Game of Queens Read online

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  Dedicated to my own beautiful Persian

  who would not come when she was called

  Vashti

  1972–1990

  One hell of a damn fine cat.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  First and foremost, thanks to my sisters: Rosemary Edghill, whose advice about using music has gotten me through days of no “inspiration” or even “desperation,” and Bonnie Edghill, who thinks I’m a great writer, even though she’s read all my books and should know better. Rosemary—Arioch, Samamat, and Daniel are for you, with love. Bonnie—Star is for you, ditto.

  Heartfelt thanks to:

  Nichole Argyres, my wonderful and perceptive editor.

  Michelle Ayala—you were right, Michelle; moving the computer did help!

  Rebecca Bridge, whose magic touch brought my characters to pictorial life.

  Laura Chasen, for helpful comments—and for making me get things done on time.

  Ginger Garrett, for encouragement, inspiration, and her terrific Biblical novels.

  Anna Ghosh, my perceptive and wonderful agent.

  Nicole Jordan, for advice, cheerleading, and her spicy romance novels.

  Michael Kourtoulou, for perceptive comments, music, and (you guessed it) encouragement.

  Cynthia Ripley Miller, for support and comments, and “Sunrise”!

  Kylah O’Neill, who provided an organized character.

  Ajashea Perez (and her cousin Crystal) who kindly allowed me to use their names, and who provided me with two intelligent, enthusiastic characters who really deserve their own book.

  Laura Pilkington, who, when I was positive I would never finish this story, reminded me that “You say that every book. You’ll get it done—you always do.”

  Diane and Buddy Rawlings for supportive comments and for sending me One Night With the King (which I spent lots of time rewatching when I suppose I should have been writing…) .

  Jill Eileen Smith, for inspiration, encouragement, and her terrific Biblical novels.

  Lauren Hougen, for her keen eyes.

  NaNá Stoelzle, my copy editor, who made sure cousins stayed cousins and the Great Staircase wasn’t built twice.

  And a very special “thank you” to J. O’N., S. C., and D. J. I couldn’t have done it without you!

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  When I read a historical novel, I always like to know what an author altered in the interest of telling a story. But when I started writing this author’s note for Game of Queens, I realized there’s so much background, and so many things I played with to create my own version of the Esther story that the explanations would be as long as the novel. So I’ll just hit the highlights here, and if you have any questions about Game of Queens, email me at [email protected] and I’ll do my best to remember what I was thinking at the time I came up with My Brilliant Idea.

  The perceptive reader (i.e., anyone who reads past page one) will notice the author has taken wild liberties with the original text. Among the more obvious alterations: handing the condemning of the Jews to someone other than the king, eliminating Esther’s three-day fast, and cutting the number of banquets Esther gives to one.

  The Bible happily conflates Cyrus the Great, who actually conquered Babylon, with Darius the Great, and gaily tosses in a Darius the Mede, just to drive writers nuts. I had to pick one, and went with Darius the Great. The Bible also makes Belshazzar Nebuchadnezzar’s son, although he was really his grandson. Unless he’s not related to him at all. (You’re all clear on that? Good, because it confused the expletive-deleted out of me.)

  And I had to pick a king because I happily combined Daniel’s story with Vashti’s and Esther’s. I also combined Bel and the dragon, creating a dragon named Bel.

  Okay, here we go, short notes first:

  Note 1: All spellings are those from the King James version of the Bible. For example, Shushan, not Susa.

  Note 2: The number of provinces in the Persian Empire is taken from the Book of Esther, which gives the number as 127. According to Herodotus, there were twenty, and modern estimates vary wildly.

  Note 3: The name Bagoas may be the shortened form of names like Bagadata. Or it may mean “gift.” Or it may mean “eunuch.” Or it may not. I used a meaning that fit my story.

  Note 4: Tradition says Vashti was Belshazzar’s daughter. I made her his granddaughter.

