know. And they wanted us to start here.” Footsteps clapped behind them — the constable, eager for orders. Harlow held up one finger, eyes tracing the sigil on the gate, mind measuring every irregularity. Nothing random here. No luck, only intent. Every mark, every trace told a story. And she intended to hear every word.