“Just because they were gifts from your grandfathers doesn't mean my love for them isn't real.”
The Sultan announced a year and half later to his two oldest children who sat at the desks across from him in the royal chambers during their daily and appropriately dubbed, Sultan lessons.
Today's was about the benefits of a haram.

"I cherish  both your mother's equally, and all your other royal half mother's. The astronomical political benefits aside that I gained from marrying them, of which I've already explained," he continued, “they provide me with much-needed emotional support, and keen womanly wisdom. They are good, honorable women, and the love they pour onto me, I can go on to pour onto our people.”

He glanced out the window, over the palace wall and to his beloved citadel.
The love she saw in his eyes was unmistakable, and the most emotion she had ever seen on her father's face.
Today's lesson was wreaking havoc on Kallisto's long held negative opinions on numerous things, her father included.

"A haram is a necessity of any good Sultan. These marriages broker peace between nations and many other rulers have wives pregnant and contracts for the unborn child's betrothal made before said birth has even happened.
Which is smart and practical, even if some foreigners view it as unconventional. For example, I'm unsure if you know this Kallisto, but Shena's marriage in Casiem, well, that was originally intended for you.”

“I did.” She responded with a heavy sigh. The knowledge of her younger sister taking her place as the 4th wife in the Caseites King's haram filled her with both guilt and relief.
"That switch took quite a bit of haggling, and though we are in no debt to the Caseites for it, it was a show of great faith between nations, and one that I demand you remember upon building your own harems my children.

"Wait, father, you wish for me to keep a harem?" The princess asked after the class had finished and both been dismissed for the morning, her eyes wide, the idea absurd, sacrilegious almost.

"Did you expect not to?"
He looked almost surprised by her question.
“W-well, it hasn't even occurred to me.
Before today, I always assumed a harem was about sowing as many seeds into various pots as possible. As a single pot myself, capable of producing limited plants, the whole notion seems rather, pointless..."

Marriage was indeed something she wanted, but a part of her had always hoped it would be for love, like those of the peasants and lesser nobles. She wanted someone to fawn over her like she had to semi-jealously listen to Alastar fawn over Desdemona, for they had been married just last month.

"I adore your euphemisms' daughter. Quite entertaining. “
The emperor laughed, but then contained himself for what she could read by his face was going to another lecture.
"I expect everything from you that I do of your brother, and that your grandfather did of me, as will our people." He planted a hand on her shoulder, and Kallisto realized that it was the first time in her life that her father had done so.

"Your joke is correct, you are but one vessel for royal heirs, where males are many, but tradition must be followed, nonetheless. Our…" he paused for a second and then corrected himself,
"Your people, will be expecting so much from you, but with all honesty, the most they will be expecting is your failure. You must prove them wrong.”
He gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze, and she did her best to hide the waterfall of emotions her father's long unknown approval was now drowning her in. It was something she had never known she wanted.

"Due to your gender, you will have to do everything twice as well as any man, for half the respect. It shall not be given to you for mere birthright alone as it was for those before, while other Emperors have been able to simply float through their rule, conformable, and unchallenged, on their birthright alone, you will not. You will be challenged constantly by those who will take your womanhood as a threat, or worse, assume it a weakness."
He paused and shook his head.

"The expectations you shall have to meet will be impossible, but nonetheless, you shall have to meet them.
Being both woman and Sultan will put expectations at odds with each other.
Your people will expect you to be both virile ruler of your haram, and a noble, chaste wife. As kind and nurturing as an elderly priestess, yet as ruthless as a conquering, bloody tyrant.
A maternal figure as well as a fearless warrior who could cut down any who opposed them. No concessions shall be made by others on account of your gender, so I shall not allow you yourself to make them either. A haram you shall have."

He removed his hand from her shoulder and folded them both behind his back, a look of contemplating on his bearded, darkly tanned face.
"I should find a way to train you for it. For men, it is pretty self-explanatory, but for women perhaps not. I will look into this." He reassured.

