An Uncommon Truth of Dying (Broken Veil Book 2) Read online

  “That’s what happened—well, part of what I saw.” Stella got up and hit the replay on the screen. “They showed me this when I got back, thought maybe I’d sent a spell. But I was busy grabbing the rubble.” She showed the clip of Aisling and the snog beast running past. Aisling watched as the vallenian popped into place. She looked around the room. “None of you see him, do you?”

  “Not at all. It’s only you and that creature. I am sorry you are going through this.” Harlie’s concern was genuine. “But this reinforces our hypothesis that the vallenians are tied to, and protecting, you for some reason.”

  “No box this time?” Maeve looked more curious than concerned.

  “No, nothing.”

  “What’s that?” Maeve frowned, got to her feet, and came closer. “That necklace that’s barely showing under your shirt? I’ve never seen it before.”

  “I’m not wearing a—” Aisling dropped her words as her hand went to her throat. She did own a few necklaces, just didn’t wear jewelry much. And she knew she didn’t put anything on this morning. How she hadn’t felt this before, she had no idea. But yup. There was a silver Celtic knot pendant within a triangle on a chain, simple, but unusually delicate. And not one she’d seen before. She tried to find the clasp, but the chain was a solid link.

  “Lift it over your head, it’s long enough.” Maeve looked ready to start pulling.

  “I didn’t have this thing before I went out there.” Aisling tried, but it wouldn’t budge past her ears. “That vallenian gave me a necklace that won’t come off? Someone help me get this damn thing off.” She tugged on it, but while it didn’t hurt her as it should have, it also wasn’t coming off. She could lift it enough to look at the pendant, that was all.

  Everyone clustered around and took turns trying to remove the necklace. Even Harlie’s magic didn’t work. Caradoc was breathing down her neck as he looked at the chain. “This looks like pure silver. No links, just a strand of unbreakable, unnatural silver.”

  They heard the first door open and everyone scattered along the large table pretending they were focusing on the screens. Of course, Area 42 had taken all of the rubble and left so there wasn’t much to look at.

  Reece and Jones came in together, neither looking happy. Jones held back as he saw everyone who was there. He was a tall, thin human, deliberately nondescript in appearance with short black hair and an angular face. He always looked like he was thinking of the best way to disable or kill someone. Aisling used to be a bit on edge around him, the trained killer persona was painfully evident. Now it was comforting to have someone that deadly on their side.

  “You weren’t kidding.” After his initial pause, he came into the room, nodded his hellos, and took a seat. He was unflappable.

  “Shouldn’t you still be with them? They just hauled it all away.” Aisling wanted to figure out the necklace and that damn vallenian, but she wasn’t bringing either up to Reece or Jones yet.

  “They asked us questions, had us help chase the LAPD out, then sent us on our way.” Reece threw himself into a chair.

  Jones looked around the room. “So we’re all working together now? I’m fine with that if we are, not happy with certain agencies. As long as we don’t do anything that should be reported to them within the guidelines that both Reece and I have in our contracts—I’m good.”

  Even Reece lifted an eyebrow at that. Aisling was sure that was the longest thing she’d ever heard Jones say. “Yup, that’s the plan. Now, what were you all doing?”

  Stella nodded to the remains of food. “We were eating and watching you all do your important work. Caradoc and Mott were trying to take apart those trackers. You two want something to eat?” She was all ready at the door when she finished her question. Which, from the look on her face, wasn’t a question. They were getting something, it just depended on if it was going to be something they wanted.

  “The usual for me. Thanks, Stella.” If Reece had an idea that there was something else going on, he wasn’t showing it.

  Jones smiled. “A bowl of stew would be lovely. Thank you.”

  She nodded twice and left.

  “Now, what were you really up to?” Reece looked around the room. “Something caused a mess at the crime scene. I didn’t see them, but the reports were that a blonde woman and some weird creature ran down Towsling Street. Then both vanished, and something blew most of our agents over. There was no evidence of any type of explosive device, yet a few agents went back as far as ten feet.”

