Esther

by Rebecca Kanner

  I am queen. I am the wife of one ruler and will be the mother of another.

  When we were done I did not stir from where I lay with my knees pulled into my chest. The king held a goblet of wine to my lips so that I would not have to move. With his other hand he lifted my head so I could drink. “Each time I see you I am more grateful to Ahura Mazda for delivering you to me.”

  He drank what remained in the goblet, kissed both my lips and the star of Ishtar that lay in a pool of sweat upon my neck, and then rolled gently onto his back, being careful not to disturb me. After a while he began to snore. Still I did not move. I lay with my knees pulled into my chest until I fell asleep, wondering if Erez had heard me moaning, and begging God to give me a son.

  In the morning I pulled my knees back into my chest and squeezed them tightly together. When the king opened his eyes he smiled and I felt a slight flush come over me, but I did not move. As he continued to look at me the smile fell from his face. His gaze became as intent as it had been the night before. I moved my legs to make way for him and we embraced as though we had been waiting a long time to touch.

  Afterward he refilled our goblets. I did not want wine, and I did not want to leave the king’s chambers until as many people as possible had seen me in the king’s bed. “Might I have some water, Your Majesty?”

  He looked alarmed. “Are you ill?”

  “No, I have just developed a particular thirst for it.”

  “Whatever you would like, my queen, it shall be granted you.”

  The king placed his own purple and white robe over me and called the attendants into his chambers. As the Immortals, eunuchs, serving women, musicians, dancers, and the girl with a fan of date palm leaves entered, I shifted my legs slightly to draw their eyes to me. I hoped they would all recognize that the robe that covered me was the king’s.

  When the servants approached us with trays of different breads and all variety and textures of sheep and goat cheeses, I looked to Xerxes. Would he hold my head and bring the food to my lips as he had done with the wine? After the tasters had sampled the food, juices, and wine, the king beckoned to a servant girl. Without further command she brought a goblet of pomegranate juice to his lips, and then a goblet of wine. Between sips she fed him dates from her own fingers. No words were spoken. I could see that this was not the first time she had fed the king. Perhaps he sometimes did the same things to her that he had done to me. In fact, he could have done these things not just to her but to any other woman in this palace or his other three.

  I straightened my legs as inconspicuously as I could and sat up slightly so I could eat. I tried to look as though I did not care that the king was being touched by another girl in front of me.

  After the servant who bore the wine refilled the king’s goblet, the king said, “My queen requires only water.”

  The attendants looked around. There was only one source of water, the heated water that filled the golden basin. One of the servant women started to move toward it.

  “Do you think my queen drinks bathwater?”

  The woman turned to the king and bowed her head so low it was as though the apology she stammered was incredibly heavy and would not come loose from her mouth. I had wanted the king to dote on me in front of his attendants, but not at their expense.

  “Majesty,” I whispered, squeezing my thighs together in an attempt not to lose the king’s seed as I rose up to put my lips near his ear, “I would be honored to drink some of the very same water that will be used to cleanse your splendid flesh.”

  Without looking at me, he said to the servant, “You are lucky for my queen’s compassion.”

  This time he did not ask me to bathe for him. He told me to return to my chambers and my servant’s herbs. He kissed me goodbye and then pulled back to look at me. He was breathing rapidly. Abruptly he turned to the attendants and announced, “You are dismissed.” When a servant began to wheel the basin out the king said, “Leave everything you cannot quickly bring with you. Wait outside.”

  We coupled once more. I knew I would be thinking of the king the next day, and perhaps for days to come. I would be thinking of him while over and over I begged God: a son. Please. A son.

  The king’s kiss goodbye did not leave me wondering if it would be long before he called for me again. He did not want to take his lips from mine. I hoped he was going to send the attendants away again. Instead he took a deep breath and released me.

  The last touch I received from him that morning was his hand upon my stomach. He could reach all the way across the front of my body, his thumb easily touching one hip bone and his little finger the other. I thought, We will fill this space.

  As I stepped from the king’s chambers, I both prepared to see Erez and willed my body to pull the king’s seed as deep as possible. So deep no one could ever again imply that I was not a true queen. Not without losing his life.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  * * *

  TRAPPED

  Erez’s jaw was so tight that I was afraid he had heard me moaning. He turned away from me. Fearing that he might begin to walk before I gave the command, I quickly said, “My chambers.”

  We moved through the greatest palace in the world as we would do many mornings in the coming months, without seeming to notice any of the treasures that surrounded us. Of all the things I pretended not to care about, Erez was the one that took the most effort. I knew I would walk behind him as often as the king called for me and as often as he sent me away. And yet I could not help studying him as intently as though I might never see him again.

  Though he had not gone through a year of purification as I had, the palace had cleaned him just as thoroughly. More perhaps. He had been a true soldier, most comfortable with a cloak of desert dust. The bright saffron of his tunic was no longer dulled by a thin layer of grime, nor the bottoms of his legs by a thick layer. The muscles of his calves no longer looked like little boulders, as they had when I first saw him lashing the waterskin to the saddle of his horse.

