Esther (29 page)

He regarded me carefully, and it seemed one eyebrow was on the verge of rising, but he did not risk the son he might have planted during the night.

“Go now, to soak in your servant's herbs. You will bathe for me another time.”

He kissed me so sweetly, and for so long, that I could not tell whether he loved me or we were not going to see each other again for a long time.

As I stepped from Xerxes' chambers and saw the Immortals standing guard, I could not keep from thinking of Erez. “Hurry,” I said to my escort as they led me back to my chambers and the wine that awaited me there. I hoped it might ease the new ache in my body.

As soon as I entered my chambers, Ruti said, “Tell me all, my queen.” She quickly added, “If it please you.”

I would have been happy to see her but for my exhaustion and the many questions I knew she would ask. “While we are in the baths, Ruti.”

The Queen's Baths were as large as the women's baths, but instead of a long line of bronze washing tubs, they contained only one large golden basin. When Ruti asked me how the evening had gone, I did not lie. “I think it went well, but I cannot be certain.”

Ruti stopped moving the damp cloth along my arm. “How is it you do not know, my queen? Were you overfull with wine?”

I placed a hand, the one that did not hold my goblet, onto my belly. “Time will tell whether something good has come of it.”

The heaviness fell from Ruti's face. The way her emotions swung wildly up and down at only a few words reminded me that everything I did now was important. The crown was much heavier than it looked.

She put the hand that was not holding the cloth on top of mine. “He will be Jewish, whether anyone knows this or not.”

Not even he will know.
The thought filled me with sadness, but I knew I would do all I could to protect my son, even conceal his true identity from him. I did not want to burden him with a secret he might not be able to keep.

“Xerxes is the most powerful man in all the world,” Ruti continued, “yet his seed is not half so strong as what is inside us. Xerxes will not be able to take the One God out of his son's blood.” She squeezed my hand. “And what of Halannah's cruelty in the harem?”

“The king said it would be dealt with.”

Ruti dropped the damp cloth and clapped her hands together as it made a slapping sound upon the tiles. “You have done what no other person has been able to. Hashem has guided you to this great moment. Perhaps He will guide you to many more.”

“First I hope he will guide me to a deep and dreamless sleep.”

Not long after I had returned to my chambers, God granted my wish.

I awoke to find Ruti staring down at me. “Hegai is here to see you.”

“Help me dress and I will go to him.”

“You are the queen. He has come to you.”

“How long has he been waiting?”

“You are queen, how long he has been waiting is not your concern. It also is not your concern that he is furious.”

“Because he had to wait?”

“He was angry before he had to wait. But yes, now he is furious.” Ruti was not able to fully suppress a smile.

“Oh, Ruti.”

When Ruti opened the door Hegai burst into my chambers. His cheeks were red with rage. He ran the fingers of his complete hand over the stubs of his shortened hand. “What did you tell the king of my harem?”

“Surely you mean ‘
Your Majesty,
what did you tell the king of
his
harem?' ”

“It is you who have forgotten yourself. Two days ago you were a harem girl with the special privileges
I
granted you. Today you are a girl who has been queen
for one day,
and that is how you are spoken of. Tomorrow you will be known as the girl who has been queen
for two days
. You will not be only ‘queen' for at least a year.”

“I will not allow anyone to give me less than my proper due. Because you have helped make me queen, you honor not only me but also yourself as well when you address me properly.”

“
Your Majesty,
Bigthan has been removed from the harem and put instead at the king's gate. Halannah remains.”

Ruti exhaled as though she had been punched in the belly.

“I do not understand,” I said. “I did not mention Bigthan. Only Halannah.”

“Was the king overfull with wine when you spoke to him?” Ruti asked. Without waiting for me to continue, she said, “You waited too long to make your request. His tolerance is not so great as yours is now.”

The crown which was so heavy upon my head seemed to be invisible to them. If my own servants did not pay homage to the crown, how was I to expect anyone else to? Before I could reprimand Ruti for speaking disrespectfully to her new queen, Hegai said, “
Your Majesty
would be wise to think more and drink less. Hopefully the king will call for you again this evening. If not I will send the most unattractive of all the harem girls to him.”

I stared at him. “
You
will send whoever you choose? He does not care who you send him?”

“Sometimes he asks for a virgin, but usually he says ‘One is as good as another.' Except for one woman who he has asked for by name many times.”

I thought of Halannah's many bracelets, necklaces, and earrings. I remembered her earlobes elongated by a pair of heavy gold rosettes. The king had given her a fortune, and now I knew that she was the only harem woman he truly lusted for or perhaps even loved. It felt as though a handful of rocks had just been dropped into my stomach.

