Excerpt from Age of Vice by Deepti Kapoor, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

He prefers to be alone and in pain anyway. The horror of the dead follows him inside, he mourns them as he breathes. He refuses all the gangs, snubs the emissaries and their overtures. So on the second day, outside the pharmacy, alone, just after he's been called to visit the doctor, three men from another cell converge on him. They stick out their tongues and remove the razor blades they keep in their mouths; they set upon him, slashing at his face and chest and the forearms he raises to protect himself. He takes the cuts in penance, making no expression of pain. Then his patience finally snaps, breaks like a trapdoor. He shatters his first attacker's nose with the heel of his palm, takes the second man's arm at the elbow and snaps it at the joint. The third he sweeps down to the floor. He snatches one of their razors and takes it to this man's tongue, slicing it down the middle, squeezing the squealing prisoner's jaw open with his grip.

He's found standing over them, splattered in blood, the prisoners howling in pain as he's locked in solitary in a daze. They beat him, tell him he'll be there for a very long time. Once the door shuts, he goes wild, snarling and slapping and kicking the walls. Screaming without language. Incomprehensible words. He cannot control his world.

* * *

He imagines the end. Everything he is and all he's done. But no. The next morning, the door is opened, new guards enter. They tell him to come with them. He'll shower first. He's shivering naked and raw. When they approach, he curls his fists, back to the wall, to fight. They laugh and throw him fresh clothes.

He's taken to the warden's office. A pleasing spread: freshly cut fruit, paratha, lassi. A vision of paradise. The warden asks him to sit. "Have a cigarette. Help yourself. There's been a mistake. I wasn't told," he says. "If I'd been told, this would never have happened. Really, no one knew, not even your friends. But things will be different. You'll be taken to your friends here now. You'll be free, within reason. And this unfortunate business with those other men, this will be forgotten. They could be punished. Only, you punished them yourself, didn't you!? Quite a show. Oh, and this money, it's yours. You should have said something. You should have made it clear. You should have let us know. Why didn't you let us know?"

Ajay stares at the food, at the cigarette pack.

"Know what?"

The warden smiles.

"That you're a Wadia man."

Excerpted from Age of Vice by Deepti Kapoor. Copyright © 2023 by Deepti Kapoor. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.