The Enchantress (Book 1 of The Enchantress Saga)

The Enchantress

1744 – 1746

(
Book 1 of
The Enchantress Saga)

Nicola Thorne

Publishing history

First published in Great Britain in paperback in 1979 by Futura Publications Ltd under the pseudonym Katherine Yorke and in the United States in the same year by Pocket Books under the same pseudonym. Also in Italy in  1980 by Mondadori under the same pseudonym and with  the title
Zingara.

Published in hardback in 1986 by Judy Piatkus (Publishers) Ltd  by arrangement with Granada Publishing Ltd under the  pseudonym of Nicola Thorne in a compendium volume taking in the  two sequels  (
Falcon Gold
and
Lady of the Lakes
) in what was called
The Enchantress Saga
.

Katherine Yorke and Nicola Thorne are two of the pseudonyms of Rosemary Ellerbeck

Copyright ©1979, 1980, 1986, 2013 by Nicola Thorne

This E book edition revised by the author in 2013

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Thorne, Nicola

The enchantress saga Rn: Rosemary Ellerbeck I. Title

823’914[F]      PR6070. H689

ISBN 1-85018-056-3

All rights reserved. No part of this publication maybe reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any other means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the publishers.

Cover painting by Nigel Chamberlain

Design by Ruth Wrixton

Author website: www.nicolathorne.com

E book preparation Witley Press Ltd, Hunstanton, PE36 6AD

For Geraldine Watkins With love

About the Author

Nicola Thorne was born in South Africa and, after a spell in New Zealand with her Mother who was born in Wellington, came to England as a child where her parents finally separated. She spent her youth in the North of England, where she was educated first at a convent school and then a co-educational school. After completing her education at the London School of Economics she then spent most of her adult life in London. She has made a long career as a writer and is the author of over fifty novels. For a number of years Nicola has been among the top most borrowed authors from public libraries in the UK (PLR statistics) and many of her books have been published in foreign languages apart from English. After fifteen years spent in Dorset, she now lives in Devon.

By the same author

Return to Wuthering Heights (also e-book)

A Woman Like Us (also e-book)

The Perfect Wife and Mother (also e-book)

The Daughters of the House (also e-book)

Where the Rivers Meet (also e-book)

Affairs of Love (also e-book)

The Enchantress Saga ( also  e -book)

Pride of Place

Bird of Passage

Champagne

Champagne Gold

A Wind in Summer

Silk, a novel

Profit and Loss

Trophy Wife

Repossession, a novel of psychic suspense (also e-book)

Worlds Apart

Old Money

Rules of Engagement

The Good Samaritan

Class Reunion

My Name is Martha Brown (also e-book)

In Search of Martha Brown (non-fiction)

A Friend of the Family

Coppitts Green (also e-book)

The Little Flowers (also e-book)

Rose, Rose, Where are You? (also e-book)

On a Day Like Today

The Holly Tree

The Pride of the School (e-book only)

After the Rain (also e –book)

The Askham Chronicles, 1898-1967
:

Never Such Innocence

Yesterday’s Promises

Bright Morning

A Place in the Sun

The People of this Parish series
:

The People of this Parish

The Rector’s Daughter

In This Quiet Earth

Past Love

A Time of Hope

In Time of War

The Broken Bough Saga
:

The Broken Bough (also e-book)

The Blackbird’s Song (also e-book)

The Water’s Edge (also e-book)

Oh Happy Day! (also e-book)

Foreword

The story of Analee the gypsy who becomes a marchioness, an intimate of the Royal families of France and England originally appeared as three separate novels in paperback and was then cut and reissued in hardback as one novel under the title of
The Enchantress Saga
. Even then it came to nearly 1000 pages so I have decided to reissue them as separate e books again under their original titles
The Enchantress
,
Falcon Gold
and
Lady of the Lakes
.

It is not very profound but it is, I think, full of fun, adventure, intrigue. It is what Graham Greene once referred to some of his books as ‘entertainment’, to divide them from his more serious novels. However, because I have a passion for historical accuracy, I always try my very best to ensure that the historical people and occasions presented in my books are as accurate as I can make them and did a vast amount of research into gypsy customs and lore and the history of The ‘45 rebellion and Bonnie Prince Charlie, life at the French and English courts. Thus in addition to a host of fictional characters we also meet Bonnie Prince Charlie, Louis XV and the Pompadour, George II of England, various members of his court and the sad Princess of Wales, Augusta, whose husband’s death deprived her of the chance of ever becoming Queen of England.

Author’s Note

In the eighteenth century, when this book is set, many places in what we now call the English Lake District had different names, or the spelling was different. I have used modern names throughout so that the areas in which the action takes place may be more familiar to the modern reader.

In the spelling of the various gypsy words I have used the translation by Charles Duff of Jean-Paul Clebert’s classic book
The Gypsies
(London 1963). I am also indebted to this book as well as E. B. Trigg’s
Gypsy Demons and Divinities
(London, 1975) for much of my information about the gypsy people.

I consulted many books on the English Lake District and the Rebellion of 1745, but I am especially grateful to David Daiches whose
Charles Edward Stewart: the life and times of Bonnie Prince Charlie
(London, 1973) was constantly by my side.

