The Apprentice

by Jana Barkley

  Chance lifted off and pumped out hard over the field in direct pursuit. Everything about the way he flew said he wanted this, and Sam slid down the near side of the creek to scramble up and over to the opposite bank. Splashing into the foot-high water, she stumbled and pulled herself upward, grabbing large handfuls of brush as she went. She had to see where he went, whether he dove on the rabbit running mid-field or disappeared while chasing it into the next stand of trees.

  Clearing the top as she panted for air, she was in time to see her boy wing over in his typical style and latch onto the back of the rabbit. Sam crawled out of the ravine on her hands and knees, struggled to her feet, and prepared to run. But before she could take a step, she found herself facedown in the rocky field with the wind knocked out of her. Lost in a sense of unreality, she tried to raise herself up, but the coughing made her gag and gasp for air.

  Straining to see where Chance had made his attack, she saw a large jackrabbit jump four feet in the air, with her wild, feathered dragon latched onto its back. She tried to yell reassurance to her hawk she was coming, but she couldn’t get enough air. Sweating, Sam crawled four feet before she could drag herself upright and stagger forward.

  “Chance,” she called, but her voice was swallowed by the cries of the jackrabbit.

  Her breathing came out in wheezing squeaks, yet she pushed on. Sam had been in the field enough by then to know the rabbit would panic at her approach and fight harder. There was no quick or easy trick to stop the beating her little hawk was taking.

  She prayed he would let go of it. It wasn’t his fault she couldn’t get there. Sam felt hot, salty tears in the back of her throat, and a gurgled scream of frustration escaped her. But before the jack had an opportunity to start dragging Chance on a dangerous ride, the little hawk let go with one foot and nailed the head. It was done. Pulling the head and rump together, Chance cinched the jack into a ball by the strength of his feet.

  Like someone stuck in a bad dream where running gets you nowhere, Sam slogged forward in pitiful, frantic steps. Within several feet of her hawk, she fell to her knees and crawled the rest of the way. Her hands shook with the expenditure of energy she’d had to muster, and the pain in her chest was excruciating. Reaching in with her gloved hand, she found the rabbit’s neck and proceeded to grab its legs with her bare hand. She had no strength to pull and stretch the rabbit’s neck.

  The jack’s cries were pitiful, and she prayed to the universe to help her do this and stop its suffering. Since a lot of women falconers didn’t have the upper body strength to break the neck like most men could, Mary Kate had taught her another way to dispatch a rabbit. Leaning over it, she planted her knee on its chest and pressed with all her weight. The rabbit kicked a few more times, but like Sam a few moments before, it was unable to breathe from the compression on its chest. Its struggling ceased; Sam felt with her bare hand to make sure the heart had stopped, then rolled over onto her side.

  Chance jumped in. He knew it was his turn again, and he began to pull fur. She took her game shears and cut a small hole in the hide behind a foreleg and left him to his task. He would have to break in on his own today.

  As she lay very still and focused on making her breathing shallow, the pain in her chest began to fade. Closing her eyes, she stilled the worried voice in her mind telling her to clip into her hawk. With a whole rabbit as a prize to eat from, he wasn’t going anywhere. It didn’t matter what she was lying on or what was going on around her. She lay back flat in the grass.

  So this was how it started. If the doctors couldn’t give her any more fancy medicines to lend her energy or help her breathe, her falconry days were over.

  A wail forced itself upward from the middle of her belly and out into the crisp morning air. She had no energy left to cry and lay there, staring up into an amazing blue sky.

  She thought about what it would be like to die in the field, to just let go in the middle of wild oats and clover. The meadowlarks’ song from the trees by the creek was hypnotic. It promised an early spring once the last frost had left its icy traces on new shoots that even now were impatient to burst forth. Her focus softened, and her thoughts flew to the azure sky, to the soft, wisplike contrails from passing jets, to the occasional buzzing insect. To die would be peace and it would be rest. She closed her eyes, letting go of the moment, until she heard a rustle in the grass near her head.