  Note 5: Marmoset—at this time, a name for any small monkey.

  Note 6: Mordecai’s refusal to bow to Haman is clearly Haman-specific, as Mordecai must be at least bowing to the king!

  Note 7: Persians practically revered dogs, regarding them as almost sacred. I was absolutely delighted to discover this fact and promptly put as many dogs as I could justify to my editor into the story.

  Note 8: Important Safety Tip: Unless you’re a queen in a semifantastical, semihistorical novel, wolves make absolutely dreadful pets! Trust me on this.

  And now the longer remarks:

  Vashti, or, No Crown Is Worth This!

  Traditionally, Vashti was considered something of a villainess—a disobedient wife who, in Jewish folklore, forced her Jewish slaves to work on the Sabbath. Naked. Fortunately, opinion has changed on Vashti; she is now often regarded as a woman of strong character who refused to obey a drunken summons to appear before men, in public, in a society in which decent women were strictly secluded. Ahasuerus ordered her to appear at his banquet wearing her royal crown; in some versions, Vashti was ordered to appear at the king’s banquet wearing only her crown. When she refused to come at the king’s bidding, Vashti was either divorced, exiled, or executed, depending on who’s telling the story. The Bible doesn’t say what happened to her, which gives novelists free rein to decide her fate.

  For her refusal to obey an outrageous command, Vashti is now often lauded as a heroine. Works for me!

  Esther, or, “Orphan” Is Not a Job Description

  All the Bible says is that Esther is an orphan raised by her cousin. However, as time’s gone by, she’s become poorer and more simple with each iteration of the story; possibly to enhance its Cinderella-esque qualities. (Come to think of it, Esther’s really the Perfect Disney Princess.) Nor does the Bible say girls were forcibly acquired for the world’s most famous beauty contest, but many novels and all movie versions have soldiers dragging screaming girls off to the palace. I’m not sure why, as being Queen of Persia probably looked pretty desirable to the average Ancient Persian girl.

  In the original, Mordecai tells Esther not to reveal that she’s a Jew, and she successfully hides her origins—which I’ve always found implausible. Seriously, unless she was raised in a rain barrel on Mars, lots of people in Shushan must know that Mordecai—who works in the palace—has a cousin who’s now in the women’s palace. And surely there was some background checking of the contestants! (Perhaps when the story was originally told, people complained that Esther couldn’t keep her origin secret because the palace gossip
network would have the info about her all over Shushan in two seconds!)

  The Royal Rascal: The Ahasuerus Problem

  Ahasuerus, King of Kings, always presents a problem to the novelist: in the Bible he’s mercurial, drunk, careless, and takes the advice of anyone who can make him stop drinking long enough to listen. The man doesn’t even ask, “Which people need exterminating?,” he just hands his royal seal to Haman, saying, “Do whatever you want”! Turning Ahasuerus into a desirable door prize is a major undertaking—which is how and why the ambitious and manipulative Queen Mother Amestris entered my story.

  Was I Wazir?: The Haman Problem

  Okay, I admit the Haman/Hitler parallels are eerie. A number of authors carry this equation to the extreme of (in one novel from about fifty years ago) giving Haman the swastika as his symbol and a personal army dressed in black. This ignores the fact that until the Nazis literally and figuratively reversed it, the swastika was a symbol of light and good for several thousand years. Tradition says Haman hated the Jews because Haman was descended from King Agag, who was killed by the Jewish prophet Samuel about five hundred years before. Eternal feuds have been carried on for less, but Haman really seems far more interested in personal power than avenging his ancestor. And he’ll happily exterminate an entire race of people to get his own way. Frankly, the man’s just plain evil.

  Bigthan & Teresh: How Not to Carry Out a Murder

  The eunuchs Bigthan and Teresh plan to kill King Ahasuerus, a plot point that sounds like something the original writer of Esther came up with because he (or she) needed Mordecai to save the king so later Haman has to honor Mordecai—because really, what good would killing the king do the two eunuchs? So I came up with a plausible scenario—plausible, anyway, if you assume both Bigthan and Teresh are idiots with seriously hurt feelings. Since they were discussing their Cunning Plan where they could be overheard, they don’t seem to have been any too bright.

