The Bell Between Worlds
A glorious epic fantasy in the grand tradition of CS Lewis and Philip Pullman, and a major publishing event, The Mirror Chronicles will take you into another world, and on the adventure of your lifetime…Half of your soul is missing.The lost part is in the mirror.And unless Sylas Tate can save you, you will never be whole again.Sylas Tate leads a lonely existence since his mother died. But then the tolling of a giant bell draws him into another world known as the Other, where he discovers not only that he has an inborn talent for the nature-influenced magic of the Fourth Way, but also that his mother might just have come from this strange parallel place.Meanwhile, evil forces are stirring, and an astounding revelation awaits Sylas as to the true nature of the Other. As violence looms and the stakes get ever higher, Sylas must seek out a girl called Naeo who might just be the other half of his soul – otherwise the entire universe may fall…
Читать The Bell Between Worlds онлайн беплатно
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Childrenâs Books in 2013
HarperCollins Childrenâs Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers
1 London Bridge Street
London SE1 9GF
Copyright © Ian Johnstone 2013
Cover illustration © Richard Jones
Cover Photography © Eliz Huseyin
Ian Johnstone asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.
Source ISBN: 9780007491223
Ebook Edition ©JUNE 2013 ISBN: 9780007491247
Version: 2015-03-23
For Emily, who shares my worlds
Contents
âTheir voice is clear and true, yet it is not breathed, nor carried upon the air. It echoes like thought inside the skull, speaking words where none are spoken.â
GABBLETY ROW WAS QUITE the most peculiar and ramshackle building in town. Its undulating walls, higgledy-piggledy red tiles and winding iron drainpipes all showed an utter disregard for straight lines. The frontage of four shops with three floors above rose in an astonishing disarray of red brick and dark brown beams, leaning here and lurching there until it reached the garret rooms at its top. These chambers teetered outwards on a forest of wooden brackets, such that they loomed over the pavement below in a manner quaint to behold from a distance, but utterly terrifying to those walking beneath.
The long passage of time had added to the chaos, bending beams and bowing walls to form a miraculous collection of angles, bulges and crannies. In recent years the entire structure had slumped sideways and backwards away from the two main roads that crossed at its corner, as if the whole building was shrinking from the incessant noise and pollution of the traffic. And yet, while it seemed to cower from the twenty-first century, Gabblety Row clung to the slick, hard edges of modern life like a barnacle to a rock. Years came and went, but Gabblety Row remained.
The terrace also had a curious way of settling into the hearts of all of its residents. Sylas Tate, for instance, was often woken by loud, unearthly groans that seemed to issue from every wall, floor and ceiling, as if the tired old structure was easing its great weight one more inch into the earth for a few hours of rest, or perhaps heaving one more straight line into crookedness. Being a boy of extraordinary imagination, Sylas loved these weird sounds. A creak of the buildingâs old joints would transport him to a swaying bough in the highest reaches of an ancient tree; the groan of a beam would take him to a hammock in a storm-weary galleon; and the sharp crack of a splitting timber would have him at the sights of a musket, firing into the massing ranks of some terrifying and brutal foe. And these moments of escape, these tricks of imagination, were now the happiest moments of his young life.
It was not only the noises that Sylas loved about Gabblety Row. He adored the baffling passageways that ran the length of the terrace above the shops, darting left and right and up and down for no apparent reason, leading to some doors that heâd never seen open and others behind which lived his only friends in the world.
And perhaps, most of all, he loved his room.
Like any good sanctuary, it was extremely difficult to reach. The only way to it was a narrow staircase that led upwards from an undersized door on the third-floor passageway to a creaky trapdoor that opened in the furthest, darkest corner of the room. As the old building had heaved and slumped over the years, so the door and the passageway had become both low and narrow, such that they were now almost impossible for an adult to negotiate. This meant that, in his room, he could be sure to be absolutely alone: a situation that suited him well, for he was not the most sociable boy. He mixed with people perfectly well when it was necessary, at school or on the bus, but kept himself to himself when it was not. Sylasâs uncle sometimes said that his motherâs death had turned him into a moody and melancholy boy â âfar too serious for a twelve-year-oldâ â but Sylas didnât agree: as far as he was concerned, he simply knew his own mind and found it company enough. Whatever the truth, Sylas was used to filling his life with his own kind of cheer.