Book 1 The Enchantress

Synopsis

Where she came from no one knew. Few cared. The men saw the pride, the grace, and the fierce defiance in her eyes. The women pitied her fatigue, the ragged clothes, and her loneliness. None guessed the tragic past from which she was fleeing, or foresaw the strange future that was her destiny. Analee however was no ordinary gypsy, her past as mysterious as the effect she had on all who came into contact with her be they men or woman. Was she a witch, a sorceress, perhaps an enchantress, a weaver of spells?

During that violent summer, among the mountains and lakes of Cumbria, three men would be enslaved by her presence and awesome beauty: The first was rebel aristocrat Brent Delamain. The second, the dark gypsy Randal Buckland. The third, the man all men knew and feared as ‘The Falcon ...’ a colonel in the Hanoverian Army which would eliminate forever the claims of the Stuarts to the throne of England.

This is the first novel in a dazzing family saga a full blooded tale of passion and adventure set during Bonnie Prince Charlie’s rebellion of 1745.

1

Where she came from no one knew; no one asked; few cared. In the huge roving community of drovers, pedlars, tinkers, whores, gypsies, pick-pockets, horse thieves and honest traders that descended on the Cumbrian town of Appleby for the June Fair in the year 1744 she was scarcely noticed.

But some there were who did notice her and ask themselves questions. The men who followed her progress through the town – surreptitiously, if their wives were watching, or with open admiration if they were not – could not help but appreciate her beauty beneath the pallor; the graceful dignity with which she walked, even though her feet were bare; the proud tilt of her head, the fierce defiance in the eyes of one who has learned to protect herself.

The women, those who noticed her, pitied her for her air of extreme weariness, her slow tired pace, the sloped shoulders, the tattered clothes she wore and the picture of poverty and loneliness that she presented.

Everyone came to the June Fair in Appleby; everyone that is who had to do with horses, cattle, sheep or chickens or who had farm produce or home-made goods to sell. Those who wanted to buy or exchange came, and those who wanted to hire servants or be themselves hired for the farms or great houses. They came in vast numbers from across the border with Scotland; they came from all parts of Cumberland and Westmorland; some even came from as far south as Preston or as far east as York.

But few came from the real south. It was a long way. Even by horse or carriage it was a journey of many days. On foot it would take weeks. And those who did notice or speak to the girl agreed on one thing: she came from the south; she was not one of them. But she said few words as she walked with her bundle in her hand, stopping occasionally to admire some glass beads or metal jewel work displayed on many of the stalls in the market place, her fine eyes glinting as though in imagination she could see herself adorned in such finery. Or her fingers would tentatively feel the satins and silks, the brocades and soft cloth, her face alight at the vision of herself such richness conjured up.

But no one tried to sell her anything because it was so obvious she could not pay; and the men smiled and winked at her or made some coarse gesture, or promised her a bauble or a yard of cloth for a certain favour she might give them, while the women told her to be off so that she should not spoil the view of those who could afford to buy.

Finally, as though instinctively seeking home, she came to the tents that stood a little apart from the town where the gypsy folk set up their camp ... those wanderers of the road who spent the year going from one fair to the next. The tents and carts clustered around smoking fires, and in the late afternoon the enticing odour of wood smoke and roasting meat filled the air.

The town of Appleby lay in the broad valley between the range of Pennine mountains in the east and the hills of Lakeland to the west. She had followed the jagged line of the Pennines in her journey north knowing that they led from Derbyshire to the Cheviot Hills that formed the border with Scotland; that they would lead her away from all that she was fleeing from, the hateful memories and painful regrets of her past life.

Boroughgate, the steep main street of Appleby, led to the huge red stone castle built in the time of the Normans. At the bottom a bridge crossed the river Eden and, asking her way, the girl had trudged wearily up the bank towards the gypsies’ field. Ahead of her, almost obscured in the hazy mist of late afternoon, were the Pennines which had guided her and knowing they were still near, in sight, comforted her. They seemed to offer both a consolation and a way of escape if she needed it. But now she was hungry and tired and at last she stopped by a fire on which stood a huge iron cauldron, and her nostrils twitched as though she were already eating the savoury fare.

‘Eh the lass is hungry, give her sommat t’eat.’

The family sitting round the fire, huge bowls on their laps, looked up at the words of the speaker, first at him and then at the hungry girl.

‘Wilt eat lass?’ the big man said, moving up as though to make a place for her.

The girl smiled with the timorousness of one who is not frequently offered kindness.

‘Aye, if it pleases you.’

‘Margaret, give her a bowl and some of this good stew. Lass sit thee down.’

Everyone wriggled to make way for her and crossly the woman got up and ladled into the bowl a measure of stew, muttering bad-temperedly to herself.

‘More, Margaret, more,’ the man said authoritatively. ‘This one looks as though she’s not eaten for days.’

Yes, she was very thin, he noticed, and hollow-eyed as though she hadn’t slept much either; but the meagreness of her clothes seemed to emphasize the contours of her young body, the firm swell of her fine breasts. His eyes gleamed appreciatively – for Brewster Driver was not primarily an altruist and it is doubtful whether a less well endowed girl would have been offered as much as a bone.

The girl saw his expression – it was one she often saw in men – but she was not in a position to make conditions so she sat down next to him, smiling her thanks.