The Enchantress (Book 1 of The Enchantress Saga) (30 page)

‘It’s something I can’t understand, never having known that life,’ Mary said.

‘And you are happy as you are?’

‘Well, our family has known much hardship. Once we were, well, wealthy and powerful I suppose you’d say, though it was long before my time. Then our father’s brother was in the rebellion in 1715 and was executed. Our mother died when I was born, our uncle died, an exile abroad, and my eldest brother finally managed to find some happiness and married a beautiful girl he had known all his life. They had but ten short months of happiness when she died, too, giving birth to a child ...’

‘And the child?’

‘Dead.’

‘Ah ...’ Analee looked away, not wanting Mary to see the suffering in her own eyes. Then she turned to her again. ‘And you ... what is your future?’

Mary’s face assumed so suddenly a look of happiness, almost ecstasy, that Analee was taken by surprise. The deep blue eyes became almost purple and a becoming blush suffused her cheeks. Analee laughed outright at such a sudden transformation.

‘I see there is someone special for you ...’

‘I am expecting to be married! Any day he could come galloping over those mountains. My brother has gone to fetch him.’

‘Oh, I am so happy for you. Have you known him long?’

‘All my life. He is my cousin; but he never showed any love for me until recently. Last year he was very ill and I nursed him back to health. We fell in love.’

‘Then why did you not marry last year?’

Mary frowned and studied the ground.

‘My family did not fully approve of him. Although he is of noble birth he showed no capacity for settling down, for hard work, and he had no future of his own. Of course I didn’t mind that,’ Mary said hastily, noting the expression on Analee’s face. ‘We have never had money, but he also had a reputation as ... a womanizer.’ Mary’s voice sank to a whisper. ‘My brother thought him too fickle.’

‘But all is changed now?’ Analee’s eyes sparkled at the girl’s shyness.

‘Oh yes. He has worked hard and been faithful ... I think, and I expect him any time.’

Analee looked at the happy open face gazing into hers and knew a sudden moment of unease, foreboding ... there seemed to be a cloud between her and this young girl on the verge of marriage. Was it the intervention of her own unhappiness or was it a foreknowing?

‘I must go upstairs,’ she said quickly, ‘and see to Nelly.’

‘What is it, Analee? Have I said something wrong?’

Mary had observed the change in the gypsy’s eyes and looked concerned. Analee leaned impulsively over to touch her, then decided not to; Mary might consider her gesture too familiar.

‘No, of course not. I was worried that I had neglected Nelly. We cannot stay here long, especially as you are expecting your brother and ... what is his name, your young man?’

‘Mary,’ a voice came from the wood and Stewart appeared through the trees, ‘can you come for a minute? I want to talk about the thinning of the coppice with you.’

‘Ah, I must go,’ Mary said. ‘We dine at five, and go to bed very early in these parts.’

‘I am used to sleeping when it is dark and rising when it is light,’ Analee said turning towards the house. ‘In fact I cannot keep awake in the dark.’

Stewart who had hoped that the beautiful gypsy would come with them looked disconsolate as she walked towards the house. Mary saw his expression and smiled.

‘I think you are smitten,’ she said.

‘A man would not be in his right mind if he were not,’ Stewart replied. ‘I don’t think I ever saw a woman who struck me more in my life.’

‘But she is not for you.’

‘Why?’

‘She is a gypsy. A nomad; would you wander too?’

‘I was teasing,’ Stewart said taking her by the arm. ‘Maybe she will give me a spell to make Emma mine. If she is a real gypsy she
_.
should know about the ways of love.’

‘I am sure she does,’ Mary said, trembling slightly, for what reason she didn’t know. Maybe a chill had sprung up. ‘I am sure she knows all about them.’

13

Stewart was at his best at the dinner table that evening, relaxed and full of laughter. In the company of Analee he seemed to bloom, to lose all his reserve. It was the way she looked at him that made him feel so, well ... manly was the word. Yes manly, and clever as well. She simply had to smile at him and he wanted to open up and puff out his chest like a strutting turkey-cock. He wanted to please her and impress her; above all he wanted to make her go on looking at him like that.

