Ash Mistry and the Savage Fortress by Sarwat Chadda Read Free Book Online Page A

round his ankles as he tottered on the edge of one of the excavation pits.
    Lucky reached out, but she was too far away. Ash fell backwards as the sandy earth beneath his feet collapsed.

sh hit the bottom hard, backside over elbow, banging the back of his head. A supernova of stars erupted behind his eyes as he lay there, coughing in the dust.
    “Ash, are you OK?”
    Ash winced as he touched the scratches on his face.
    “Ash, say something. Please,” she said.
    “This is all your fault.”
    Lucky by name, lucky by nature. It was her that had upset the scorpions, but it was him at the bottom of the pit.
    Scorpions. Oh, crap.
    “Where are the scorpions?” he asked. He didn’t dare move. They could be sitting on him right now. In fact, he couldfeel something there – oh, God, were they all over him? “Can you see them?”
    “No.” But she didn’t sound that sure. “Dunno. Maybe they ran away. You don’t have any down there, do you?”
    “Bloody hope not.”
    Cautiously Ash pushed himself up, expecting a sharp stab in his back and the sudden injection of hot poison into his body at any moment. But nothing. He shook the dust off and waited until the dizziness passed. Then he looked around his hole. The pit was four, maybe five metres deep. But when Ash tried to clamber up the sides, the soft, sandy walls crumbled under his fingers.
    “Can you see a ladder or anything?” he asked.
    “No.” Lucky knelt over the edge. “I’m so sorry, Ash.”
    “Just go and get Uncle Vik.”
    “OK.” She stood up. “Don’t go anywhere.” Then she ran off, shouting.
    Ash brushed himself down. Apart from the lump on the back of his head, he just had a few bruises and scratches, and a soft spot on his butt where he’d landed. He found the torch and, with a shake, a dim glow rose from the bulb. He searched the rest of the pit: there was a pick down here and a plastic water bottle filled with a yellow liquid that probably wasn’t lemonade.
    “Lucks?”
    Nothing. He couldn’t even hear her shouting. How far had they wandered? No idea. Would Lucky even recognise his hole? There were hundreds. He could be down here ages!
    Ash lifted the pick. Maybe if he jammed it into the wall halfway he could use it like a step. He drew it over his head and swung with all his might. Dust and chunks cracked and fell off after a few hefty wallops.
    What’s this? He put his finger against a piece of rubble.
    It was a brick. The corners were square and even. He saw that behind a few centimetres of the compact, hard sand was a brick wall, definitely man-made. He tapped it – it gave a dull, hollow sound.
    That means there’s an open space on the other side. He lifted up the pick and struck the wall, his muscles reinvigorated with excitement. He hit it again and again, breaking up the earth, knocking out bricks. Each blow sent a bone-jarring tremor right through him. A brick fell back with a sharp crack. Then another fell away until he was deafened by an avalanche of dust and sandstone.
    Coughing harshly, Ash waved his arm at the dense cloud of dust until it cleared enough for him to see what had happened.
    The wall had collapsed, showing a space beyond. Even in the weak torchlight Ash sensed the space was large. He dropped the pick and crawled through the hole, torch in hand.
    He had to duck; the ceiling was just too low, dangerously bowed by the weight of sand above it. The ground above groaned and dust showered down over him. Not good.
    The chamber was rectangular and as he swept the beam of light across the room it fell on a dusty, cobweb-covered statue.
    Ash pulled away a handful of cobwebs. Roughly life-sized, the statue was bronze and of a muscular, blue-skinned man. In his right hand he held a curved bow, in his left an arrow.
    Rama. India’s greatest mythological hero.
    Light shone off the arrow, attracting Ash’s gaze. The shaft was ivory and the fletching white. But the light came from the arrowhead, a broad triangle of gold.
    It