The World Walkers: Quiar: Fasach: Daedelus: The Aardvark Private Detective

[k_a_webb]

Daedalus had always been skilled at finding things. Even though all his friends were aardvarks too, then, they turned to him if they needed something found, whether it was a younger sibling or something of value. So, when he realised he had no idea what he wanted to do with his life, he came to the conclusion it was time to use his ability to earn a living, which did mean listening to several lectures from his mother, who believed he could do so much more with his life. The one thing she never seemed to understand was that he didn’t want to do so much more – he wanted to be happy and that was really all that mattered.

That was, of course, before his job took over his life. Daedalus started off in the market. It seemed like the best place to start and whenever he though of the stall he smiled. Sometimes he thought life would have been easier if he’d just stayed there, instead of deciding to move on to somewhere more professional. While he was in the market he got small jobs, most of the time, the same sort of things he’d once done for his friends, but once he had an office that changed. Word of mouth had changed things.

People knew he was the one to turn to if they needed help. Back then Daedalus was grateful. Every little bit helped him earn enough to be able to move out of his parents house, finally, and it was then he started to think about having a family of his own. As he sat in his office, drinking coffee after another night of little sleep, he wondered if maybe it was time to stop, to move on, to find something else to do with the rest of his life. There never seemed to be an end to the work that he was needed for and when he was younger that was a wonderful thing. He’d never thought, then, that it would become so difficult, but that was before he started getting the missing people jobs.

It was those jobs that had changed his life and, sadly, not for the better. Daedalus had thought it would be simple enough when he took on the first job. He’d always been able to find his friend’s lost siblings. Unfortunately he hadn’t realised how difficult it would be to find someone who was truly missing, not in the Web, although that was before he even knew the Web existed. Like most of his hame he knew nothing about the doors, or the Moonjumpers, or the fae, so when he took on the task of finding his first missing person he ended up learning about things he had never expected to. There was no way he could have done.

He started the job the way he’d done before, by asking his clients to bring in something that had belonged to their missing sister, because that would mean he could feel her. It was hard to explain exactly how it worked, although he did like to try for his clients, as it helped them, more than he realised, to understand what he did. Once he had a hold of her, with his magic, he could find wherever it was she might have gone, and it really should have been that simple. Daedalus told them it would be better if they didn’t go with him, just in case she didn’t want to be found for some reason. They accepted that better than he thought they would and off he went.

When the trail came to an end he had no idea what to do. He stood in the middle of a clearing and looked around, wondering how someone could disappear entirely, even though he could still feel her. If someone was dead he couldn’t feel them, that he knew from when his grandmother had died, because that was the only time he had ever tried to find someone for himself and it hadn’t worked out. Remembering that helped. At least he knew she wasn’t dead. The problem was he didn’t have any idea where she might be, which meant he’d failed, for the first time.

Until a voice came out of nowhere… that had made Daedalus jump. “Can you move?” he asked, and Daedalus felt hands on him, that he couldn’t see, which made him even more uncomfortable than he already was. “You’re standing right in front of the door.”

“Door?” Daedalus moved as he spoke, not wanting to be rude, and through stepped a creature he had never seen before. “I can’t see a door.”

“Means you don’t have the ability to walk the worlds,” the creature replied, before taking something off and turning into a zebra, which was unexpected. Daedalus couldn’t work out, however, what was the most unexpected part: that it was a zebra, that they had apparently stepped through a door he couldn’t see, or that they had changed form. “Not necessarily a bad thing.”

Unsure, Daedalus nodded. “I was looking for someone.”

The expression on the zebra’s face, which had been confusion, turned into understanding. “You’re looking for someone.” The zebra smiled. “I think I’ve heard of you. Daedalus, right?”

“Yes, that’s me.” He hoped he didn’t sound as uncomfortable as he felt. “Even the zebras have heard of me?”

“Some of us.” The zebra held up a hoof. “I’m Nadir.” When Daedalus took it, uncomfortably, Nadir’s smile seemed to grow. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Now, maybe I can help you with your problem.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s obvious you lost the trail here, which means whoever you’re looking for went through the door, but the question becomes where did they go, because this door leads to a number of places normally, and they have a habit of tossing someone to somewhere unusual if that’s where they think they should be.” All Daedalus could do was stare at Nadir. “Sorry, I know it’s a lot to take in, the first time.”

Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.

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