³ Then Queen Esther answered and said, “If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request. ⁴ For we have been ^(A)sold, my people and I, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. Had we been sold as ^(B)male and female slaves, I would have held my tongue, although the enemy could never compensate for the king’s loss.”

⁵ So King Ahasuerus answered and said to Queen Esther, “Who is he, and where is he, who would dare presume in his heart to do such a thing?”