An Uncommon Truth of Dying (Broken Veil Book 2)

by Marie Andreas

  Bart frowned. “Do you know who called them back?”

  “No, a few were called back four days ago, then the final six were asked to return a day ago—not long before you got here. I thought you knew? I believe they left most of their things as they told the mayor they would be back in a few hours.”

  “That’s not good,” Caradoc said. “But it might explain why so few London agents have been found. If someone was working with Nix and was high enough up the pecking order to call agents back?”

  Reece nodded. “And that would also tie into why some agents had been cloned or possessed. That way it was them who did the calling and the field agents would trust them. Greely must have been one too.”

  “We don’t know for certain.” Jones spoke up.

  “Has anyone heard from him since he vanished at the house?” Aisling wasn’t sure how she felt about Greely. “Honestly, he seemed too freaked out to have been a clone, replacement, or possessed. I think he was afraid of becoming one of those and took off after the attack on the house because he figured he was next.” She might not have Harlie’s mojo for sensing things, but she had intuition.

  Bart ran his fingers through his hair leaving it stuck up. “You may be right and I should have worked harder to find him. He might know more than he was letting on, but was too scared to speak of it.”

  “He might be trapped in that dome,” Reece said.

  “I don’t think so.” Bart went to one of the laptops and started doing searches of some kind. “He was upset, he didn’t trust anyone, because he knew some people had been replaced. But he wasn’t sure who. Would you stay in town if everyone you knew could be an enemy?”

  “No. But that just means he could be anywhere.” Maeve peered over Bart’s shoulder. “What’s Langertown? I was born in the U.K. and never heard of it.”

  Bart grinned. “And you wouldn’t have. It’s shut down now, has been for over fifty years. But in the heyday of spying, it was where all the secrets were kept and worked on. There’s nothing of value there now, they cleared it out decades ago. But if I were trying to hide, and I were Greely, I’d be hiding there. They had an underground bunker that was fully stocked with rations and water that would last a hundred years.” He tapped the monitor. “If we want Greely, that’s where we go.”

  Chapter Forty-Three

  “I know he was your friend, but how much help is he going to be if he’s that terrified?” Reece frowned. “I saw him in action, he was almost shaking when we were at the house that got pulled under. He probably does know a lot, but he won’t trust us either.” He joined Maeve in peering over Bart’s shoulder. Disadvantage of being short, everyone could look over you.

  “I think we have to bring in every resource we can.” Caradoc was building another screen on the murder board laptop, but clearly still listening. “As I see it, there are two distinct situations going on.” He expanded the screen. “Nix is over here. We have to assume he did get pulled through the veil when he escaped—whether it was his choice is another issue. He came back as clones of some sort and was working on gaining replacements of people in high places. He also either took over using a glamour, or persuaded the HLF to join him and made them more visible. You said they’re not violent, yet they’ve been tied to some violent cases the past two weeks.”

  “But why pull them in?” Aisling asked.

  “Because he’s trying to gain control of the world and has decided to go start back at home,” Caradoc said. “Increasing distrust between humans and fey could help him. His prior attempt was to remove the other fey, leaving him with power in a land of magicless humans.”

  Aisling looked at the board. It was twisted, but made sense. She took a marker and added, Who on the High Council is he working with. “Harlie said there had been evidence of a few massively delayed spells. Things Nix used to his advantage, but wouldn’t have been strong enough to have created.”

  “It wasn’t the spells that were delayed though, it was the reactions, the backlash of what they created with those spells. That was what they held back.” Harlie moved to the screen. “Massive spells create a reaction throughout the natural world; someone delayed two that I can tell. One a few hundred years ago, the other even longer. It could be as far back as the first crossing to this world.”

  “Would there have been any advantage to have hidden the magic they used when they burst through the veil and crossed over?” Maeve was focused on Nix, but she could split her annoyance.

  “I was there, young in age, but I crossed.” Dailten also stared at the screen, but turned back with a shrug. “There was no magic on this side, nothing. That was one of the reasons our people chose it.” She nodded at everyone’s looks, even Harlie’s. “Yes, you hadn’t heard that had you? There are a number of worlds through the veil. Ours was dying and we were under attack from beings stronger than us. This one was magicless and beautiful. So the High Council selected it. But, the only reason to delay a spell reaction is to not let other magic users notice it. There were no magic users here when we crossed, so there would be no reason for a delay on the spell reaction.”

  “Excellent point.” Caradoc stepped back from the board, scowling at something only he could see—or didn’t see. “At any time, was there a large enough spell that someone would have wanted to keep hidden?”

  “The only other large spell would have been when the High Council saved the humans from the Black Plague.” Harlie added it randomly to the board. “I was born before then, and was old enough to understand that the humans were extremely ill. There were more of them than us by that point, we reproduced much slower than they did back then. By the time the High Council found a way to save them, they were less than half our population.” He tilted his head. “But why would they need to hide that? All of the fey knew what the Council was doing. The spell to remove the plague almost took the lives of a few of the Council, but humanity was saved.”

  “And left almost sterile.” Jones stood back from the board and folded his arms.

