On the night of February 29, 1788, in some mountain village of the Trabzon (Trebizond) eyalet, or Ottoman province, Nurcan's parents receive an owl carrying a scroll bearing the seal of the Bab-I Humayun in Constantinople. When they read the letter out loud, which they struggle to do, they start questioning the Imperial Diwan (or Ministry) of Magic's motives.

  "What does the Bab-I Humayun want from us now?" Nurcan's dad asks himself, after repeated attempts to read the message from the Imperial authorities.

  "We already paid the devshirme to the Bab-I Humayun under the form of our bright little Nurcan! I can't believe they want anything to do with us, now that she's at some... academy, somewhere in the Baghdad eyalet!" Nurcan's mom whines.

  "The Sublime Porte wants her to study a year away from the Empire?" Nurcan's dad gasps.

  "Did she get into trouble? Why would the Sublime Porte want her banished?"

  "They said that she would be able to serve the Empire better if she went to... wherever she is now, vs if she stayed home! And the promise of a better future for the whole family, too!"

  "Then how she would better serve the Empire by studying outside of it, as opposed to where she is now? Most other girls would learn about household tasks at her age!"

  "But, if we let her go get whatever training she's getting now as far away from home as the Baghdad Eyalet, surely it wouldn't be a big deal to us for her to study elsewhere for a year! Or at least no bigger a deal than studying at... what's the name of that place again?"

  "Karakalem! We know nothing about... whatever we paid the devshirme for, so we may as well let our daughter go wherever she, or the Sultan, wants!"

  "Better not anger the Sultan..."

  Nurcan's mom starts praying for two things: that Nurcan doesn't use her time abroad to sleep with someone before marriage, and, of course, her safety.

  And yet, the parents don't realize that what they call the devshirme, or blood tax, was once paid by Muggle households, but only paid in non-Muslim boys, and not by families of all faiths in wizarding children of any gender.

  Who were lured away from their families to become yeniceri, with hopes of a better future for their families and themselves. Much like Karakalem's staff lured Muggle-born young wizards-to-be away from their respective homes under the same stipulation.

  "The Sultan better see something special in our daughter then... I really wonder what the consequences would be if we refuse!" Nurcan's dad ruminates.

  "Whatever that is, I hope the Sublime Porte has good reason to keep that a secret from us!" Nurcan's mom sighs. "My guess is that they might kill her if we refuse!"

  "I don't think it will go that far, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was the end for her..."

  By that point, Nurcan's dad puts a crude "X" on the dotted line for the parents, using the magical quill in a pouch on the postal owl's back to do so before putting the scroll in that pouch for the journey to Karakalem.

  What kind of attribute would my daughter have that would be best used by the Sublime Porte in secret? We're the only ones for several fersahs (leagues) and maybe even the whole nahiye (district) to whom it happened! Nurcan's mom finds the opacity of the Bab-I Humayun regarding the nature and extent of their daughter's abilities... unsettling. Whatever this attribute is, she never showed it publicly.

  But as the owl flies into the night, over the Pontic Mountains towards its final destination in the Baghdad Eyalet to the southeast, Nurcan's parents are kept up at night by their failure to grasp magic as being Nurcan's special ability. That they're thrust into a world full of secrets that even Nurcan has yet to discover just how dangerous they can be.

  Away from her parents, however, Nurcan kept studying at Karakalem, in hopes of proving herself worthy of the trust Mehmet placed in her. Of the nomination for the Nizam-I Cedid Exchange Program, which pushed her to study more advanced material at every opportunity.

  Speaking of which, on March 5, Mehmet approaches Nurcan as she eats her pide ekmek, a garlic-flavored flatbread, and the owl from Trabzon Eyalet has finally made it to Karakalem, near the Persian border:

  "Please come to the owlery before next class..." Mehmet requests her, which causes her to rush eating her flatbread on her way to it.

  I never received any correspondence during my time here, nor sent any, because my parents have no access to wizarding mail. So it could mean one thing: the Ministry's response for the Nizam-I Cedid exchange program! Nurcan hyperventilates as she makes her way to the owlery, nested inside the complex's tallest tower, but underneath the observation floor used for Astronomy classes. If by some miracle, I make it... then all these nights of studying, both in my room and in the library, will have been worth it. Then again, I know my life here as a Muggle-born is a constant struggle.

  But when she arrives at the owlery, she dashes for the janitor maintaining it, with hundreds of stalls lining the walls of the room, filled with either the school's owls or the students':

  "I'm Nurcan, first-year student, Mehmet told me there was mail for me..."

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  "Oh yes, today, we received this one letter from Trabzon Sanjak!" the janitor hands over the letter from Bab-I Humayun.

  Once she opens the letter, she looks at her dad's X being used as a signature, while also looking at other requirements. That her signature isn't enough to constitute acceptance, and her response must arrive in Constantinople by March 15, 1788.

  So my parents know about me being awarded a spot in the program. But, knowing them, they agreed to it only because they feel declining would be an insult to the Sultan. All they know about why I'm here is to receive training that will allow me to serve the Empire later, one that's kept secret from them, but no more than that, Nurcan ruminates, while she tries to calculate the time it would take for an owl to deliver the form to the Bab-I Humayun in Constantinople from Karakalem. Damn it, I only have 4 days to decide where to go, and understand the expectations as well as the requirements!

  So she realizes then that her starting budget that will be given to her by the Bab-I Humayun is there to cover her supplies, at the exchange rate of the day. And there's also the reporting requirements to go over to ensure that she understands what else is expected of her, beyond abiding by the local regulations.