  Chance. She peeled her gaze away from the heavens and rolled her head sideways to stare. He was doing well; he had broken into the chest cavity all by himself.

  “Good boy,” she said. “You’ll do fine when you’re released. Just fine.”

  He was the tie keeping her here, insisting she be present and alert. He had caught the rabbit with her but also in spite of her. Any other hawk might have come out worse for wear after a rough scuffle, but he seemed nonplussed at the moment. All he cared about was eating.

  But there was another other precious tie holding her. One she would give anything to nurture for a lifetime, long after Chance had returned to the wild.

  Sam rolled up onto her hip and sat up, supporting herself on shaky arms. Her breathing had returned to a less frantic mode, and she took stock of her surroundings. The last thing they needed was a local with his ball-fetching dog to come running up and surprise them. So far, however, the field still belonged to them—and the jackrabbits and the meadowlarks.

  Chance had a huge crop from gorging on his meal. She reached into her bag for a tidbit and found it impossible to muster a whistle as she offered it to Chance. He didn’t need it. He knew what she was up to. Sam smiled at her smart little hawk as he let her clip into his anklet without paying her hand any mind.

  Last Monday she had been given her most recent chemo session, and it had made her unfit for anything all day Tuesday. Today was Wednesday, which held the promise of seeing Hank tomorrow. He had called her on Sunday night after the meet on the excuse of making sure she had arrived home okay. Their phone call had lasted a couple of hours, time neither of them seemed to begrudge as much as they did having to say goodbye.

  Her breathing had started to become a problem at the end of the meet, but she had thought nothing of it until she arrived home with a pretty pervasive cough. At her Monday chemo session, the technician she knew from her previous appointments was not there. Another woman who was having a bad morning put Sam in a treatment room without making any eye contact or even acting as if she were there. She could hear the disgruntled nurse talking to someone else about her hours. The woman was in such a bad frame of mind Sam didn’t think to ask her about the coughing. The usual check of her vitals seemed cursory, but the woman hadn’t bothered to listen to Sam’s chest with a stethoscope. None of this had made any impression on her at the time, but now she wondered if something should have been caught during the exam.

  She knew she should call Dr. Franco when she got home. He would want to see her and address what was happening. But she wasn’t going to do it. Something wrong enough to put her in the hospital before she talked with Hank tomorrow wasn’t an option. Tomorrow’s date was etched in her heart and would happen. Hank was going to hear the truth from her. She could hold out until then. He deserved it.

  She stared at her beautiful hawk, who was full to bursting with his hard-fought meal. “Chance,” she said, “I want to live.”

  The little red tail reacted to her voice; his gaze bored into her. The eyes of a wild hawk on its kill showed no loss, no weakness. When life was harsh, they stared back fiercely at the world, come what may. His desire to survive, to live, was what motivated every instinct and every flight, chase, or perch he took.

  She could do this. She threw out his lure and held onto the rabbit carcass. Chance jumped off the rabbit and bounded to where it had landed not three feet away, while Sam grabbed what was left of the large jack and shuffled it behind her. She watched Chance play with his lure, footing it even though it had no meat on it. While he was distracted, she managed to get the rabbit into the back
pocket of her vest and zip it up. The effort cost her a few more minutes on the ground to recover.

  When Chance looked up and around from his lure, she had a tidbit ready in the glove and called him to it. Staggering to her feet as best she could, she stood in front of the lure while she jessed him up to go home.

  Sam was in bed by eight o’clock. Rest was the only remedy helping her to breathe better. Any sudden strain or activity brought the shortness of breath back and made her dizzy.

  After a few hours in bed, she started to feel like her old self. She had to be like her old self long enough to talk with Hank tomorrow. Then the world could fall apart.

  She was dozing when the phone rang. With its tone came a heady rush of expectation.

