Though I could hear the menacing sound of the enemy coming, I could not see them. They were hidden, and it seemed as though our plan might actually work. During the previous twelve hours every able-bodied person in Bridewell had worked tirelessly to build a wall within a wall. We knew the enemy would come from The Dark Hills' side, and so, stone by stone, the top half of the wall separating Bridewell from the forest was taken down and put back together again twenty feet high, all the way around the town square. The enemy was trapped inside a prison of stone, not unlike the one I'd been trapped within my whole life.

As soon as all the convicts were inside, ready to pounce on Bridewell in the stormy black night, the explosions were set off at locations coinciding with the map. I felt the cobblestones rumble under my feet as the earth pounded beneath me. The detonations were used to be sure the tunnel would cave in and trap the convicts, a 243.

few below ground, but most already out of the tunnel, completely unaware of the trick that had been played on them.

"They will try to scale the walls. We must hurry!" cried Pervis. With a fierce look my father motioned me to return to the lodge, and then he turned and disappeared into the night.

I stood motionless with rain pouring over me, fear gripping my bones. I was terrified that the enemy would escape over the wall and overrun Bridewell, that I might be taken prisoner or worse. A heavy wind gust tore through the town square and I had to brace myself from falling back.

Ladders had been placed all around the wall, and guards were stationed here and there upon the stone shelf on top of the wall. With the wind and the rain they were having trouble holding on, and I feared they might be blown off and tumble to their deaths. Without thinking I began walking, then running toward one of the ladders. I scaled the wall in the driving rain, the pain in my side reminding me with every step of the blow from Ganesh. And then I stood on the top of the wall and I looked down over the edge.

Convicts were standing on shoulders, grabbing hold of the seams in the rock, and scaling the wall. To my left was a pile of rocks, each the size of a large apple, placed there to use as weapons for just such a time as this.

"You there!" a guard yelled from my left. "What are 244.

you doing? Get down from the wall!" But convicts were climbing right beneath him as they were beneath me. I couldn't see across the enclosure, but I could only a.s.sume that men were trying to scale the wall all the way around.

I picked up a rock and hurled it straight down, where it bounced off a man's shoulder a few feet below. He screamed but held his grip, then looked up at me and growled through clenched teeth. I picked up another stone and threw again, this time hitting him on the head, and he toppled over and fell to the ground, alive but injured.

The rain began to lessen and the noise from the enemy drew back. They were gathering in the center of the enclosure, crowding together like shimmering black boulders.

"Alexa!" It was Pervis, running along the top of the wall toward me. When he arrived he sat me down. I hadn't even realized I was standing on the edge, a gust of wind away from falling to my death.

"What on earth are you doing up here?" he asked. "You could have been killed!"

I looked out into the center of the prison we had built and I realized something wasn't right. They'd given up their attempt to scale the wall and they were rushing to huddle in the center of the town square. Where were the rest?

"What's going on, Pervis? Have they retreated into the tunnel?"

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Pervis looked at me for a long, silent moment before answering. "We've sent men in to check, Alexa, and that's all there is."

"Where have they all gone?"

Pervis looked at me, blocking the rain from his eyes with one hand. "They're all dead, Alexa. Most have been dead for years. The ones in the square are all that remain. Let's get down from here before the rain and wind pick up again." He descended partway down the ladder first and I followed, glad to have him watching my steps on each slippery rung. When we arrived at the bottom I noticed a thin bead of blood running down the side of Pervis's face.

"Why the gash on your forehead? Don't tell me one of them actually took a swipe at you," I said. He touched his temple with his hand and wiped away some of the watery blood, grimacing as he did so.

"Slipped on the way up the ladder and bashed my head against the wall." He placed his hand against one of the ma.s.sive stones in the structure we'd just spent two days building. "It seems as though the only things causing pain around here are these ridiculous walls we keep building."