  When she leaves the owlery, her Arithmancy professor, Ioannis, a fellow Muggle-born, has another announcement for her.

  "Since you're the last Karakalem student to receive an acceptance letter from the Nizam-I Cedid committee, you missed the information session everyone else attended. I want you to see me in my office after school!" Ioannis tells her about her predicament.

  When Nurcan goes to her Arithmancy teacher's office that day, near the seray where students are housed, she struggles not to cry.

  "Before we begin, congratulations on making it to the Nizam-I Cedid Exchange!"

  It's then that she starts to cry. "I feel like merely performing at the same level as I currently do in class won't be enough to justify my spot, I must do more than just do well in class to be a worthy representative of the Empire!"

  Ioannis freezes in place while he watches Nurcan cry. I can kind of feel like, by nominating her, Mehmet put her in a lose-lose situation. I dealt with her type before. The kind of person, usually a star student, who feels like they always need to meet what they feel are high standards, often impossibly high, or take failure too close to heart. But it wouldn't do her any good to send her away to the infirmary until we get to the bottom of the exchange's requirements.

  "I trust that you understand that, just because all expenses are paid for by the Sultan, doesn't mean that you can spend as much as you like. You might say the Muggle treasury is separate from the wizarding one, and thank God for it, or we would be paying for a Muggle war..."

  "Not that the Sultan doesn't incur expenses to educate me here. The Sultan gives a supplies allowance for low-income Muggle-borns, and I'd still be covered..."

  "You need to file expense reports three times: first, when your supplies are purchased at the start of the year, and the other two at the end of each half-year!"

  Ioannis then runs down the list of expenses that are allowed vs not. Once that is done, there's also the matter of the final report to submit to the Bab-I Humayun after the exchange ends. Which must come with the final report card attached for the year. And a report detailing the host institution, the coursework taken, challenges lived at the host institution, broken down by academic vs non-academic. But the final section makes Nurcan resume crying a river upon reading the description:

  "I'm afraid I will need to repay some of the fees paid by the Bab-I Humayun under the Nizam-I Cedid if I can't show how my trip could benefit the Empire!"

  "I admit that it's a consideration that none of the others brought up. You might need to repay some of the money if you leave Imperial service, or the Empire, before the service period is up, but you never know..."

  "I was the final admit, I must show these folk in Constantinople that I was worth picking! That, despite being several years younger than everyone else, I can still serve the Empire!"

  "You seemed a little too stressed out. But rest assured that you earned it irrespective of any diplomatic favor the Sultan might need from the host country, or of wizarding political favors at home His Imperial Majesty might wish to curry!"

  "The question is: what institution would be the best fit, knowing that Durmstrang, Uagadou or Koldovstoretz are off-limits?"

  "It's obvious that friendliness to Muggle-borns is a must. But, if you want to attend Mahoutokoro, their school year starts five months earlier than everyone else. In that case, you might want to ask yourself what area of magic you feel most strongly about..."

  This statement gives her pause. With much soul-searching, while she might perform very well in some areas, she doesn't seem to be very passionate about a whole lot of things beyond History of Magic, Muggle Studies and Arithmancy, in that order.

  "I don't know... Arithmancy?"

  "That's what people come here for. Is there another way to decide?"

  "Seeing that the UK and France are both currently Ottoman allies, maybe Hogwarts or Beauxbatons?" Nurcan's tone seems less than assured.

  "You're one of the few witches I ever met to put any weight on Muggle diplomatic relations in travel decisions, even when the Bab-I Humayun might act otherwise. You make me feel like you want to work with Muggles in some capacity once your education ends!"

  "If the Sublime Porte thought trying to get in good terms with Washington was a good idea, maybe I could go to Ilvermorny..."

  Ioannis interrupts her. "You're acting as if your decision could change the course of Ottoman wizarding diplomacy!" He starts being fed up with Nurcan's obsession with the diplomatic implications of her choice, before yelling at her. "You're NOT the Sultan!"

  From what little I heard about the actions of MACUSA, a.k.a. Washington, they seem to be inactive in wizarding diplomacy, Nurcan is then escorted to the infirmary, her mind still in overdrive, as she has yet to decide where to go on exchange.

  Because Ioannis believed Nurcan to be too easy to excite whenever anything to do with geopolitics is involved, and she also had an anxiety attack, he introduces what happened to the magiwitch on duty, Nassima:

  "Here I caught Nurcan going into circles, believing that she's somehow much more influential in Ottoman wizarding diplomacy than she would really be, and also appeared very stressed out!"

  Nassima asks Nurcan about the sources of her stress. "What's stressing you out so much?"

  "Where to go on exchange. The one thing I'm confident about is that what I'll learn in second year won't make that much of a difference in the long run!"

  "In that you're right. But since you're Muggle-born, just ask yourself which place is nicest to Muggle-borns..." Nassima then prepares a few drops of the Calming Draught. "Do you have a short list?"

  "Beauxbatons, Hogwarts and Ilvermorny!"

  "I'd say Beauxbatons, but not by much. Ilvermorny, while relatively nice to Muggle-borns, is one of the most hostile to the Muggle world..." Ioannis sighs while Nassima administers the Calming Draught.

  Once the Calming Draught is administered, Nurcan's stresses melt away with each drop she drinks, and finally brings herself to both sign the form and declare her exchange intention.

  And goes to the Owlery to send an owl to the Bab-I Humayun in Constantinople with the form in tow, praying that the letter would arrive in time for her participation to be confirmed.