  “And why would we have been involved with that? Just because your people got tossed about by some wind doesn’t mean we did anything.” Maeve folded her arms and glared.

  “Jones and I were being talked down to by Captain Driyflin at the time and missed most of it.” He smiled at Aisling.

  “What? It’s not my fault she went after you. Or was it?” He might have been grinning because the person with the monster was a blonde woman. She’d lead him away from that.

  “She wasn’t happy about the lack of people brought in on that FBI case, but I convinced her that you all had nothing to do with the fake FBI crew, or whoever was behind them. I was thinking that since a blonde had been involved in the parking lot...what’s that necklace?”

  Aisling was willing to take the distraction. He might not have actually seen her, but her description with shades and a hat could be any number of a few thousand women in a ten-mile radius.

  “This? I’ve had it for ages. You’ve never seen a triskele before?” She held the pendant up.

  “You weren’t wearing that when I left.” He narrowed his eyes.

  Caradoc gave Reece a raised eyebrow. “Yeah, she was. She’s been wearing it since everything went into the shitter a week ago. It’s a family good luck charm.”

  Reece got up and sat in the chair next to Aisling. “I would have noticed that.”

  She tucked it under her shirt. “Even if it was covered by my shirt? You only saw me for a short while.”

  Stella came in with food for Reece and Jones and refills for any who wanted them. She sat the food down then looked at the Aisling/Reece tableau. “What’s wrong?”

  “Reece thinks he’s never seen Aisling’s necklace before.”

  It was still hidden by her shirt, but Stella nodded. “The triskele? She’s been wearing it each time I’ve seen her. Are you just not paying attention? And I thought you were a super spy.”

  Reece looked around the room, even Jones shrugged. “Don’t look at me, I haven’t seen her since we lost Nix.” He slid over the photos that had been left out on the table. There were only two and both pictures had familiar red hair. The rest of Grundog’s file must have been scooped up by Stella when she left. “Speaking of which. We have a lead on the bastard?”

  “One that I found, thank you very much.” Stella looked ready to take the pictures back but folded her arms instead. “Grundog has some connections and got those two photos to me. She knew Aisling and Maeve would be interested.”

  Aisling hid her smile. Stella was good. She’d sacrificed two pictures to keep the rest of the items hidden. And distracted Reece from the necklace. She didn’t want him or Jones knowing about it until she had a better idea where it came from and what in the hell it did. Those two might be currently estranged from Area 42, but they were still agents of it.

  She resolved to wear turtlenecks until summer came or they could figure out what the damn necklace was and how to get it off her.

  “Where were these taken? When? Does MI-6 know?” Reece asked without looking up as he and Jones examined the photos.

  Aisling shared a smile with Stella as Caradoc moved over to the other two.

  “A coffee shop in Cardiff, a few days ago, and no idea. They don’t share things with us.” Stella got just the right amount of snark in the last line.

  “This has to be reported.” Reece looked up earnestly.

  Maeve shook her head. “I’m the closest thing you have to an MI-6 agent. And they have not thrown me unde
r the shitter as some people have. Yet I say let them find their own copies.”

  Aisling knew the comment was for show. If Maeve seriously thought MI-6 didn’t know where Nix was, or at least where he had been, she would be scanning those photos to them in a heartbeat. Maeve was in a non-active but still on-call status with them and had been the entire time she’d been working with Aisling. With Aisling only finding that out a few weeks ago.

  “Do you want to show them to Area 42?” Stella didn’t sound concerned which meant she had far more interesting things in her envelope that she wasn’t sharing yet.

  “We can talk about it,” Reece said as he stacked the photos in the center of the table.