  Oh, Susannah! or, Get Your Stories Straight Before Accusing the Innocent

  There’s a lot of argument about the actual creation and placement of the Susannah and the Elders story in the Daniel canon. (See the Anchor Bible, volume 44: Daniel, Esther, and Jeremiah: the Additions by Carey A. Moore.) Because it suited my plot, I set Susannah’s peril just before Daniel leaves Babylon for Shushan. Note: There’s no evidence Daniel was in Shushan during the Esther story. But there’s no evidence that he wasn’t, either.

  Poppies Are For Lovers: The Story of Zariadres and Odatis

  A very popular tale in the Persian Empire. (Warning! Spoilers!) Princess Odatis, the most beautiful girl in all Asia, sees Zariadres in a dream and falls in love with him. Zariadres sees Odatis in a dream and falls in love with her. Odatis’s father wants her to marry one of his relatives, and invites the candidates for her hand to his palace. Odatis secretly invited Zariadres, who strides in, introduces himself to Odatis, and the two dream lovers flee to Zariadres’ kingdom. How Odatis knew where to send the invitation isn’t explained.

  For readers who’d like still more about Queen Esther, there are plenty of sources to go to:

  Novels about Queen Esther

  Esther is understandably a hugely popular subject for novelists, so there are far too many to list here (and I’m pretty sure I’ve read most of them). Search for “Esther, Queen of Persia—Fiction” to track them down in your library system. I will, however, put in a shameless plug for one of my favorite books of all time: Behold Your Queen! by Gladys Malvern. This is the best novel about Esther ever written (I own two copies of the original 1958 edition) and it’s at long, long last been reprinted and is once more available. Buy it and read it as soon as possible!

  Movies about Queen Esther

  Esther and the King (1960) starring Joan Collins attempting to be a Simple Jewish Orphan. This is the movie in which Queen Vashti is divorced for doing a strip-tease in front of the king; she also has an affair with Haman. (Trivia note: The actor playing Xerxes in Esther and the King played Leonidas in The 300 Spartans.)

  Esther (1999) (a made-for-TV movie)

  A Historia de Ester (Brazilian miniseries; eight hours of colorful enjoyment)

  One Night with the King (lively, extravagant, and lots of fun to watch)

  A Few of the Books I Read While Writing Game of Queens

  The Anchor Bible: The Book of Daniel by Louis F. Hartman & Alexander A. Di Lella

  The Anchor Bible: The Book of Esther by Carey A. Moore

  The Anchor Bible: Daniel, Esther, and Jeremiah: The Additions by Carey A. Moore

  Beauty Secrets of the Bible by Ginger Garrett

  Biblical Women Unbound: Counter Tales by Norma Rosen

  Dictionary of Ancient Deities by Patricia Turner & Charles Russell Coulter

  The Holy Bible: King James Version

  The Keeper of the Bed: The Story of the Eunuch by Charles Humana

  The New Penguin Atlas of Ancient History

  The Persian Empire by J. M. Cook

  The Persians by Jim Hicks & Time-Life Books (The Emergence of Man Series)

  Persians: Masters of Empire by Time-Life Books (Lost Civilizations Series)

  Smith’s Bible Dictionary

  Vashti’s Victory: And Other Biblical Women Resisting Injustice by LaVerne McCain Gill

  Writing this book was a huge amount of fun. Not only did retelling Vashti’s and Esther’s stories give me the chance to wallow in research and to reread every Esther novel I could get my hands on (thank you, Adriance Memorial Library, Amazon, and ABEbooks.com), Game of Queens allowed me to fulfill a longtime dream: to write the kind of story in which the heroine has a pet wolf.

  Happy reading!

