Picture credits : DeviantArt. African-study-by-neinor. This my dears is Diana Wangare Otieno.

A/N
Disclaimer : Kare is the common short form for the name Wangare.

I have decided that this part comes before the chapter I had previously posted for purposes of sense and continuation. This is now Chapter Eight and the previous Chapter is now nine. Sorry to all those who it will inconvenience.

Also rest assured that all cliff hangers will be resolved and all questions will be answered.

Thank you for reading. I hope you enjoy, vote and comment. I really appreciate it.
Love,
Stacy Muya.

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1989

15 year old Kare aka Diana Wangare Ndegwa was barely managing the walk uphill. A baby tied to her front, she tried not to trip on the muddy terrain. Her belly grumbled with hunger and her feet hurt from the walking. On her back, where the load strapped to her head rested, were huge fresh welts and wounds from the last night's beatings.

Everyday she wished she had remained in school like her friends. When Ndegwa had courted her two years ago, she had been only thirteen, naive and anxious to leave her parents' home. She had eloped with him, madly in love and full of dreams.

She finally got to the top of the hill, her shack was at the edge of the little village. She hoped that the baby would not disturb her today, she still had to cook for Ndegwa. If he didn't find food when he came from the market, where he was a mtu wa mkono doing odd jobs indiscriminately, he would get into an angry fit.

She dropped the guney sack to the ground and put her son down to play with a car she had made from attaching bottle caps as wheels to an empty container and adding a small wire for him to push and pull it by. She added dry maize cobs into the fire seeing as the beens had not cooked yet. She poured more water into the githeri and went out to find Kimotho, her son.

The boy was standing by the
kei-apple fence, picking at the ripe fruits and eating them. He was talking to a stranger. A tall bulky man stood next to him, seemingly asking Kimotho questions that he shyly responded to by nodding or shaking his head. The man didn't look like he was from around here, not just that she had never seen him before, but his dark skin and burly stature set him apart as a foreigner.

She went to them and picked up Kimotho, the urine patch on his knee length Tshirt had dried up. He only wore shorts when going to church or on special occasions. If it wasn't for the cool weather, she would have left him to hang around the compound naked, he liked it better. She used the ends of his shirt to wipe his nose and turned to look at the stranger.

"How are you," she asked him, wondering if he understood Kikuyu. She hoped she wouldn't have to resort to Kiswahili as hers was greatly afflicted by vernacular. One of the reasons she had gladly dropped out of school was that every time she spoke English or Kiswahili, the other pupils laughed at her poor pronunciation.

"I am well. And your home?" He responded peering down at her like she was a child. Indeed in comparison she was. He spoke broken Kikuyu, but atleast they could understand each other without turning to Kiswahili.

"We are as you see us, I would ask you to come in but my husband wouldn't like to find me alone in the house with a man. If you've come to seek him, just leave a message, I'll give it to him," she was anxious to get rid of him before any of the neighbours saw them talking and tell Ndegwa about it.

"No, no, I am actually here for the boy." Her face scrunched up in confusion. "I work with the ministry of health, I am going door to door with the polio vaccine for all children under five." His hair was a short afro that looked like a halo. "What is your name," she asked curiously, just to know which part of the country such big dark men came from. "Ben," he answered after a minute of hesitation.

"Ben who?"
"Just Ben."
"You have one name like a dog?"
"Yes."
"Then you won't immunise my son, I'll wait for the minister to send someone with two names."

Sometimes she could allow herself to be cheeky. She gauged his reaction, deciding not to push too far. "Otieno," he finally responded sighing in frustration. She knew he expected her to turn him away now that he had told her his tribe. People from Central and Nyanza did not typically like each other much to put it mildly.

"Okay, immunise him," she answered and handed him the baby. He was surprised. He gave her a big smile, she felt proud, knowing she may have been the first person to give him an easy time about his decent around here. She stood by and watched as he took out a huge office book and a bottle. On the book he recorded the name, age, gender and parents of the child then he asked Kimotho to open his mouth and gave him a drop from the bottle.

"Thank you,"she said and took the baby back. He didn't leave immediately, taking a minute to look at her. She felt shy and lowered her gaze, fiddling with Kimotho's dusty toes.

"If Kimotho ever needs a doctor, bring him to the hospital in town and ask for me, if I'm around, everything will be for free. For you too. All those bruises and cuts need to be checked. You will come, won't you?" She knew he was still looking at her so she only nodded in response, embarrassed he had deduced that she was being abused. Her face was full of old scars and new injuries, anybody with eyes could tell.

She was turning to leave when she spotted Ndegwa standing at a distance, watching them like a hawk. She managed to maintain her calm although her heart was racing like it had a finishing line to cross, pounding with almost enough energy to hammer itself out of her chest. She peeked in the direction she had seen him, he was walking away from their house, towards his favourite drinking den to get charged up.

