Stars of Fortune
Nora Roberts
HOT ICE
SACRED SINS
BRAZEN VIRTUE
SWEET REVENGE
PUBLIC SECRETS
GENUINE LIES
CARNAL INNOCENCE
DIVINE EVIL
HONEST ILLUSIONS
PRIVATE SCANDALS
HIDDEN RICHES
TRUE BETRAYALS
MONTANA SKY
SANCTUARY
HOMEPORT
THE REEF
RIVER’S END
CAROLINA MOON
THE VILLA
MIDNIGHT BAYOU
THREE FATES
BIRTHRIGHT
NORTHERN LIGHTS
BLUE SMOKE
ANGELS FALL
HIGH NOON
TRIBUTE
BLACK HILLS
THE SEARCH
CHASING FIRE
THE WITNESS
WHISKEY BEACH
THE COLLECTOR
TONIGHT AND ALWAYS
THE LIAR
Series
Irish Born Trilogy
BORN IN FIRE
BORN IN ICE
BORN IN SHAME
Dream Trilogy
DARING TO DREAM
HOLDING THE DREAM
FINDING THE DREAM
Chesapeake Bay Saga
SEA SWEPT
RISING TIDES
INNER HARBOR
CHESAPEAKE BLUE
Gallaghers of Ardmore Trilogy
JEWELS OF THE SUN
TEARS OF THE MOON
HEART OF THE SEA
Three Sisters Island Trilogy
DANCE UPON THE AIR
HEAVEN AND EARTH
FACE THE FIRE
Key Trilogy
KEY OF LIGHT
KEY OF KNOWLEDGE
KEY OF VALOR
In the Garden Trilogy
BLUE DAHLIA
BLACK ROSE
RED LILY
Circle Trilogy
MORRIGAN’S CROSS
DANCE OF THE GODS
VALLEY OF SILENCE
Sign of Seven Trilogy
BLOOD BROTHERS
THE HOLLOW
THE PAGAN STONE
Bride Quartet
VISION IN WHITE
BED OF ROSES
SAVOR THE MOMENT
HAPPY EVER AFTER
The Inn BoonsBoro Trilogy
THE NEXT ALWAYS
THE LAST BOYFRIEND
THE PERFECT HOPE
The Cousins O’Dwyer Trilogy
DARK WITCH
SHADOW SPELL
BLOOD MAGICK
The Guardians Trilogy
STARS OF FORTUNE
eBooks by Nora Roberts
Cordina’s Royal Family
AFFAIRE ROYALE
COMMAND PERFORMANCE
THE PLAYBOY PRINCE
CORDINA’S CROWN JEWEL
The Donovan Legacy
CAPTIVATED
ENTRANCED
CHARMED
ENCHANTED
The O’Hurleys
THE LAST HONEST WOMAN
DANCE TO THE PIPER
SKIN DEEP
WITHOUT A TRACE
Night Tales
NIGHT SHIFT
NIGHT SHADOW
NIGHTSHADE
NIGHT SMOKE
NIGHT SHIELD
The MacGregors
THE WINNING HAND
THE PERFECT NEIGHBOR
ALL THE POSSIBILITIES
ONE MAN’S ART
TEMPTING FATE
PLAYING THE ODDS
THE MACGREGOR BRIDES
THE MACGREGOR GROOMS
REBELLION/IN FROM THE COLD
FOR NOW, FOREVER
The Calhouns
SUZANNA’S SURRENDER
MEGAN’S MATE
COURTING CATHERINE
A MAN FOR AMANDA
FOR THE LOVE OF LILAH
Irish Legacy
IRISH ROSE
IRISH REBEL
IRISH THOROUGHBRED
BEST LAID PLANS
LOVING JACK
LAWLESS
SUMMER LOVE
BOUNDARY LINES
DUAL IMAGE
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
THE LAW IS A LADY
LOCAL HERO
THIS MAGIC MOMENT
THE NAME OF THE GAME
PARTNERS
TEMPTATION
THE WELCOMING
OPPOSITES ATTRACT
TIME WAS
TIMES CHANGE
GABRIEL’S ANGEL
HOLIDAY WISHES
THE HEART’S VICTORY
THE RIGHT PATH
RULES OF THE GAME
SEARCH FOR LOVE
BLITHE IMAGES
FROM THIS DAY
SONG OF THE WEST
ISLAND OF FLOWERS
HER MOTHER’S KEEPER
UNTAMED
SULLIVAN’S WOMAN