"Father, you're... a, a good Sultan.”
She said, almost unable to believe it.
"Don't sound so surprised. I'll have your head. “
He chuckled, before urging her out the door and to her next combat training.

A week later, he summoned her back to his royal chambers. True to his word, He, Gnesh had spent the week devising a haram training regime specifically tailored for a female Sultan. At his side stood her mother, and Jaipushet, one of his concubines. At first Kallisto was confused, she had always assumed concubines were not allowed in any of the upper palace chambers, well, with the exception of one.

"Mother... Quarter mother." She greeted respectfully. The use of such an often disregarded title by a princess made the brown haired beauty at her mother's side smile warmly. Concubines had a complicated life. They were usually gifts the emperor from anyone looking to seek his favor, nobles, businessmen, and trades people mostly.
This made them not quite princesses, not quite whores. Not married to the emperor, but not able to marry another. Vessels for royal pleasure alone, frequently looked on with jealousy by both those below and above them.

A plan had been devised, that Kallisto would begin receiving additional training, specifically on the keeping of a haram. "You will train until your coronation both within the royal haram, utilizing all the knowledge of your gandae, and also in the temple of Carys, under the direct tutelage of my mother Vallarta, the head priestess."

Kallisto gulped, her skin paled and her palms grew clammy, Carys was the God of love, but more specifically, sex.

Kallisto followed dutifully by her brother's side as they walked from the palace gates to the Temple of Love.
Nerves twisted in her stomach like a rag being wrung out to dry.
Several months had passed since the beginning of her harem training, and with each lesson from her mother, half and quarter mothers more uncomfortable than the next, it was time for her to venture outside the palace walls to meet the priestess at the temple itself, and begin what she hoped would be the final stages of this awkward training.

Both her destination and the words of her father that very morning were to blame for her current slightly fearful state. Her father had assigned her to brother guard her during her time inside the inner sanctum of the Temple; a place so sacred that apart from the temple staff, only virgins, eunuchs, and the tragically widowed were permitted inside.

“What good is all that I'm teaching you if you will send assassins the minute after I die. If you two are going to kill each other, I'd rather it is done while I'm still alive."
The Sultan had argued with his two eldest children after making the order.
Kallisto grumbled to herself as she followed in her brothers' bounding footsteps. She hated to admit it, even to herself, but her father's unorthodox strategies were working.
Obvious because in just the last year alone, Azazel had begun treating her more like a person, and less like a problem.

Her father had granted Alastar marital leave, on the stipulation that they would spend their honeymoon on Akia, so that the new groom could familiarize himself with the island, as well as gather a progress report on the palace and mine construction.
He had been gone for only a few weeks, and she missed him in a way that could only be described as bitterly.
Sitting through his wedding, though it was only a small and private ceremony, had been one of the most excruciating moments of her life. Watching him dote and fawn on the beautiful and kind Desdemona, a woman she could find no physical reason to hate, had been brutal.

Though she had a new, temporary eunuch gaurd, a tall, heavily tattooed and mostly silent man, Gnesh had decreed that escorting the princess to the Temple of Cerys would be the duty of the crown prince.
She was to stay here for a week now, but she knew that duration would slowly increase as the eve of her first wedding and coronation grew nearer, instruction with the priestess would become divided between her studies with her father, and education with his generals.

It was brilliant, no matter how frustrating, and at this point, both his children had become quite annoyed with his ingenuity. He yearned for them to form some sort of working relationship. Her life was now in her brother's hands, and a pleasantly worded threat from her father had ensured that no fate, no matter how seemingly accidental, would fall to her at Azaze'ls hands, lest he wished to lose both of them.

They dressed plainly, so as not to draw attention, disguised with hooded cloaks and face coverings. Approaching the temple entrance, a temple devotee, a beautiful young woman dressed in white and red, but not much of it greeted them.
Kallisto and her brother made their way through the corridor of the temple, heading straight for the room where her grandmother, Vallarta, was. Everyone they came across had their heads bowed down, and that spooked Kallisto, but with the nerves twisted in her belly, it wasn't that hard to do.
The entrance of the room was covered with a veil, and with the intensity of light from torches coming from the room, it could be deduced that the room had no opening of any kind to allow natural light.

