Then Esther sent this message to Mordecai:
"Go, gather all the Jews in Shushan and fast for me. Do not eat or drink anything for three days and nights. I and my maids ill fast also, and I will go in to the king, although it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish."

Mordecai went away and did as Esther directed.

Audience With the King
On the third day, Esther put on her royal robes and stood in the inner court of the royal palace opposite the king's house. The king held out to her the golden scepter that was in his hand. Esther went up and touched the tip of the scepter. Then the king said to her:
"Whatever you wish, Queen Esther, and whatever you ask, it shall be granted, even to the half of my kingdom."

Esther replied:
"Let the king and Haman come today to the feast that I have prepared for him."

The king said:
"Bring Haman quickly, that Esther's wish may be granted."

So the king and Haman went to the feast that Esther had prepared, and she then invited them to come to another feast on the following day.

Haman went out that day joyful and happy; but when he saw Mordecai in the king's gate and noticed that he neither stood up nor moved for him, he was furiously angry with Mordecai. Haman went home and told his friends and Zeresh, his wife: "Queen Esther brought no one with the king to the feast which she had prepared but me, and tomorrow also I am invited by her along with the king. Yet all this does not satisfy me, as long as I see Mordecai, the Jew, sitting at the king's gate."

A Wicked Plot
Then Zeresh, his wife, and all his friends said to him:
"Let a gallows seventy-five feet high be built and in the morning speak to the king and let Mordecai be hanged on it. Then go merrily with the king to the feast."
This advice pleased Haman, and he had the gallows built.