That makes sense, thanks.
I don't think my idea for a healer works as a female. The general idea is someone who is brilliant but also a bit mad. He's explored all over the compass and has an intimate knowledge of how the body works and how various herbs/roots/etc interact with it, and obsessively tinkers with that knowledge, with a variety of medicines and poisons and narcotics resulting from the experiments.
I had considered the idea of a female fighter disguised as one of the women (to increase safety while decreasing the appearance of too many guards) or one of the handmaidens, but I thought the apothecary was a more interesting challenge.