As we were prodded into different rooms containing tubs of washing water, I had to pass by the she-lion. If a girl quickened her pace or knocked into another girl in an attempt to leave a wide berth, the she-lion’s tail began to lash back and forth. She was huge. Even her paws. “If you show fear she is more likely to attack you,” Hegai said. “Animals cannot tell the difference between fear and aggression.” I looked only at the goblet a servant handed me as I took slow, steady steps away from the beast.
Instead of sating my thirst, drinking seemed to increase it. I drank deeply, being careful to keep the Faravahar safely tucked into my cheek, and then I held my goblet out for the nearest servant woman to refill. The sweetness traveled down my throat, through my chest, and filled my belly.
A new lightness was flooding my head and somehow expanding even though already it seemed to fill my whole skull. Around this blissful glow, I saw the smoke rising up over the harem courtyard. A little part of me knew I should be sad, that something irrevocable and terrible was happening. Our clothes were being burned. Unless one of the other girls had hidden something as I had, none of them had anything left. As I entered the baths I moved my tongue against the Faravahar. I must never lose this, or I will have nothing.
CHAPTER TWELVE
* * *
THE INSPECTION
Perhaps to distract us from the smoke, a servant said, “These baths rival the late king Darius’s at Persepolis. You will be as clean as polished marble soon.” She gently placed a hand upon my back and steered me toward a long line of bronze washing tubs. Before I could stop her, the woman took the goblet from my hand and helped me into the bathtub. “Just rest,” she said, putting a hand on my shoulder and pressing me back.
I tried to resist. I wanted my goblet. But I also wanted to conceal my private places, and so I did not move my hands from where they covered me.
“Even with all the wine you have drunk you feel the need to cover yourself? You must dispense with thinking of your body as your own.”
Without meaning to, I started to pray.
The servant pressed her hand over my mouth. “Hush. Do not speak aloud of God. Just lie still.” She knelt beside me and began scrubbing my neck with washing powder and a rough cloth.
After a moment she put down the cloth and pressed a calloused fingertip next to my eye. “No tears.” I had not realized I was crying. The servant gently lifted a lock of hair out of the way so she could clearly see my face. The wine had not caused me to forget that touch is the purest testimony of a person’s feelings. Hers was gentle.
“There is no cause for tears, your cuts will heal in time. As for Halannah, it is true that she is the king’s favorite, but she will never be queen. If Xerxes meant to make her queen he would have done so already. After learning that he was rounding up all the virgins and would take a queen from among them, Halannah drank up the harem wine and great quantities of opium tea. She did not eat for many days.
“She will spend the rest of her youth as a wine-soaked harem girl. When the king is done with her she will be a servant to the new, younger harem girls. She will clean the chamber pots just as I do now. One day she may even clean your chamber pot.”
It took me a moment to realize that the servant thought I was crying about my cuts or Halannah, and not all that I had lost. She had forgotten everything outside the palace walls.
“Until then, though, you will have to be careful. She does not like you. If you do not win Hegai’s favor and secure his protection, it will not be safe for you to sleep.” She pressed the cloth so hard against my neck that my breath stopped. “Look at me.”
Her skin was wrinkled and thin. The bridge of her nose was slightly crooked, as though long ago it had been broken and no one had attended to it. Her eyes were hooded and sad.
“I did not please the eunuch in charge at the time I was brought here. He gave me to the soldiers, and beneath them I grew old. It took no more than a few years of that rough life to put bitterness in my heart and then it made its way onto my tongue. Not even the toughest soldier can withstand a woman who mocks him with laughter. Now I will spend the rest of my days as a servant.”
“I am sorry, mistress.”
“I am a slave. Do not call me mistress.”
“I do not know what to call you.”
“I was born Ruti, but now I am ‘woman’ or ‘servant.’ Do not seem too familiar with me.” She shoved my goblet into my hand so hard that wine splashed over the edge and onto my stomach. “And stop crying. It is not yet time to pity yourself. You still have a chance.”
I kept the Faravahar against my cheek as I drank. I thought of Erez’s kind eyes, and the strength in his arms when he had helped me onto his horse.
“There is the little smile that will win Hegai’s favor,” Ruti said as she gently patted my hand.
After she had scrubbed me from head to toe she told me to stand. She looked at me for a moment before she pressed a towel over my body. “The scratches upon your skin will heal. You are clean as a baby, and beautiful enough to be a queen.”
The floor seemed to undulate beneath me. Still I was strengthened by her faith in me. “Thank you.”
Next I was escorted to another room that held only a table with a large pillow on it.
“Think of palm trees, a soft breeze, the wine you have drunk and the wine you will drink soon,” Ruti whispered in my ear. She pushed me back onto the pillow. Wine sloshed down my arm, but when Ruti tried to take the goblet I tightened my fingers around it. If they were going to clean my teeth I would need a place to hide the winged man.
After hot wax was used to remove all the hair from my body, Hegai’s own attendant eunuchs gathered around the table and Hegai himself came to stand near my feet. I sat up to look for his she-lion. I was relieved to see that Hegai had not brought her. Ruti took both of my hands in her own.
