Origins
By the early 1700s Majestrix Kyia had become aware of the ways that prostitutes were often exploited by their handlers, due in large part to the fact that the illegality of the business kept them from reporting abuse to the authorities. Kyia wanted a way to put the control of the "oldest profession" back in the hands of the women who did the work.
Malger Sutt, the avatar of Nocturna, a shameless sybarite himself, had some experience with organizing people and no qualms whatsoever about the sex industry, so with the blessing of Kyia he quickly set to work crafting what was eventually called the Sensualists' Guild.
With funds drawn from the Sutt fortune, Malger founded the first training college for sex workers, the Sutt Institute of the Sensual Arts. Rather than focusing solely on sex, however, Malger set out to redefine the sex worker's role in society, bringing in experts from all over the world to teach his students such diverse skills as therapeutic massage, dance, music, art, chiropractic therapy, and marriage counseling. Licensed Sensualists could attend the Institute and leave with the training to minister not just to the fleeting desires of the libido, but to a person's entire body, mind and spirit. The idea was revolutionary, but it came at a time when people were open to revolutionary concepts, and both the Guild and the Institute soon gained a level of prestige and respect that could hardly have been imagined a hundred years prior.
The Institute Today
The Sutt Institute of the Sensual Arts is located only a block east of the Citadel of Metamor. It is also know for the wide scope of it's curriculim, even among the Sensualist Guild colleges, and for good reason:
Based as it was in Metamor, the heart of the Curse itself, the college dedicated itself to a study of sexuality that stretched far beyond what was understood in many other countries. For in Metamor, one's client might well be a woman, who was born a man, who still had the urges of her past masculinity, confused by the physical desires that came with being female. Or one might encounter another species entirely, trapped halfway between one extreme and the other, but no less deserving of the physical intimacy that any other human was accorded. Such learned and practiced intimacies she revealed to her gentle, quiet, one-eyed client, as they brought each other much more slowly and sensually toward a second climax. To his credit, she went higher than she would have normally expected, and stayed there longer, beyond even the point of being able to continue speaking for the better part of an hour, before he rose to meet her and they came down together.
The age-regressed, however, were more problematic. That was an area that Ret had studiously avoided in her courses, avoided while in the employ of Turelea, and avoided still in the dark back streets of Caralore.
Calming the Storm
In addition to clients and Sensualists who are effected by The Curse, Metamor City is a home to a significant population of vampires, earthbound celestials and fiends, plane-touched and members of other varied races. And as the captial of the Empire, it is also a tourist destination and political hub bringing visitors, diplomats, and business people from all over the Empire and the Earth.
Today the Guild and the Institute generally take care of themselves. Most of Malger's time is focused on helping Nocturna in her work, particularly in keeping the Dreamlands War from spilling over into the waking world. However, he is not completely divorced from what is happening in his creations.
Author's Notes
Sources: Malger Sutt, Margarette hin'Jylnass, Sensualists' Guild, Calming the Storm