Although Kare was relieved for the moment, she was well aware that the inevitable was coming. She was terrified, she decided to take Kimotho away from the house, she didn't want him to get caught up in her scuffles with his father again. She washed him and dressed him for the cold night to come. She walked across the compound to her mother in laws hut and left him with her. The old lady asked Kare to stay, if Ndegwa brought any trouble, she would protect her. "Mama, just look after Kimotho," Kare turned her down.

Kare passed by the shed where they kept all the farm tools and some of the animals. She picked out an axe and used a stone to sharpen it. She took it back to her house and hid it under the bed. She had done this a hundred or so times before. Every time she agitated Ndegwa, she always hid a weapon under the bed then swore to herself that this round she would not just stand there and be beaten, she would retaliate, even kill him, but she never did. More than once, after he beat her up, he nursed her wounds himself and put her to bed, singing to her, apologising, promising that the next time he got angry, he would control himself.

At first she stayed because she believed him, now she did so just because she was an orphan with no one to turn to. Her entire family had been wiped out in two phases, first by Sir Barring then by Moi. Headstrong in every way, the men and women in her clan had resisted the British in Maumau and had resisted both regimes after independence in defence of their heritage. Her fathers had been stubborn, refusing to surrender their ancestral land, from which sprung a sacred mugumo tree, just because there might or might not be some gold beneath it.

In a way, she was only alive because of Ndegwa. Shortly after they eloped, her entire family had been killed. Not all at once, it started with fatal robbery with violence incidents, then car accidents, kidnappings and finally arson. Everyone knew who did it, but no one dared to speak. Nobody from her village knew Ndegwa so no one had an idea where to look for her.

Without a know living blood relation to inherit it, her family land was reverted back to the state. Mining on it begun after a respectable mourning period. It turns out the government had been right, there was gold, plenty of it.

Kare heard Ndegwa singing all the way from the gate. She stood up on unsure footing and opened the door. She served his food and put an empty tumbler and a jug full of water for him. She cut an avocado into his food and a little chilli, just how he liked it.

Ndegwa fell into the house face flat when he attempted to kick in the already open door. She rushed to help him up but he pushed her away. He reeked of alcohol and sweat and Eunice's cheap perfume.

He hurled insults at her about keeping the door open for just anyone, thieves and men especially. He only had a bite of his food before he said he had eaten better at Eunice's, atleast some women could still cook. He attempted to throw the plate at her but was by far off target since he was drunk.

"Kimatho, where is that stupid boy, I want him to tell me what you two were doing with that man in my own house," he slurred. "Your mother took him," she managed to respond. She was so scared, having not healed from his most recent abuse, she didn't think she could take another beating, if she did, she would surely die.

"That boy is stupid like his mother, what is he doing sleeping in his grand mother's hut? Is he a girl?"

She did not answer. "Go bring him here, I want to ask him serious questions before I bring some discipline back into this house." Her very core shuddered at the words. She had never been this afraid of him before, she feared for her life. Yesterday he had rained kicks and punches on her entire body. Her ribs were still sore. Her eyes were purple and puffy. Her light skin made it easy to see every bruise.

"Baba Kamotho, your mother is already asleep, I don't think we should wake her up," she managed to croak. Ndegwa went wild all of a sudden, pushing the table away so hard that it turned. He got to her within seconds and pulled her by the arm. He slapped her across her purple jaw, where a wound was still fresh. She winced in pain, trying not to cry it, it would only infuriate him more. He threw her out into the cold. She landed on the ground painfully. He put his akala sandal clad foot on her back and pressed her to the earth. The pressure on her spinal cord caused her unimaginable pain. She struggled to crawl out of his reach but only hurt herself more. She cried out, begging him for mercy. He removed his foot and pulled her up. "So now you thought you could talk back to me the way you like?" He put one hand on her throat and squeezed painfully. She tried to pry it away with all her strength. Her eyes rolled back, a searing pain spreading from her lungs to the rest of her body. "I could just kill you to teach you your place in this compound. Without me you are nothing." He released her throat just before she suffocated and pushed her forward. She coughed and gasped, massaging her kneck so it wouldn't swell tomorrow.

"Go bring the little rascal!" he demanded. She staggered towards the hut, trying to figure out what to do. The door flew open before she got there. Out came the frail old mother in law, a look of determination set on her face. She walked up to her son, leaning on her walking stick for most part. Kare followed behind, trusting that Kimotho was asleep and would remain so.

Ndegwa was still standing at the door of his shack. He was fuming, talking to himself and fumbling to remove his belt. He normally hit her with the metal buckle while holding the other end. Seeing his mother instead of his boy, he got even more mad.

"Ndegwa, what is the matter? Are you Mohammed Ali now? Or is your wife a football for you to kick around? I lived with your father for sixty years and until the day he went to be with our forefathers, he never weighed his strength on me." The old lady chastised. The night was unusually cold, Kare couldn't feel her toes and fingers. It was also dark save for the dim light of the kerosene lamp in her house. "You did not sleep around with men while my father was out looking for food."

