Gwen absolutely insisted that I spent the night before the wedding in her quarters. At first I declined, not wanting to be of trouble, but she did not let me be until I had said yes. I would probably also have felt a little lonely on my own.

When I arrived, she had yet another surprise for me. She had invited Sophia and Jocelyn and arranged for the four of us to have a private dinner together. The food was very good and we had a great laugh around the table. They were all very excited for me, and the excitement was infectious. Gwen was clearly enjoying just to be a girl in the company of other girls, and I don't think I had ever been enjoying that same thing so much as I did now, even though I sometimes still felt stupid and rigid when I compared myself to them.

When dinner was over, Gwen and the others set to work beautifying me. They poured a big tub of hot water and washed and scrubbed me all over with the finest herbal soap I'd ever seen.

"You really don't have to do all this," I said, my bad conscience killing me.

"Don't be ridiculous. Tomorrow is your big day. You deserve it more than anyone else I know," Gwen said, putting a stop to the discussion. So I decided to let them do whatever they wanted and just enjoy it as much as I possibly could. At first I felt very awkward about being naked in front of them, but when they took off their dresses in order not to get them wet and just worked in their undergarments, I felt better about it. I tried to hide my arms under the foam floating on the water, but it was difficult to keep them there all the time. At one time Jocelyn said "Drea, what that on y-"

I looked up, but she stopped in mid-sentence. I caught just a glimpse of Gwen shaking her head furtively at Jocelyn. But then she noticed me and she just smiled like nothing had happened. Gwen must have noticed the scars first and sensed they were a matter of embarrassment to me. I was glad of the way she had handled the situation, but also very frustrated because I was like a baby who needed special protection. But the bath was so nice that after a minute or two I was able to shrug it off.

They washed my hair with something that smelled absolutely heavenly. My hair had never felt softer than it did afterwards. And when I came out of the water they rubbed me in savoury lotions before drying me up with the softest towels. That got me to thinking that soon Percival would probably also be looking at my body, and touching it. I was so incredibly nervous about that that I totally stiffened. What if he wouldn't like it? What if I wouldn't like it?

"Drea? Are you alright?" Sophia asked.

"Oh, I'm fine," I said, trying to smile, when I realised that in my mind I had been completely gone from the room.

Then they cleaned and polished my nails on both my hands and feet. Several more beautifying rituals followed. When they were done, even I thought I looked a little like something that could be described as beautiful. All the while we had been talking about girly things, like love and marriage and men. I was feeling more and more overwhelmed, so it was quite a relief when Sophia and Jocelyn finally said good night and went home.