It was a rainy evening in Worthsmist and within the office of Felix Investigations. Petra Isaac sat at her desk reading a letter with disappointment in her eyes. Her finger tapped rapidly on her messy desktop. Her cat Felix stared up at her. He meowed and she translated it mentally as a sound of concern whether or not that was really what he had been saying. “Friend, are you okay? Do you need me near?” she thought he said.

She sighed, bringing a hand through her hair. She hadn’t taken a shower in a couple of days and it was greasy. She was a mess. 

“Felix, it’s really not looking good.” She said quietly. “I think this may be the end.”

The letter had been from a client, her only client at present. He was Sir Henry Plowmann, a man who had come from meagre means but had been granted a knighthood by the king for defeating a massive reptilian beast which had already destroyed a handful of villages. She had read all about him when he came to hire her for her services. He had wanted her to find someone he hadn’t seen since he was a child, but who had become a great source of inspiration to him.

The letter wasn’t good. Sir Henry had written that he had heard the rumours about her and was going to take his business to another private investigator. She threw the letter down on her desk and stood up. “What other investigator? There aren’t many people who would take this case with so little information!” she shouted. She grew quieter, tears filling her eyes. “If not even a knight will accept my services then what can I do?”

Felix came to rub himself against her leg and purr. She crouched down and put her hand into his soft fur. “I’m sorry Felix, if only you had a better human.” He pushed himself into her hand. She didn’t want to say it, but she wished that she had never taken that murder case.

That case had been easy. Petra had been surprised by that. Usually, the clues for a murder case were either really cryptic or well hidden. If it was obvious who the culprit was then the police would have already dealt with it. She had been hired by a child of the victim because the case had gone cold. The police weren’t getting that far with it, so they passed it on to someone more specialized in solving mysteries.

If only she had turned back once she saw all of the obvious clues. The victim had a planned meeting with someone the night they were murdered. There were bloodied clothes left at the scene of the crime which would have only belonged to someone very well off such as a royal. On the night of the murder, any potential witnesses sped away from her as she asked them about who had come in and out of the small townhouse the victim had lived in alone. Even with her magic, she was able to get the victim to name their killer. It couldn’t have been more obvious.

From all of those clues, there was only one suspect. The villain was Princess Alice, the younger sister of the current king. She could have stopped there, but she was an idiot. She needed to bring justice to the victim. She didn’t realize just how deep the princess was in the criminal underground of Worthsmist. With both her connections as a criminal mastermind and as a princess, she could make it almost impossible to make a living as a private investigator. That is exactly what she did.

Princess Alice had spread rumours about her, threatened loyal clients, and even attempted to get her charged with crimes she didn’t commit. Felix Investigations was hemorrhaging money. It would die soon if she didn’t do anything to save it. She would be done for good and there was nothing she could do about it. At least she still had Felix and her family at least for the moment.

But what could she do against a royal against which not even the king would lift a hand to punish for a terrible crime?

As she was closer to the floor she noticed something sticking out from beneath her desk. It was the corner of a book. She carefully pulled the book out from where it had been pushed beneath her desk. There was no way to know how long it had been there. Perhaps it had been put there one of the times she had been asked to babysit her much younger brother Karl. She was always happy to take care of him. It was nice having someone there aside from her, a cat, and her clients who were just there to use her services.

He liked to read about all sorts of topics. As she looked at the book she knew it had to have been left by him. The book was a thick children's book and it was titled, “The Treasure of the Labyrinth.” Flipping through it the book was all about what was known about the labyrinth beneath the city of Worthsmist. There were even stories about people who had claimed to have explored it. 

She had heard the legend of the treasure as much as anyone else in the kingdom. It was said that it was built by a king a thousand years before whose name had been struck from the annals of history for an unknown reason. It could grant the wishes of whoever found it in the heart of the labyrinth beneath the city. Though hundreds of people had gone looking for the treasure, you wouldn’t even need an entire hand to count the people who had returned alive.

