“Lovely, yes.” Haman sounded nowhere near impressed. “But better suited for a nursemaid than a wife of the king of kings.”
He shot his friend a glare. “She pleases me. Let that be that.”
“I will speak not another word of her.”
He glanced at his son to see whose side he would take up, and his breath bunched up in his chest. It was a look he knew well, that expression on Darius’s countenance. Knew it by feel. The same intrigue he himself was given to, the very one that had overcome him upon his first sighting of Kasia.
No. He would not suffer his son mooning over her, risking scandal and bad blood. He would not allow himself to consider that Darius was far closer to her in age. He would not let himself wonder if she would get a glimpse of the pup at his side and realize that her husband was, as Amestris helpfully pointed out, old enough to be her father.
Curse it.
“Father!”
The happy squeal stole his thoughts back from that vortex, and he looked down in time to scoop up little Chinara, who was aimed at his knees. With a chuckle, he settled her on his hip. “And a good morning to you, little sweet. Have you run off from your mother again?”
The wee one offered him an impish grin and no apology. “That is Kasia. She told us a story about a shepherd boy who fought a giant, and he won! And then the boy grew up to be king, but his sons were bad, and their people would not listen, and so eventually your father’s fathers carried them away.” She clapped chubby hands to his cheeks. “I know not why that made them cry. I like it when you carry me away, Father.”
He laughed and rewarded the mite’s wit with a kiss upon her brow. Chinara always brightened his day. “Shall I carry you around all day with me? You can help me pass judgment and plot out our great war against Greece.”
Her face gathered into a mask of consideration. “No. I shall listen to more of Kasia’s songs. But perhaps tomorrow I will help you, Father.”
“I will look forward to it.” He placed her back on her feet and then made himself face reality. The exchange would have caught Kasia’s attention. When he looked up, would he find her gaze had shifted and locked on Darius?
Her attention had indeed been snagged from the children. She had pulled her knees up, wrapped her arms around them. Her expression registered fascination, her eyes reflected what he would have called love, though she may apply the word more carefully than he. But she looked not at Darius. Nor at Masistes, at Haman, at any of the children. Her attention was his, and his alone.
Evening could not come fast enough.
Seven
Esther jerked up in her bed to fight the enemy holding her down. It took her a moment to realize her cover was tangled in her limbs, nothing more. Still, her heart thumped too fast, too hard, and dark images pounded her eyes.
There had been water everywhere. Pouring from the sky, surging from beneath. Wave upon wave beating her until she could not tell which way was up. Just as she thought her lungs would explode, Kasia’s name had burst from her lips and the nightmare had vanished.
Only it had not. Kasia was still gone, lost to those waves. Had her last moments been like that? The burning, the confusion, the mad fight for salvation?
Esther tossed her cover aside and crawled out of her bed, desperate for fresh air. Exiting into the main room, she heard the soft snoring of the servants and silence from Mordecai’s chamber. She held her breath and let herself out the front door.
The night washed cool and refreshing over her. She knew not where she intended to go, but her feet would not stand still. They took her down the street, stuck close to the houses, and paused at the end. A low wall stretched ahead. Over it she would find the Choaspes River.
Dare she?
Kasia would have. She would have cast a glance over her shoulder to be sure no one followed, then run off with a grin. She would have plunged into the water until it erased all her worries, then reemerged the better for it.
Until the night the waters did not relinquish her again.
With a shudder, Esther turned back toward home. She took a step, then stopped when the sound of metal clashing against metal reached her ears. Weapons? Out here? Curiosity underscored her alarm—she slid forward until she could see over the wall.
The moon, three-quarters full, shone down and bathed the earth with silver light that erased all color and left it shimmering. It gilded the two men, caught their spears and daggers arcing through the air.
Her breath caught when she recognized Zechariah, his face stony, his arms bulging as he parried off his attacker. She was set to release it in a scream when the attacker broke off. And laughed.
“Were it possible, I would swear you had been practicing on your own, Zech.”
Zechariah relaxed his stance, but from where she stood in the shadows, his smile looked forced. “I have a few demons to battle.”
“The Spartans themselves would tremble if they saw you tonight. Fight like that in the war, and the king will advance you quickly.”
War? King? Esther pressed a hand to her lips. Surely he did not intend to join the army, to march against Greece. Surely she would not lose him, too.
Zechariah sighed. “Assuming I can convince my father to let me go. If he knew you were training me, Bijan . . .”
“You are a man, Zechariah. Old enough to join the army without your father’s permission.”
Esther had the urge to lob a rock at this Bijan’s skull for such a suggestion. Zechariah sighed again. “He just lost his eldest daughter. If I joined the king’s forces, he would see it as losing his eldest son as well. I cannot do that to the family. I will not go without his blessing.”
Yet the expression on Zechariah’s face told her that though he may respect his father’s word on the matter, he would also resent him for it.
Her poor Zechariah. Would he ever be content in the life he was given? To labor beside his father and take over the wood shop? Or would he forever yearn for more, for what he could not have?
Bijan snorted. “You are a better son than your father deserves. Did you see the way he sneered at me when I came into the shop last week? It is no wonder few other Persians make use of his skill.”
Esther winced, but Zechariah chuckled. “He will never see that he is as judgmental of his Persian neighbors as they have been of him. I had better get back, Bijan, before I am missed. Same time tomorrow night?”
“I will be sure I am well rested so I might offer you more of a challenge.” The Persian took the spear Zechariah proffered and, with a wave, trotted off down the river.
Before she could dash away, Zechariah turned. A start of recognition crossed his countenance, and he strode her way.
She pulled her spine up, rolled her shoulders back, and promised herself she would not cower.
“Esther.” His voice, though low and harsh, sounded sweet to her ears. “What are you doing here?”
She tried to arch her brow in the same way Kasia would have. “I might ask you the same question.”
The corner of his mouth tugged up, though he was quick to bite back the smile. “Ah, but I am not a slip of a girl out without chaperone.”
“And yet I daresay my cousin would not be as angry at finding me here as your father would be you.” She nodded to the spot where he had been training for a war not his own. “What are you doing, Zechariah? You know he will never allow you to go, so why torment yourself?”
He loosed a long breath and raked a hand over his hair. “I do not expect a girl-child to understand these things.