“Of course.” He did not follow her in, but turned back to the wall. How to digest what she had revealed about Artaynte? He could not pin down his feelings on the
matter. He wanted to hope, wanted to think his dreams within reach . . . but they felt so ephemeral at this point.
He wanted her still. Of course he did. She was so beautiful, had such strong blood. She would make the perfect wife, the perfect queen. But did he love her still? Could he,
given how little he apparently knew her? They had not spent much of their childhoods together, given that her father had his own province, not until the war-planning brought
Masistes to Susa. He had never realized how completely under Parsisa’s thumb she was.
It seemed, then, that he must decide if he wanted his aunt as his queen. Thinking Artaynte would stop listening to her once she was married was stupid and naive. There was
the chance she would welcome the freedom from her mother, but he would not assume so. More likely was that Parsisa would always whisper in her ear, and then she would
whisper in his.
One mother thinking she ruled the world from behind him was quite enough, thank you.
“Prince Darius.”
He spun around and frowned. “Haman. What are you doing back in Sardis?”
Haman bowed. “Your father sent me, my prince, to keep an eye on the Jewess.”
That explanation only deepened his frown. “Why would he do that?”
Though the man shrugged, his expression held no confusion. “He said that he did not trust her interactions with other men, and he knows I am above her charms.”
By the god, that made no sense. He stepped to Haman’s side and pitched his voice to a bare murmur. “Are you saying that my father doubts her fidelity?”
Haman’s wide eyes carried no shock at the suggestion. “He did not say so. Of course, there is much he is not speaking of these days, when it comes to the Jewess.”
“You refer to her condition?”
“It is curious.” Haman sighed and shook his head. “Everyone knew the king had kept himself from her after her fall—his temper made it obvious. Then her figure began to
change . . . of course, she was seen coming from the king’s tent again, but one has to wonder which came first. Given that his temper never exactly improved, and he refuses
still to acknowledge the child.”
Ridiculous. She had offered an explanation for that . . . one that made a kind of sense. Perhaps not as much as this, but . . . she would not betray his father with another
man.
Would she?
“It is a sad thing,” Haman said, casting his gaze toward the mountain’s spur. “To be expected, though, when a creature who won the king’s attention by throwing herself
at him is then denied his love. It is probably a flaw in her soul, this need to be in a man’s bed.”
No. Certainly she was passionate, but . . . “That is nothing but conjecture, Haman. If the king thought such a thing had happened, he would have had her killed.”
“Possibly. But he is still in love with her. It is not beyond reckoning that he would forgive her in part, but send her away from him to have the bastard child. Is it?”
He would not condemn her, even if it were true. Who had not had a dalliance at some point or another? True, it was unwise to engage in an affair when one’s husband was
jealous—and the king—but plenty had done it. It would make her only typical.
Which grated more than it should have. He did not want her to be typical. She had always seemed so much more, and he wanted one thing—just one—to be what it seemed.
He glanced toward the citadel as she passed before one of the windows. The child she carried was only obvious from the side. Otherwise one noticed only the rich cascade of
her hair, the gleaming eyes, the mouth so quick to smile. The passion that imbued everything she did.
The passion that now radiated off her as anger. Would she be angry if she were guilty? He wanted to say no, but only because that, too, would make her typical. Just like his
mother, furious because she was punished when she thought herself invincible.
Innumerable men would be willing to risk the king’s wrath for her. Had one had success when she was lonely and cut off from her husband? If Xerxes thought so, then no
wonder he sent Haman. Here she would be lonely and cut off once again.
Perhaps he ought to keep his eye on her as well.
Twenty-Nine
Athens, Greece
Why did victory not feel sweeter?
Xerxes shifted the reins from one hand to another and watched the smoke billow over the Acropolis. It rose in great black clouds, obscuring the sun and slinking shadows over
the land.
Nothing felt right. Darkness underscored everything. They may have won at Thermopylae, but it had cost him thousands of men. He may have had the pleasure of ordering the
fallen king of the Spartans beheaded, but it had only reminded him of Pythius’s son and made him jolt awake in the middle of many a night, ashamed for dishonoring a valiant
warrior.