It was her favourite dress, the first of which she purchased on her arrival to Bree, and even though at the time she did not have two coins to rub together, it gave the illusion she did. The crimson fabric was now much darker, almost black, as it lay heavily in her bathing tub, swirled in the icy cold salt water. She knew this a fine way to be rid of blood, and although it would only have been noticed should someone be looking near her feet, that perhaps she could pass it off for mud, she knew it was there, it had to be gone.
He had been teetering on the edge of madness for some time and this act had convinced her more so that they should be wary in his presence. So much blood, chaos, fear at his hand alone. She knew him capable of such cruelty, no matter how he might justify it, and now he thrust them both once more into the midst of it.
She was angry, she liked that dress and it could be ruined! Her life had become normal, respectable, to a point. She rarely thought of the cavern where lifeless eyes stared from corpses in their seats, of the tree where the familiar body swung limp in the night breeze by its neck, but now, now such thoughts returned, stealing sleep from her.
A large comfort was her lover. He had returned and on his heels the rabid teeth of the wolf, but in his marred, broad arms there was sanctuary. He was once more with her and unharmed, which could not be said of those who crossed his path. Four days hence, that is what the frayed wolf and he decided upon, and now one of those days was spent…spent by her reddening her hands from soaking them in bitterly cold water and salt, all to be rid of a strangers blood…though she feared it would not be the last time she would have to tend to such a task, and it likely to be repeated soon.
