The Veil Treaty

The Veil Treaty has often been compared to the United Nations by contemporary scholars, despite predating the UN's formation by eleven hundred years. The Veil Treaty was an agreement signed by representatives of various supernatural factions in 821 AD, swearing to limit their interference with the mundane world. It was brought forth by the horrors and the angels as a means to limit supernatural abuse and depredation. While most of the supernatural world opposed the treaty vehemently, most of the supernatural world also couldn't exactly stand up in a protracted conflicted with the Empyrean. And so they signed the treaty under duress, and have lived under its purview ever since.

The Veil itself part ritual and part political agreement--after it was signed, it took a choir of angels a full week to weave it into existence. As such, it didn't cover the whole world immediately. Instead, it flowed out from the Middle East along with the knowledge and culture that came along with the Islamic Golden Age. The Renaissance was sparked in part by the Veil Treaty finally reaching Europe. When new lands were discovered, ambassadors for the Veil Treaty would come and meet with the supernatural communities of the region and explain the way the world would now work--and the consequences for violating these new rules.

The Veil Treaty is today based out of London, after moving from Baghdad to Cairo to Fez. Originally, the Veil Treaty mostly concerned itself with ensuring that the Veil wasn't breached, enforcing the newly established separation between the magical and the mundane. However, the Veil soon became the venue for disputes within the supernatural community to be resolved, and then the representatives of the supernatural community to mundane governments. By the time the Veil Treaty relocated to London, it had become a sprawling bureaucracy with ties to governments from Beijing to Lisbon.

Today, the Veil Treaty is still concerned with maintaining the separation of the mundane and magical worlds, and it has agents still devoted to ensuring that the Veil is enforced. However the majority of its efforts are in providing services to the supernatural communities and handling issues on behalf of mundane governments. The Veil Treaty acts as the go-between for the powers of the mundane world and those of the supernatural world, keeping the delicate peace.

Modern members of the Veil Treaty include:

• The Archangel Council
• The Byfrost Group of Companies
• The Children of the Blood
• The City of Jewels
• The City of London
• The Committee of 300
• Death, on behalf of the reapers of the Underworld
• The Draculesti
• The Druids of Avalon
• Gaia, the spirit of the Earth
• The Invisible College
• The Kingdom Under the Mountain
• The Knights of Solomon's Temple (the Templars)
• The Lycan Nation, as represented by the Court of Wolves
• The Magnus Foundation
• The Mount Order Society
• The Order of Assassins
• The Orders of Atlantis
• The Order of the Rosy Cross
• The Parliament of Shadows
• The Priory of Scion
• The Seekers of Thoth
• The Skull and Bones Society
• The Society of the Green Dragon
• The Society of the Illuminated Eye (the Illuminati)
• The Summer Court of Faerie
• The United Nations
• The Vril Society
• The Winter Court of Faerie

Veil Councils

Though headquartered out of London, the Veil Treaty has become rather decentralized over its millennium of existence. Most issues are handled by a regional branch of the Treaty's operations, called a Veil Council. There are several hundred Veil Councils in the world, ranging in size from the great councils of Paris, Hong Kong, and New York to one guy who sits in a small office in Jamestown, St. Helena. Veil Councils are a place for members of the supernatural community to meet, solve disagreements, obtain service they are unable to from the mortal world, and the like. They're something like a shadow government for a region, regulating the world of magic just as a civil government regulates the mundane world.

And just like mundane governments, Veil Councils differ depending on where they're located. Most Veil Councils are urban affairs, given where most supernaturals live, and most cities with more than a million inhabitants has their own council dedicated to the city and its suburbs. There are also rural councils who hold sway over large geographic regions and represent the concerns of those supernaturals who still prefer the rural life. Even small towns have have a bustling Veil Council if they control a region with significant supernatural activity, such as Iqaluit in Canada, Timbuktu in Mali, and Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky in Russia. Indeed, Ushuaia, Argentina--on Tierra del Fuego--has one of the larger Veil Councils in the world, given how its territory includes all of Antarctica, and all the various mysteries buried under the ice.

The Ushuaia Veil Council is something of an exception, however. Most Veil Councils keep their territory strictly within the borders of one mundane nation--to do otherwise creates legal and jurisdictional uncertainty, especially for mundane governments who might not trust an organization located in another nation. Thus, every nation has at least one Veil Council located in their capitals--even small island states have at least a token Veil presence.

The Veil

The Veil works as something of a minor psychic suggestion, encouraging humans to ignore the supernatural, or to forget anything odd they've seen, leaving them with only odd memories and an unsettling feeling. Over the years, countless mages and artificers have learnt how to tap into the Veil's magic to hide their stores, towers, or sanctuaries from the eyes of humankind. Entire buildings have been veiled away through cleaver applications of thaumaturgy. Likewise, numerous supernatural races, such as dragons, fey, jinn, and horrors have learnt how to use the Veil to create human forms for themselves as a form of limited shapeshiftng to better disguise themselves within human society.

Of course, the Veil isn't perfect. Humans pierce it all time, naturally falling through gaps in the weave and seeing the truth for themselves. Likewise, the more a human is exposed to magic, the harder it is for the Veil to grab them and encourage them to forget again. A mage flinging a fireball in a busy mall, or a werewolf shapeshifting in a crowded street is likely to cause what is known as a Veil Breach--when numerous humans break the Veil's hold on them, and suddenly awaken to the truth of the world.

The Men in Black

That is where the Veil Treaty's agents come in. Though formally known as the Black Cloaks, they are more commonly known as the Men in Black. They investigate paranormal happenings across the world, and seek to restore a sense of normality, patching the Veil where they can, encouraging people to forget, modifying memories so the Veil can once again grab a hold of the awoken human. The Men in Blacks' mandate is to do everything possible to keep the Veil from falling. Though this can usually be achieved through espionage and illusion, sometimes they have to resort to tomb raiding, blackmail, and even assassination at times. However, the Men in Black believe this is all necessary to protect the mundane world from supernatural threats, and to protect the supernatural world from the threats of the mundane.

See, when the Veil Treaty was established, the supernatural factions had an upper hand on humanity. But now, the tables have turned. Humanity has advanced technologies such as modern firearms, jet planes, drones, and nuclear weapons. And there are also more humans now, as a percentage of the world's population. A supenatural might be able to hold off a dozen humans, but not ninety-nine.

And that's about percentage of 'sleepers'--or humans who are unaware the supernatural world. Ninety-nine per cent of the world is unaware that they share this world with ghosts and demons and dragons and spirits. Of the remaining one percent, a plurality are 'wakers', or mundane humans who happen to be aware of the supernatural world, seeing through the Veil. Most wakers are created by Veil breaches, but either are not caught, or agree to follow the Veil's rules and thus become counted as members of the supernatural world. And after that comes supernaturally gifted humans, such as mages, mediums, psychics, warlocks, hunters, and the like. Again, humans who happened to be awakened to the supernatural world, but have become supernatural themselves somehow--by fluke of birth, years of study, possession, pacts and rituals, radiation, mad science, or just being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Humanity dominates the world, and it is through the Veil that the supernatural races and factions preserve their lives, cultures, and communities. Though originally despised, the Veil has become a shelter, a sanctuary where those who are different can be themselves, without having to hide behind masks and lies.