  “Okay, so then do you want to tell us about that pile of building?” Aisling held up her hand before Reece could respond. “Yes, I know that you two weren’t included in the investigation, which doesn’t mean you weren’t noticing things.” She still wasn’t sure what was up between her and Reece, but that was a separate, and definitely private, issue. Depending on what Reece said here, and even Jones would help determine if they could all trust each other professionally.

  “Not a lot. That section of building hit with enough force to crack the parking lot like a glass plate. It didn’t come from high above, but appeared five, maybe ten feet above the ground.”

  Harlie nodded. “It was falling for a while before it broke through. That makes sense.”

  Jones narrowed his eyes. “Broke through?”

  Aisling nodded. “Harlie believes the building, or whatever that chunk was, is what popped open the veil.”

  “And what’s keeping it open,” Harlie said. “It’s quite wedged open at the moment.

  “Seriously? That’s not possible.” Jones looked like he was about to reach for his phone, then dropped his hand.

  Aisling looked from one to the other. Yes, they’d been censured by Area 42, but for them to not pass on important information? That wasn’t like them. “What’s really going on? I don’t believe you two wouldn’t report things like Nix or a possible break in the veil to your captain.”

  Reece ran his hands through his hair. “Something in Area 42 is compromised. The system was showing cracks before the disaster, and it’s only been worse since then. We’re working with Captain Driyflin but there’s something wrong with one or more of her bosses above her. She doesn’t know exactly what’s wrong and we sure as hell can’t tell. She cut all of us, and kept you all out, to try and keep people safe.”

  “That’s why you and Garran and Surratt formed your little support group.” It made sense in a way. Before the building had been taken, Area 42 had a problem with agents being taken out in their private homes. Their hidden, secretive, private homes. Aisling had speculated they had a mole. Reece had insisted it was something else. One of the times she’d hoped to be wrong.

  “Yes. Speaking of which, neither were happy about us expanding our group, nothing personal, everyone is just a little paranoid now. We should see if we can pull their holograms back.” Reece tried calling both, but from the sound of the voice mails, neither picked up.

  “So these bad higher-ups are who gave my inventions to the fake FBI and possibly a few other random evil groups?” Mott had been watching everyone. At least once he’d finished building whatever spec he’d been working on his pad. He didn’t look any happier than anyone else.

  “They might have been. We don’t have a lot of information.” Jones joined the unhappy club.

  “What do you know? We gave you Nix, what do you have?” Aisling looked between both of them.

  Reece nodded. “That building was part of the Area 42 complex. I believe Harlie might be right that it crashed through the veil. Which means the rest of it is probably still on the other side.”

  Chapter Nine

  “I don’t see how. But it’s not my area of expertise.” Jones shook his head and turned to Harlie. “I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know as much about the veil as the average fey, let alone you. But wouldn’t we have noticed if the veil opened long enough to suck an entire complex up? The building was large, but the underground portion was massive. I crawled around down in the pit for two days. It’s all gone.”

  “You’re right,” Harlie said. “There was a psychic impact, one that was felt by precogs when the building portion crashed through the veil just a short while ago. It also caused a physical disturbance. There would have been an even worse one when the entire building vanished if it went through the veil.”

  Jones narrowed his eyes. “You’re saying it didn’t go through the veil, but this piece of it came back through the veil? That’s a direct contradiction.”

  Aisling settled back in her chair. She hadn’t known Harlie most of her life. But in the past month, she’d learned a lot. Such as his dropping into lecturing mode on topics that most normal people had no clue about. Jones made the wrong observation. She noticed that Caradoc and Maeve settled back as well. The others, including Mott, were leaning forward.

  “Now, that is what it seems to be, isn’t it?” Harlie’s current grin probably terrified the Nepalese in the village below the cave he lived in for a few hundred years. “But time is different between the land past the veil and here. Oh, it moves the same, but at a different rate of influence. A fascinating phenomenon but it would take a few months to explain it to anyone clearly. Not to mention that there was an impact.” He turned to Aisling. “You mentioned that this Nix person got pulled up and a massive wind filled those tunnels? Right about the time Area 42 was being taken?”