“Lean back and close your eyes.”
I did as she ordered and soon felt fingers upon my thighs. Ruti held my hands tighter and I pressed the Faravahar hard against the inside of my cheek. I pressed until I tasted blood, so I could focus only on the pain in my mouth.
Ruti yelled at one of the eunuchs, “Not so hard! You will ruin her for the king!”
I could no longer raise my head. Each part of me had become unaccountably heavy.
Finally Hegai announced, “She is untouched.” This seemed a strange thing to say, as I had never been touched so much in my life. “Bring her to the king’s harem.”
“Carry her, you mean,” someone muttered. And then I could no longer keep hold of my goblet. I heard it clatter onto the marble floor, and then I heard nothing.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
* * *
NIGHT
I woke in the dark. A lamp burned somewhere nearby, giving off just enough light for me to see a ceiling that was not the simple flat expanse of clay that had been above my straw mattress in Mordecai’s hut. It was so high above me that I had to squint to see that it was made of polished blue and red stone. The walls were full of bulls, lions, and winged men.
The day before came back to me and my heart started to pound so hard that I could not get enough air. With my tongue I felt for the Faravahar. My cheek was full of cuts and nothing else. I groped in the darkness beside me, hoping the winged man had fallen onto the mattress.
My eyes were beginning to adjust to the darkness. It was an uneven darkness. One piece was blacker than the rest. It sat beside me.
I screamed and it folded over me as if my voice had woken it. Hair, necklaces, and breasts swayed above me. Fingers lightly touched my thigh.
I slapped at the hands with all my strength as they yanked my tunic up.
“Hit me again, peasant, and I will not be so gentle.” It was Halannah’s voice.
Had Halannah taken my Faravahar? I swallowed back the bile rising into my throat. “What do you want?”
“That is a foolish question. Does a man with only one jewel wonder why he is being robbed?”
I knew the Faravahar was not the jewel Halannah spoke of. I turned my head to the side and vomited.
“You do not make this pleasant,” Halannah said. Her fingers dug into my legs and she yanked one of them to the side.
I looked up in time to see another, smaller woman-shape of darkness come up behind Halannah. The shadow-woman brought something down upon Halannah’s head and Halannah let out a startled cry and fell on top of me.
“Out, demoness!” Ruti cried, throwing the pitcher to the ground and knocking Halannah off me.
“What goes on here?” Bigthan asked as he rushed in.
“What kind of guard are you, who does not protect the girls Hegai has instructed you to watch over?” Ruti gazed at his wrists in the light of the oil lamp he held. “One paid with a portion of the trinkets Halannah is given.”
Now I could see other girls and another eunuch hurrying toward us. I did not want anyone to know of Halannah’s hand upon my thigh and also I was afraid for Ruti.
“Halannah came running toward me with a pitcher,” I said to Bigthan, “but she fell before she could hit me with it. You can see she has vomited here. Ruti came to clean up Halannah’s mess.”
“Your tale was believable until you said Halannah vomited. Her body has not wished to rid itself of wine since shortly after she arrived here three years ago.”
“She owes you no explanation,” Ruti cried. “Take this demoness from here before I decide to tell Hegai of your corruption.”
Once we were alone Ruti knelt to clean the floor. The room was not whirling quite so violently as before so I tried to help. Ruti waved me away. “But it is my fault,” I said. “I drank too much wine.”
“You will get used to the wine. Or you will lose your treasure.”
“Please do not call it my treasure.”
“Halannah was trying to ruin you for the king and she will try again.”
I knew this, but hearing it aloud caused me to cringe.
“Stop that, or you will become wrinkled before meeting the king,” Ruti said. “You need every drop of beauty you possess for your night with him.”
I knew it was childish to pity myself, but still I said, “If my beauty is the reason I am here, it has done me little good.”
“Do not pretend you do not cherish your face. Like all foolish girls I am sure you dreamed of a good marriage. Whatever boy you might have desired in your village no longer exists. Nothing outside the palace walls does—not even this.” Ruti held up the Faravahar. I reached for it, but Ruti moved it out of reach.
“God does not exist?” I asked.
She did not respond.
“Please, it is important to me.”
“It should not be. Do not waste another moment thinking of this trinket. All your thoughts must go toward your survival.” She dropped the Faravahar into her tunic pocket. “Your beauty will not save itself.”
When my strength returned I would find a way to get it back.
“After I clean your face, I will pick and whiten your teeth, then give you a rinse that you should use whenever Hegai might enter the harem. You must win his favor. He can protect you better than I can.”
“How will I win his favor?”
“By making him feel like something he can never be again. A man.”
I waited for Ruti to explain, but instead she said, “You are too alone. I will not always be able to rush in and hit the drunken demoness on the head.”
“Why did you protect me? Halannah will surely take revenge upon you.”
“What can she do to me? Take away my beauty? Take away my freedom? I do not even remember what it is like outside these walls and I have no children to take care of me. All I have is my life and now, a reason for it.”