  Because of his honor, and because of me, he was trapped inside the massive walls of the palace for as long as the king desired. Perhaps he would not get to see any more of the world. I remembered what he had said on the march when I told him that it did not look like herding girls was all he did: “I have not trained to be an Immortal since I was seven for this.”

  I am sorry that my life has suddenly become so much more valuable than yours. I am beginning a new life, and you will have to watch it getting bigger while your own shrinks.

  When we arrived at my chambers and the two Immortals standing guard opened the doors, Erez moved to go first and inspect them.

  “No,” I said. I need you. “Jangi, it is your duty from now on to inspect my chambers before I enter them.” If someone was to die inspecting my chambers, I was determined it would not be Erez.

  Erez looked at me only briefly before averting his gaze when I looked back at him. I did not know what he was thinking. Perhaps that we should be careful, even with our eyes.

  When Jangi came out and reported that it was safe for me to enter, Erez stepped aside to let me pass. I walked slowly, silently finishing my apology: And I am most sorry I can never tell you I am sorry.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  * * *

  THE ROUTINE

  We fell into a rhythm. It began in my body. Men moved through the palace, taking me to the king, or stayed stationed around my chambers, because I did or did not bleed.

  Ruti, my guard, and I—all of us—seemed in league, as though we were all trying to make a son.

  The routine was the same each month: one, I stop bleeding. Two, I am bathed. Three, I receive perfume treatments. Four, cosmetics are applied to my face. Five, I order my escort to take me to the king. Six, I spend the night with the king. Seven, I order my escort to return me to my chambers. Eight, I do not want to bleed.

  But I do.

  “Do not count the days, Your Majesty. It will fill you with worry and you can
not conceive when you are already full. You must make room for something else inside yourself.”

  “But we must know—”

  “Do not count, let me.” Her voice was clear, even with the scarf she wore over most of her face. “Time moves faster as you get older, and I am so old that you will conceive in what seems only the blink of an eye to me.”

  “Thank you,” I said. But I could not stop. Not while I was bathed, not while I ate, not while I read, not even while I slept.

  During the third cycle of the routine, a few days after I had stopped bleeding and had spent the night with the king, he said, “Sometimes, upon parting, you seem so full of anticipation that I wonder if you have taken another lover and are going to meet him.”

  My heart began to race. If I often appeared more eager to leave than I should have, it was because I did not like seeing Xerxes eat fruit from the fingers of other women and because I wanted to see Erez. “Your Majesty, no woman could want for another man after being with you. I am only eager for the herbs Ruti gives me, which might hasten the gift I want to give you. A son who will be as big and powerful as his father, and as worshipful of him as I am.”

  He looked carefully at me for a moment. Then he said, “Hathach, the servant I have assigned you, is my most faithful eunuch. There are few men I trust as much as a eunuch. My wise grandfather Cyrus understood their value and made great use of them during his reign.

  “Cyrus died twelve years before I was born, but first he passed along his wisdom about eunuchs to my father, and my father passed it on to me. People are most vulnerable to attack when going about the simple tasks of daily life—eating, drinking, washing, sleeping—and this is why eunuchs are ideal servants. Who else do they have to be loyal to besides their masters? A man who has a wife and children will love them more than all others. A woman or girl, especially, is prone to love—love for a husband, for mothers and fathers, for children. But a eunuch is dependent upon and indebted to his masters, because most men—even a eunuch’s own family—will consider him a shameful creature. A eunuch will be beaten, or worse, if caught alone. A eunuch needs protection and will pay his master with unwavering devotion.” Xerxes nonchalantly ran his hand over his rings. “He will not fall prey to a bribe. He will see to his king’s safety and do anything his king asks of him.

  “And this is not the only benefit. A eunuch thinks more clearly than a man, because a man may lust for women or a crown. A eunuch can have neither. He can have only his position, and therefore all his thoughts are upon the same goal: pleasing his master.”

  I understood the king’s warning. The eunuch had been assigned to watch me. Still, I said, “Thank you, my generous husband, for giving me your most trusted servant. I will make good use of him.”

  I had assigned Hathach to stand outside the doors to the reception hall so he could announce visitors. When I returned to my chambers he bowed to me as I walked past him. Does he truly have nothing else in all the world but his service to the king? And does aligning himself with the king mean he has aligned himself against me? I would tell him nothing I did not also want the king to know.

  Both my head and heart were heavy. I hoped Hegai and Ruti had chosen wisely in aligning themselves with me. It was not only for myself that I wished to conceive a son. It was for them, and also, strangely, for Erez. He had risked his life to kneel before me in the military court; he would rise or fall with me.

  All of us continued carefully going through the routine determined by my body, as if the routine itself was our purpose. But really, we were waiting. Our destinies hung upon my womb.

  The routine repeated itself four times. Then, one day, I woke up with Ruti staring down into my face. “It has been—”

  “A whole month,” I said. I sat up as though the new life propelled me. The servant who bore the pitcher of water I requested each morning hurried toward me.

