The Enchantress (Book 1 of The Enchantress Saga)

by Thorne, Nicola

  ‘I see we have a bargain,’ he said. ‘A true partnership is based on mutual need. You and I need each other Mr Delamain.’

  10

  Now that spring had come Analee only looked forward to the time of her delivery. She was big and the baby was heavy, kicking inside her, making it difficult for her to move easily, to sleep at nights. She would lie on her back, her hands on her belly, gazing up at the roof of the tent, Randal snoring or breathing heavily beside her, and her thoughts were full of dread for the future.

  She still didn’t want this child, Brent’s child or Randal’s or any other. She wanted the child that had given one cry and died as it was born, its first cry in the world its last. She could still hear the tiny cry and see the small limp lifeless form attached to her by the cord. The child had been too thin to survive, it had been born too soon – for Analee had been cold and hungry and full of grief, and it had been a bitter winter. An old woman, a gadjo, had looked after her as she’d lain in a barn giving birth to the baby who died so soon; an old woman who worked on the farm and felt sorry for her. The woman had held her hand and wiped her dry mouth, and then she’d cut the cord and tied it, severing the lifeless child from its Mother.

  She’d given it to one of her sons to bury, as though it had been an animal, and Analee had been forced on her way.

  Now this brought all those memories back and although she tried to be happy and wanted to be, she could not. She had nothing to say against Randal; he was a good man, though limited and set in his ways. Now that they no longer danced or made love he seemed to have lost his love for her; he was no longer as tender as he had been and soon she would be put in a tent by herself, away from the others, to await the baby’s birth. For a woman in labour was marime, unclean, and the husband could not be with her or else he would be contaminated too.

  There was so much in Analee that would not conform, that had lived for such a long time away from the formal gypsy tribe, that she resented this treatment still meted out by the gypsies to women. She would often sit near the labour tent when other gypsy women were giving birth and listen to their cries, and then imagine that soon it would be her turn. Some of the women cared, but most of them did not. They had endured it and expected others to do the same. When you were very near your time the cohani came and assisted the new baby into the world. But even then the father didn’t come near for days. Both Mother and baby were marime until the child had been baptized by immersion in water and thus made itself and its mother clean.

  Analee could see how Randal accepted the customs of his tribe. He neither knew nor cared that she feared to be alone and needed him, because it reminded her of the time she had lain alone in an evil-smelling barn and had given birth to the child who had died with its first cry.

  But she knew already that the tent was being prepared for her and that very soon she would be moved into it. She would not be allowed to come out, and there she would be on her own or occasionally with the cohani or Rebecca.

  In the long months of her pregnancy Analee had come to realize that she could never be a true member of the Buckland tribe. She no more belonged here than she had anywhere else. She was a nomad, born to wander. The thought of the baby, of a life with Randal, was stifling and the way Randal had so quickly adapted himself to being a husband, had become just like any other gypsy of the Buckland tribe who squatted for hours smoking or chewing tobacco and mending pots and pans brought from Carlisle. His sister and brothers had soon gone off to make music without him and he no longer sang or danced as he used to. He was content to let his wife become as other wives, to sit with the women and cook and mend. Soon he would expect Analee to be just like them, with a baby in her arms and another in her belly. He had told her so. It was her duty.

  He no longer seemed to remember the glory of their lovemaking, or the magic of the dance. He gazed at her dully because she was just a wife, an object, and it was her duty to look after him and bear children.

  Randal turned in his sleep and Analee moved away from him. Though they no longer made love she didn’t even want him to touch her. Already he was beginning to think of her as unclean. He showed it by the way he looked at her.

  Analee wondered why Randal had changed from a lover into a husband so quickly. Was it because of the baby or had he tired of her beauty and her charms? Reyora had become a friend to Analee who tried to ask her the reason for this, but Reyora would smile and shrug and say it was the way with men. They quickly tired. Randal would want her again. He would be tender with her again after the baby, only then they would be kept awake by its screams. It would never be quite the same again as it had been after they had married. It could not be. It was not the way with men and women.

