Harvest of Rubies (33 page)

“I don’t suppose you enjoyed losing your post only to find yourself far from court and abandoned by your husband.”

I shifted on the golden stool; it creaked under my weight. In spite of its beauty, it wasn’t comfortable. How like Damaspia to set my behind on an incommodious chair while asking her disagreeably insightful questions. “At first, it was devastating. I felt very sorry for myself,” I said.

She smiled. “And then?”

I shrugged. “I made a few friends.”

“I’m glad to hear it. You must have been lonely.”

Even in my years of working at the court I had been lonely. I had merely been too busy to notice, and too tired and afraid to care. At the court, I had had acquaintances, colleagues, superficial friendships. But I had had no one who knew my heart with any degree of intimacy, nor had I known how to reach deeply into the heart of another.

The early quiet days in my new home had made it impossible not to recognize how alone I felt. Without distractions, without the urgency of scribal expectations, for the first time in many years I had had no choice but to feel.

“Yes, Your Majesty,” I said, and left it at that.

She folded her hands like an ivory fan and laid them on her lap. “It was my doing that no one tried to reach you all summer. I had good reason. Your husband walked about these walls like a wounded panther for weeks. I feared that if we tried to write you or visit you, he would misunderstand it for some kind of interfering plot and grow even angrier with you. So I stayed away from you, and told Nehemiah to do the same and to bid
your father to keep his distance as well.

“After a few weeks, the king sent Darius on some mission to help him cool down a little. He was more himself when he returned. That’s when I asked him to fetch you.”

I remembered believing Teispes’s venomous declaration that the silence of family and friends meant no one cared for me. Now, it appeared the opposite was true. They had stayed away
because
they had cared. I had accepted Teispes’s version of events. At the time, it had rung true. But I had been wrong, and in my despair it had been easy to believe a lie.

I saw the queen expected a response and stirred myself. “His lordship has been most kind since his return.”

“Oh? Are you a real bride at last?”

I didn’t pretend not to understand. Doing my best to keep my expression neutral, I said, “No, Your Majesty.”

“Well, it’s early days yet. Tell me, how do you like your apartment here in Ecbatana?”

“Very … unusual arrangements.”

Damaspia laughed. “It took some maneuvering, I assure you. Even the king was scandalized that I would put husband and wife in one room. But with you looking so pretty and under his foot day and night, it won’t be long before that cousin of mine will sit up and take notice.”

I tried to squelch my annoyance at her interference. I knew she felt responsible, guilty even, for the outcome of this union. Her motives were good, but I couldn’t help wishing that she would take her fingers out of my life. “Hardly pretty, Your Majesty,” I said, my voice dripping skepticism.

“Do you still doubt it? With those lips, thick shining hair, and all those curves, you’d turn any man’s head. And now that you’re dressing like a lady instead of an orphaned peasant, you’re showing your beauty to advantage. Where did you get
that sumptuous robe you wore to the feast last night? That wasn’t one of mine.”

“Lord Darius gave it to me. His mother set it aside for his wife.”

“He
has
been kind. I noticed how attentive he was at the feast last night.”

I jumped when she reached out to hold my hand, not as a queen, but as a friend. “Sarah, you were not born as one of us. You cannot imagine what it means to have privilege and influence from birth. You cannot imagine the way people clamor to be with you, only so they can use you. You cannot imagine what it’s like never being sure if someone cares for you, or only wants to avail himself of some benefit through you. Trust is not something we can give with ease, and once broken, it’s hard to restore.

“That’s one of the reasons I chose you for Darius. I knew you were trustworthy and loyal. I knew he would be safe in your hands. The trouble is that he doesn’t know that yet. It will take time to heal this damage. But I think it will heal, because the truth is that you aren’t who he thinks you are. When he comes to know the real you, he will forgive what you did.”

After my time with Damaspia, I stopped for a brief visit with my old colleagues. As usual, they were at work in an airless cubicle in the women’s quarters. For some moments I stood at the door unobserved. This would have been my life scant months ago. I felt strangely detached from it. I had thought that seeing them at work would revive my longing. But I felt like a stranger in that room. I no longer belonged there. The insight came as a shock, for I did not feel like I belonged
to Darius’s household either. Where was my place now? My reverie was interrupted by one of the eunuchs, who, noticing me, jumped up, spilling his parchments on the floor.

I tried to help pick up the sheets, but they wouldn’t allow me. It was clear they felt I didn’t belong with them either. To them, I was now a lady of rank. They acted awkward with me, and no amount of verbal assurance could put them at ease. I left soon after, knowing I was an unwelcome interruption.

I had a solitary supper in my apartments that night. Of Darius there was no sign. Shortly after I had eaten, one of Darius’s men brought a message from him saying that the king had recommended a scribe to replace Teispes and Darius had left to follow up the lead. So much for my efforts to prove my worth to him by my service. Now that he was about to hire a new scribe, he would have no need of my help. I was back to being the nuisance with whom he was saddled. I slept in his bed and wore his mother’s bride clothes and gave nothing in return. The spark of hope Damaspia’s words had ignited in me began to dim.

