Game of Queens (43 page)

Again I looked down, found myself staring at Haman. As he smiled and gestured, and the king smiled back, I realized that not only Queen Mother Amestris stood between me and the king. Another obstacle was Prince Haman.

I did not like Haman even before he revealed his evil heart to all the world. When I looked upon Haman, I saw a man who drowned half-breed pups and fouled water with their small bodies. A man who tore away a woman's veil on a public street. Lord Prince Haman, the king's friend—so sleek, so attentive, so obsequious. Even had I not encountered him before, I think I would have disliked what I saw. And what I most disliked was seeing my king smiling upon this man.

“That is Prince Haman, is it not?” I asked Vashti. “How did he become the king's favorite?”

Vashti looked and shrugged; light flowed over her pale hair. Haman, she told me, had always lurked about the court—

“But he became the king's good friend only after I was queen no longer. The Queen Mother always favored Haman, and I think she set him in Ahasuerus's path. She wanted Haman to be his friend—and Haman knew how to make Ahasuerus like him. Ahasuerus needs friends,” Vashti finished, rather wistfully.

So Queen Mother Amestris has her own pawn in play. But I think she misjudges, this time, with this man.
I guessed that Amestris thought to rule Haman. Amestris had not learned that soon or late, a blade grows too heavy for an aging hand to command. That Haman was a weapon that would turn upon its wielder.

“Why do you call him the favorite?” Vashti possessed a disconcerting ability to remember what had been said many words ago. She clearly wished to understand my thoughts. I answered as seriously as she had asked.

“Because he so clearly is. See how he stands, his body curving toward the king? And how the king reaches out to him, permits him near?” I distrusted Haman's fulsome devotion to the king. I saw Haman's loyalty for what it was: a sham.

“Everyone turns to the king, Esther.”

“Not as Haman does. Not so…” I hesitated, trying to choose the right word to describe Haman. Images slid through my mind.
Serpent. Wolf.
But they did not fit; the serpent, the wolf, were merely animals, innocent.
Haman is truly evil.

“Esther?” Vashti's voice, questioning, concerned. “Are you all right? Suddenly you looked—ill.”

I managed to smile and shake my head. “No. Perhaps I am a little tired, that is all.”

Vashti's worried eyes brightened. “Of course you are. We will go to the baths. That will soothe and rest you.”

Vashti led me to the Queen's Bath—she no longer held the title of queen, but all that had been hers remained hers save that title and the crown. All the world knew Ahasuerus still went to her. A dart of jealousy stung; I forced myself to ignore it. No matter how my heart burned for him, the king did not yet know I existed.
He might never know, if he chooses another. If he does, I will die—or wish to. How can I ensure I am the first maiden to go to him?

All such pains and questions vanished in the Queen's Bath. Of course I had been bathed and perfumed in the palace baths, and thought myself pampered like a princess, but compared to the Queen's Bath, the palace baths were as a bucket in a shed.

I seemed to walk into an underwater world where maidservants bathed me in water that smelled of roses and washed my long heavy hair. After I had been bathed and rinsed until I thought I must melt if one more drop of water touched my skin, I was permitted to lie upon one of the marble slabs so the maids might rub sweet oils into my skin. The women were so skilled in their art I fell asleep as one combed out my hair and another rubbed myrrh into my feet.

I awoke refreshed as if I were once again a child on my father's farm, when each awakening was to joy. I stared up at the high-arched ceiling, admiring sunlight glinting through little stars. Stars; a good omen. I was Star, now.

Omens! What would Mordecai say?
Sunlit stars, water and warm oil. My body naked to perfumed air and expert hands. No place, no position, for a good Jewish girl.
But by my cousin's own order, I am no longer a good Jewish girl. I am not Hadassah bas Abihail. I am Esther, one girl among many in the palace of the king.
I stretched, supple as a cat, or as a courtier's back—or as my cousin Mordecai's scruples had proven to be. As I stared up at the sunlight stars, I found myself thinking of Vashti. She had no true place in the palace anymore, and nowhere else to go.