  Reyora saw that Analee didn’t understand. She was not true gypsy; she was romantic. Sometimes Reyora, who could see certain things but not everything, wondered what would become of Analee.

  One beautiful June day Reyora beckoned to Analee after the noonday meal and bade her come over to her tent. Analee had been walking restlessly around the camp in the morning, too uncomfortable to remain sitting and had even followed a footpath towards Carlisle until fear drove her back. She was heavy and tired and to be near her own people was important.

  The smell of the hedgerows in early summer, the wisps of pale clouds in the sky, the thick burgeoning leaves, the spring of the grass underfoot, made her yearn to shoulder her bundle and steal away – to make for the sea or to go deep into the mountains and regain her true freedom.

  Reyora told Analee to lie down and, placing a hand on her belly, prodded it gently. Then she put her ear to it, resting her cheek on the bulky flesh. ‘It will be soon,’ she leaned back and pulled down Analee’s skirts. ‘You must go to the birth tent.’

  She looked at Analee’s face, her own expression enigmatic.

  ‘I’m frightened,’ Analee said, ‘I don’t want to be on my own.’

  ‘I will be near you,’ Reyora said tersely, ‘though I have other things to do, people to take care of, my own family to see to. It is the custom that our women are with their mothers when they give birth. As you have no mother, or mother-in-law, you must be on your own.’

  ‘Please,’ Analee begged, ‘don’t leave me on my own.’

  ‘If you were a true gypsy woman you would not speak thus,’ Reyora said contemptuously, ‘that is the trouble with you didakais, especially with you Analee. I have observed how you dream and wander away. You are more like a gadjo in spirit than a gypsy.’

  ‘That is not true!’ Analee said spiritedly, getting to her feet with difficulty and smoothing her skirt over her swollen belly. ‘I have the heart and the looks and the blood of a gypsy! But I cannot abide this life. It is like death to sit around all day chewing nuts and gossiping about nothing with the women. The men live their lives and we live ours.’

  ‘That is the way it is,’ Reyora said smoothly, her eyes flashing. ‘You must go now to the birth tent and wait there. You must do as a gypsy woman does. Get your things and do not let your husband near you; you are very close to your time.’

  Analee walked slowly from the tent across the field to the one she shared with Randal. In the distance the birth tent looked forbidding. Then she thought of the pain and terror she would have to endure alone. She wished even now she could leave and have her baby in some remote field or barn as she had the last time; but she was too afraid. The baby would die and there would be no one to cut the cord.

  When she got into her tent Randal was sitting on the floor mending a shoe. He gazed at her with indifference as she came in and made no attempt to move or let her past.

  ‘I must go to the birth tent,’ Analee said. ‘It is nearly time.’

  ‘Then get thee gone,’ Randal said. ‘It is an evil time and you must not come near me until you’re clean again. Be quick.’

  ‘Will you at least help me?’ Analee said, because it was hard to bend and get her possessions from the floor.

  Randal’s answer was to get up and look at
her. There was no love there, or desire or even pity.

  ‘You are on your own now Analee, as you have always wanted to be. There is no place for a man in childbirth, you know it is our custom.’

  Analee stood and looked at him, panting slightly because it was so hot in the tent. Was this gaunt unbending man really the tender lover, the passionate wooer who had made love to her so many times a night when they were first married?

  ‘I am still Analee, Randal,’ she said quietly, ‘the woman you loved. I have not become something else, something disgusting.’

  Randal looked at his toes, a blush on his handsome face.

  ‘You are not as other women, Analee, you know that. Everyone says you are different, not of our people. You do not behave as the other women, your ways are alien.’

  ‘You brought me here,’ Analee said bitterly getting awkwardly to her knees to gather together her things, ‘by force. You forced me to become your bride.’