Azazel pulled the curtain back and peeped through, and Kallisto stood back in anticipation. Azazel entered the room and asked Kallisto to follow him. The room was wild, filled with candles and torches, the walls draped with beautiful finery in almost every color she had ever seen. There was even a relatively small, man-made pool of water in the middle of the room.
Kallisto looked around to familiarize herself with her new home. She turned slowly around and feasted with her eyes but was interrupted by a nudge from her brother.
"What..." she was about to snap at Azazel when she spotted the priestess. It wasn’t the first time she had seen the high priestess in person, but it was the second. Before this year, Kallisto seldom left her palace.
The older woman was in the pool, naked, and there was a servant pouring oil into the pool. Kallisto adjusted herself, and she and her brother simultaneously bowed their heads in greeting. A high priestess being one of the few people whose respect was demanded from even nobility.

Vallarta turned her head away from the royal teenagers that stood in front of her and pulled the male servant close to her, planting a long, wild kiss on his lips.
Kallisto looked elsewhere quickly, disturbed and uncomfortable by the sight of her quarter grandmother kissing, but her brother just fixed his eyes widely on her.
"Greeting Children, welcome to the Temple of Cerys."
Vallarta remarked as she pushed the servant away and reached for her robe. She got out of the pool slowly and cloaked herself with her robe.
“Follow me, girl. Thank you for bringing her, Prince Azazel." Vallarta spoke.

Kallisto took in her brother and watched him gulp nervously.
He turned to her, his amber eyes that matched her own wide with an emotion she had never seen within them.
"Be safe."
He said before hurriedly exiting the temple.
Concern, the emotion was concern.

Once fully robed, Vallarta led Kallisto into the inner sanctum of the Temple, started by telling Kallisto how impressed by her intelligence she was. When she heard about her idea for the looming war, and then its outstanding success once implemented, she was curious to meet the girl who would be Sultan.

"Pardon me, Your Eminence, but I get the impression that you are not as shocked, or up in arms by my existence as the entire empire seems to be."
Asked the Princess hesitantly.
“Not at all. You are in a way my child, the unintentional fruit of my own labor."
Replied the older but still incredibly beautiful woman.
"What do you mean?"
Gulped Kallisto. Had the Goddess herself prophesied something that she was unaware of?

"Oh, silly girl. Do you think I gave my favorite daughter to your father's bed for nothing?"
She laughed, patting her on the back.
She reached for a book on her shelf and gave it to Kallisto, who accepted the book reluctantly.
"I’ll be teaching you everything you need to know about men. How to make them submit to your will, and how to use them to your benefit and that of your people." She paused and took a quick glance at Kallisto’s horrified face.
"How to love them, genuinely, and how to gain their true love and affection."
Kallisto was going through the manual that was handed to her already, almost ignoring everything the priestess was saying. Vallarta placed her long skinny palm on the book to get the attention of Vallarta and it worked.

“First lesson, the one thing you need to know right here right now is that once corinated, your body no longer belongs to you, but that to your people. It shall be a weapon, a tool in which to protect them. Do you perceive? " She asked with a fixed glare on Kallisto’s face.
Kallisto gulped quietly. Fear gripped her heart, and for a moment, she wondered if this job, this life, was really for her. She swallowed hard and nodded.
"I-I understand."
"Good. Now read. You have so much to learn about men, love and sex, in the upcoming months. It will be only reading and watching for now, but eventually, we shall introduce your own physical training.”

_______________________

Hey guys!
New chapter as promised.
Super excited about this story and glad to be writing again, I was pretty stressed over this last year, so it's so nice to have the passion to write a new story again. Hope you guys enjoy.
Can't wait to read your comments and as usual dont forget to vote!

-QueenOfGeeks