Key Trilogy by Nora Roberts Page A

had power—a talent. One was an artist, one a bard, and one a warrior. Devoted to each other, they grew up in the kingdom, taught by a young goddess of magic, guarded by the king’s most trusted warrior god. Either the teacher or the guard was to be with them at all times, to keep them safe from the plots surrounding them.”
    “In the painting there were two figures, a man and a woman, in the background. They seemed to be in an embrace.”
    Flynn gestured with his fork, then speared more steak. “That fits with what’s coming. The king’s advisers were campaigning to have the daughters marry three gods of rank from the opposing faction. To unite the kingdom again. But the self-proclaimed king of the opposing faction didn’t like the idea of giving up his throne. Power had corrupted him, and his thirst for more, for complete dominance of this, let’s say, netherworld, and the mortal one, consumed him. He wanted to kill the daughters, but he knew that if he did, all but his most devoted followers would turn against him. So he devised a plot, and the two who were closest to the daughters aided him, by falling in love.”
    “They betrayed the daughters?”
    “Not purposely.” He tipped more wine into their glasses. “By distraction. By looking at each other rather than looking after their charges. And as the daughterswere young women, fond of their keepers, they made it easy for the lovers to slip away from time to time. And one day when they were unprotected, the spell was cast.”
    “Their souls were stolen.”
    “It’s more than that. Are you going to eat the rest of that steak?”
    “Hmm.” She glanced down at her plate. “No. Do you want it?”
    “For Moe. I go back empty-handed, he’ll sulk.” He asked the waiter to box up the leftovers, then smiled at Malory. “Dessert?”
    “No, just coffee. Tell me the rest.”
    “Two coffees, a crème brûlée, and two spoons. You’ll never hold out against the crème brûlée,” he said to Malory, then leaned forward to finish the tale. “The bad king’s a clever guy, and a sorcerer. He doesn’t take heat for slaying innocents, and he turns the good king’s choices and policy against him. If a mortal is fit to be queen, if three half-mortals are worthy of rank, then let the mortals prove it. Only mortals can break the spell. Until that’s done, the daughters will sleep—unharmed. If mortal women, one to represent each daughter, can find each of the three keys, then the Box of Souls will be unlocked, the daughters’ souls restored, and the kingdoms united.”
    “And if they fail?”
    “The most popular version, according to my granny, has the bad king setting a time limit. Three thousand years—one millennium for each daughter. If the keys aren’t found and the box unlocked within that time, he alone rules, both the god-world and the mortal.”
    “I never understand why anyone wants to rule the world. Seems like one big headache to me.” She pursed her lips when the dish of crème brûlée was set between them. Flynn was right, she decided. She wasn’t going to be able to hold out against it. “What happened to the lovers?”
    “A couple of versions of that, too.” He dipped his spoon in at one end of the dish while Malory dipped into the other. “My grandmother’s pick is the one that has the grieving king sentencing the lovers to death, but his wife intervened, asking for mercy. Instead of execution, banishment. They were cast out through the Curtain of Dreams, forbidden to return until they found the three mortal women who would unlock the box of souls. And so they wander the earth, gods living as mortals, in search of the triad who will release not only the souls of the daughters but their own as well.”
    “Rowena and Pitte think they’re the teacher and the warrior?”
    It pleased him that their conclusions meshed. “That would be my take. You’ve got a couple of weirdos on your hands, Malory. It’s a nice faerie tale. Romantic,