LESS OF A STRANGER
REFLECTIONS
DANCE OF DREAMS
STORM WARNING
ONCE MORE WITH FEELING
ENDINGS AND BEGINNINGS
A MATTER OF CHOICE
Nora Roberts & J. D. Robb
REMEMBER WHEN
J. D. Robb
NAKED IN DEATH
GLORY IN DEATH
IMMORTAL IN DEATH
RAPTURE IN DEATH
CEREMONY IN DEATH
VENGEANCE IN DEATH
HOLIDAY IN DEATH
CONSPIRACY IN DEATH
LOYALTY IN DEATH
WITNESS IN DEATH
JUDGMENT IN DEATH
BETRAYAL IN DEATH
SEDUCTION IN DEATH
REUNION IN DEATH
PURITY IN DEATH
PORTRAIT IN DEATH
IMITATION IN DEATH
DIVIDED IN DEATH
VISIONS IN DEATH
SURVIVOR IN DEATH
ORIGIN IN DEATH
MEMORY IN DEATH
BORN IN DEATH
INNOCENT IN DEATH
CREATION IN DEATH
STRANGERS IN DEATH
SALVATION IN DEATH
PROMISES IN DEATH
KINDRED IN DEATH
FANTASY IN DEATH
INDULGENCE IN DEATH
TREACHERY IN DEATH
NEW YORK TO DALLAS
CELEBRITY IN DEATH
DELUSION IN DEATH
CALCULATED IN DEATH
THANKLESS IN DEATH
CONCEALED IN DEATH
FESTIVE IN DEATH
OBSESSION IN DEATH
DEVOTED IN DEATH
Anthologies
FROM THE HEART
A LITTLE MAGIC
A LITTLE FATE
MOON SHADOWS
(with Jill Gregory, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Marianne Willman)
The Once Upon Series
(with Jill Gregory, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Marianne Willman)
ONCE UPON A CASTLE
ONCE UPON A STAR
ONCE UPON A DREAM
ONCE UPON A ROSE
ONCE UPON A KISS
ONCE UPON A MIDNIGHT
SILENT NIGHT
(with Susan Plunkett, Dee Holmes, and Claire Cross)
OUT OF THIS WORLD
(with Laurell K. Hamilton, Susan Krinard, and Maggie Shayne)
BUMP IN THE NIGHT
(with Mary Blayney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)
DEAD OF NIGHT
(with Mary Blayney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)
THREE IN DEATH
SUITE 606
(with Mary Blayney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)
IN DEATH
THE LOST
(with Patricia Gaffney, Mary Blayney, and Ruth Ryan Langan)
THE OTHER SIDE
(with Mary Blayney, Patricia Gaffney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)
TIME OF DEATH
THE UNQUIET
(with Mary Blayney, Patricia Gaffney, Ruth Ryan Langan, and Mary Kay McComas)
MIRROR, MIRROR
(with Mary Blayney, Elaine Fox, Mary Kay McComas, and R. C. Ryan)
DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE
(with Mary Blayney, Elaine Fox, Mary Kay McComas, and R. C. Ryan)
Also available . . .
THE OFFICIAL NORA ROBERTS COMPANION
(edited by Denise Little and Laura Hayden)
An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014
This book is an original publication of Penguin Random House LLC.
Copyright © 2015 by Nora Roberts.
Excerpt from The Obsession copyright © 2015 by Nora Roberts.
Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices,
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eBook ISBN: 978-0-698-19073-3
Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
Roberts, Nora.
Stars of fortune / Nora Roberts. — Berkley trade paperback edition.
p. cm. — (Guardians trilogy ; 1)
ISBN 978-0-425-28010-2 (paperback)
I. Title.
PS3568.O243S73 2015
813'.54—dc23
2015004188
PUBLISHING HISTORY
Berkley trade paperback edition / November 2015
Cover photos: “Corfu”: Pavle Marjanovic / Shutterstock; “Twinkle”: Ramona Heim / Shutterstock; “Crystal”: Baloncici / Shutterstock; “Gold flame”: Keantian / Shutterstock.
Endpapers: “Underwater fish”: Holbox / Shutterstock; “Vintage gold floral design”:
After6pm / Shutterstock.
Cover and endpaper design by Rita Frangie.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of
the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Version_1
For Sarah, daughter of my heart
Contents
Also by Nora Roberts
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Special Excerpt from The Obsession
As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods;
They kill us for their sport.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Was it a vision, or a waking dream?
Fled is that music:—do I wake or sleep?
JOHN KEATS
PROLOGUE
Once, in a time long ago, in a world beyond our own, three goddesses gathered to celebrate the dawn of a new queen. Many who’d traveled across the land and skies, through time and through space, had brought gifts of gold and jewels, of rich silks and precious crystals.
But the goddesses three wished for more unique gifts.
They considered a winged horse, but news came that a traveler had flown in on one, making it a gift for the new queen.
They debated gifting her with beauty beyond compare, with wisdom or uncommon grace.
They couldn’t make her immortal, and knew from those who were that this was both blessing and curse.
But they could give her an immortal gift.
“A gift that will shine for her, for all time.” Celene stood with her friends, her sisters, on the sand, white as diamonds, on the verge of the ink-blue sea, lifted her face to the night sky, to the swimming moon.
“The moon is ours,” Luna reminded her. “We cannot give what we are pledged to honor.”
“Stars.” Arianrhod lifted her hand, palm up. She closed her eyes, her fingers. And smiling, opened them again. Now in her palm a jewel of ice glowed. “Stars for Aegle, the radiant.”
“Stars.” Now Celene held out her hand, opened it. She held a jewel of fire. “Stars for Aegle, who will shine like her name.”
Luna joined them, produced a jewel of water. “Stars for Aegle, the brilliant.”
“There should be more.” Celene turned the burning star in her hand.
“A wish.” Luna stepped closer to the sea, let the water lay cool kisses on her feet. “A wish from each for the queen, and into the star. For mine, a strong and hopeful heart.”
“A strong and questing mind.” Celene held the fiery star aloft.
“And a strong and adventurous spirit.” Arianrhod raised both hands, one holding the star, the other lifted toward the moon. “These stars to shine while worlds turn.”
“They shed their light in the queen’s name for all to see.” The Fire Star began to lift into the sky, and the star of ice, the star of water with it.
They spun as they rose, showering light, over land and sea, pulled toward the moon and its cool white power.
A shadow passed under them, a silent snake.
Nerezza glided across the beach toward the water—a shadow smearing the light. “You meet without me, my sisters.”
“You are not of us.” Arianrhod turned toward her, with Luna and Celene flanking her. “We are the light, and you the dark.”
“There is no light without dark.” Nerezza’s lips curved, but fury lived in her eyes, and with it the early blooms of a madness yet to fully flower. “When the moon wanes, the darkness eats it. Bite by bite.”
“The light prevails.” Luna gestured as the stars flew now, trails of color in their wake. “And now there are more.”
“You, like supplicants, bring gifts for the queen. She is no more than a weak, simpering girl when it is we who could rule. Who should rule.”
“We are guardians,” Celene reminded her. “We are the watchers, not rulers.”
“We are gods! This world and others are ours. Only think of it, and what we can make from our powers combined. All will bow to us, and we would live in youth and beauty forever.”