Kimotho came outside the hut. The two year old boy looked from adult to adult in confusion. Why were they shouting at each other in the middle of the night. Ndegwa got to him before the women could. He took the boy in his arms. Kimotho recoiled, he was terrified of the man. "Is your mother bringing men to my house?" he asked the child. Kimotho looked bewildered and scared. His eyes darted around, searching for a way to escape.

The two women watched in horror, they were both still, praying that Ndegwa didn't do anything to the boy who begun to cry. "Answer me," the father prodded aggressively.

"Put my grand son down." Ndegwa's mother demanded, raising her walking still and shaking it at him as a warning.

"I will, but first he has to answer me." Ndegwa was fast losing his patience. He shook the boy vigorously all the while yelling incorrigible questions at him. The boy wailed for his mother. "This one cries like a woman."

He held the boys lips together between his thumb and forefinger. The child looked at him in trepidation as the man continued, finding the sight amusing. The grand mother couldn't take it anymore. She tried to snatch the boy away. He pushed her aside easily. She landed on the hard ground with a cracking sounding. She became absolutely still, eyes closed as if she was dead. That finally got his attention away from torturing Kimotho, he quickly put the boy down and ran to his mother.

Kare had gone into the house the moment her baby begun to cry. She fished out the axe from under the bed and ran back outside. Seeing Ndegwa bent over his mother, she realised it was now or never. She raised it up and without blinking, brought down the axe with all her might. The first blow, on his shoulder, had him toppling down by the side of his unconscious mother. His eyes widened in shock, voice caught in the back of his throat. He raised his hands up in surrender, his eyes pleading for mercy. It was too late. He had already gone too far, nobody touches the cub.

The second time she axed him was right between his eyes. His was a soundless death. Gruesome memories of times when he had punched and kicked her, times when he had broken her bones, when he had smashed her head into their mud wall, days he had humiliated her by telling her to kneel down and raise her hands for hours as punishment, or the times he caned her as if she was an errant pupil, the one time he threw a knife at her and by grace it missed. With each memory she continued to assail him, even after he was long gone. Blood sputtered all over.

The neighbours had stopped coming out when the Ndegwas fought because over time it had become something normal. No matter how many times she was rescued, Kare went back to her husband. No matter how many times he was punished, Ndegwa still beat her up. Nobody had seen. Kare removed her blood stained clothes and washed up. She took a frightened Kimotho and tied him to her back. Both of them were trembling, stunned into silence.

She walked for the remainder of the night and got to the nearest town at daybreak. Passing her old school, she went straight to the hospital and asked for Ben Otieno, who works for the ministry of health and is good with children. She tried not to look too suspicious although her nervous fidgeting was uncontrollable.

"I didn't think I'd see you again this soon," Otieno spoke up first once Kare had been brought into his quarters. It was a single room, the bedroom and sitting room partitioned by a curtain. He ushered for Kare to sit down. He looked at her at length, he was concern. He couldn't miss the distraught air about her.

"Are you a doctor?"
"Not yet."
"Do you know any Catholic orphanages?"
"Yes, why?"
"You look like an honest man, are you?"
"I'd like to think so."

"I don't really have any other choice. I have done my worst. I am going to hang but please Kimotho cannot become a chokora. I want him to finish school, to have a good life. I am begging you take him to the Catholic Church. Give him to a Seminary, please. I have to go now. I don't have time to explain."

Kare put the child on the chair. Her eyes were mixture of fear and pain. He was already asleep. She looked a him sadly for a brief while before turning to Otieno. He was confused, unable to fathom exactly what was happening. "What are you talking about?"

She couldn't form complete sentences, she couldn't stop pacing and biting her nails either. She spoke frantically, never pausing for a breath. Her hands flailed dramatically, gesturing out all her words. "I'm going to hang... Give my child to the Catholic fathers. They will take him to school... I... I am going to hang you know... I need to know he'll be okay...I have to go now..."

"Where?" He was really trying to follow.

"To the police," she answered. He looked at her with knitted brows. She could see realisation dawn on him. "You are just a child," he shook his head pitifully,"what did you do? What did you do my dear?" He looked even more distressed than she was. He put his hands on his head sorrowfully. She could see how deeply he empathised with her.

She dropped down to her knees and tugged at his trousers. "Please, do for Kimotho what I have asked. It will save his life. Don't let anyone take him, just a padre. Please." Otieno pulled her to her feet, she could see he was still in shock. He was so sorry for her. How could her life just be over like that? He contemplated helping her escape.

"I will do everything I can for him." He swore. She was so grateful. She kissed the sleeping child and left before she lost the strength to. She walked to the nearest police station and reported everything that had happened. Only after being locked up in a filthy, stinky, cold and crowded jail cell did she finally break down to cry, reality setting in slowly.