“I did not tell you because I did not want you to lose courage,” Hegai said. “But now you must know your enemy's strength so you are prepared. It does not appear you were ready for your task last night. It takes more than a crown upon your head to be a queen.”

I knew a true queen was one who outsmarted her enemies and did great things for her people. But in the meantime I could dole out punishments and rewards to remind them of who I was. “I am your queen and you will give me my proper due or you will no longer have my ear.”

Hegai looked like he might say something, but he swallowed it.

“Up until now you have served me well,” I said, “and I wish to reward you for it.”

I turned first to Hegai. “I know you have as many riches as a man could want, but I wish at least one of them was from me. Is there nothing you desire?”

“There is only one gift you can give me.”

“Yes, removing Halannah from the king's harem. Very well. If you have nothing more to tell me, you may go.”

Though he left, the disapproving look he gave me seemed to linger.

Ruti was more easily won over. When I told her to pick whatever she liked from the wardrobe, her eyes widened like a child's. Once she had made her selections, I spoke to the wardrobe attendant. I spoke firmly so that she would not dare to look strangely at me as I ordered her to have clothes for a queen made into a servant's dress-up things. Ruti would not be able to wear her new robe and head scarf outside of my chambers, but this did not seem to dampen her happiness, just as my failure to get Halannah removed from the harem no longer dampened it. She twirled before me with a surprising grace that had been hidden in her sack-like garb. The gem-encrusted purple robe she had chosen brought out hints of green in her brown eyes.

“It is a good color for you,” I said.

“Thank you, Your Majesty. I feel as though I am floating.”

She looked like she was floating too. Happiness had lifted some of the creases from her face, and I could see that she had once been beautiful.

Even with all the mistakes I have made, and whatever is to come while I am finding my way, at least there will always be this moment in which Ruti seems as light as though she never cleaned a single chamber pot or suffered beneath a multitude of soldiers.

All because of a robe and a head scarf.
If only everyone could be so easily won over.

I had risen as high in the world as a woman could, yet the afternoon following my night with the king I had the same thought as the lowest girl of the harem:
Will the king call me to him tonight?
By the last meal of the day I knew he would not.

“It is a blessing from Hashem,” Ruti said. “You look terrible.”

But surely it was not a blessing from Hashem when the king did not call for me the next night, or the one after.

After the third night that the king did not call for me, Ruti returned from the servants' quarters with news. The king had spent the last two nights with Halannah and had called her to him once again. “But, my chil—
queen,
I have been instructed to keep track of your monthly bleeding. Surely this instruction comes down from the king himself. It is likely he does not call you to him because he does not wish to risk disturbing the new life in your belly.”

“How long will this go on?” I realized what a foolish question this was as soon as the words left my mouth.

“Hopefully nine months.”

When I bled a few days later, Ruti tried to hide her disappointment. “Well, now you will have a chance to see the king again,” she said, “and make your request before he is overfull with wine.”

As soon as my time of bleeding had passed word was sent to the king. He did not call upon me that night either. Even in sleep I could not escape a thought:
Is he punishing me for getting up after the first time he lay with me?

I awoke to a familiar voice screaming for me to hide. Then came a wet, sinewy sound. Flesh being opened with a sharp blade. There was a cry that hurt me as much as if it were my own flesh being torn. Though the voice was distorted by pain, I knew it was Ruti's.

I shifted my feet off the cushions, but when I tried to stand my foot came down upon a goblet that lay on the tile.

“Hurry—hi—” Ruti choked and went silent. I knew I needed to obey her command and hide. But it was too late. Someone fell upon me, straddling my chest and taking hold of my hair. I put my hands up to protect my neck.

Footsteps—not the light flying footsteps of assassins but the heavy footsteps of soldiers—rushed closer. The soldiers' torchlight reached me before they did. I saw that my attacker was all in black, his face hidden by a mask. In his hand—the one that did not hold my hair—was a knife. It was exactly as it had been when Halannah attacked me. I raised my right hand just in time to catch the knife as it came rushing down toward my neck. The knife point hit the gold plate, bending back my wrist and then sliding off to strike the tile beside my head.

Soldiers were upon us—five of them—dragging the man off of me. I shuffled back away from them and stood up. A sixth soldier rushed up behind them. Parsha. “I am sorry,” my attacker stammered when he saw Parsha. Before he could say more, Parsha grabbed him by the hair, bent his head back, and slit his throat.