  “Hello, beautiful,” he said; it made her smile wide.

  “How do you know I’m beautiful? I could have curlers in my hair and gobs of cream on my face.”

  “Not a chance,” he said, laughing. “You’re not the type.”

  Well, that was true.

  “You sound tired,” he said.

  “And you would be too after the hunt we had today.”

  “Yeah? Tell me about it.” He was all interest.

  Sam told him about the chase and catch of the jack, which had turned out to weigh eight pounds. Of course, she left out the parts about her collapsing and crawling to get there. But she did tell him Chance had tied the rabbit up without her help.

  “They learn how to do it. It’s amazing, but it happens. Some falconers make the hawk struggle longer to encourage them to do just that instead of waiting for help. I’m not crazy about that technique myself, but there’s sure to be a time when you can’t get to your bird fast enough and he’ll have to hold his own. In either case, you have yourself a very good hawk there, sweetheart.”

  He enjoyed the story. She lay back against her pillow, savoring the pleasure of his voice.

  “Where are you?” he asked.

  She laughed, imagining his smile. “I’m in bed.”

  “Already?” His voice was playful, but she heard an edge of concern. “You’re taking care of yourself, aren’t you?”

  “You bet. That’s why I’m in bed.”

  “Well, at least you’re home and not in this dive I’ve been forced to stay at. I’m headed out first thing in the morning. I should be home around one.”

  “I’ll see you then?” She asked, knowing the answer already, but enjoying the game of asking, just to be told yes.

  “Whenever you want, Sam.” His voice was deep, reaching out over the line like a caress. She heard him take a deep breath, and then he said, “I can’t wait to see you. It’s been too damned long.”

  Her voice was soft. “Yeah, it has.”

  It was amazing how talkative Hank was when he wanted to be. She settled into her pillow and turned off the lamp. It didn’t matter what he talked about, it was the sound of his voice that made him feel near. Before she knew it, she was nodding off, and she heard his voice tell her goodnight.

  He’d stayed with her until she fell asleep, and he’d done it on purpose. Funny how she knew that, and why he did a lot of things. It felt like she had known him forever.

  Now, if they could get past tomorrow…

  Duck hawk: An ancient name

  for the peregrine falcon

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  “Thanks for doing this, Mary Kate,” she said into her cell as she drove down the coast highway. Her stomach took a nervous roll as she recognized the stretch of road a few miles away from Hank’s driveway.

  “I want to be there for you, darlin’,” she said.

  “I appreciate that, Mary Kate, but it’s more important you’re there for him. If he does send me packing, he’s going to need a friend at some point, and you’re the best person for the job.”

  Her friend was silent and then sighed. “How are you feeling this mornin’?”

  “I’ll manage,” said Sam, though she knew Mary Kate wanted to know more.

  “All right, girlfriend. I’ll see you in half an hour. Will that give you enough time?”

  “I think so. See you then.”

  The morning had been rough. Coughing until she was sore had almost sent her to the phone for the doctor, but after a couple of hours, she had begun to breathe easier as long as she wasn’t too active. The shower helped, and the day got better from there. Although she’d planned to meet Hank around one, she’d needed the extra time to get herself together, and didn’t find herself on the road until after three o’clock.

  Hank’s mailbox appeared on the right, and with it her heart sped up. She drove down the bumpy path past the wild fennel and pulled up into his yard. He was unloading wood from the back of a white pickup truck, which must have been his work vehicle. The sound of her tires on the gravel pulled his head around, and he greeted her with a large smile. This was what it felt like to come home: a welcoming smile and eyes full of love, waiting to see you. Her throat constricted with the feeling.

  She parked her vehicle and got out, hands in her pockets, and sauntered over to where he waited. He was covered in sawdust and sweat and wiped his forehead on his sleeve as she approached.

  Peeling off his work gloves and flinging them aside, he sat back against the open tailgate of his truck, grinning at her.

