<div class="floatleft">(https://i.imgur.com/p7GXzGV.jpg?1)</div>The woman smiled widely and slipped over the edge of the tub, gently lowering herself into the warm waters. She made a face as the warm water sucked on her toes, then up her leg, the heat spreading through her body until she was submersed up to her shoulders. “Lovely, lovely,” she said, her wide smile showing no signs of shrinking. Her voice was gentle and pleasant but tinged with a rustic accent that Miriel couldn’t place. It didn’t sound like a Brightgarden accent she’d heard before, but it didn’t sound like any other type of accent she was familiar with either.<br/><br/>The young woman who had accompanied the dark-haired woman put down some vials of liquid on the wide rim that ran around the bath and then quietly left, her sandaled feet clapping on the stone floor.<br/><br/>“I’m Anna,” the woman said. She scooped a handful of water over each of her tanned shoulders, wetting the dark curls that hung there. “Thank you for allowing me to join you—I always dread coming to these baths alone, sitting by myself like some poor, lonely old spinster, with nothing in life, only waiting to die—ah, not, not that<em>you</em>are such a lady, sitting here by lonesome. All I mean, of course, is that, well, I come here so often alone that people, they have a propensity to speak out of turn. And I try to limit their choices of conversation as best as I can, is what I mean.”<br/><br/>Even with both sitting in the tub, their feet were far from touching in the clear water, each of them with quite a bit of space on their own side. Miriel could see Anna swallowing nervously as she talked. The black-haired woman moved as far away in the tub as she could get from Miriel as she rambled nervously.<br/><br/>Miriel caught Anna’s eyes look down through the mostly-clear water at Miriel’s body, but her gaze was neither judgemental or shy—appearing only curious as she looked over the young woman across from her.<br/><br/>“But, ah, you—Miriel! I’ve never seen you here before, yes? What brings you to Lady Sondra’s? Have you been here before?” Anna continued to wet her shoulders and hair, then squeezing the water out of her hair.<br/>