AI Rain slicked the cobblestones of the alley behind the old textile factory in Shoreditch, turning the grime into a slippery black paste. Detective Harlow Quinn ducked under the yellow police tape, her boots splashing through a puddle that reflected the strobing blue lights of the patrol cars. She checked the worn leather watch on her left wrist. 02:14. Three hours since the call came in. Three hours for the scene to go cold, or for something else to crawl out of the woodwork.
PC Miller stood by the dumpster, his face pale under the harsh glare of the portable floodlights. He held a evidence bag containing a shattered wine glass.
"Victim's name is Julian Thorne," Miller said, his voice tight . "Found slumped against the bin. No visible wounds. Paramedics called it a massive cardiac event. Open and shut, Detective."
Quinn stopped beside him. She scanned the alley, her brown eyes narrowing. The air smelled of wet cardboard and ozone, a sharp, metallic tang that didn't belong in a standard London backstreet.
"Cardiac event," Quinn repeated. She stepped closer to the body. Thorne lay on his side, eyes wide and fixed on the brickwall. His skin possessed a waxy, grey pallor that spoke of more than just stopped blood flow. "He's twenty-four, Miller. Fit. No known history of heart conditions according to the preliminary ID check I did in the car."
"Stress kills, ma'am. High finance job. Long hours." Miller shrugged, shifting his weight . "Looks like he dropped his drink, panicked, and his heart gave out."
Quinn crouched. She ignored the broken glass Miller pointed to. Her gaze locked onto Thorne's right hand. The fingers curled inward, clutching at nothing, but the palm faced up. A faint, circular burn mark scorched the center of his skin. It wasn't red or blistered; it looked like the flesh had been erased , leaving behind smooth, white tissue that pulsed faintly in the dim light.
"Stress doesn't leave a brand," Quinn said. She pulled a pen from her pocket and hovered it over the mark without touching it. "And stress doesn't make the rain stop falling three feet above a body."
Miller frowned. "What?"
Quinn tilted her head. Above Thorne's corpse, the rain from the overcast sky curved around an invisible dome. Droplets slid sideways, avoiding the space directly over the body and the two feet of ground surrounding it. The cobblestones beneath him remained bone dry while the rest of the alley glistened.
"See it now?" Quinn asked.
Miller squinted, shaking his head. "Just rain, Detective. Maybe the awning above caught some of it."
"There is no awning." Quinn stood up, her sharp jawline set hard. She walked a circle around the dry patch. The boundary was precise, a perfect line where the wet met the dry. "Someone or something created a barrier here. Recently."
She reached into her trench coat pocket and pulled out a small brass object. The Veil Compass. Verdigris stained the casing, and protective sigils etched into the face caught the blue police lights. The needle spun wildly before snapping rigid, pointing not north, but directly at Thorne's chest .
Miller took a step back, his hand drifting toward his radio. "Is that standard issue, ma'am? Looks like junk."
"It's evidence," Quinn said, her voice low . "Thorne didn't die of a heart attack, Miller. He died because something passed through him. Something that doesn't exist on any database you have access to."
"Right." Miller's tone shifted, becoming defensive. "Look, Detective Quinn, I know you've been under pressure since... since Morris. But we can't chase ghosts. The ME is on the way. We bag the body, we file the report, we go home."
Quinn ignored him. She knelt again, this time focusing on the wall behind Thorne. Faint scratches marred the brickwork, too high for a falling man to make. They formed a pattern, a series of intersecting lines that matched the sigils on her compass.
"Thorne wasn't alone," Quinn murmured. She traced the air above the scratches. "He met someone here. They argued. Or maybe he was trying to buy something."
"Buy what? In a rainy alley?" Miller scoffed, though he moved closer, curiosity warring with skepticism.
"Not something you buy in a shop." Quinn stood and brushed dirt from her knees. "The Veil Market moves tonight. Full moon. Thorne knew. He had a token."
She pointed to Thorne's left pocket. The fabric bulged slightly . Miller hesitated, then pulled on a pair of latex gloves and reached in. He produced a small, jagged piece of bone, whitened and polished, with a hole drilled through one end.
"Bone," Miller said, holding it up. "Weird jewelry."
"Entry requirement," Quinn corrected. "For the market beneath Camden. Thorne made it halfway. Something intercepted him before he could descend."
The compass needle twitched, swinging away from the body and pointing toward the mouth of the alley, where the shadows seemed deeper, thicker than the darkness should allow.
"Someone followed him," Quinn said. "Or something waited for him."
"You're talking about a suspect?" Miller asked, his grip tightening on the bone token . "A person did this?"
"A person with access to things that bend physics." Quinn walked toward the alley entrance. The rain intensified as she stepped out of the dry zone, soaking her shoulders instantly. "Look at the footprints, Miller. Really look."
