Chapter 7

Chapter Seven- South of France, 1802

Dianna wiped the sweat that had accumulated on her forehead and breathed a sigh of relief. It was finally bedtime.

She went into her small tent that she shared with some of the other gypsy girls and grabbed her bathing materials. She walked back out of the tent into the blistering hot evening and began trudging to the bathing tent.

The tent was simple, just a white tent, and inside were three large tubs filled with boiling hot water. Dianna undressed out of her smelly and dirt caked work clothes and stepped into one of the tubs. Immediately, the hot water scorched her skin and she sucked in a quick breath at the intensity of the heat. But after a few moments, the hot water began to feel so comforting and cleansing against her clammy, dirty skin. She sighed and settled back against the tub, letting the water completely envelop her small frame. After soaking for a minute or two, Dianna grabbed the sponge and bar of soap out of her bathing bag and began to scrub herself clean, scrubbing away the dirt that marked the trials of the day, and symbolized her life as a gypsy. She scrubbed until she felt clean enough, and her skin was left pink and raw. She sat in the tub for a minute longer, letting the water wash the last of the dirt and the soap on her body away, then she stepped out and wrapped herself in the raggedy white towel she'd been using since she started working with the fair. She dried herself quickly and dressed in her white lacy nightgown and her white robe. She tied the robe tightly around her thin waist so as to cover her body completely, then she twisted her black red hair into a bun, grabbed her things, and stepped out of the tent.

The night had become slightly cooler as she had bathed herself. The sun was pretty much gone now, and a half moon was appearing behind a few wispy clouds. Dianna breathe in the smells of all the fairs and fair workers and even all the smells of France itself. She felt almost happy in the moment, maybe because she was clean after a long day of work that had tired her, and she was ready to climb into her thin bed that barely held even her small frame, and go to sleep.

As she continued walking to her tent, she heard someone whisper.

"Gypsy girl, here." Dianna turned to see the fairs fortune teller stepping outside of her own tent. She was an older woman, close to her seventieth year, with extremely long, white hair that she kept in a braided bun on top of her head and under her turban. She had a straight, stern face, but there was also a look of innocence about her, probably because of her pink cheeks and little bulge of fat under her colorful dress that gave her an almost grandmotherly look. Dianna remembered her name was Lia, and she realized Lia was talking to her.

"Yes mam?" Even after a year with the fair, Dianna would not forget her manners.

"If I were you, I'd keep a packed bag of my belongings close to me and ready to go." Lia said, her emerald green eyes darting to and fro, looking for any listeners or passerby, but the fairgrounds were quiet as everyone slept.

"Pardon?"

"Just do as I say! You may be leaving sooner than you think. I've seen something in my messages from the other side. Something about you leaving! And if you're going to leave, you should be packed and ready to go on short notice." Lia finished, nodded at Dianna once, then fled back into her tent.

Dianna turned and began walking back to her own tent. What a crazy old bat. Leaving sooner than you think? What did she mean by that? Dianna decided it probably meant nothing. The woman was old, and she thought herself a fortune teller; things like that weren't real.

But when Dianna got back to her tent, she quickly filled a cloth bag up with her few belongings and hid the bag under her bed. Just to be on the safe side.

~

Author: sorry for the short chapters! Gonna try to add more soon! Please comment and vote and have a great day! :))))