As it turned out, there were fifty-seven convicts who tried to invade Bridewell that night. All the rest had died waiting for Sebastian or Ganesh or whoever he was to give them orders to attack. He had taken terrible advantage of their willingness to follow blindly someone, anyone, 246.

who would just lead them. While he lived a life of royalty for many long years, they hid in tunnels, scrounged for food, and watched their lot die of disease. Most of them were barely adults when they entered the prison at Ainsworth, and cowering there in the town square that night, I got the feeling they only wanted a place they could call home. I was scared to death of what was to become of them. But I needn't have worried.

A few days later, after things calmed down, my father and Nicolas decided to send twenty of the remaining convicts to Lunenburg, twenty to Turlock, and seventeen to Lathbury. It was easier to handle them in small numbers and each town was willing to do their part. The resolve to fight had left most of the convicts, especially once they understood what Ganesh had done to them. Some of them, though not all, were rehabilitated and lived productive lives after a time, and there were even a few that seemed out of place as convicts to begin with. One of these, a man named John Christopher, would become my friend (but that's a story for a different time).

A few days after the convicts were moved, my father and I took a group of men to the midway point on the road from Bridewell to Turlock, and we smashed six-foot holes in the walls on both sides of the road. Before we left, I looked out into the mountains with my father and watched as Darius came into view. Then I looked into Fenwick Forest on the other side and saw two more 247.

wolves creep out from behind the trees, Odessa and Sherwin. They would finally be reunited on that very day. I waved in both directions and the three of them howled: "Thank you."

It was the last thing I ever understood the animals to say.

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EPILOGUE.

A month after the invasion the people of Bridewell voted to tear down the walls. Six months after that, the giant blocks that once formed the ma.s.sive walls were strewn across the valley floor in thousands of pieces, weeds and flowers alike growing between the shattered stones, like an endless broken tombstone. The only,walls that remain are those that surround Bridewell, a decision made by my father and Nicolas at Pervis's insistence. It sits alone now as a walled fortress at the center of everything. Maybe those walls will be of some use in a distant future I can't see, but for now they only remind me of an imprisoned past I'm happy to have behind me.

Life is better without the walls, everyone agrees. Still, sometimes I'm afraid of the outside world, and every so often in my private thoughts I wish the walls were still there to protect me. It feels like growing up, as if the safety of childhood has been stripped away, and I've woken up on the edge of something dangerous. The walls are gone and I can do as I please. It's a freedom I'm not so sure I'm ready for.

These days, when I make the trip from Lathbury to Bridewell, I see animals all along the way. I no longer understand what they say, and it makes me feel old, as if all 249.

the child has gone out of me. But I still get a funny look now and then from a squirrel or a wolf or a fox, and I remember the thrill of those days and all that was at stake, so much that n.o.body will ever know or understand. For a pa.s.sing moment I feel like I'm twelve again, the magic filling the forest, and I can almost hear the animals talking.

The last time I visited Bridewell I spent hours and hours in the library, walking the aisles of books, looking for the volume I've missed that would make for the perfect companion. Grayson and I sat quietly reading all day, sometimes nodding off to sleep, other times sharing a favorite pa.s.sage, as only old friends can.

Pervis is still the head guard. With so many walls down, he seems a tad more jumpy, forever casting a wary eye toward Ainsworth and The Dark Hills.

Yipes moved to Lathbury for almost a month, but he missed the wild of the mountains so much he returned to his house on the river. He seems content to live out his days mostly alone, and he goes back to the pool and looks for stones all the time. I know, because sometimes I go with him and I look, too, but we never find any. The ones we find are as dull and lifeless as the one I carry in a leather pouch around my neck.

In fact, as far as I can tell, all of Elyon's magic has drained out of the valley, leaving a dry and barren void even when the rainy season is upon us. I suppose the wall had its own way of holding the enchanting beauty of the wild away from us for a time, but eventually we found a 250.

way to snuff out what little magic remained. Maybe that's just what people do, or maybe Elyon, if he's real at all, is getting farther away from us as Ander had suggested in the forest. How I wished I had pushed Ander for more answers when I had had the chance. I fear the great silence between us will forever make Elyon a mystery to me.

