Run: 2026-02-24-01KJ8VYH1CCM5D5G4PJQMFGYWB

The rain fell in steady, cold sheets, turning the neon glow of Soho into smears of colour on slick black asphalt. Detective Harlow Quinn leaned against a damp brick wall in the shadow of a fire escape, the collar of her trench coat turned up. The worn leather watch on her left wrist felt heavy with moisture. Her eyes, brown and unblinking, were fixed on the distinctive green neon sign that spelled out ‘The Raven’s Nest’. Water dripped from the closely cropped salt-and-pepper hair plastered to her scalp. Movement at the door. The heavy oak door swung inward, spilling a wedge of amber light and the low thrum of conversation onto the wet pavement. A figure emerged, pulling a hood up against the rain. Even in the poor light, Quinn recognised the set of the shoulders, the way he moved with a paramedic’s efficient grace. Tomás Herrera. He glanced left, then right, his hand going to the Saint Christopher medallion at his throat. A nervous tell. Quinn pushed off the wall, her movement a study in military precision. She’d been waiting three hours for this. Three years of dead ends and the ghost of Morris’s laugh in her ear, and tonight, maybe, a thread to pull. She kept a half-block behind, using the evening crowd as cover—theatre-goers huddled under umbrellas, late-shift workers hurrying home. Herrera moved with purpose, not haste, down Dean Street, then cut through a narrow alley that stank of wet garbage and stale beer. The rain muffled her footsteps, but he was alert. He looked over his shoulder once, twice, and then his pace quickened. “Herrera! Metropolitan Police! Stop right there!” Her voice cut through the drumming rain. He froze for a split second, then broke into a sprint. Quinn cursed under her breath and gave chase. Her shoes slipped on the greasy cobbles of the alley. He was fast, younger, fueled by panic. He burst out onto a broader street, dodging between a black cab and a delivery van, the horn blaring. Quinn followed, her sharp jaw set, breath burning in her lungs. Eighteen years on the force, but desk work had softened her edges. She pushed the thought of Morris away. “Tomás! It doesn’t have to be like this!” He didn’t answer. He vaulted over a low iron railing, dropped into a sunken service area, and was gone. Quinn skidded to the edge. A metal staircase led down into darkness. She hesitated for only a heartbeat, then descended, hand on the service pistol at her hip. The air grew colder, smelling of damp concrete and something else—ozone, and a faint, coppery tang. The staircase ended in a brick-lined tunnel, part of the old utility labyrinth beneath the city. A single, flickering bulb illuminated a junction. She heard running footsteps echoing from the left-hand passage. She ran, the tunnel walls closing in. The sound of the rain faded, replaced by the drip of water and her own ragged breathing. The tunnel opened abruptly into a vast, cavernous space. The abandoned Tube station. Camden Town, the old Northern line platform. But it wasn’t abandoned now. Quinn stopped dead, her hand falling away from her gun. The platform was alive. Dozens of stalls constructed from scrap wood and moth-eaten velvet lined the walls, lit by lanterns that burned with a weird, greenish flame. Figures moved in the gloom—some human, some decidedly not. A creature with skin like tree bark haggled over a bundle of dried herbs. A woman with eyes that reflected the light like a cat’s examined a row of gleaming blades. The air hummed with low conversation, the clink of glass, and that same ozone smell, now overwhelming. The Veil Market. And there, thirty yards away, standing at a stall, was Tomás Herrera. He was talking urgently to a hooded vendor, gesturing with his hands. The scar on his left forearm was visible as his sleeve rode up. He hadn’t seen her yet. Between Quinn and the market floor was a makeshift archway of rusted train tracks and animal bones. A figure stood beneath it, blocking the way. Tall, thin, wrapped in a long coat that seemed to drink the light. Its face was hidden in shadow, but one long-fingered hand was extended, palm up. Quinn took a step forward. The figure did not move. “You lack the token.” The voice was dry, like leaves scraping over stone. “Metropolitan Police. I’m in pursuit of a suspect.” A low, rasping sound that might have been laughter. “Your authority ends at the arch, detective. This is not your city. The token.” She looked past the guardian. Herrera was finishing his transaction, accepting a small, cloth-wrapped package from the vendor. He turned, his eyes scanning the crowd, and then they locked onto hers. His face went pale. He mouthed a single word that looked like “Don’t,” then melted back into the throng, heading for a darker tunnel at the far end of the platform. Her every instinct screamed to go after him. This was it. The lead. The thing Morris had stumbled into. A hidden world operating right under their noses. But the guardian was still there, an immovable object. She saw no weapon, but the air around it crackled with static. The green lantern light glinted off things in the shadows that she couldn’t quite identify—shapes that moved wrong. She could rush it. Draw her weapon. Announce herself. She was Harlow Quinn, with eighteen years and a commendation for bravery. She had faced armed robbers, knife-wielding addicts, a serial killer with a taste for trophies. But she had never faced anything that made the hair on her neck stand up like this. Morris had been a good detective, a better partner. He’d followed a hunch into a warehouse in Wapping one night and never walked out. The official report said structural collapse. Quinn had seen the photos. The concrete had looked… melted. And in the rubble, they’d found a single, perfect feather that shone like oil on water. She’d kept it in her desk drawer for a year before throwing it into the Thames. Herrera was getting away. The package in his hand could be evidence. Medicine for the clique, or something worse. Banned alchemical substances. Information. The guardian’s hand remained outstretched. “The token, or you turn back.” The rain from the world above was a distant memory. Here, the only water was the perpetual drip from the curved ceiling. The market’s din was a low, alien chorus. She was exposed on the threshold, a woman in a sodden trench coat in a place where the rules were written in something other than law. She could step back. Return to the rain-slick streets, to her case files and her cold, empty flat. She could file a report no one would believe. She could let the ghost of Morris fade a little more, becoming just another regret. Or she could step forward.