“Had you never spoken to him before you were summoned to him?”

“I’d never even seen him. Had done all I could to keep from drawing attention to myself. If I must be here, I will have a quiet life of contemplation. You do not understand in the slightest how I am tormented.”

“I’m so sorry,” I said. I could not imagine the horror of being sent to the bed of a man I knew not at all. Barbaric did not even approach a strong enough word.

“Most of the time, no one pays attention to me. My religious beliefs have kept me from becoming close to those around me.”

“You are not a Muslim?” I asked.

“And now, Lady Emily, you have discovered what it is that I need to hide. I’m a Christian. And every day—every night—that I spend with the sultan puts my soul in mortal danger. Have you any idea what it is to know that you are forced to live in sin?”

“Are you allowed—forgive me—to be Christian?” I asked.

“I do not speak of it to others. No one knows. I kneel in the direction of Mecca during times of prayer but recite my own words.”

“As a fellow Christian, I can assure you that if you are forced to do things—”

“The martyrs had the strength to stand up for their beliefs. I am not so brave, nor so virtuous. Now that I’ve spent the night with the sultan and am a gözde, I have better quarters and more privacy. If I am elevated further and become an ?kbal, or kadin—an official consort—my position would be better still. But I ought not be tempted by privacy and should have refused to go to him in the first place, regardless of the consequences.”

“What would the consequences have been?”

“I don’t know, but can well guess. No one rejects the sultan. The punishment would be unspeakable.”