I asked her whether she could not return to her father's house. The question startled her.

“I never thought of it, Esther.”

“Think of it now. Would you be happier there?”

“No.” Her answer came swiftly, without pause for the briefest thought. Then, more carefully, “No, I would not. I have not dwelt beneath that roof for so long I think I have forgotten even the scents and sounds there. And I don't think my mother would welcome back a daughter so disgraced and dishonored as I.”

VASHTI

“I would like to be his wife,” Esther said, and I stared at her. Ahasuerus was king, and he was kind and generous, and I loved him as a sister loves her dearest brother—but what I saw in Esther's eyes was a pure hunger, a longing I had never felt for him.

Can she love him? So swiftly, so easily?
And if she did, was that good or bad?

I put the question to Hegai later, when all the queen-maidens walked about the gardens, enjoying the warm evening air. I explained what we had done, and what Esther had said, and how her eyes had looked as she gazed upon the king.

“My lady Vashti, will you never learn caution?” was Hegai's first response. And when I pointed out that he himself had suggested it might be wise to learn how Esther would regard the king, Hegai sighed.

“Yes, and I—that is, you and I would have arranged something together. Something safe and secret.”

“It was safe and secret,” I said. “And—oh, Hegai, her face glowed like a star, and her voice sounded like—like poured honey.”

“Sticky,” Hegai said, and I laughed.

“Oh, Hegai, you know I have no gift for clever words. Esther does. But do you think it will please Ahasuerus, that she already loves him so greatly? He never liked me clinging to him, you know.”

Hegai frowned, considering. “Let us examine this matter. The maiden Esther is beautiful and virtuous, learned and witty—and she has fallen into love with the man, and not the king, as a pearl falls into a pure well.” The thick black lines of kohl stretching past his dark eyes curled up as his face creased in a wide smile. “I believe it just possible, my lady Vashti, that the King of Kings will like
her
to cling to him.”

For a heartbeat anger bit sharp; I shoved the unworthy emotion away, scolding myself.
No envy, no sighing over the past. There was never love like that between us. Free him and yourself. All that matters now is the future, and Ahasuerus's happiness.

*   *   *

I had chosen Esther, and now it seemed Esther herself had chosen as well. Now it was time to unfold her future before her.

Yet somehow the moment never seemed quite right. At last, one day when the two of us walked together in my garden, I simply said, “Esther, you are going to be queen.”

Esther stopped walking. “Vashti, you cannot know that.”

“Yes,” I said, “I can. Because it is what I want, and what Hegai wants, and—”

“But is it what King Ahasuerus will want?” Esther looked—angry.

“Oh, Esther, of course it is! You are perfect. You—”

“I will not trick him into choosing me.” Esther's mouth set in a firm line.

She does love him—loves him as I never did.
I regarded her rather wistfully. “Of course not, Esther. But he will choose you.”

“Because you will arrange it?”

“Yes. Because it is what is best for him. And while I do not love him as you do, Esther, I want him to be happy.”

“And you think I will make him happy?” Esther asked. I noticed she did not deny loving Ahasuerus.

“I think you will make each other happy.”

“And you, Vashti?”

“Esther, I came to this palace when I was only ten years old. I was called queen for another ten years. And yet only now, when I no longer wear a crown, am I a queen in deed instead of merely in name.” I wore a circlet of golden flowers; I lifted it from my hair and held it out to Esther. “Set this upon your head, O Most Beautiful, and may you learn more swiftly than I what it truly means to bear its weight.”

A grand gesture, but life is not a necklace strung with grand gestures as its gems. I was still Vashti; still a young woman who had been raised for half her life with every whim treated as iron law.

That night I cried myself to sleep, and my dreams were not pleasant things.

ESTHER

At last all the maidens had finished the months of preparation; it was time for the king to choose his new queen. Each maiden was to be allotted one night with the king—one night to decide her future and his. To make the allocation of the nights fair and equitable, all the maidens were to draw ivory tokens. Each token had a number written upon it in gold. We would go to the king in the order of the number we had drawn. We were to choose our tokens tomorrow.