“We have no desire for power over the mortals, the immortals, the demimortals. Such matters bring blood and war and death.” Arianrhod dismissed the notion. “To crave forever is to dismiss the beauty and wonder of the cycle.” She lifted her face again as the stars they’d made spilled their light.
“Death comes. We will watch this new queen live and die as we did the last.”
“She will live a hundred years times seven. This I have seen. And while she lives,” Celene continued, “there will be peace.”
“Peace.” The word hissed out between Nerezza’s sneering lips. “Peace is nothing but a tedious lull between the stretch of the dark.”
“Go back to your shadows, Nerezza.” Luna dismissed her with a careless wave of her hand. “Tonight is for joy, for light, for celebrations—not your ambitions and thirsts.”
“The night is mine.” She slashed out a hand, and lightning, black as her eyes, sliced the white sand, the dark sea, and arrowed up toward the flying stars. It cut through the streams of light moments before the stars found their home in a gentle curve at the base of the moon.
For an instant the stars trembled there, and the worlds beneath them trembled.
“What have you done?” Celene whirled on her.
“Only added to your gift, sisters. They will fall one day, the stars of fire, ice, and water, tumble from the sky with all their power, their wishes, the light and the dark combined.”
Laughing now, Nerezza lifted her arms high as if to pluck the stars from the sky. “And when they fall into my hands, the moon dies for all and ever, and the dark wins.”
“They are not for you.” Arianrhod stepped forward, but Nerezza carved black lightning through the sand, left a smoldering chasm between them. Smoke streamed up from it to foul the air.
“When I have them, this world dies with the moon, as you will. And as I eat your powers, I will open others long sealed. The pale peace you worship will become all raging torment, all agony and fear and death.”
Through the smoke, she lifted her hands, glowing in her own desire. “Your own stars have sealed your fortunes, and given me mine.”
“You are banished.” Arianrhod lashed out, and hot blue lightning that cut like a whip wrapped its tongue around Nerezza’s ankle.
The scream ripped the air, shuddered into the ground. Before Arianrhod could drag the dark into the chasm of her own creation, Nerezza spread thin black wings, snapped the whip of light as she flew up. Blood from her ankle burned and smoked in the white sand.
“I make my fate,” she shouted. “I will come back, take the stars and the worlds I wish. And you will know death and pain and the end of all you love.”
The wings folded around her, and she was gone.
“She can do nothing to us or ours,” Luna insisted.
“Do not doubt her power or her thirst.” Celene stared into the dark gulf, felt a terrible sorrow. “There will be death here now, and blood, and pain and sorrow. She has left it behind her like a stain.”
“She must never have the stars. We’ll bring them back now,” Arianrhod said. “Destroy them.”
“Too much to risk while her power still stings the air,” Celene replied.
“So we only wait, and guard and risk all?” Arianrhod argued. “We allow her to twist a bright gift into something dark and deadly?”
“We cannot. We will not. They will fall?” Luna asked Celene.
“I can see they will, in a bright flash, but I cannot see when.”
“Then we will make the when, and the where. This we can do.” Luna took her sisters’ hands.
“In another place, another time, but not together.” Nodding, Arianrhod looked up at the stars, so bright and beautiful over the land she’d loved and guarded since her time began.
“If even one falls into her hands, or one like her . . .” Celene closed her eyes, opened herself. “Many will seek the stars, the power, the fortune, which is the same. And the fate. It is all one. And we, reflected light, must send of us on the quest.”
“Of us?” Luna repeated. “We do not go to retrieve them?”
“No, that is not for us. I know we must bide here and it will be done as it is done.”
“We choose the time, the place. In silence,” Arianrhod added. “Even in our minds. She is not to know when and where they will fall.”
They joined minds as well as hands, and each took her journey, followed her star where it willed as it tumbled from the sky. Each hid her gift, each laid the power of protection over it.