Chapter Twelve #3
Andressa looked down at herself. She wore what was essentially a long tunic, all the way to the ground, tied about her waist with a loose leather belt.
Beneath that, she wore a shift, but it was made from rough material and that, too, had been given to her.
Cast downs from other nuns who had moved on to finer habits.
On her feet were leather shoes, with a hole in the sole of the right one, and that was all she wore. No hose, nothing to protect her skin.
Gone were the days of the fine garments she used to wear, the lovely dresses made from silks.
Her hair, which had been a source of pride for her, had always been elaborately dressed.
She looked like an heiress, which she was, but all of that finery had ended the day she entered St. Blitha.
The lovely dress she wore had been taken from her and in its place she’d been given the monstrosity she currently wore.
She had a second shift, for sleeping or the rare bathing, but she was basically wearing everything she owned, and she knew it was a sight.
Not a good sight, either.
Her resistance to the call of comfort wasn’t very strong.
She hadn’t much willpower where that was concerned.
Therefore, with a sharp nod, she began to untie her belt, removing it and pulling the heavy woolen garment over her head to hand to the servant.
As the woman moved to the door, presumably to go clean the wool, Andressa removed her shoes and made her way over to the basin to peer at the clean, warm water.
Heavenly!
But she jumped away from the basin, startled, when the old servant opened the door and was met by another servant outside.
The old woman handed off the woolen garment to the servant and took something from her in return, something she carried with her as she closed the door, bolted it, and headed over to the table near the hearth, where she sat everything down.
She then picked up a three-legged stool from a corner and headed for the big, steaming basin on the ground.
“Remove your shift, m’lady,” she said as she placed the stool inside the basin. “Get in, sit down, and I shall wash you down.”
It was almost too good to be true, but Andressa refused to remove the thin linen shift.
She simply wasn’t comfortable doing so. The serving woman encouraged her to get into the basin, anyway, easing her down onto the stool.
The water was several inches deep, deep enough so that when she sat down, her bottom was right at the water level.
Once she settled down, the old servant went to work.
Such a simple comfort as a washing had never felt so good.
It wasn’t a full bath, as Andressa wasn’t immersed, but the serving woman used a large pitcher to pour water over her, drenching her, before scrubbing what skin she could get to, from her head to her toes, with a bristly brush and a cake of hard soap that had seeds in it, and smelled of honey and pine.
It was a glorious smell, and Andressa reveled in the pleasure of being scrubbed down. Her ankles, filthy above the edges of her shoe, were scrubbed clean, as where her elbows, knees, hands, and any other piece of flesh the serving woman could get to.
More water rinsed over her and the serving woman took her hair out of its thick braid, the one that went all the way to her knees, and began pouring water through it.
Andressa wasn’t exactly sure how she was going to explain wet hair when she returned to St. Blitha but, at the moment, she didn’t much care.
It was a heavenly bath and she was savoring the moment.
She’d worry about the consequences later.
“I have soap meant for your hair, m’lady,” the serving woman said. “It’s meant to kill any vermin and make your hair very fresh.”
With the warm water and the scrubbing, Andressa was quite relaxed at that point. She was game for anything the woman wanted to do to her. “How is it that you have so many things for a bath?” she asked. “Is there a lady of the house?”
The old woman began to pour something over Andressa’s hair, something that smelled strongly of vinegar. “Lord William has five daughters,” the servant told her. “When they visit London, this is where they stay.”
Andressa looked to the dress hanging over the chair. “Then the gown belongs to his daughters?”
“Aye, m’lady.”
That made sense to Andressa. She said a silent prayer of thanks to the daughters of William Marshal, loaning her their bathing things and something to wear.
Perhaps a bath and clean clothes was the simplest thing in the world to them, but to her, it was everything.
It reminded her of the outside world she was coming to miss, so very much.
God, she wanted to live in a fine house like this, with all of the food and comfort she could tolerate, and it deeply saddened her that it simply wasn’t meant to be.
Therefore, she was determined to enjoy the moment, as short as it would be, because God only knew when she’d ever know such comforts again.
The old woman washed her hair once with bar soap that smelled strongly of sulfur, and then rinsed it clear with vinegar again.
Seated on the stool, Andressa’s hair was so long that it went all the way to the floor and then some, and the old servant spent a good deal of time combing out her tresses while Andressa sat in the cooling water.
Cooling or not, it was still as blissful as she could imagine and she would stretch it out as long as she could.
Bless Maxton and his requests for her comfort.
When the water became too cold, the old woman urged her out of the basin by holding up a large piece of drying cloth.
Andressa did as she was told, stepping onto the cold floor while the woman vigorously dried her and her sopping shift.
As the old woman came around to the front of her and began drying her arms and torso, as least as much as she could, she suddenly came to a halt.
Andressa had been enjoying the attention until that moment, but when it abruptly stopped, she peered at the old servant only to see that the woman was looking at her midsection with some alarm.
“What is it?” Andressa asked curiously.
The old woman opened her mouth to speak, then quickly shut it. She shook her head, swiftly, and returned to her drying duties.
“I… I do not believe that dress shall fit you, m’lady,” she said hesitantly. “I will go and see if I can find something else that is suitable.”
Andressa wasn’t able to reply before the woman was hastily bundling her up in the drying cloth and pushing her towards the hearth.
“Stay here,” she told her firmly. “The heat from the fire will dry you and your hair, but careful you don’t get too close. We wouldn’t want to see your hair go up in flame.”
Andressa nodded, thinking the woman was acting rather strangely all of a suddenly. As she watched, the woman grabbed the wine-colored garment and fled the chamber, shutting the door behind her.