Having slept so little the evening before, it was no hardship to slip into bed early. I don’t know where my husband spent the night, but it was not in our room.

n
ehemiah sent Darius and me an invitation to visit him in the morning. He had been present at the feast of the equinox, but had not come to greet us. I suspected the rift between him and Darius remained unrepaired. This invitation was his way of extending a peace offering, no doubt.

For my part, I had long since forgiven Nehemiah for his role in arranging my marriage. He had meant me no harm. Indeed, he had paid me a profound compliment believing that a man like Darius would want me for his wife. The discovery that he had not ignored me for three months, but stayed away out of obedience to Damaspia removed any lingering barriers I might have felt toward him.

In Darius’s absence, I decided to accept Nehemiah’s invitation by myself, although I broke several social rules by doing so. As the wife of a nobleman, I no longer had the freedom of a commoner. To meet alone with a man, even one who was my cousin, was forbidden. But I doubted that Darius would care.
I was a wife foisted on him. He seemed little concerned with my choices.

Besides, I found myself longing for Nehemiah’s company. I wished to share with him the joy of my newfound faith; more than anyone, he would understand what that meant to me. I decided not to wait for Darius, and flaunting etiquette, went in search of my cousin.

I caught Nehemiah in the midst of packing. For once, his offices were not in perfect order. No one announced my entrance and I walked in to find my cousin with his head buried in a leather chest. “Going somewhere?” I asked.

“Sarah!” I gulped when he enveloped me in a fatherly embrace. “I’m delighted to see you.”

I had not expected such welcome. Neither had he intended to give it, I think, since he stepped away from me with a stiff step. I found both his impromptu affection and subsequent self-consciousness endearing. “I’m going to Susa ahead of the court to prepare for the king,” he said, answering my initial question.

“Ah. I’d forgotten the court would soon be moving to Susa. A few months and I already feel out of step with the routines of the royal household.”

“Obviously, since you are here unaccompanied. Aren’t you asking for trouble?”

“Seeing you is worth it.”

Nehemiah gave me a stern glare. “You’d better leave. Come back later with an appropriate chaperone.”

“My husband will not care.”

He arched an eyebrow and invited me to sit on an overstuffed saffron-colored couch. “You’ve had quite a summer, I hear.”

I imagined by now he knew every detail of what I had shared with the king. “Yes, my lord,” I said. Technically, he
wasn’t
my lord
anymore since my rank was above his. But old habits died hard.

“It sounds like you have found faithful friends in your new home.”

“That I have.”

He nodded. “Good.” He looked away for a brief moment. “You’ve spent some time with your husband, at long last. How does he treat you?”

There were so many ways he could have asked that question. With simple curiosity. With meddlesome intent. With shades of criticism. Instead he asked it with honest concern, his gaze warm with compassion as well as strength. Nehemiah always managed to make me feel like he could handle my gravest problems.

So instead of the flippancy I had intended, the truth slipped out. “He is kind. Appreciative, even, since the Teispes business. But he’ll never love me. He won’t even touch me.”

“And
you
love
him.”
It wasn’t a question. I should have known he would unearth my deepest secret without effort. Since I’d been a child, the man had known how to burrow inside my mind and expose what I thought.

I buried my face in my hands for a moment. “How foolish can a woman be?”

“It’s not foolish to love your husband.”

“It is when he can’t bear the sight of you.”

“I think you are past that at least, judging by the way he looked at you on the eve of the equinox.”

“It was his way of shielding me from court gossip. I told you, he’s kind.”

Nehemiah drummed his well-groomed fingers on the alabaster-top table next to him. “He no longer despises you if he shows you kindness. You’ve come far in a handful of months.”

My smile was tinged with sadness. “I had hoped that I could win his favor by helping him as a scribe. He left his personal aid at his palace to help in Teispes’s absence. Until he hired a new scribe, I was supposed to assist him. I thought he would come to see that I was not a complete disappointment. But that’s not to be, it seems. The king has found him a man already.”

“Your husband must learn to love
you
, not your abilities. You do him no favors by trying to win him with what has far less value than your true self.”

I found myself on the edge of tears. “He won’t find much to love about me, I fear.”

Nehemiah jumped to his feet. “Are you daft, girl?” He exhaled an audible breath before sitting down again. “Sarah, you’ve never known your worth. You’ve never known how wonderful you are.”

For once I was speechless. Half of me longed for him to tell me what was so wonderful about me. The other half refused to believe any good thing he might have to say.

He was thoughtful for long moments. “I blame your father.”

“I am all for blaming my father,” I said with a shaky smile. “But what exactly are we blaming him for?”

“Perhaps if I told you about the past, you would understand. You don’t know your father very well. Did he ever tell you that he didn’t intend to marry?”

“That would require conversation of a personal nature. So, no. He did not.”

“He was a scholar from boyhood. A shy man. He told me once that he thought he would never marry, because he couldn’t imagine conversing with a woman. Then he met your mother and everything changed.

“She was beautiful as you know, and gentle. Somehow she
had a way of putting others at ease. Your father fell in love with her at first sight, I think. He thought it was hopeless, of course. He couldn’t imagine such a ravishing creature returning his feelings, or settling for the humble life he would provide. She did, though. Your mother returned his love.”