Miller dropped the bone token back into the evidence bag and shuffled over to the edge of the dry patch. He shone his flashlight on the mud. Two sets of prints led to the body. One set, heavy boots, belonged to Thorne. The other set... stopped abruptly three feet from the victim.
"No exit prints," Miller whispered.
"Because they didn't walk away," Quinn said. "They vanished. Or they stepped sideways."
She tapped the face of her compass. The needle vibrated , humming with a low frequency she felt in her teeth. The direction it pointed led deeper into the industrial complex , toward a boarded-up maintenance door that looked no different from the others, save for the lack of dust on the handle.
"Morris found something like this," Quinn said, the words slipping out before she could stop them . The memory of her partner's empty chair in the precinct flashed in her mind. "Three years ago. Same burn mark. Same dry patch in the rain. They told me it was a gas leak. An explosion."
Miller stayed silent, watching her. The skepticism in his eyes softened, replaced by a flicker of unease . The air around them grew heavier, the smell of ozone intensifying until it burned the back of the throat.
"If this is some kind of ritual..." Miller started.
"It's not a ritual," Quinn cut in. "It's a transaction gone wrong. Thorne bought a ticket, but he never got on the train."
She moved toward the maintenance door. The handle turned easily in her hand, rust giving way as if it had been oiled moments before. Behind the door, darkness waited, but it wasn't empty. A faint, violet luminescence pulsed from the cracks in the floorboards beyond.
Quinn drew her service weapon, the metal cold against her palm. She checked the chamber, slid it back home, and flicked off the safety.
"Stay behind me, Miller," she ordered. "And keep that bone token close. If my theory holds, it might be the only thing keeping us from ending up like Thorne."
Miller swallowed hard, nodding as he clicked on his own flashlight. The beam cut through the gloom , illuminating dust motes that danced in strange, spiraling patterns.
"What do we do if we find whoever did this?" Miller asked, his voice trembling slightly .
Quinn stepped over the threshold, the violet light casting long, distorted shadows across her face.
"We ask them where Morris went," she said. "And then we arrest them for murder."
The door slammed shut behind them, cutting off the sound of the rain and the distant sirens. Inside, the air hummed with a energy that made the hair on Quinn's arms stand up. The compass needle spun faster, blurring into a silver disc, before locking onto a staircase leading down into the earth.
"Down," Quinn commanded.
They descended, the footsteps echoing too loudly, as if the space around them swallowed sound and spat it back distorted. At the bottom of the stairs, a corridor stretched out, lined with doors that bore symbols matching the scratches on the brickwall above. One door stood ajar. From within, a voice whispered, speaking a language that sounded like grinding stones and breaking glass.
Quinn signaled Miller to halt. She pressed her back against the cold concrete wall, edging toward the open door. The whispering grew louder, forming words she almost understood. Names. Prices. Betrayals.
She peeked around the frame. The room beyond wasn't a storage closet. It was a portal, a swirling vortex of grey mist hovering in the center of the space, surrounded by crates of glowing vials and bundles of dried herbs that twitched on their own. A figure stood before the mist, cloaked in rags that seemed to shift color with every breath .
The figure turned. Two empty sockets where eyes should be stared directly at Quinn.
"Detective," the figure rasped, the voice echoing inside her skull rather than her ears . "You are early. The market does not open for another hour."
Quinn raised her gun, aiming center mass, though she knew bullets might pass right through. "Julian Thorne is dead outside. You have five seconds to explain why before I treat this room as a crime scene."
The figure laughed, a sound like dry leaves skittering on pavement. "Thorne paid the price. The toll is always steep for those who seek what is hidden." The figure gestured to the swirling mist. "But you... you seek something else. Something lost."
Quinn's finger tightened on the trigger. "Where is DS Morris?"
The mist churned , forming shapes within its grey depths . Faces flickered in the vapor. One of them looked painfully familiar .
"Ask the Compass," the figure said, fading backward into the swirling grey. "It knows the way. But be warned, Detective. The path back is never the same as the path forward."
The figure dissolved into the mist, which suddenly surged outward, filling the room. Quinn shielded her eyes, the wind from the vortex whipping her salt-and-pepper hair across her face. The compass in her hand grew hot, burning her palm.
"Miller!" she shouted over the roar. "Grab the crates! Don't let them vanish!"
Miller lunged forward, snatching a jar of glowing blue liquid just as the mist receded, leaving the room empty once more. The portal was gone . The figure was gone . Only the crates remained, and the lingering scent of ozone and old blood.
Quinn lowered her gun, her breath coming in short, sharp gasps. She looked down at the compass. The needle no longer pointed forward. It pointed down, deep into the foundation of the building, toward a place that didn't appear on any map of London.
"He's down there," Quinn said, her voice steady despite the tremor in her hands . "Morris is down there."
Miller clutched the jar to his chest, his eyes wide. "What now, Detective?"
Quinn holstered her weapon and checked her watch . 02:47. Time to move.
"Now," she said, turning toward the stairs, "we go shopping."