Find the right key

"As your situation becomes more and more hopeless, the more balloons you pop. I'll explain the final rules of the game." He could hear it coming out of speakers way above their heads... The men paused, listening to the gloating voice of Madmoisell de Carvoisin. "As Philippe correctly pointed out, you need the notes to find the right key. The search for the key will be all the more complicated the more balloons will burst. Because after five burst balloons, another fake key will be brought into play, leading to a wrong place in the castle. You know yourself how big the Chenonceau area is.It would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. That' s why finding the right key is necessary.That is, of course, if the groom wants to marry his bride today. In order to do that, you must answer the questions on the note correctly. Have fun!"

"This is amazing!" Claudio growled. He looked down. Pink pieces of the burst balloons were everywhere. How much had they already burst? He couldn't say for sure. In the end he just stabbed at them.

Alexandre lowered his head to think. "How much of this note do we have?"

"32!" Philippe finally said, after counting the pieces of paper in his hand.

Alexandre nodded. "So there are seven keys in circulation and six of them are fake."

Claudio raised his shoulders. "What does the note say?"

"Questions about Lily and several possible answers." Philippe replied.

"Could you please read one out loud?" Alexandre ran his fingers through his hair. He stared at his friend as he rolled up a piece of paper. He was an idiot to think that Nelli would settle for money and riches. She was like a mother lion who would defend her cub against predators and he was in this case the predator who was too close to her beloved cub Lily. She wouldn't just hand Lily out without testing him if he was worthy of her.

"What is the bride's favorite book?" Philippe read it in a lowered voice. "A - Jane Eyer. B - The Journey to the Center of the Earth. C - Good Omens or D - Cabal and Love.

Alexandre recalled Lily's things from the apartment where Fabien had been hiding Lily for the past two years. Those few little things were the ones Lily had accumulated over those two years on the run. Not much! Just things she needed to live. A few items of clothing, and a bunch of books. He knew that she enjoyed reading. When she had a quiet minute to herself, he'd always would fnd her with a book in her hand. But only one book in her collection had a cover that was already worn out and pages that looked all tattered and yellowed. Apparently she would read it over and over again. To disappear between its lines, she would always pick it up. A book he had not expected. A relieved breath escaped his lips. "C" He whispered.

Philippe turned the note over. "C - go up to the fifth step and look for a balloon with a red string."

It was like a scavenger hunt. The men had to answer one question after another to find the key. After four more questions about Lily's preferences, a gold note appeared. Alexandre slowly unrolled the note."Unlocker her heart with a golden key." It was written in white letters on the paper. "The first clue to the correct key is that it must be golden."

Claudio moaned annoyingly. Hell, his wife knew how to torture a man.

With a shrug, Philippe pulled out another piece of paper and read it to his friends. Like Sherlock Holmes, the men followed the clues on the notes. answering one question after another. They knew that if they had made a mistake, sarcastic quotes from Lily's favourite book would appear.

At each of these black messages, Alexandre could hear the gloating voice of Nelli in his head. How she would recite every single word of Terry Pratchett with a smug smile on her lips! "Progress just means bad things happen faster."

It was like a Sisyphean task. If the stone was already in the middle of the way to the top, the faster it could roll back down the mountain. But again and again the groom and his best man encountered golden notes telling what the right key looked like. By now they knew that it was a four centimetre long golden key, whose head looked like the blossom of a lily. They also knew that engraved on its blade was a verse from a poem.

During their search they had found five keys. But only two matched this description. However, he also knew that they had burst 17 more balloons in the meantime and that the first rule of Nalli was to burst as few balloons as possible. So three more keys had been brought into play, probably confusingly similar to the original.

That was okay.

At least for now. Still, they lost time. He could make a guess. Picking the key with Lily's favorite poem. Or the one with her favorite gemstone. Or maybe the ones he held in his hand were both just the wrong ones and they still hadn't found the right one?

Alexandre was happy to test his luck. But by now he knew Nelli too well and realized that if he didn't play it safe, the game would end badly for him. He gritted his teeth. "God damn it!" He cursed and then shouted, "Stop!"