"That's what artificial means, yes," Sage tells him.
"Someone on campus," I say. "Or with access to campus resources. The wraith tracking seal on Thane was placed within the last forty-eight hours of the lockdown. If someoneis constructing Veil breach anchor points and placing tracking seals on students, they're not operating from a distance."
"The Headmaster signed off on three of the patrol reports," Sage says. "I noticed it when I was cross-referencing. His signature is on the reports that rated the site at level two and level four. The level six report went to a different administrator."
I let that sit for a moment.
"Why would the Headmaster personally sign off on patrol reports?" Malik asks.
"He wouldn't," Sage says. "Not normally. That's administrative work for junior faculty."
The tree line comes up ahead, a dark mass against the darker sky. We push through into the woods and the temperature drops further, the canopy cutting off the starlight, and Malik's shadow magic thickens around us with a quiet reassurance that makes the dark feel less absolute.
"When we get to the site," I say, "I need you both to stay back from the breach itself. If the anchor is artificial, I don't know how my null current is going to respond. The last thing I need is to pull energy from a constructed Veil breach with both of you in range."
"I wasn't planning to cuddle up to it," Sage says.
"Good. Keep that plan."
The quarry opens up through the trees without warning, a sudden absence of ground, the rock walls dropping thirty feet to a rubble floor below. We stop at the edge. Malik grabs Sage's sleeve automatically, pulling her half a step back from the rim.
The breach is visible. That's what stops me cold. Veil breaches aren't supposed to be visible. They're supposed to be detectable through instruments and trained perception, not visible with your eyes in the dark. But this one is visible: a vertical tear in the air above the quarry floor, twelve feet high and roughly four feet wide, its edges running with a light that isn't quite light,a luminescence that makes my eyes want to slide off it, like looking at a thing that doesn't want to be observed.
And around its base, sunk into the quarry rock at four equidistant points, are anchor stones.
Four of them, carved with sigil work I don't recognize, glowing with the same not-quite-light as the breach itself.
"That's not natural," Malik says.
"No," I agree.
"Who builds a Veil breach?" Sage asks. Her voice has gone very quiet.
"Someone who wants the wraiths to have a door," I say.
The implication hits all three of us. I watch Sage work through it, the same logic I followed, the patrol reports and the Headmaster's signatures and the tracking seal placed inside the lockdown perimeter. Someone with access to this quarry, to campus resources, to the patrol report schedule. Someone in a position to know when teams would and wouldn't be at the site.
"We need to document this," Malik says. "Photographs. Measurements if we can get them." He's already pulling a small recording charm from his jacket pocket, a Witch House tool, the kind that stores visual impressions in a crystal matrix.
"Do it fast," I say. "The breach is active and I don't know the wraith cycle at this site."
Malik moves along the rim, recording. Sage stays beside me, close enough that our shoulders are touching, and I'm grateful for the contact without saying so.
"Ryder is going to be furious," she says.
"Ryder is going to be worried first, then furious. He follows that order."
"Is that better or worse?"
"Worse," I admit. "The worry is harder to argue with."
Sage is quiet for a moment. Below us, the breach pulses once, a slow exhalation of that wrong light, and I feel my null current stir in response. Not pulling, not yet, but aware. Cataloguing.
"He broke his engagement," she says. Not pushing. Just saying it.
"I know."
"That's not a small thing, Angelic."
