|| Highest Ranking in Historical Fiction: 286 ||
When Clarisse Barnes arrives at the Topkapi Palace she is unaware of what her future holds.
However a chance encounter with Kosem Sultan's begins Clarisse's journey from being a slave to becoming one...
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"You!" I exclaimed, as I push him away.
"Clarisse." Sehzade Mehmed greeted me.
The reality set in. This handsome stranger was sehzade Mehmed.
"Is this some kind of a joke?" I scolded him, "I thought my life was finished."
"Why would you think that?" Sehzade Mehmed asks with a slight confusion on his face.
"I thought I was going to be some Sehzade's concubine." I explain, "And I don't want to be anyone's concubine."
At this point, my pitch was very loud even though I was speaking calmly. At least I was trying.
"Watch how you are speaking. I am a sehzade. I can have your head." He responded sternly.
"Then why don't you?" I dared him and came face to face with him. I looked right into his eyes.
He stared intensely back at me. In that moment I saw a familiar look in his eyes.
It was a slight shift. A shift I knew too well.
A shift that said because I don't want to.
It was the look my mother would give to my father every time he would go for war. A look that said I know how things must be but I don't want to follow them through. The look my father would give when my mother would attend his wounds. A look that said I am sorry about what I do but this is a part of life.
I backed away. I didn't need an answer from him anymore.
Mehmed looked sideways and started, "I felt that I should tell you who I was because you asked. Now that I have done that you can leave."
But that look. I thought it meant.....
I didn't want to leave. I was angry at him for tricking me. But I was happy to be here and I wanted to stay with him.
As I started moving backwards slowly, I recalled something my father had once told me.
My father, for a warrior, was a very romantic person.
He had said that the best type of love was when our Lord would help bring two people come close, we as humans just had to keep our eyes open to see the signs the universe would show us.
So as I began heading out, my sight unconsciously scanned the room and fell on his large bookshelves. On those bookshelves I noticed that some of the books had English titles. As I looked closely I saw the titles of the books, some were written by writers of my country. I picked up the books and opened them, it was all written in English. Seeing my mother tongue again after so many years I felt a spark of joy. I wanted to cry.
Without realizing what I was doing I turned to Mehmed, "You read English books?"
Mehmed whose back was turned to me, turned around and looked at me in surprise and approached me.