  “Baby girl, you are a sight for sore eyes.”

  In spite of the lingering chill of the February afternoon, his shirt was unbuttoned, no doubt because of the work he had been doing. The sun shone warm enough to make working in it hot. Her gaze dropped to his bare chest to take in every pleasurable inch of his muscular physique, and then returned to his face.

  He reached for her hands. “When you stare at me like that,” he said in a voice that confirmed the hunger in his eyes, “you make me think of all the things I want to do to you.”

  Sam moved in to embrace him, but he pulled back with a grin.

  “No, sweetheart,” he said, laughing, “I’m a mess. I need a shower.”

  Her mischievous look made him continue to smile, and she took hold of the edges of his open shirt, pulling herself toward him.

  “Sam, I stink.” He laughed again and pretended to fight her off, but she would have none of it. She closed her eyes and took in the scent of him.

  “You smell like fresh-cut wood,” she murmured, “and…like wild fennel and grass, and…”

  He sat transfixed, his hands barely touching her shoulders.

  “You smell like a man,” she whispered in his ear, his sudden intake of breath leaving no doubt in her mind she aroused him.

  It was all he needed, and he gathered her in his arms. He buried his mouth in her hair and worked his way down to her face. When Hank kissed her, he took possession of her like no man ever had. His kisses could be gentle, insistent, or consuming. It didn’t matter. It undid her every time.

  “Baby,” he murmured next to her ear, “I can’t get enough of you.”

  She leaned back to let her smile tell him she felt the same.

  But the seriousness of what she had to do raised its ugly head and clouded her expression.

  He saw it and reached to tilt her chin up so she would look him in the eye.

  “We have to talk, Hank.”

  A glimmer of fear passed through his steel-blue eyes. He nodded but did not let go of her.

  She took a step back from his arms and he didn’t stop her, though he reached down to hold her hands and watched in silence.

  “Mary Kate is coming by any minute now,” she said, bracing herself.

  “What the hell for?” he asked. “What’s going on, Sam?”

  He was wary but not distant. Not yet.

  “I asked her to come for a little bit, and then go.”

  He raised a curious eyebrow. “Somehow I don’t think this is a social visit.”

  She shook her head and turned her face from him, searching for inner strength to stem any tears and not fall apart.

  When she could risk a glance at him, she saw the mu
scles in his jaw working, and his eyes glued to their hands.

  His voice was heavy with feeling, betraying the control he was trying to exercise over his reactions. “Sam,” he said, and then paused for a long moment. “I asked you not to run away from me.” She saw his fear as he lifted his eyes to her face.

  Her heart reached out to comfort him, and she stepped closer.

  “And do you remember what I promised you?”

  His look told her of course he did, but he wanted her to say it, to make it real again with her words.

  She smiled and pulled a hand free to stroke his face. “I promised you I would stay with you as long as you wanted me to.”

  He took her hand in his, buried his mouth in it, and then closed his eyes.

  “And when Mary Kate leaves, will you leave, too?” He avoided her eyes.

  “Not if you don’t want me to.”

  Possessive arms wrapped her against him, and she could feel his heart pounding. “Stay with me,” he whispered, and she nodded.

  He took her by the shoulders and pulled back to search her face. “I don’t understand any of this, Sam. But I trust you. You call the shots.”

  Mary Kate’s timing couldn’t have been better. He noticed her arrival with a flash of grim irritation and then turned back to the woman in his arms.

  He sighed. “Well, I hunted Remo on the way home, but the falcon needs to fly. I suppose we could all head out to the landing for a short flight?”

  He waited to see if this was going to be in line with whatever it was she had planned. And Sam was amazed to realize this man who never yielded control, who always had a game plan and never varied from what he purposed to do, had given her the reins. It was a surrender of control only someone in love was capable of doing.

  Her eyes teared up with the force of her love for him, and she touched his face. She wouldn’t say the words, not yet—but after.