“I've never heard of anything so outrageous.” I stared at Vashti, and saw nothing in her eyes but a faint, wistful amusement.

“The court is outrageous,” Vashti said. “And Amestris is the most outrageous creature in the court. This is her plan.”

“And it's absurd. How can the King of Kings make an intelligent choice in one night?”

“You think two would be better?”

“I think it's the way one chooses a concubine, not a queen. Surely the King of Kings desires a Queen of Queens, not merely someone—”

“Beautiful, supple, and compliant?” Vashti rested her chin upon her knees, wrapped her arms around her legs, hugging herself into a tight ball. “I think that Ahasuerus desires what his mother wishes him to desire. And if I had learned that earlier, I would still be queen today.”

“I am sorry,” I said, and she glanced up at me, and smiled.

“Don't be. If I'm a fool, you clearly are not. You are what the Seven Princes demanded—a maiden wiser and more worthy to be queen than I.” Vashti uncoiled and rose to her feet, leaned upon the wall beside me. “This is war, Esther—and I intend to triumph over Amestris.”

“By making me queen?”

“Yes, by making you queen. We must ensure that Ahasuerus chooses you, Esther—and no one else.”

*   *   *

I remained in the tiny balcony long after Vashti had gone, watching the sky burn from turquoise into red and gold. Queen of Persia—I, Hadassah, jewel of learning, must win the crown by competing in a contest to satisfy a king's lust.

And if I did? If King Ahasuerus chose me, what would that mean for me?

Somehow I suspected that being queen would not mean I could sit in my study and read all day—although if I became queen, Queen Mother Amestris would undoubtedly encourage me to do just that. I knew how she had controlled Vashti's life, and she would seek to do so with the new queen. And I would not allow her to control me.

Then I must ensure that Queen Mother Amestris is rendered powerless to interfere in the queen's life.

I had no idea how I could achieve that goal, but I refused to worry myself over the matter now. I would only need to draw Amestris's fangs if I became queen. If I did not—

If I do not, I shall ask Vashti to send me back to my father's farm. I shall raise horses there, and be happy.

So I told myself—and knew that I lied.

*   *   *

To draw the lots that would determine our fate—or at least, our night with the king—we all gathered in the Garden of Roses, under the watchful eyes of Vashti and Hegai. Hatach called out our names to come and pull an ivory token from a deep-necked jar. There was a number written upon each token; we would go to the king in the order of our numbers. Hatach called my name first; I saw despair and anger in the eyes of many of the other girls.

I walked slowly up to the jar and put my hand down into the darkness. Vashti had told me how to choose: one token would have a small imperfection marring its smooth surface. That was the token I was to grasp as my own.

I felt carefully through the cool smooth ivory disks. All alike—except one. One of the disks was chipped; rough at the edge. I closed my fingers around that one and withdrew my hand from the jar. As all the other girls waited, staring, I opened my hand.

When I looked at the number upon the ivory disk, it seemed to waver.
Forty.
Not
one
. “Forty,” I said, and saw smiles as my rivals realized they still had a chance to outdo me.

I looked at the number upon the ivory disk and swiftly calculated the date that would be mine. The last night of Adar. Spring. Far too long to wait before I went in to the king. He might choose any of the girls who went to him before me.

I may never look upon his face. I may never feel the touch of his skin against mine. If he chooses another …

Too long to wait. Why had Vashti not arranged for me to draw the first night?
Forty nights until my chance with the king. Why so long? Does Vashti play some cruel game with me?

“My lady Esther?” Kylah bowed and spoke soft-voiced, a sound that did not carry as a whisper did. “You are summoned.” She slanted her eyes; I followed her gaze and saw she looked to where Hegai and Vashti sat. I followed Kylah to the alcove and bowed before the Chief Eunuch.

“I am here,” I said.

“Here and unsmiling,” Hegai said.

I held out my hand. The ivory disk lay warm upon my palm; the golden number glinted in the sunlight. “Forty. That means I do not go to the king until the last night of Adar.”