  “Humanity was on the brink of dying out,” Bart said. “And they are working on the sterility issue.”

  “Or are they?” Stella shook her head. “Along with her theories that we’d left fey behind the veil, my aunt had been looking into studies of the Black Death and the cure—not long before she was killed.”

  “The Council always gives a report on the status. It’s slow going, but they are optimistic. I believe human conception was up again this year.” Harlie looked like he was trying more to convince himself than anyone else.

  “Yes, we’re up to 2.7 percent.” Maeve looked around. “I’m not blaming anyone here. But there is a lot of talk about feet being dragged in searching for a cure. People are getting angry.”

  “And we’re back to Nix using that anger and pulling in the HLF.” Aisling looked at the board. “How old is he? Nix, I mean.”

  “Random, but let me see.” Caradoc pulled up a new browser window but swore as he had to go through a few attempts. “This information was hidden; but he crossed the veil as an adult.”

  Dailten came over to him. “Let me see his picture, please? I don’t recognize the name, but it’s not that uncommon.” She swore at a level that Bart even blanched at as she saw his photo. “That one. He wasn’t supposed to cross over. We did leave people behind, criminals who were waiting death.” She glanced to Stella. “But I doubt that’s what your aunt meant. This one, his name back then was Nicolox Langhit. He was wanted for going on a murder spree a few years before we left.” Her fist clenched and unclenched and she looked over to Maeve. “I won’t fight you for the right to kill him, but I would like to help. And destroy his body to such small remains that he can never come back. He murdered many of my friends.”

  Stella took her arm and led her to one of the chairs. Dailten seemed stunned as well as pissed.

  “I’m thinking we’re finding out answers to questions we didn’t know we had.” Harlie sat on the other side of Dailten and patted her hand. “We still
don’t know what spell could have needed to be blocked. The effort to push a spell reaction back a few thousand years would be massive.”

  Aisling studied the board. Harlie was right, they were building more questions, but no answers. “We need to find the relationships. If Nix came through when the other death row prisoners couldn’t, he had help. Whoever helped him is who told him about the spell reaction and enabled him to utilize it. But why, if he wasn’t supposed to have left in the first place, would he want to go back, even for a short while?” Aisling looked over to Harlie, Stella, and Dailten. “Are there cases of people going there and coming back here? Ever?”

  “No.” Dailten was obviously still processing Nix’s being here, but she answered quickly. “In the first years, a few did try to go back. Most were killed and their remains found on this side of the veil. A few vanished and a search for them on the magical planes indicated they had made it past the veil. The extremely powerful magic users were even able to make contact with some of them across the veil. All they knew was that the people who survived the crossing desperately wanted to come back to this world. But they couldn’t. The veil wouldn’t let them pass back.”

  “Yet, Nix appears to have crossed back and forth.” Aisling knew this wasn’t going to be a happy thought, but it struck her as true. “I’m not just saying this because I hate her, but pretty sure our mother and the rest of the High Council are working with Nix, probably have been from the beginning, and did some nasty spell of some sort 1700 years ago.”

  Caradoc scowled. “That was the Black Plague spell. One they had no reason to hide from anyone.”

  “Unless they added something to it.” Aisling glanced to Maeve and Jones as the only two pure humans in the room. “Something that would keep the original owners of this world beholden to the High Council.” She felt sick. Her mother was a nasty, vile, woman. But to have gone that far? That was beyond anything she could have imagined. But the pieces fell into place too well.

  The silence that followed was heavy.

  Even Harlie looked like he wasn’t sure what she was saying. “Are you...”

  “I think that when they were saving humanity from the Black Death, our mother and her people, all the ones in power, did something to change the way humans reproduced. They made sure that the fey would be the dominant species in this world. And humanity would be dependent on them. Isn’t it odd that some humans can be assisted with magic to reproduce, yet they can’t fix everyone?” She felt sick saying it and it was hard to meet Maeve’s eyes. Maeve never indicated that she wanted kids, but Aisling knew many humans just ignored that thought altogether since the odds were so stacked against them. Getting the special conception treatment of magic took a lot of time and money. Even then it wasn’t always successful.

  Maeve looked pissed, but then she nodded to Aisling. “I think you’re right. But just because some of your people, your mother, might have done this, doesn’t mean all fey did. And if they pushed back the reaction to the spell they did to slow down our reproduction, they did it because they knew most fey wouldn’t agree.”

  “This is huge. If it’s true and it got out, there would be a war.” As a breed, Reece was on both sides, and from the look on his face, both sides were terrified.

  “Which would be a damn good reason to construct a long-time spell reaction delay.” Stella shook her head. “I would have no idea how they did what we think they did, but the magic involved would be powerful.”

  “And I can’t imagine any fey agreeing with that being done. Or how in the hell we can prove it if true.” Caradoc looked ready to break something. Not a common reaction from him.

  He had a good point. This was just a theory, but even if it felt true given what they were learning of the High Council, but there was currently no way to verify that was what happened.