But when she turned to Mary the look was only subtly changed because Mary was a woman and Stewart was a man. Analee wanted to draw Mary out too, and she did this by her smiles of encouragement, the way she nodded her head, seemed completely absorbed by what was being said. Years fell away from the brother and sister as they responded to the impact Analee made on them. She brought out the best in them, caused them to relive childhood memories, remembering when times were not as hard as they were now, so insecure.

It was almost as though ... she had cast a spell on them, Stewart thought watching his sister’s face as she chatted and sparkled, erupting every now and again into long forgotten silvery laughter. Could she cast spells, this beautiful gypsy woman who came from nowhere? Was she, perhaps, a witch? An enchantress?

‘Mary has been telling me she is about to marry,’ Analee said suddenly interrupting the flow of childhood nostalgia. ‘And you, Stewart? Have you no young woman you long to make your bride?’

Stewart looked abashed, less sure of himself. He knew he was blushing, but hoped she did not see it under the brown tan acquired from so many days of chopping trees in the sun.

‘Yes, he does have ...’ Mary began impishly, but he looked imploringly at her and she stopped.

‘It is true,’ he said cautiously. ‘I am enamoured of someone, but she will not spare a glance for me. She is younger than I and different, and ...’

‘Then that augurs well,’ Analee said practically. ‘It would not do if she were older or exactly the same in temperament.’

But she could see that Stewart was not joking; he was not amused. He nursed a hopeless passion for someone who did not love him.

‘No, she does not like me enough. Maybe you could give me a spell,’ Stewart said half in jest, wanting to restore the happy laughing mood of a few moments ago. ‘Why not? Can you cast spells?’

‘No,’ Analee said slowly. ‘I do not have the powers. I told you I am not
cohani;
but, well ... there are one or two ways I do know of trying to capture someone’s love.’

Stewart leaned forward impressed, despite himself, by her gravity, the sincerity of her tone.

‘Then tell it. I will try it.’

‘Well ... You must pluck three hairs from the neck of the girl you love, better if you do it while she is sleeping. You then put the hairs in the chink of a tree and as it grows her love will grow for you.

‘But,’ Stewart protested amused, though he could see that Analee did not speak in jest. ‘She is not here. She lives quite far away and I cannot get the hairs from her head.’

‘Ah.’ Analee stared thoughtfully at the table. ‘You really need a
drabarni,
a drug woman who will give you a potion to put into her food. But there again you need to be with her. To win love from afar, that is more difficult. Look, this will be easy for you. You must go to the lake and pick a leaf from a tree hanging over it. Then with your knife you prick your wrist and smear the leaf with the blood while repeating your name. You then turn the leaf over and smear it on the other side, saying over and over again the name of the girl you want to marry. Her name is ... ?’

‘Emma,’ Stewart said.

‘Then you say “Emma” over and over again. Then you throw the leaf into the lake and watch it flow away.’

She stopped and gazed at Stewart. He was such a handsome, vital young man, looking earnestly at her face. But she did not see happiness for Stewart ... there was something about this family that bred its own disaster. Looking at brother and sister she could see happiness for neither of them. Neither Stewart nor the girl, not for a long time.

She hoped she was wrong. The mood of gaiety had gone and it was partly her fault. She was not bringing happiness to the house and she wanted to. She felt she already loved this family, the two young vulnerable people who had given her, a rough wandering gypsy woman, so much hospitality. She wanted to help them, to do something for them. But what?

‘I must take Nelly some food,’ she said getting up from the table. ‘She will be better tomorrow. We will go, and presume no more on your kindness.’

‘But we like having you here,’ Stewart said. ‘We get so few visitors. Besides, where will you go?’

‘Ah, that I can’t say. We are making for over the mountains, towards the sea. Maybe we will cross the water and go to Ireland.’

‘You mean you just wander on and on?’

‘Yes.’ Analee tilted her head at Stewart. ‘You cannot understand it can you? You have a house and a bed and fresh clothes to put on. You have food at regular times and warmth in your grate. But I, and Nelly, have known nothing else. The earth is our home, the wild hills and forests. We have always done it and it is how we live. I have ... for some months dwelt in a gypsy camp and I could not abide it. I hated being tied down. I cannot explain it, it is how I am. How my people are.’