Lately I've been wondering whether or not I could go off searching for a place where you could stand in a pool of icy water and come out talking to animals. A place where secret messages could be found, and squirrels are full of comic bravery. Sometimes I think I could ask Yipes and he would go with me, and we could travel the world just like Warvold did, looking for pockets of magic where Elyon's presence still remained. But then I'm not twelve anymore, and sometimes I'm almost sure adventures like that only happen when you're a child.

My thoughts keep returning to Elyon and all that Ander had said about him. The mystery of this mythical creator" has drifted into my head and I can't get it out. My world has always been so small, hidden behind walls. I'm beginning to think this Land of Elyon is bigger and more dangerous than anything I could have imagined. How many more mysteries are waiting for me beyond the walls?

I wonder what would happen if I drove my cart through Bridewell, on to Ainsworth, and beyond a girl of thirteen and not a wall in sight to hold me back.

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Was that a rabbit that just winked at me? I think I just saw Ander in the mist, and I hear Darius howling through the windswept trees. Could it be that Elyon is in the shadows, waiting for us, longing to be with us once again? Maybe an unscheduled visit to see Yipes with a big bag of tomatoes would be a good idea.

To be continued. . .

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Author's Notes:.

The Dark Hills Divide was originally constructed as a weekly serial for my two daughters. If you should run across them in your travels, cover your ears, and run the other way. They are talkative little darlings, and we are always somewhere beyond the reader in Alexa's adventures.

Bridewell was a real place: a prison in England, where they really did brand Vs on vagabonds.

Renny Lodge was the name of one of the buildings at the historic Bridewell prison.

Lunenburg (the first town Warvold settled) is the name of a town from the Robert Frost poem "The Mountain."

The Grob is a genuine chess strategy used for precisely the reasons outlined in this story.

Cabeza de Vaca (which translates as cow head) was a real person, a Spanish explorer of the sixteenth century.

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255.

coming soon.

The Land of Elyon Book 2 Beyond the Valley of Thorns.

Alexa Daley has been keeping quiet, living out what remains of her life in the city of Lathbury, mending books and daydreaming about faraway places. But all that changes when a mysterious letter arrives from an old friend beckoning her to the caves, a dark and ominous place, the one place she doesn't want to go.

Thus begins the second installment in The Land of Elyon series, in which Alexa leaves the safe confines of Bridewell Common and travels into The Dark Hills and beyond. She discovers stunning new lands, finds extraordinary new friends, and encounters a strange new evil with the power to destroy The Land of Elyon.

Full of excitement and peril, Beyond the Valley of Thorns will redefine everything Alexa believes about the world she inhabits. She will discover the dark unseen forces at work all around her, and she will carry a burden she alone was meant for, a burden that will determine the fate of The Land of Elyon and all who reside there.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR.

PATRICK CARMAN began The Dark Hills Divide as a story to tell in the night. The characters and places soon took on a life of their own, and The Land of Elyon was born.

Before writing this, his first novel, Carman helped to create board games, Web sites, a mentoring program, and a music show heard on hundreds of radio stations across the country and around the world. He currently lives in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and two daughters.

To learn more about Patrick Carman and The Land of Elyon, visit: www.scholastic.com/landofelyon 258.

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Twelve-year-old Alexa Daley is spending another summer in Bridewell with her father. She looks forward to exploring the old lodge where she stays each year with its cozy library and maze of pa.s.sages and rooms. She's also eager to finally solve the mystery of what lies beyond the immense walls that were built to keep out an unnamed evil that lurks in the forests and the dark Hills, an evil the townspeople are still afraid of.

As Alexa begins to unravel the truth about what lies outside the protective barrier she's lived behind all her life, she discovers a strange and ancient enchantment. Armed with an unexpected new power, Alexa exposes a danger that could destroy everything she holds dear and change The Land of Elyon forever.

end.