A Labyrinth of Honeybees
Heather Fawcett
Cozy vs Ninja
Heather Fawcett's A Labyrinth of Honeybees is the fourth story in the Amazon Original Magic & Mystery series. This is a series of standalone little mysteries in different worlds by different authors. There is no common plot thread through the series that I can detect. They can thus be read in any order.
The action of this one takes place in the holy grounds of a deity known as the Goddess of the Garden. The story is told in the first person by the Goddess's priestess. She and her Goddess are what I referred to as Cozy in my title. She is visited by the Royal Inquisitor and some Royal Guards (the Ninja component), who are investigating the disappearance of the king's heir.
Unsurprisingly, it turns out there are complicated palace intrigues going on among the king, the inquisitor, the heir, and the royal guard. Also the Goddess.
This was not bad, but I felt it was trying a little too hard. It got complicated at the end and difficult to make sense of. I felt that Fawcett had not fully appreciated the limitations of the short story form and tried to stuff a bit more into it than it would comfortably hold.
Still, it was fun, and short. I will forgive a lot when the read doesn't ask for much of my time. This was the second of the stories in the series I had read. I intend to read the rest of the stories in the series. I intend to read them all.