AI Detective Harlow Quinn descended the rusted spiral staircase into the bowels of the abandoned Tube station beneath Camden, her worn leather watch ticking steadily against her left wrist. The air thickened with the stench of damp stone and something sharper—ozone, like a storm about to break underground. Her flashlight beam sliced through the gloom , catching glints off makeshift stalls shrouded in black tarps. The Veil Market. She'd heard whispers of it for years, ever since DS Morris vanished three years back on a case that smelled wrong from the start. Supernatural bollocks, her superiors had called it. But Quinn knew better now. Her bone token—pilfered from a junkie snitch last month—had parted the illusory wall at the entrance, revealing this warren of shadows peddling curses and contraband.
Uniforms milled about the central aisle, their faces pale under the flickering gas lamps that lined the platform. Crime scene tape fluttered like dying moths, cordoning off a stall piled with brass trinkets and vials of glowing sludge. PC Ellis waved her over, his voice a hushed rasp. "Detective Quinn. Glad you're here. It's a right mess."
Quinn ducked under the tape, her military bearing snapping her posture straight despite the low ceiling. At forty-one, with her salt-and-pepper hair cropped close to her sharp jaw, she moved with the precision of a woman who'd stared down worse than this freakshow bazaar. The victim sprawled across the stall's counter: a wiry man in his fifties, skin like weathered parchment, throat laid open from ear to ear. No blood pooled beneath him. That was the first wrong note. Arteries should've painted the cracked tiles crimson, but the gash wept only a thin trickle, already congealing black.
"Name?" Quinn asked, snapping on nitrile gloves. She crouched, eyes tracing the body's contours.
"Victor Hale," Ellis supplied. "Local lowlife, dealt in enchanted baubles. Found at dawn by another trader. Looks like a mugging gone south—throat slit, wallet emptied."
Quinn's brown eyes narrowed . The wallet lay splayed on the floor, emptied sure enough, but beside it glinted a pile of gold sovereigns, untouched. Rings studded with what looked like captured starlight cluttered the counter. No robbery worth a damn would leave those. She straightened, scanning the scene. Footprints in the dust—size tens, heavy tread—led from the body toward the tunnel mouth twenty feet away. Then nothing. They vanished mid-stride, swallowed by the shadows.
"Odd," she muttered, prodding the counter's edge. A brass compass, small and etched with sigils, sat askew amid the debris. Verdigris patina clung to its casing, the needle twitching erratically, not north but looping wild circles . She'd seen its type before, in Morris's cold case file: Veil Compass, tuned to rifts and portals. Pointed to the supernatural like a divining rod.
Footsteps echoed from the platform's edge—soft, hesitant. Quinn glanced up as Eva Kowalski emerged from the gloom , curly red hair frizzing in the humidity, round glasses fogged slightly . The woman tucked a strand behind her left ear, freckles stark against her flushed cheeks. Her worn leather satchel bulged with books, slung over one shoulder. At five-four, she looked swallowed by the underground sprawl, but her green eyes sharpened on the body.
"Detective Quinn," Eva said, voice steady despite the nervous tic . "They called me in from the Museum. Restricted archives consultant. This... it's not what it seems."
Quinn's jaw tightened. Kowalski. Childhood mate of that Aurora girl her unit had been tailing—the clique neck-deep in occult dabbling. Eva worked the British Museum's shadows, digging through tomes on curses and elder gods. Convenient timing. "Save the ghost stories, Miss Kowalski. Facts first."
Eva knelt beside the body, careful not to disturb the tape. "Victor's no ordinary trader. He specialized in rift artifacts. Look at the wound." She gestured without touching . "Clean slice, but no spatter. No drag marks from a struggle. And those footprints..." She trailed off, following Quinn's earlier gaze to the tunnel.
"End in thin air," Quinn finished. "Your supernatural vanishing act?"
Eva shook her head, pulling a small notebook from her satchel. "Not vanishing. Phasing. This station's a nexus—old ley lines converge here. The Market moves every full moon because rifts destabilize it. Victor had a Compass." She nodded at the brass device. "Needle's berserk. Means a rift tore open nearby, close enough to bleed through."
Quinn picked up the Compass, its weight cool and heavy in her palm. The sigils hummed faintly under her thumb—protective wards, etched by some Shade artisan she'd never met but whose handiwork she'd cataloged in nightmares. The needle whipped counterclockwise, frantic. She set it down, mind churning . "Mugging interpretation holds if we ignore the fairy dust. Killer grabs wallet, slits throat, bolts. Footprints fade because he swept them or wore booties. Sovereigns left behind? Panic."
