The Warrior Who Carried Life Read Online Free PDF Page A

Finally she was able to scream.
    The Old Women heard it, a thin, wheedling wail, and from nowhere there was a great wind deep inside the chambers of the cliff. Dust was whipped into their faces and their robes rose up and lashed them like whips. Hazily, they saw Clara stand up, steam issuing out of her gaping mouth.
    Then she exploded.
    She was torn apart as they watched: great jets of blood and splintering of bone, hair and scalp dancing freely, the teeth flying apart, the skin lifting up like wings. The mass of it hung in the air and swirled, heart opening out, lungs blossoming open like red flowers, ligaments and strands of muscle circling upwards like seagulls in the wind. Then suddenly it all began to collapse in on itself again, liver and intestines scurrying back as if for shelter, the rib cage closing like a trap, the skin wrapping itself back around again and healing, and finally, from nowhere, something that some of them thought for a moment might be the shell of a giant tortoise closed over the skin. The wind died, and there before them stood an armoured warrior.
    He was tall and broad, arms and legs weighted with muscle. He had a shield and a breastplate and a spear and a sword and a helmet cradled in one arm. His face was as regular and as handsome as Cara’s once had been, with a clipped brown beard and staring, startled eyes. The warrior stared at them, and the women silently gaped back at him.
    Cara’s thoughts settled back slowly, like dust. She was Cara. She was here. Her whole universe was a different shape. The movement of air on her arms, the feel of the sandal thongs on her calves, the light reaching her mind through eyes that were in different positions and that would not focus: all her information was received through channels that seemed distorted and swollen. She looked down dizzily on an impossibly broad chest. How did a chest like that work, what on earth could fill it? Her whole body felt heavier, yet quicker, more instant: great splayed feet and broad, veined hands. Yet somehow the great bulk was less stubborn or long lasting. Hanging nestled between her legs was something that felt like a small new animal. The thought and feel of it paradoxically excited her, and it began to swell.
    “It’s worked,” she whispered in a slow, rasping voice. “By all the stars, it’s worked.”
    She wanted a mirror. She wanted to see that weight of flesh that meant she could kill, the weight that would make her safe in the world outside the canyon. Her thick hand, with clumsy fingers like sausages, padded around her face. It was bearded and larger, but she knew also whole and smooth again. She chuckled to herself and the sound, rising deep out of that bloated chest, startled her and made her jump. She laughed at it again. “I am a man!”
    A man could walk the roads and not be kidnapped into bondage as a whore. A man could take up arms and fight, and if he knew better what needed to be done, other men would listen. He could get into the place that Cara needed to get into. A man could take revenge where she could not.
    She took a step forward. The whole world rocked and limped and twisted as she fought to make the limbs work in the way that she was used to. That worried her. She didn’t have time to learn how to walk all over again.
    “You didn’t expect that, did you?” Cara demanded of the Old Women, relishing now the booming of her voice. “Kasawa, you thought I’d fail as you did, didn’t you?” She took another step and found that she could make her unsteadiness look like a swagger.
    “Cara?” Aunt Liri called her, horrified, wondering, saddened.
    “Yes?” Cara answered, and turned to her with difficulty.
    “What are you going to do? Do you know?”
    “I know exactly,” Cara replied, and began to walk again with her ponderous, careful stride across the room. “Exactly.” The thrill of the idea made her smile even broader. “Take care of my family while I am gone, sister.” Without