I suspected that if Ruti truly was loyal there was a reason for it that she hid from me. And yet I was somehow certain that she really did care for me, or for something she hoped to gain from me, and I wanted to help her as much as she had helped me. “I hope I am made queen, so I can give you a life worthy of all you deserve.”
She laughed. “Well, if you are going to be queen, I would prefer much more than that.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
* * *
LIFE IN THE HAREM
In the morning, an old woman massaged oil of myrrh into my skin. I was both thankful and unnerved to see that she wore the expression of someone performing a menial task with which she has long ago grown bored. I did not close my eyes, even when my hair was soaked with olive oil and wound in a warm towel.
Ruti explained that I would undergo skin softening and hair treatments for the next six months. “During your second six months of treatments we will more thoroughly cover you in perfumes and cosmetics.”
When the old woman told me to turn my head so she could apply perfume behind my ears, I pretended I did not hear her. I needed to keep watch for Halannah. Perfume was also dabbed between my breasts, and in my private places. I wound my fingers tightly together to keep from knocking the servant’s hands away.
I closed my eyes only briefly as my face was powdered and my eyes were ringed with kohl. Then I resumed my vigil over the entrance to the baths as pomegranate juice was rubbed into my cheeks and lips, and my hair was brushed with ivory combs and styled high on top of my head. I understood why Halannah kept her head straight upon her neck. I would have to get used to the added weight.
When I stood up with my hands covering me, Ruti sighed impatiently but wrapped me in a large swath of thin gauze identical to those the women of the harem wore. I felt no less naked than I had without it. Unlike other Persians, the women of the harem did not wear undergarments.
“Is there not a robe to wear over this . . .” I did not know what to call it.
Ruti wrapped two more swaths of gauze around the first. They floated behind me as Bigthan led me toward the harem room and my new place among the virgins. Even before we entered, I heard the women’s voices bouncing against the marble; it sounded like the room itself was speaking.
As soon as we stepped inside, the noise faded to echoes and then disappeared. Hundreds of kohl-ringed eyes turned to stare at me. The day before there had been space for the concubines to be scattered throughout the room, each woman on her own cushion. Now the room was divided into two separate sections left and right: one for concubines and one for virgins. Most of the concubines and all of the virgins had to share cushions.
There are so many, I thought. Each one of them seemed to be looking at me. Are all these eyes that look upon me now unkind, or do all eyes heavily lined with kohl look so merciless? Do my own eyes make me look as capable of cruelty as all of these?
Maybe word of the struggle with Halannah the night before had already made its way through the harem. No one spoke or invited me to come near. Perhaps Halannah had not lied when she said that there is no such thing as a friend in the harem.
Bigthan stopped near the entrance. It was where Hegai had said the least beautiful virgins would be kept in case the security of the harem was breached. But around me were girls who could not possibly be the least attractive among us.
I turned to Bigthan. “Certainly these girls are not—”
“Hegai is fickle, as you will soon learn. Now he has decided the most beautiful virgins should be where he will see them each time he enters. If anything happens to you or the others he will lose his position.” He could not suppress a little smile.
“Sit next to Bhagwanti.” He gestured at an Indian girl.
“I am flattered that I am thought one of the most attractive,” I said, “but I would prefer to be farther back.”
“Your preferences are not important.”
“Surely I should not be in the same place as Halannah. Is not the front of the harem where she is kept?”
“Halannah is not kept.”
With that he went back toward the baths, to fetch the next girl and show her the small spot where she was to live out the rest of her days. Before disappearing through the entrance to the hare
m he looked over his shoulder and spoke to me loudly enough for everyone to hear. “Sit down. You do not hold your wine well and you are less likely to hurt yourself if you are already on the floor.”
From the silk cushion where she lay, Bhagwanti raised one of her perfectly drawn eyebrows. “Are not your feet tired? Sit down before you draw any more attention to us.” Without waiting for me to respond she turned her body away from me.
The first meal we were served was lamb’s meat cooked with dates and plums, and sugared almonds for dessert. And of course wine. I hesitated. Was the lamb before me slaughtered according to Jewish dietary law—a quick, deep stroke across the throat with a perfectly sharpened blade? Was it drained of all blood? Was it prepared in a kitchen that kept meat apart from milk, cheese, and yogurt? I was certain that the answer to at least one of these questions was no. But Bigthan was looking at me. And I had broken our dietary laws already. The day before I had drunk grape wine prepared by gentiles. I had drunk so much of it that it had overcome me.
Without moving my lips or making a sound I implored God, Please forgive me.
I tried not to taste the meat as I chewed it, as though that might lessen my sin. The other girls spoke of the food before us and of the beauty treatments we had received. If any began to speak of their families or where she was from, a eunuch told her to eat lest she be too reedy, boyish, or chicken-legged for the king. Kohl ran down the face of a girl who cried loudly beside me.
“One of you will be queen,” Bigthan said, “but this one has little chance. There is none less desirable than the girl who dares cry with the riches of the palace kitchens spread before her.”
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