“Then you will be better off than most of the wives.” Atossa smiled again and then stood. “I shall let Hegai proceed. After you go to the king, I will pay you another visit.”
Kasia jumped to her feet, though she had no idea how to say farewell to royalty. Would those lessons be poured upon her this week along with the oils and perfumes, or would she be let to blunder her way through? She suspected Haman and Amestris would be in favor of the blundering. Hopefully Hegai’s and Atossa’s attention would save her.
~*~
Mordecai nodded to his manservant as he shut the door behind him. Esther sat in the same place she had when he left three hours earlier. Her fingers kept busy with the mending, but her expression was a hollow mask of pain.
That was how she looked when he first met her three years before, after her parents’ deaths. He had hastened across the miles the moment the news reached him, but still she was alone for a month, with naught but a neighbor to watch her. His heart broke that day, when he beheld the small girl who looked ready to give up on life. It broke again now at the return of the dispassion.
“Daughter.”
She looked up with the smile she always gave when he called her “daughter” instead of “cousin.” But it was a dim echo of the smile that graced her features one short week ago.
Mordecai sighed. “We will be dining with Kish and his family tonight.”
Esther’s gaze fell again. “I am not hungry.”
“I know.” He crouched down beside her and urged her chin up with a finger. “But you must eat, dear one. If you waste away and leave me too, then how will I survive it? I need you, Esther. Kasia’s family needs you. You were closer to her than any of them, and they are comforted by your presence.”
Her face twisted in agony before she turned it away. “How can you be so calm about her loss? How can you go over there without it piercing you anew?”
A question he could not answer. Not honestly. How could he explain that the part of his soul that had blossomed as he watched Kasia, as he came to love her, did not accept this loss at all? It felt as though she were only on a journey. Visiting family in another province. Not here, but not gone. Not for good.
It was a delusion—he knew that. But when he cried out to the Lord his God, he felt a whisper of peace wash over him like the river flooding the plains. And the soil of his being was left fertile with hope.
Perhaps he was a fool to think she might return. But he was not enough of one to share that, to get another’s hopes up where they could be dashed against the rocks of reality. Still, he could not escape the peace, the feeling that the young woman he loved so much was well.
To Esther he could only say, “I trust in Jehovah, my child. I find my sustenance in him.”
“But he allowed this to happen. He sent the rains that killed her.”
“Those rains fall on the just and the unjust alike. He allows much tragedy, or so it seems to us. But we cannot see the future, precious Esther. We do not know what greater tragedy may have come had this one been withheld. It is our part to have faith in his divine orchestration. To put our hand into his and keep our eyes open, so that we might see what small blessings blossom under our tears.”
She turned her face back to him. He would not have said she looked convinced, but her eyes were no longer shuttered behind the dull pain. They blazed with an ache magnified by her tears. “What blessing can come of this, cousin? You have lost yet another woman you love. I have lost a dear friend, a sister, a would-be mother.”
“Yes, we have. But there is another family of friends three doors down that has also lost a daughter, a sister, and one they loved far longer than we did. Who are we to withhold what comfort we can give them, because it hurts us? Is it not our part to ease their burden in whatever way we can?”
When she blinked, a drop of brine fell from each eye. “You are too good, my father. I cannot be like you.”
“No?” He smoothed back a few stray hairs from her face and smiled. “Odd. In you I see a spirit far sweeter than mine has ever been. If you will turn over your injured heart to Jehovah, I think you will find far more strength at your disposal than I have.”
Her lip quivered, making her look far younger than her twelve years. “How do I do that?”
“Pray, little one. Ask him to touch you, to speak to you. Ask him to bring clarity through the pain.”
A frown creased her brow. “And that will work?”
“Jehovah will not keep his comfort from a contrite spirit. Seek him, and he will pour a balm over your soul.”
Her nod was small. “I cannot fathom what good can come of Kasia’s death . . . but I will look for some.”
Not the total surrender to almighty Jehovah that he would have wished, but at least she would keep her heart open to the Lord’s ministrations. Mordecai nodded and stood, held out his hand. “Come. We must go to our friends.”
The pinched look eased away from her face as she put her hand in his. “Yes. Let us go to our friends.”
~*~
Gossip sprinted through the palace, and it did not earn Kasia any friends. For a week, she endured hostile glances from the virgins nearly finished their year of preparation. She listened to their mutters and snickers as she walked by on her way from lesson to lesson. More than one “accidental” bump sent her into a table corner or statue.
She would go to the king tonight, and she would go with bruises on body and soul. She would go knowing the other soon-to-be wives hated her for receiving the best room, a higher daily allotment of oils and perfumes, the undivided attention of Hegai. And for being put ahead of them in the line of women awaiting their turn with the king of kings.
Gladly would she have traded places with any one of them. But instead here she stood in her chamber, listening to Hegai instruct her on her final minutes before meeting her husband.
“You may take anything you like with you,” he said. “Most select their own dress and jewelry. Some take incense or gifts they make for the king. What do you wish?”
An escape? Kasia swallowed, though her throat felt dry and swollen. Perhaps some fatal disease would strike her down before she came face to face with Xerxes. One could hope.
Moistening her lips, she shook her head. “What do you recommend?”
Hegai smiled, even chuckled. “No one ever asks—they spend so long planning, they care little for what I have to say. But I offer my advice freely to you. Dress simply. Do not detract from your natural beauty with too many adornments. Take no gift, as you have had no time to make one with your hands and could otherwise give nothing the king has not first given you.”
He held up a hand and twirled a finger. She spun in a circle so that he could see her from all angles. “The king was intrigued by stories of simple beauty, not riches. Go as you. Offer him what you are, who you are. I think he will find it pleasing.”
Though she nodded, her hands trembled. She clasped them together. “Will you select
