The night after the banquet, Proculus again called to her as she left Valeria’s room.
“Prepare the boy,” he barked. Esther’s heart sank. All afternoon, she had waited for Coqua to leave the kitchen so she could boil the hellebore roots. Finally Coqua had gone outside, and Esther had boiled the leaves and poured the cinnamon-scented water into a small bottle. She had slipped some of it into Proculus’s wine, but maybe it hadn’t been enough.
Esther stood just outside his door and looked at him: his smug expression; his thick, scraggly eyebrows; cold, glinting eyes; and the dark stubble on his chin.
“Take me instead,” she said, walking closer.
“I don’t want a filthy, bloody hole,” he snapped.
Just then, a male slave walked past her into the room, carrying a pile of blankets. “Get the boy,” Proculus commanded him. “Oil him and rouge his lips.”
Valeria was calling her again. “Ancilla! Come here!”
Esther bit the inside of her cheek, fighting the urge to run to Matti. They had kept their relationship a secret. If she tried to stop Proculus now, he might guess. As punishment, he might sell one of them. She couldn’t take a chance. Besides, she knew she couldn’t stop him; she’d only make it worse. She staggered back, her feet dragging along the floor as if they were filled with lead. How could she feel so heavy, yet be so empty at the same time? Every day that she lived as a slave, a little more of her disappeared. Soon she would be all hollowed out, merely a ghost.
After filling the brazier in Valeria’s room, she returned to the alcove. She found herself whispering to her mother, “I’m sorry I let you down. I tried to keep him safe…I’m sorry…I’m so sorry.”
When Matti came back, he told her what had happened. He had gotten into bed with Proculus. Matti had been so nervous, he couldn’t stop shaking, but just when he’d feared the worst, Proculus had groaned and cursed as the hellebore had torn through him. He’d yelled for Matti to bring him the chamber pot.
Esther and Matti laughed so hard, there were tears in their eyes. She couldn’t remember the last time either of them had laughed.
But in the morning, Proculus said he would sell the cook if it happened again; her food was making him sick. Coqua wasn’t exactly kind, but Esther didn’t want her to be sold. Esther would have to go back to the poppy milk.