  India

  www.indiaedghill.com

  PROLOGUE

  Stars

  HEGAI

  Where does this tale truly begin? Does it start in the jeweled garden of the harem of the King of Kings, master of half the world? Shall I begin it there?

  Or shall I begin it at an extravagant banquet on the night that a woman defied the King of Kings before all the nobles of the empire?

  Shall I begin when the Queen Mother and the Grand Vizier plotted slaughter and treason—or with the extraordinary contest arranged to choose a new queen for a humiliated king?

  Or perhaps I should first tell you of a battle fought over five hundred years ago, when one king surrendered to another, only to be beheaded by an outraged prophet—an act that created a feud between the descendants of King Agag and those of King Saul. Yes, that is a place I could begin, with the eternal hatred of the Agagites for the Jews.

  But although that long-ago murder played its part in what follows, even that is not the true beginning.

  Oh, you know a part of it already, but you only know what all the world knows. You have heard how Vashti, Queen of Queens, the most beautiful woman in all the empire, defied the king her husband and so lost her crown. You have heard how Ahasuerus, King of Kings, commanded the most beautiful maidens in his lands sent to him that he might chose a new queen. You have heard how he set the queen’s crown upon the head of the virtuous and beautiful Jewess, Esther.

  And you have heard how Queen Esther herself defied both king and law to save her people from the fate the evil Prince Haman had prepared for them.

  But beyond that, you do not know what truly happened, for you were not there. I was. I am Hegai, who once ruled the imperial harem. I was there. Oh, yes, I was there when this great and deadly game began. When a beautiful woman deceived her cruel husband, and he plotted his revenge—and so set in motion his own destruction.

  For from that commonplace tragedy—a wife’s unfaithfulness and its discovery by a furious husband—all the rest flowed, unstoppable as a river in full flood, relentless as time. Its force altered forever the lives of everyone trapped within its current.

  But the game we all played began long before any of its players were born. It began in the decadent court of old Babylon. It began when a man I would not meet for many years saved the life
of a woman I would never know.…

  BOOK ONE

  The Lion’s Den

  DANIEL

  Somehow, Daniel was not surprised when Mordecai the Scribe came to his small courtyard asking advice and counsel. Having sent his cousin into the snake pit of the King’s Palace to become queen or concubine—or nothing, Mordecai now tormented himself.

  “You wish to know if you have acted rightly,” Daniel said, before Mordecai could speak more than a few words of petition.

  Mordecai stared; behind him, Daniel heard a muffled laugh from Samamat. Mordecai’s mouth thinned, but he said nothing. To ease Mordecai’s mind, Daniel motioned to Samamat, who obligingly vanished into the house. Among the many things Mordecai the pious disliked was Daniel’s Gentile wife.

  “You are wise indeed,” Mordecai said when Samamat had left the two men alone, and Daniel smiled.

  “It takes no wisdom to know that a man who’s made a fateful decision is troubled in his mind.”

  “Then tell me—did I act rightly? My cousin…” Mordecai hesitated, finally said, “She was not willing. I ordered her to put her name into the contest. We parted ill.”

  “Did you beat her?” Daniel asked, and Mordecai stiffened, affronted.

  “No, of course not.”

  “Did you force her to drink wine until she no longer knew what she was doing?”

  “No!”

  “Did you yourself drop her name into the basket?”

  “No. The rules—”

  “The rules decree that each maiden place her own name in the basket with her own hand.” Daniel sighed. “Mordecai, you may have ordered Hadassah to do so—but she herself chose to let her name fall into that basket. I don’t suppose you told her why you demanded she enter the contest for queen?”

  Mordecai’s cheeks burned a dull red; it didn’t take any particular talent to interpret that sign. Daniel sighed, and said, with calm certainty, “Well perhaps that was wise. But telling a dream may change a future.” Of course, so could not telling a dream. But that was something Mordecai did not need to hear from him now. “Done is done,” Daniel added.