  Everyone stayed in their own thoughts until Aisling rattled them out of it. “We have some terrifying speculations of what might have happened back then, and while they might help us to figure out what we’re up against, they aren’t currently the direct source of our problems. If Nix is trying to create a human world that he can rule, he’s not working with the High Council on everything. Most likely he’s double crossing them. We need to look at what’s happening now, and stop it.” Not to mention, if her theory was right, it was too massive to face right now.

  “And figure out why the veil is breaking through so much.” Harlie said. “It’s not just the magic of the first ones that keeps it closed, they did use spells. But it’s the very nature of the veil that keeps it closed. If it fails completely, all of the worlds it divides will fall into each other. I don’t have to point out how very bad that would be.”

  Bart watched the speculation, but stayed silent. He finally got to his feet. “I’m reversing my earlier assessment. I want everyone to see the building crash site, before we hunker in to save the world. Then I’ll break everyone up into teams.” He looked at his watch. “Narissa and the agents with her should be here soon. The others aren’t flyers and she wants to stay together. I say we don’t let anyone in on this newest theory until we know for certain and can prove it. Aisling could very well be right, but the news of that could destroy this world.”

  Aisling kept watching Maeve and Jones. Both had been furious at her theory—she had a feeling it was because deep down it felt right to them. She couldn’t imagine why her mother and the High Council had gone so far. Yes, before the Black Death, there were more humans than fey. Had that continued, fey would be a massive minority right now. But to basically sterilize an entire species? Humans didn’t have magic, so even as a much smaller population, the fey would be able to hold their own. The actions of her mother and cohorts were inexcusable.

  Everyone except Harlie and Dailten walked down the road to the building drop. They were going to try reaching out to the other precogs they stayed in contact with and see if any of them had any information about the dome over London.

  Dailten’s barn/meeting room was only a block away from the building drop and Stella, Maeve, and Aisling walked down the road together.

  “I thought you’d stay with Harlie and Dailten?” Aisling asked Stella.

  “Naw. I do like Dailten though, she reminds me of my aunt. But those two have gifts I don’t.”

  Maeve dropped one arm around Aisling’s shoulders and hugged her. “I meant what I said by the way. If your theory does turn out to be true, it won’t change how I feel about any of you here. Or any fey beyond the assholes who might have been behind that spell.”

  “Thank you. I still can’t...damn it.” Aisling hugged her back. “The entire time they’ve been working for a cure, and they might have been the ones who caused it.” She stopped as a thought hit her. “Heike. She couldn’t have kids when I first met her, then she joins the dark side and suddenly has three. They do have a cure, but are using it as incentive for humans who will help them. Damn it, this keeps getting worse.” Heike had been a good friend in the police department years ago. Then the two drifted apart. She came back working for Nix. And trying to get Aisling killed.

  Maeve tightened her hug and they walked forward in silence.

  This building drop looked like the others, even though Harlie had tried to explain why it was different to her briefly before they left L.A.. She hadn’t understood a single thing he said beyond that Noth was a nexus of magic lines and the veil should have been thicker here.

  Dug into the ground before them was a piece of beige building, looking worse for wear, with cracks radiating out from it. Melted vehicles showed what had finally stopped it as there was rock hard goo trailing out from the hole to them.

  Maeve stalked forward to the goo. “Is everything beyond the veil green goo? Didn’t put it together before, but the building goo is green, whatever came up from underneath in London was green from what you said, that Nix clone you told me about melted down to green goo, and the dome strangling London is green. Did the fey flee because of an influx in green goo?”


  Caradoc was off to the side, walking along the edge with one of his gizmos and scowling at some more petrified goo. “Unlike Dailten, I’ve never been on the other side, but it could be a chemical reaction to being here. The building was from our world, but going through the veil changed it.” He looked over to Reece and Jones. “The first fall didn’t have any goo, did it?”

  Jones shook his head. “Not only no goo, green or otherwise, but the building was in a better state than any of the ones I’ve seen since then.”

  “My question is, what does our veil expert think?” Reece had his arms folded and watched Bart stalk around the hole.

  Bart finally looked up. “Harlie is back in the barn, Dailten too.”

  “And Mott recognized you from a successful academic paper on the veil.” Aisling joined Reece in the folded arms and glare brigade. It might have been a while ago, but the veil was still the veil. Maybe understanding more of how it was before could help them figure out what Nix had done to it.

  “That was...fine.” His defense fell as all of them looked at him. “It was a long time ago. I was fascinated by the changes in the veil since records started being kept. They are obscure and hard to find, but there has been a study of the veil and its functions since a few hundred years after we first crossed over to this side. Apparently, when the fey were on the other side, there was no thought or discussion about the veil. They could feel it, see it in ways we aren’t able to over here. But it just was. They never thought about what might be on the other side until things started getting bad.” He coughed. “I could go on about that for a while. But the pertinent points were that the veil was consistent, as far as these reports indicated, until about two hundred years ago. Then there were wobbles; little breaks, times when it got thinner, but then it would solidify again. My research paper was that these incidents of breaking down or thinning were getting worse and increasing in frequency. But there seemed to be no event or weather pattern, nothing to tie the issues to. They were random in all appearances.”