Stewart thought it thrilling to listen to the sombre voice of the gypsy as dark gathered over the lake, and the only light in the room came from the guttering candles on the polished oak table. He thought of her sleeping rough and living like a nomad, no table, no bed. He got up and took her hand and kissed it, noting how fine and smooth it was, the long nails blunted at the ends but not rough or jagged. Although her clothes were poor they were clean and her body was sweet-smelling. She took care of herself.

‘I wish you would stay,’ he said. ‘At least stay and see Mary married. Rest here awhile. Nelly is not nearly fit to go; see if the spell works. I will try it tomorrow. With you.’

Analee laughed into his earnest young eyes. Why not stay a while if he meant it, and it seemed he did? Maybe she could dance at Mary’s wedding, reward her like that? She got up and clasped his hand, her eyes shining.

‘Well ... maybe a little longer if you really wish it. Now I must take Nelly her dinner. See how she does. It is late for me to be awake. I am like the birds, as I told you. I will see you tomorrow.’

Betty had already taken up Nelly’s food and Nelly was asleep when Analee got to their room. She had come slowly up the stairs, along the corridors. She got in beside Nelly and lay for a long time with her hands clasped beneath her head looking out onto the dark sky studded with stars.

Analee thought that, tomorrow or soon, she and Nelly would bed down as they always did beside a ditch or under cover of a rocky crag. Sometimes they found a cave and stayed a day or two if it were cold or wet. Luxury like this she had never known. But, to her surprise, she did not dislike it as much as she thought she would: the feel of the sheets on her bare skin – for she did not wear a chemise as Nelly did – the boards under her bare feet when she got up. The gleaming table at dinner with silver, and flaming wax candles, plates and the smell of hot food.

It was her first real experience of living in a house and she liked it. It was attractive. It appealed to something in Analee she didn’t know she possessed.

Suddenly, her head resting on her hands clasped on the fine white flock-filled pillows, Analee thought of the man who had lain in this room recovering from an illness. He would have looked out on the stars as she did He and Mary had fallen in love; maybe they had lain together in this very bed.

And suddenly, for no reason at all that she could understand, Analee had a clear picture of the long lost Brent Delamain, and with his image in her mind she fell asleep.

Brent Delamain had ridden hard since leaving Cockermouth at first light, John close behind him. It had been a glorious morning as they left the valley and began the ascent of the foothills just as the sun broke over Grisedale Pike and the fells, covered with heather and brown bracken, had the rich golden gleam of fresh honey. They toiled up towards Whinlatter, and the brown and green fells gave way to the thick forest of tall straight firs through which many a mountain stream cascaded from its source over stones and fallen logs towards Buttermere and Crummock Water.

As it rose the sunlight pierced the trees, dispersing the dense morning mist which spiralled up like smoke through the thick branches. At times Brent’s nostrils caught the scent of wood smoke caused by the charcoal burners who plied a living in the forest.

After a steep descent into Braithwaite they rested, taking bread and ale at the hostelry, and then set off along the narrow bridle paths that meandered through the Newlands Valley by way of Stair and Skelgill and climbed high up to Skelgill Bank and across the top to Catbells. All the way along this last part the lake of Derwentwater gleamed below them, a broad glistening ribbon mirroring the blue sky and clouds, the purple hills that surrounded it and the forest which ran alongside either bank.

From where he waited for John to catch up Brent could see across to Low Moss, Castlerigg Fell and away to Watendlath, and then in the distance the high snowy peaks at the end of Borrowdale.

But below lay the jewel, the prize, its tall chimneys and soft red stone, its gables and mullioned windows reflected in the still lake: Furness Grange and at its core nestled his beloved Mary. He imagined he saw her walking in the grounds and raised his hand to call, but he was too far away. He looked at John who smilingly indicated he should go ahead, and then he dug his heels into his horse and raced down across the fell towards the house.

And indeed it had been Mary walking in the grounds on her way back from taking Stewart and Nat their noonday meal. She clasped her hand over her eyes against the sun as she heard the sound of hooves and there he was towering over her on his horse; and then he had jumped down and she was in his arms.