Eva snorted softly , pushing her glasses up. "Panic doesn't explain the lack of blood. Human throats gush—physics, Detective. This cut cauterized as it happened. Look closer." She pointed to the edges, where the flesh gleamed charred, not ragged.
Quinn leaned in, torch beam steady. Eva was right. The incision smoked faintly still, edges fused like a laser's kiss. Not a blade—too precise, too clean. Her gut twisted, flashing to Morris's file: unexplained burns, shadows that didn't cast right. She straightened, circling the stall. Dust motes danced in her light, undisturbed except for those vanishing prints. No scuff marks, no overturned crates. The air hummed, thicker here, charged .
"Ellis," she barked. "Get Forensics down here yesterday. Luminol the lot, and bag that Compass."
The PC nodded, scurrying off. Eva lingered, tucking hair again. "Quinn, listen. Victor crossed someone big. Rumors in the archives—Shade cartels muscling into the Market. They don't use knives. They rift-jump. Step through a tear, strike, step out. No trail."
Quinn shot her a look, sharp as her jawline. "Shade bollocks. Last time I chased shadows, my partner ended up ash." But doubt gnawed. She paced to the tunnel mouth, boots grinding grit. The footprints stopped dead—size ten, laced patterns matching work boots sold at every Camden stall. She knelt, fingers hovering over the last print. Dust finer here, undisturbed beyond. No sweep marks, no residue.
Her watch beeped—low battery warning. Irrelevant. She flicked off the torch, letting eyes adjust. Gas lamps dimmed unnaturally, shadows pooling deeper in the tunnel. There—a shimmer. Faint ripple in the air, like heat haze over asphalt. Ozone spiked, biting her nostrils. She waved a hand; fingers tingled, chilled .
"See?" Eva murmured behind her, closer now. "Rift echo . Unstable. Victor's Compass went haywire warning him, but too late."
Quinn ignored her, mind piecing it. If a rift, killer phased in—left no entry prints. Struck with what? Energy blade? Wallet taken post-mortem, misdirection. Sovereigns bait, untouched to scream "supernatural." But why? Message to the Market?
She spun back to the body. Victor's eyes stared glassily, pupils blown wide , flecked with iridescent specks. Not drugs—Quinn pried one lid wider. Tiny crystals, embedded. She scraped a sample with a penknife, bagging it. "Poison? Or your rift residue?"
Eva peered. "Astral shards. From the other side. Inhale them, they shred from within. But the throat..."
Quinn's brain snapped connections. Wound first—distraction. Shards forced into eyes post-mortem, staging. No: eyes during, paralytic. Killer rifts in, pins arms (no bruises visible yet), slits throat with charged blade (cauterizes), jams shards to mimic curse. Footprints deliberate—real boots, phased out. Wallet rifled for a key item. She scanned the emptied billfold. Missing: a bone token, like hers.
"Token's gone," Quinn said aloud. "Entry pass. Killer needed it to return."
Eva blinked. "Or to stable the rift next time."
Quinn holstered her torch, resolve hardening. Evidence didn't add up because it wasn't mundane. Prints too perfect , ending theatrical. Blood absent, valuables pristine . Compass screaming rift. Morris's death replayed: similar burns, vanishing assailant. Shades. Cartels. Her clique leads—Aurora's crew—had been spotted near Camden rifts last week.
"Ellis!" she called. "Seal the tunnels. No one in or out till I say." To Eva: "You're with me. Walk me through your archives on Shade phasing. Every detail."
Eva hesitated, satchel creaking, then nodded. "It's not just phasing. They leave echoes —residual energy. Test the air around the prints."
Quinn did, waving her penknife through the shimmer. Static crackled, blue sparks dancing . Her skin crawled. "Christ." Deduction locked: not mugging. Assassination, rift-delivered. Killer knew the Market, knew Victor's stock. Motive? Compass led to unstable portals; Victor fencing one too hot. Her watch ticked louder in the hush.
As Forensics clattered in, Quinn pocketed a sovereign—evidence, or leverage. The Veil Market pulsed around them, stalls whispering secrets. She'd missed nothing now. The unnatural clicked into place: a hit from the shadows, and her clique's fingerprints all over it. Time to tear the veil wide.
But the Compass on the counter spun faster, needle locking south—toward the heart of Camden, where Aurora's flat squatted. Quinn's lips thinned. Bingo.
Word count: 1427