Operation: Dard and Devotion

14 | Embarrassment & Evil

Thankyou @bobnuggets for the creative chapter art! :)

I accidentally stared at Ahsan in horror longer than I needed to. He peered at me, confused.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" He took a step back with caution. "You look...creepy."

"I...I want to take a bath," I told him carefully. Well, that was not very far from the truth. "Can you quickly put up a fire in the dungeon bath?"

"Oh," he relaxed. "Come along."

I quickly turned back to Saad to make sure he was still in a deep slumber before I hastily followed Ahsan.

He pulled out a match from one of his vest pockets and lit up the firewood in the far corner of the dungeon bath. Thankfully, he left the room and I waited until I could no longer hear his retreating footsteps to close the door and slip off my flats. My shoulders slumped in seeing that the "door" was nothing more than a typical jail door, consisting of vertical, rustic metal columns with space between each bar.

Great...

Using the small mug, I poured as much water into the large bucket as I could and dragged it along the floor to the far corner of the room where I could not be seen from the doorway. I quickly stripped myself of all clothing, trying to make this bathing process as quick as possible, and attempted to soak my jilbaab, abaya, and especially my undergarments. I hurriedly twisted and wrung out all of the clothing, and laid them beside the fire so that I could spend the most time cleaning myself. Judging by the speed of the warm liquid that oozed down my thigh, I definitely needed to quicken my pace.

My period could not have arrived at a more horrible time.

I was disgusted with myself and for the first time ever, I hated being a female.

The stone ground was frigid beneath my bare feet and I shivered after pouring the first mug of equally cold water on myself. My teeth chattered from the brisk, icy feeling and I tried to shift my focus on cleansing myself rather than the water's abnormally glacial temperature. On the count of three, I threw the icy water on my head, with the slight, irrational fear that my brain would actually freeze, and struggled with the knots in my wet hair.

What the hell was I thinking when I decided to grow out my hair this long?!

I had a sudden desire to be bald.

After successfully untangling and parting my hair with extreme effort, the tresses draped down my shoulders and back like a damp curtain. Now, I was clean and my clothes were just about to dry, but the flow was not cooperating with me at all. I folded my arms tightly, trying to keep as much heat to myself as possible, and muttered a string of curses.

I had no pads. I had no tampons. Hell, I had nothing!

Glancing over to where my clothes were, I saw that my underwear was still stained even after excessive wringing.

"Damn it," I swore again aloud and mumbled out some more colorful vocabulary.

Apart from water droplets crashing to the floor, there was an eerie silence that hung in the moist air. Suddenly, heavy footsteps echoed down the hallway and my heart raced up to my throat.

Crap.

I swiftly tiptoed over to the fire, reaching down to grab the garments only to find out that they were still soggy.

The sturdy footsteps got louder and I guessed whoever it was had just turned down to the corridor where only the dungeon bath was located...which meant that person was going to see me fully naked and dripping in more ways than one.