Claimed by the Viking

Chapter 11 : Wet and Wild

The wind was making the leaves ruffle around Adelheid. The sunlight was being filtered by them, casting dancing shadows around her, which distracted her from her mission: Hilda had sent her to pick up different roots and plants in the forest.

The young woman took a deep breath of this earth smell that invaded her nostrils. It was really nice.

As she continued walking down a small path, she found a bush crawling under the weight of red fruits. She wasn't sure what it was so she didn't dare try them since Hilda had warned her about poisonous plants around the forest, but they appeared to be on the verge of being spoiled, therefore Adelheid decided to fill the left space of her basket with them and bring them back in case they were good to eat.

As she picked them up, she hummed a song the kids from the Clan had taught her a few days before.

It had been only two days since Tharn had rejected her.

At first, Adelheid had been so hurt she hid from people for the rest of the day. After that, she had kept to the backroom of the nursing house and purposefully missed the time of the midday and evening meal, pretexting she had work. This morning, she had heard that Tharn had gotten out of rest for the first time since he had returned, and therefore she had asked Hilda to go and gather plants because she was afraid he would show up at the nursing house for a check up of his wounds or something else.

She didn't regret it: the nice weather and the forest helped her change her thoughts as she had picked what Hilda had asked for.

Once her basket was full of those fruits, Adelheid decided that she should keep on walking since the evening was approaching and she wanted to purposefully come back at the end of the evening meal to avoid meeting with Tharn.

She had brought some bread and dried fish with her for her midday meal, that way she had not been in the village since early that morning.

As she kept on walking, still humming lightly, she arrived to a beautiful source of water which was being constantly filled by a waterfall. It was a beautiful sight.

Adelheid put her basket down and approached the water that she touched with the tip of her finger. It was deliciously warm!

Hilda had told her about how the heat from the soils in this country warmed up water sources. That was also what made the water of the bathing house always warm. Usually, they smelled quite gross, but the light wind that had picked up was chasing the smell away and it was a very nice landscape to admire.

Adelheid looked around her. She hadn't seen anyone since this morning, and everyone should be busy with the evening meal or other things, so she should be completely alone here. After a moment of hesitation, she decided to dare bath in here.

Hilda had told her that many people did that in the many sources, so it was nothing to be frowned upon even if Adelheid had first been shocked at this information: bathing outside completely naked was not very common back in her former country.

But this place was entirely different, and therefore Adelheid didn't feel insecure as she put her clothes off piece by piece and folded them with her shoes and her basket a few meters from the source before she dipped her toes into it.

The warmness was really nice, and Adelheid went in step by step until the water came up to her waist. The source was not deep and she could see the bottom of the source so she wasn't worried of drowning thanks to that, since she didn't know how to swim. She had to bent her knees so that the water reached her shoulders.

As she relaxed in the water, she could feel her muscles enjoying the soothing effect of the warm water. It felt completely different compared to the bathing house where the fog would hide you from the other people in here. Even if they were women, she had been quite self-conscious about being seen in her naked form.