  ‘It was the heat of the moment,’ Randal said still not looking at her. ‘It was madness in me. I didn’t know you, like you really are. You are not happy, not settled, not a true gypsy woman. But,’ he moved closer to her, only not too close unless he touched her and became marime, ‘you are my wife Analee, wedded according to gypsy law. You are the mother of my child and it is you who must change, must become obedient and docile. Rebecca says that having a child will calm you, make you want to wander less. Then we will have another, and another, and then Analee, you will become a true Buckland gypsy, one of the tribe. That is what I intend. To do that you must learn the hard way, and go now to the tent and have your child.’

  Analee knew it was useless to say more to this man who had become a stranger. Now that there was no lovemaking there was no bond, nothing. To him she was a possession, a vessel for childbearing; it was her business to cook and clean and be obedient.

  Without another word, no endearment, no caress, not even a glance of sympathy or compassion Randal Buckland turned on his heels and left the tent. Analee gave in at last and, lying on the ground, her head pressed to the earth, gave vent to a spasm of sobbing such as she had never done before in her life.

  After a while she grew quieter and lay there listening. There were sounds outside, shouts and the noise of horses. She crawled on her knees to the entrance to the tent and looked out, the canvas framing her face. What she saw astonished her. Brewster Driver and all his family were arguing with Rebecca and Lancelot, pointing to a figure who lay on the ground and then gesticulating, arms raised to the heavens. Yes there he was and Nelly and all the children gathered round; but the person on the ground was his wife Margaret; she was pale and still.

  Analee didn’t want to see Brewster Driver now, but she had no option. She had to pass by him to get to the birth tent and already she felt a cramp in the lower part of her belly, a dull ache across the back. She got slowly to her feet and tied her things, her few things, in a bundle. Then she crept out of the tent hoping to avoid being seen.

  But she was unlucky. For as she came out there was a stillness and she realized that everyone had seen her, had been waiting for her. It was an event to give birth, envied by the ones who hadn’t, pitied by the ones who had. They all knew, too, that Analee was different, reluctant, an odd gypsy. It was even noised abroad that she was didakai, no real gypsy at all, and Randal Buckland had made a mistake marrying her. Normally the pregnant woman was led by her mother; there were murmurings and a few sympathetic glances as she made her way to the birth tent. But this time Analee was alone. Most of the looks she got were hostile.

  The stillness on that hot day in June was unnerving. Analee was aware of the flies buzzing around, of the horses flicking their tails in the heat. Then suddenly someone cried out and came running over to her.

  ‘Analee!’ an arm was thrown round her neck and she felt hot tears on her cheeks. But the tears didn’t come from her, they came from Nelly Driver, thin and sallow, ill-looking but with her face shining with joy. ‘Oh, Analee it is you. It is you. Analee?’

  She stood back and looked at the large misshapen form before her. Analee attempted a weak smile.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘And ...’ Nelly’s eyes fell to her belly, so heavy that Analee had to support it with an arm.

  ‘I am with child, as you see, about to give birth.’

  ‘You are wed?’ Nelly exclaimed with astonishment as though not particularly expecting an affirmative.

  ‘Yes to Randal Buckland,’ Analee said boldly so that all could hear. ‘He abducted me. I was a bride by capture shortly after I left you last summer. Nelly I must go to the tent, my pains are starting. What ails your mother?’

  Everyone had begun talking again and the shouting and gesticulating went on outside Rebecca’s tent.

  ‘She has a fever; she has been sick for weeks. Father wants to rest here; but they said it is no common gypsy camp but only for the Buckland tribe. Father is talking to them about the gypsy traditions of hospitality.’

  Nelly’s eyes lit up in a wry smile.

  ‘And the baby, Nelly. Yours?’

  ‘It was born dead. I don’t think it ever had a chance. ‘Twas as well ... Analee, you are all right?’

  A fierce pain shot across Analee’s abdomen and she nearly fell. She clutched Nelly’s arm.

  ‘Could you see me ... there.’

  ‘Of course.’