  “Careful!” Ruti said, putting her hand on my shoulder and urging me to lay back. “You must be careful not to move too quickly.”

  There was still water in my goblet from the night before, so I gently waved the servant away.

  “Do not drink from anything that has not been tasted,” Ruti said.

  “He tasted it last night, as did I.” As soon as the words left my mouth I realized how foolish it was to have waved the servant away. “But I have not watched it each moment since.” I called to him, “Servant!” I had been advised never to learn this eunuch’s name and to look only closely enough at him to know if someone else was sent in his place. I watched as he poured some of the water into a goblet and drank it. Though I was thirsty, I had the eunuch stand at the other end of my chambers while Ruti and I talked. I would not drink until I was certain he would not be sick.

  “From now on, you must be gentle and happy and move slowly,” Ruti said. “This is your only care, but do not let it be a care. Do not think on it too much.” She put her hand on my stomach. “And do not tell anyone but the king. You must tell him or he will continue trying to plant his seed, damaging the seed he has planted already.”

  I remembered what Hegai had once told me: “Do not tell anyone what you plan to do, that way they cannot stop you.” I would guard my belly, my future, and my heir by guarding my tongue. I finally called for the eunuch to bring me a goblet of water and then I dismissed him. “I am going to have the king’s child, Ruti. The king’s, and ours.”

  I often lay with my left hand upon my stomach, hoping the life inside me would reach up and move against my palm, reassure me that I was truly carrying a child. One day I asked Ruti, “Should I feel something?” I only saw the cruelty of my question after it had escaped my lips. She had never carried a child in her belly, or, if she had, she never mentioned it.

  She came closer to where I lay upon my bed. I could not tell from her eyes whether I had hurt her. “I have heard that many women do not feel anything within their wombs until they get sick, Your Majesty.”

  “I am sick with hope, Ruti. I want to feel this child inside me and I want to do all I can for him. I will not allow any harm to come to our child.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  * * *

  DAGGER TRAINING

  “Do you know how to use your daggers?” I asked Ruti the next day.

  She was bathing me and she did not look up or take the cloth from my leg. “Yes. Plunge them into anyone who tries to harm you. I am old, but not so old I cannot thrust a dagger all the way through a man’s back, into his heart.”

  I laughed. “I am glad you are a soldier in my army and not my enemy’s. But me. Should not I also have a dagger?”

  “Two. You should have as many daggers as you have hands. But also, you must be taught how to use them to defend yourself. When I defended you, I attacked someone who was rushing past me. Next time I will better know where to stab a man who, because he must go about his work in silence, is not wearing armor. My blade will enter his side and slide into his ribs. He will be dead before he even comes close to you. You though must know how to stab someone who is rushing toward you. That is different, and I cannot teach you how to do it.”

  “There is someone here who could teach me.” Erez and I had not come close since we had stood together in my wardrobe months before. I was confident we would not give in to foolishness again. I had too much to lose.

  She looked sharply at me. “We must make certain your training does not bring about something even more dangerous than that which you are training to defend against.”

  When my cosmetics were like a mask upon my face and I was dressed in my most commanding crimson robe, I had Erez and Jangi called in from where they were posted outside the doors.

  Erez entered my chambers stiffly, perhaps tired from standing for so long. As hard as it was for me to rest, it must have been as hard for him to spend his days and sometimes nights standing in one place when he had spent his life traveling the empire. I was happy to provide him a break from his routine.

  I dismissed all but Erez, Jangi, an
d Ruti. Ruti was giving me such a foul look that I could hear it as clearly as though it were words: Do not make it easier for people to spread lies about you. Especially the most dangerous lies—those with tiny pieces of truth inside them.

  “I know that I have the best guard around me”—I moved my gaze over all three of them—“and I would like to be part of it.” I looked at Erez. “I must be trained in the use of a dagger.”

  Color drained from his face so quickly that I suspected I was not the only one who had nightmares about the night he kidnapped me. What in particular haunted him? Being bitten, my cry, how he had ignored my pleas, how he had dragged me toward the other girls’ cries—one of his arms around my ribs and elbows, the other around my neck?

  “Jangi, you will remain at the door.” I could see by the slight rise of his cheeks that he was flattered I had addressed him by name. “With Ruti.”

  I walked toward the screen behind which musicians sometimes played and Erez followed. “Have you already forgotten that using a dagger is not as easy as it looks, Your Majesty?” he asked quietly.

  Do not use that night when I was still a girl against me. I had not forgotten how I slipped the dagger from his belt and tried to plunge it up the inside of his tunic sleeve and how it had been no match for his flesh. I had not forgotten how it had flown from my hand as if he had knocked it away.

  I did not answer. When we were safely behind the screen I turned to face him. His eyes looked dry and tired. This did not make him any less beautiful. He had been standing guard for me a long time, and unlike other guards, he never closed his eyes.

  “You would be better off if your plan was to stay as far from any danger as possible,” he said.