The three known survivors each gave a different description of the treasure. It was described as a chalice, an orb, and a partially formless light with a humanoid shape. They also didn’t give any details about their wishes or how they had been granted. One of the three, the one who had only explored it a hundred years ago, had explained that it was a part of getting one's wishes granted, that they couldn’t talk about the wish or specifics of what they had faced in the labyrinth without what they had wished for being taken away from them.  They did say that the legend was true, however. They insisted it was.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Petra sighed. It was a long shot, but she needed a long shot. She had to save Felix Investigations.

She looked down at her cat Felix who was now staring at her with a look of betrayal, his ears folded back after she had stopped giving him attention. 

“Well, Felix.” She faked a smile. “It looks like I’m going to do some treasure hunting.

##

The next day Petra went down into the sewers to search for the entrance of the labyrinth. Felix had gone to stay with her adoptive parents until she got back. On her back, she carried a bag holding what she hoped was enough food for ten days, a blanket, a magnifying glass, the orb she used to cast the spells she had learned from school, some rope, a spare dagger, a fire starter, and a notebook and pen. She never left the office without a notebook.

She had decided to be smart about this. As she went through the labyrinth she planned to use her skills as an investigator to navigate. If she could see where people had failed or signs of traps she could bypass the dangerous parts in theory. It was likely that she wasn’t the only person who had taken this approach. She hoped that she had maxed out the amount of bad luck she could have at once. 

Of course no matter what, this was a last-ditch effort. It didn’t matter the outcome as long as she tried.

The entrance wasn’t that hard to find. A short distance into the sewer system there was a large stone door that looked ancient, much older than the sewers that had only been built within the last few hundred years. 

There was a sign next to the door that must have been put there only a few years ago. It read:

“Danger ahead: Enter at your own risk. The King will face no liability at your entrance.”

She took a deep breath and pushed the door open. It swung easily on its ancient hinges. It was as though the door was brand new, only it was ancient. There was some impressive magic on this door. The entire labyrinth was full of this same magic. That’s what kept the stonework from crumbling after all these years.

Inside the labyrinth,h she was faced with a series of tunnels that formed a maze. She took her notebook out and began to draw a map as she walked. She twirled the pen in her fingers as she thought about what she would find. The walls were a bare brownstone. A light seemed to emanate from somewhere on the ceiling which kept away all of the shadows. This wasn’t the most interesting place to explore. She focused on her map to distract herself from how boring it was in there.

Perhaps she was being negligent about looking for clues because she almost stumbled over one about half an hour after she entered. 

There was a skeleton that had fallen face down, facing away from the way she had come. She had passed no traps on her way there and there had only been one branching pathway so far. Plus if there was a trap this poor person had discovered just up ahead, they would have fallen on their back. That just made sense. It was also strange how easily she flipped the skeleton over. The joints were all loose and the limbs hung limply as she flipped this person over.

She could think of a couple of scenarios that would have left this person here like this, alone in a labyrinth from which few people returned. Though it was still early, she decided that she could at least get something from this person. Maybe they had gone down that branching path and saw what was down there. Telling a theory without knowing all the facts was unbecoming of a private investigator.

She crouched. That was why she was glad she could use at least basic magic. She could ask this person what had happened to them and whether or not they knew anything about what was to come.

She set her bag on the ground and pulled her small orb out of it. She turned the skull so that it was facing up. It wasn’t required for the spell to have the mouth facing up, however she did prefer it. It made things make more sense.

She held the orb up to the forehead of the skull and muttered under her breath in the old language that was now used only for magic.

“Come back and dispense to me the knowledge of the ancients. Answer my questions and then return to your peace.”

Suddenly the body animated. The skeleton sat up as though it had been pulled up by a series of strings. The skull turned to face her. The eyes glowed with an ethereal light. Most people would have found this creepy or unnerving, but she had been casting this spell long enough that it had just become a part of the job.

“Yes?” the skull spoke with a raspy voice. “What is it you wish to know?”

She raised an eyebrow, holding up a hand with five fingers. She folded one finger down. “Let’s start easy. Who were you?”