  While the women of the Buckland tribe idly watched, Nelly Driver helped Analee over to the tent and came inside with her. She assisted her on to the palliasse and loosened her clothes to make her comfortable.

  ‘I will stay with you, Analee.’

  ‘No, you must not. It is not allowed,’ Analee said weakly, but Nelly saw how her eyes pleaded with fear, contradicting the firmness of her voice.

  ‘But you have no mother. Does your husband have a mother?’

  ‘No. The cohani will come from time to time. She is a good sort.Go to see to your own mother. She needs you.’

  Nelly got up and looked around fearfully. ‘It is so dark here, so lonely.’

  Analee was about to reply when the pain came again, sharper this time. She cried out and grasped Nelly’s hand holding it tight until the spasm had passed. Then the curtains of the tent parted and Reyora came in, glancing at Nelly and motioning towards the entrance.

  ‘Go. Your mother can stay until she is better. I will come and see her after I have attended to Analee. I see you know each other?’

  Nelly nodded. ‘Analee was a good friend to me when I needed someone. May I not stay with her?’

  Reyora shook her head and knelt down by Analee producing a long sharp knife.

  ‘You know the custom. She is a good strong girl. She will be all right on her own.’

  ‘She is afraid.’

  Reyora looked at Nelly and sneered.

  ‘I think you are no true gypsy either.’

  As Nelly left Reyora leaned towards Analee with the knife and, not knowing what to expect, Analee shrank back afraid. Reyora grasped the knot of the loose tie of the belt at Analee’s waist and cut it; then the knots of the laces of her bodice. She hacked at each one until the bodice fell loosely open.

  ‘There,’ Reyora said getting to her feet. ‘’Tis the custom to cut all knots on the clothes, as a symbol of cutting the umbilicus. It is sympathetic magic.’ Then she cut the skirt from top to bottom and opened it exposing Analee’s belly and thighs completely. Before she could protest at the destruction of her lovely skirt, bought in the happy days with money earned from dancing, Analee felt the pain again, stronger this time. It went round in a tight circle from her navel to her back. She arched her back compulsively and bit her knuckles to stop herself screaming.

  Reyora leaned down and felt her belly which was now a seething rippling mass. She knelt beside her and massaged it gently, with her long supple fingers. The pain went and Analee gazed gratefully at her.

  ‘Do not leave me alone.’

  Reyora said nothing but continued with the soothin
g massage, right over the belly, between the legs, across the back, easing and helping. Every time there was a pain it did not last so long. But suddenly Reyora got up, leaned over and gave Analee a piece of cloth. ‘Bite on this if the pain is too bad. I must go.’ Then she left the tent, drawing back the curtain so that it was quite dark inside.

  Analee sweated now in fear and pain, her breath grew shorter and her whole body seemed alive with one long agony. The pain went, but never for long and never completely. It was dark in the tent but outside she knew it was day; soon it would be dark outside as well, pitch dark. Then inside the tent it would be black. Analee wished Reyora had left her knife so that she could plunge it in her breast and kill herself.

  But somehow she survived; even when the night fell and it was so black she could not see the rest of her body. Then suddenly when she had almost despaired there was a soft voice, a hand pressed hers.

  ‘Analee, I have come back to you. I can’t leave you by yourself. I care not what the cohani says. I know what it’s like when I had my own baby, and my mother and sisters were there. I waited for nightfall so that no one could see.’

  Analee pressed her hand and, drawing the thin face down to hers, kissed it.

  ‘You will be my friend forever, Nelly.’

  ‘I have brought water and some bread. How can they leave you like this?’

  ‘It is the custom,’ Analee smiled bitterly in the dark. ‘Also they don’t like me. Randal captured me and they have never accepted me. Even Reyora, who is not as bad as the rest, wants to let me suffer, tame me and teach me a lesson.’

  ‘She is kind. She was very good with my mother – gave her a potion that immediately brought the colour to her cheeks.’

  ‘She is limited by what she is and who she is and where she is. She –’