  “Wait, you’re saying that Nix was taken beyond the veil and managed to come back?” Reece wasn’t narrowing his eyes like Jones, but there was a good amount of doubt on his face.

  “Yes.” Harlie’s smile had gone beyond scary and into the complete and utter terrifying range. “Makes sense, doesn’t it? Things from our world aren’t meant to be on the other side. The building had never been over there, so it had no resonance with the old world. Even if Nix had been one of the ones who crossed originally, thousands of years would have changed him too much to fit there either. None of us can go back.”

  “The veil spit them out. I agree with spitting Nix out.” Maeve snarled whenever she said his name.

  “In a manner of speaking, yes.”

  Aisling was following things, barely. “Wait, so if the things that got pulled through the veil are coming back, where in the hell is the rest of this massive building? Not to mention the people who were in it.” She turned to Reece and Jones. “There were no people or bodies in what you found, right?” They hadn’t seen any on the screen, but they couldn’t see below the top layer of rubble.

  Reece gave a quick head-shake but didn’t say anything. At least that was good news. Hopefully.

  Harlie barreled on. “That’s where the time displacement issue arrives, I’m afraid. The rest could come through anywhere or any when. The people could be alive or dead. Others might have been pulled through as well. You might want to have a global search for mass missing persons about the time the building vanished. However, the thing we need to focus on is the displaced reaction.”

  Everyone was giving him the same look Jones had.

  “You lost us.” Caradoc shook his head.

  “Only the more powerful precogs felt the true impact of the veil opening this time and that chunk of building falling into this world. But all of us felt the physical side—the building shaking.” He waited until everyone nodded. “That was only a small portion of the actual power that opening caused. The rest will hit us at another time. Earthquakes, tsunamis, who knows. The point is that was part of it, not all of it. The impact wasn’t the reaction of the building or Nix being pulled through the veil—it was how it went through. The physical and psychic impact will be massive. And could hit at any time. It could come in waves.”

  Reece still looked lost. “We’re waiting for a reaction of some sort, one that will most likely be catastrophic wherever it happens. We might also have more ext
remely large sections of building crashing anywhere. Also, I assume, random and unpredictable.” He looked to Harlie for confirmation but frowned more when it was given, “And there’s nothing we can do about any of it?”

  “You were right until the end bit.” Harlie wiggled his fingers at him. “I believe that Caradoc, Mott, and myself can create a program to predict the returns. It will still take time and require all of your equipment here plus more that you’ll need to get.”

  Maeve stood, leaned on the table, and glared at everyone. “What can we do now? Right now. I’m glad you three can hopefully figure out how to stop things from destroying us unexpectedly, but I need to do something now. And Nix is alive out there somewhere. I’d like to take care of that situation.”

  Reece’s phone buzzed. “Garran, I assume that you and Surratt saw? They kicked us out not long before the clean-up.” There were almost five minutes of talking from Garran’s end with only minor sounds of agreement from Reece. “I agree on all of that. However, we have a roomful over here and there’s been some updates you two need to know about.”

  There was a flicker near the front screen, then a second one. Then both Garran and Surratt shimmered into being.

  Reece hung up the phone. “Let me start by saying, everything is worse than we thought.”

  “We’ve news as well, but judging by the looks on your faces, I’m going to suggest you go first.” Garran nodded.

  Reece and Harlie filled them in about the veil, the building, and the possible world-destroying return of the energy used to move the building and its parts coming back into this world.

  “That’s hard to believe, and if it came from anyone other than Harlie, I’d say you’re all drugged. Not enough people know about the mechanics of the veil to even come up with good questions. I think our ancestors thought that once we were over here, we didn’t have to worry.” Surratt leaned back on something outside of the range of the hologram. He was still pale and gaunter than usual, and he was leaning back because he needed to, judging by the wince on his face. Even though he hadn’t been killed, he’d still been injured when he was ambushed.