I swallowed down my anxiety as best I could and nodded to her.
I didn’t belong in this place. I had known that much from the first sight of the sprawling estate. Hell, the carpet on the stairs had more class than I did.
But it didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try.
6
Bella
I followed Cori and Anya to the bath, all of us clutching towels and some kind of gowns or robes made from flowing white cotton.
“So, what is the deal here exactly?” I asked.
“We have to purify,” Cori said. “Basically just a shower.”
“But don’t try to put on deodorant or anything afterward,” Anya cautioned.
“Oh yeah, no scents, no nothing,” Cori said.
“Why not?” I asked.
“No freaking clue,” Cori said. “But don’t try to get around it, or they’ll make you do it all over again.”
“Noted,” I said.
We had reached the staircase and I spotted a dozen other girls heading downstairs from the opposite wing.
The halls, that had been so quiet when I arrived, were now teeming with women around my age carrying armloads of white fabric.
Thankfully, no one seemed to take notice of me. They were too busy chatting and laughing. It seemed like a friendly environment, and one I would enjoy being part of. I felt myself let out a breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding.
We took a turn to the left at the bottom of the stairs and followed a hallway past what must have been the back of the kitchens.
After a long walk past many doors, there were two steps down and I could hear the echo of voices over tile and hear the hiss of steam.
“Here we go,” Cori said.
We headed into a huge bathroom with dozens of shower heads sticking out of the walls at regular intervals. The floor was tiled a Caribbean blue and sloped toward a drain in the center. Soft light came in through slit-like glass block windows.
But I hardly noticed the decor for the women, short and tall, heavy and thin, and in every color - naked women, bathing and drying off, moving busily around the humid space like it was the most natural thing in the world.
I could feel the blood rush to my face. I tried to look away but there was nowhere to look.
“It gets easier after the first time,” Cori murmured, taking me by the elbow and steering me to a shelf where she placed her towel and robe in bins marked with numbers. “Remember your number.”
I would have an easy time remembering my lucky number, seven. When I placed my things down, I noticed someone had scrawled a bit of graffiti inside with a purple sharpie. It looked like a crow’s head, with lines coming off the top like a halo or a crown. Probably something from a band I’d never heard of, or maybe it was some kind of witch thing.
I looked up to ask Cori about it, but she was already stripping down.
Shit.
Well, I could either prolong the inevitable, or I could get naked before anyone had time to notice me.
The idea that being clothed might actually draw more attention had me pulling my sweater and t-shirt over my head without delay.
By the time I was bare, Cori and Anya were heading to the showers. I followed and let the hot water pound away at me.
Now that this was happening, I was feeling more okay about it. The soap was unscented and harsh, but it felt good to clean up after the long day of travel. And no one seemed to notice me.
“Wash up ladies, and keep moving,” a matronly voice barked out.
I opened my eyes to see a fully dressed professor in an emerald gown marching through, making me realize my nakedness all over again.
“That’s Head Mistress Hart,” Cori murmured.
“You guys ready?” Anya asked.
“Sure,” I said, eager to be done with the whole process and back to the relative safety of my shared room.
We headed over to collect our things.
“I didn’t know it was summertime,” a familiar voice whispered.
“Not funny, Kendall,” Cori said.
“What do you mean?” I asked at the same time.
“Anya’s got mosquito bites,” Kendall snickered and marched off.
“Jesus,” Cori said.
“It’s fine,” Anya shrugged. “No worse than what I heard in high school.”
“We’re not in high school,” Cori fumed.
“Kendall’s kind of an asshole,” I noted.
“She can be okay,” Anya said, shrugging.
“Move, ladies, move,” Headmistress Hart trumpeted on her way back through.
Up close, I could see that she looked younger than her voice and posture suggested. She might have been in her late thirties or early forties, a trim Black woman, with short hair and high cheekbones.
Cori led the way to the next room where we hurriedly threw our towels in a bin and pulled on the snowy white robes we’d been carrying.
They looked surprisingly fantastic on every figure and skin tone, though we did all look a bit dramatic.
“Wow, it looks like we’re all getting married,” I joked weakly.
Cori and Anya exchanged a look.
“What?” I asked.
“Nothing,” Anya said. “It’s just that you can’t joke once we get out there. It’s all super serious.”
“Juniper Krantz, are you putting on deodorant?” Headmistress Hart demanded of a startled looking girl who was holding a stick of the offending item.
“Get back in there, scrub down quickly, and you’re on detention for a week,” the Headmistress told her. “No scents, no exceptions. Am I clear?”
“Yes, Headmistress,” everyone chorused.
She nodded and followed the chastened Juniper back to the showers, ostensibly to be sure she scrubbed off her deodorant.
“Ready?” Cori asked.
“Sure,” I said.
“No,” Anya said, “But it doesn’t really matter, so let’s just get it over with.”
Together, we headed through the last doorway and out into the stone courtyard. It was freezing out - October in the mountains of Pennsylvania had more teeth than it did in the city. And the bright moonlight reflecting off the stones somehow made it seem even colder.
I expected the cold ground to be the worst part, but
