Book Excerpts

Catch a Glimpse of What Lies Behind #TheWall | EXTRACT

Mithila’s world is bound by a Wall enclosing the city of Sumer – nobody goes out, nothing comes in. But when Mithila tries to cross the Wall, every power in Sumer comes together to stop her. To break the rules is to risk all of civilization collapsing. But to follow them is to never know.

As Mithila and her friends search for the truth, they must risk losing their families, the ones they love, and even their lives.  Read this thrilling extract from Gautam Bhatia’s The Wall to find out if the world they haven’t yet discovered is worth the only world they have:

 

By the open ground above the Eleventh Mandala’s sewage chamber, Alvar came to a halt, and looked around. He was alone.

He let himself breathe, felt his heartbeat slow down. The bare, circular patch of ground was surrounded by the buildings of the Eleventh. Alvar breathed deeply again, and stepped back into the streets.

In two minutes, the clubs sounded again.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught sight of the black Shoortan cloaks a careful distance behind. Alvar’s heart leapt, and he almost staggered. For a moment, he considered looping around and going back home. But not yet. Alvar ploughed on until he heard the sound of running water again.

There, for the first time that night, he sensed them hesitate. Even the Shoortans were afraid to cross the invisible border into the last Circles of Sumer. Alvar cleared the bridge. Almost at once, the streets narrowed into uneven dirt paths, ladders hung from empty windows, and the buildings enfolded him. Somewhere along the way, the lamps had been snuffed out, yielding to darkness.

Minutes passed. Behind him, the clubs had fallen silent. He felt them drawing closer and he heard the sound of heavy breathing. Alvar crouched as he walked, and began to count under his breath. One … two …

On five, Alvar broke and ran.

Stop! ’

Feet pounded the ground. Alvar ran across the bridge, feeling it rock beneath him, and into the Fourteenth Mandala. Two more turns and then he saw it, a few metres away in the darkness: the tops of the buildings merged into each other, forming a tunnel. Alvar threw himself into the cavity and, as the Shoortans followed him in, he turned into the familiar little stairway to his left, invisible in the night.

He heard them blunder past, still shouting. Alvar rushed up the stairs, taking two at a time. They twisted and spiralled, and then disgorged him out onto the rooftops.

He paused, gasping for breath. Beneath the open sky once more, he saw the jumbled rooftop roads of the neighbourhood of the Dooma spread out before him, connected to the ground through a web of ladders. The mud-brick towers, domes, vaults, and stairwells entwined around each other, creating a complex network of passageways above Sumer.

A little way beyond them was the Wall, blacker than night.

Alvar threaded his way through the terraces, ducking beneath the odd washing line that swung in the breeze, damp with the smell of freshly laundered clothes. Fourteenth … Fifteenth … and then he was back down. Only a stretch of eld now lay between him and the Wall.

From the Dooma, he heard nothing. The City slept.

Change of plan. The Pit at midnight. Come alone.

He crossed the field. The earth felt light beneath his feet. The Wall drew closer, blotting out everything, its top vanishing beyond his gaze and into the night, high above the City. Then he saw the chasm—and the single figure keeping vigil beside it.

‘Mithila!’

‘You’re late.’

‘I was followed.’ ‘By?’

‘The Shoortans!’

She sucked in a breath. ‘You sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘And?’

‘Shook ’em off in the Dooma.’

‘Are you sure?’ Again.

‘Yes. They’ll be lost for hours.’

‘How did they know?’ Mithila whispered. ‘We’ve not been careful enough.’

‘Does it matter now?’ Alvar asked, hoping.

A glint of starlight caught the smile around Mithila’s lips. ‘You’re right—it doesn’t. They’re too late. The time of the Circles is over.’

He allowed himself to smile back. ‘At last?’

‘Dhara hit rock yesterday. We’re deep as can be. You won’t believe what she found.’

‘What?’

‘A chamber—but, wait. I won’t spoil it for you.’

Alvar nodded. ‘I thought something was up, with Garuda’s “change of plan”.’

‘He felt you should be here for the moment. We all should.’

Alvar opened his mouth, but stopped as Mithila raised a hand. ‘Wait. Did you hear that?’

‘What?’

Listen.’

The Wall rose behind them, steep, smooth, immense. And then he saw it before he heard anything. Flickering lights beyond the eld, spilling out from the Fifteenth Mandala.

The Shoortans!’

‘Alvar, you said you’d lost them!’

‘They couldn’t have,’ he stammered. ‘Not through the Dooma … and those ones didn’t have lamps.’

At the edge of the eld, the lights diverged. Shouted commands carried through the night. ‘Here they come,’ said Mithila, calmly.

Alvar shifted. ‘Do we run?’

He sensed her calculate. ‘No. They’ll see us. We can’t let them find the Pit.’

‘They’ll come after us—we can lose them back in the City.’

She shook her head. ‘No.’

But we can’t stay here!’

‘By the Builders, Alvar,’ Mithila said, through clenched teeth. ‘I have not dug by night for months to see it all fall to the Shoortans now. Into the Pit!’

Alvar hesitated. Then he took two steps forward and leapt into the cavity. There was a moment of falling, of panic, before his hands found the rope ladder. It swung under his weight, sending him spinning into the jagged bricks that lined the Pit. The impact almost threw him off, but Alvar held on. A second shock hurled him against the wall again, slamming his face into the side of the Pit, sending down a shower of dust and small rocks. As Alvar tasted blood in his mouth, he listened for the sound of the stones hitting the ground. It came back to him, rebounding and echoing off the walls, farther away than he had imagined.

‘Alvar! Quickly!’

He let go with his legs and slid down the rest of the way, crying out as the friction tore at his palms. Somewhere near the bottom, when a faint light was visible, he lost his grip again. Alvar fell, landing in a tangle of arms and legs, breath shaken out of him.

After a moment of darkness, his eyes blinked open to lamplight, and to the three figures that stood around him.

 

Read more from this astonishingly powerful novel – order your copy of The Wall today!

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