AI The suspect’s shoulder slammed into a stack of wet crates outside a fishmonger’s, sending a cascade of ice and mackerel skittering across the slick pavement. Detective Harlow Quinn hurdled the mess without breaking stride, her worn leather watch slapping rhythmically against her wrist. The rain wasn't helping . It blurred the green neon signs of Soho into bleeding watercolours and turned every footfall into a potential disaster.
She’d picked up his trail outside The Raven’s Nest, that dive bar with too many secrets and too many exits. He’d been a flicker in the periphery, a nervous silhouette against the distinctive green glow. Now he was a blur of a dark coat, fast and desperate, cutting through the late-night crowds spilling from the theatres.
"Met Police! Stop!" The command was swallowed by the city’s din, a useless formality. He didn't even flinch.
He vaulted a low iron railing and disappeared down a set of greasy steps she knew led to a service alley. Quinn followed, her movements sharp with military precision, her salt-and-pepper hair plastered to her sharp jaw. The alley was a canyon of dripping pipes and overflowing bins, the air thick with the smell of rotting vegetables and wet concrete. He was faster, younger, but she knew these streets. She’d walked them for eighteen years. She cut a diagonal across the alley, her longer legs closing the gap, her mind already mapping the dead ends and choke points.
He took a hard right, and for a heart-stopping second, she thought he’d ducked into one of the many illicit gambling dens that operated behind unmarked doors. But he didn't stop at a door. He dropped to his knees beside a rusted utility cover set into the cobblestones. With a grunt of effort, he pried it up, the screech of metal on stone grating against the rain’s steady hiss. He threw a panicked glance over his shoulder, his eyes wide and wild in the gloom , then dropped into the black hole.
The cover clanged shut behind him.
Quinn skidded to a halt, her breath clouding in the damp, cold air. She stood alone in the alley, the rain pattering on the discarded lid. This wasn't on any city schematic she’d ever seen. This was something else.
Her radio crackled on her shoulder. "Quinn? Status. Did you lose him?"
She keyed the mic, her voice steady, betraying none of the sudden, cold curiosity coiling in her gut. "Took a service tunnel. I’m in pursuit." The lie came easily. Morris would have known. He’d have felt the shift in the air, the wrongness of that opening in the ground. But Morris was gone . Three years. Unexplained circumstances. Supernatural origins. The words were a cold stone in her pocket she carried everywhere.
She holstered the radio. This was no service tunnel. The cover was too heavy, too deliberately obscured by grime and neglect. This was a threshold.
She crouched, her fingers tracing the cold, wet iron. Her instincts screamed at her to call it in, to get a tactical unit, to do this by the book. But the book had no pages for this. The book had failed Morris. If this was connected to the clique, to the things that moved in London’s shadows, then procedure was a useless shield.
With a final, decisive breath, she gripped the edge. The metal was bitingly cold. She heaved it aside, the effort straining her shoulders. The opening revealed was not a ladder, but a steep, narrow staircase carved from old, damp brick, descending into absolute darkness. A faint, strange smell wafted up—ozone, old parchment, and something metallic, like hot copper.
She drew her torch, the beam cutting a shaky path down the steps. She descended, each step a conscious choice to leave her world behind. The sounds of the city faded, replaced by the drip of water and the scuff of her own boots. The staircase turned sharply , and a faint, flickering light appeared from below.
The passage opened abruptly into a cavernous space. Her torch beam was suddenly redundant, swallowed by a vast, chaotic glow. She stood on a metal gantry high above a scene that made her mind stutter and recalibrate.
It was a market, but like no market she had ever seen. It sprawled through what had to be an abandoned Tube station, the old platforms transformed into a labyrinth of stalls and tents. The air hummed with a low, frantic energy, thick with the smells of exotic spices, curing meat, and that same sharp, coppery tang. The ceiling was lost in shadow, but from it hung hundreds of mismatched lanterns—caged electric bulbs, flickering gaslights, glowing orbs that pulsed with a soft, internal light—casting a jittery, uneven illumination over the scene below.
This was the Veil Market. A rumour, a ghost story cops told each other after a few too many pints. She’d never believed it was real.
And there, thirty feet below, weaving through the crowd with the ease of a local, was her suspect.
The crowd was a gallery of the impossible. A woman with iridescent scales dusted across her cheekbones haggled over a jar of swirling black liquid. A hulking figure wrapped in heavy robes examined a blade that seemed to drink the light around it . Whispers slithered through the air in languages she didn't recognise, deals were struck with handshakes that left faint, glowing sigils on skin.
Her training demanded she retreat, call for backup she knew would never come, would never be cleared for this. This was beyond their jurisdiction. This was beyond any jurisdiction.
But her suspect was getting away, swallowed by the bizarre throng. He knew this place. He felt at home here. And that made him more dangerous than any armed robber she’d ever chased.
She needed to move, to blend, but she was a lighthouse beam in a cave of shadows—a Met detective in a sober coat and sensible shoes in a world of silk , scales, and shadow. Her hand went to the radio again, a lifeline to the world above, but her fingers hesitated. What would she say? *Requesting assistance at the supernatural black market beneath Camden. Suspect is browsing the enchanted weapons aisle.*
A figure detached itself from the shadows near the gantry stairs. He was lean, with short curly dark hair and olive skin. He wore a simple dark jumper, but the scar running along his left forearm was visible as he lifted a hand, a Saint Christopher medallion glinting at his throat.
"This is a bad place to be lost, Detective." His accent was warm, Spanish. Seville, maybe. His eyes, a warm brown, held no threat, only a weary caution. He looked her up and down, taking in her posture, her sharp gaze, the way her hand rested near her hip. "You stick out. Badly."
"Not lost," Quinn said, her voice low, her eyes never leaving the retreating form of her suspect as he ducked into a stall hung with what looked like preserved animal hearts . "Working."
The man—Tomás—followed her gaze and a frown creased his brow. "Ah. Him. You will not take him from here. Not without causing a scene. And a scene here..." He let the sentence hang. The implication was clear. It would be very , very messy.
"He's a person of interest in an investigation."
"Everyone here is a person of interest in someone's investigation." He took a step closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. "This is not your place. Your rules do not apply. They have their own justice. It is faster. And far less concerned with warrants."
Below, her suspect concluded his transaction, accepting a small, cloth-wrapped parcel. He turned, and for a fleeting second, his eyes scanned the upper level. They swept past her, then snapped back. He’d seen her. Panic flared in his expression. He shoved the parcel into his coat and bolted deeper into the market, towards a dark archway that promised even deeper, older tunnels.
Quinn’s body tensed, every instinct screaming to give chase.
Tomás’s hand was on her arm, not restraining, but a firm warning . "Don't. That leads to the old sewers. The parts even they do not fully control. It is a maze. You will not come out."
She shook his hand off, her decision crystallising in that moment. Procedure had failed. Caution had cost her Morris. This… this was the edge of the map. This was where the truth was hiding .
"Then I guess I'd better not get lost," she said, and launched herself down the last flight of stairs into the seething, unnatural heart of the Veil Market. The crowd parted before her like a dark sea, eyes of every colour and shape tracking her progress. She was a shark in a reef, and every creature here knew it. She fixed her eyes on the dark archway, the last place she’d seen him, and pushed forward into the unknown, the worn leather watch on her wrist counting down the seconds until something in the shadows pushed back.