By the Light of the Moon

The apex of each arched window lay about twenty feet above the church floor. The top of the scaffolding thrust two feet higher, to service the three-foot-tall band of carved and painted plaster that began at approximately the twenty-four-foot mark.

That work platform, where on weekdays craftsmen and artisans conducted restoration, was perhaps five feet wide, nearly as wide as the aisle below it, constructed of sheets of plywood secured to the horizontal ribs of pipe that formed the scaffold cap. The height, combined with the gloom that prevailed in the vaulted upper reaches of the church, where the work lights were not aglow, prevented them from seeing who lurked in those cloistered elevations.

The back wall of the nave lacked windows; however, the frieze continued there, as did the scaffolding. Ten feet away, just to the right of Shepherd, a ladder was built into the scaffold: rungs of pipe coated with fine- grooved rubber.

Dylan went to the ladder, touched a rung above his head, and felt at once, like a scorpion sting, the psychic spoor of evil men.

Having hurried with him to the ladder, Jilly must have seen a dire shift in his expression, in his eyes, for she said, 'Oh, God, what?'

'Three men,' he told her, taking his hand off the ladder rung, repeatedly flexing and clenching it to work out the dark energy that had leeched into him. 'Bigots. Haters. They want to kill the entire wedding party, the priest, as many of the guests as they can get.'

Jilly turned toward the front of the church. 'Dylan!'

He followed her stare and saw that the priest and two altar boys were already in the sanctuary, descending the ambulatory from the high altar to the chancel railing.

From a side door at the front, two young men in tuxedoes entered the nave, crossed toward the center aisle. The groom, the best man.

'We've got to warn them,' Jilly said.

'No. If we start shouting, they won't know who we are, might not understand what we're saying. They won't react right away – but the gunmen will. They'll open fire. They won't get the bride, but they'll cut down the groom and lots of guests.'

'Then we've got to go up,' she said, gripping the ladder as if to climb.

He stayed her with a hand on her arm. 'No. Vibrations. The whole scaffold will shake. They'll feel us climbing. They'll know we're coming.'

Shepherd stood in a most unusual posture for him, not bowed and slumped and floor-gazing, but with his head tipped back, watching a floating feather.

Stepping between his brother and the feather, Dylan met him eye to eye. 'Shep, I love you. I love you… and I need you to be here.'

Refocusing his vision from the more distant feather to Dylan, Shep said, 'The North Pole.'

Dylan stood in bafflement for a moment before he realized that Shep was repeating one of Jilly's answers to his monotonous question Where's all the ice?

'No, buddy, forget the North Pole. Be here with me.'

Shep blinked, blinked as if with puzzlement.

Afraid that his brother would close his eyes and retreat into one mental corner or another, Dylan said, 'Quick, right now, take us from here to there, Shep.' He pointed to the floor at their feet. 'From here.' Then he pointed toward the top of the scaffolding along the back wall of the nave, and with his other hand, he turned Shep's head toward where he pointed. 'To that platform up there. Here to there, Shep. Here to there.'

The welcoming hymn concluded. The final notes of the pipe organ reverberated hollowly through the vaults and colonnades.

'Here?' Shep asked, pointing at the floor between them.

'Yes.'

'There?' Shep asked, pointing to the work platform above them.

'Yes, here to there.'

'Here to there?' Shep asked through a puzzled frown.

'Here to there, buddy.'

'Not far,' said Shep.

'No, sweetie,' Jilly agreed, 'it's not far, and we know you can do much bigger things, much longer folds, but right now all we need is here to there.'

Seconds after the final notes of the hymn had quivered into silence in the farthest corners of the church, the organist struck up 'Here Comes the Bride.'

Dylan looked toward the center aisle, perhaps eighty feet away, and saw a pretty young woman step out of the narthex, escorted by a handsome young man in a tuxedo, through a passage in the scaffolding, past the holy- water font, into the nave. She wore a blue dress with blue gloves and carried a small bouquet of flowers. A bridesmaid on the arm of a groomsman. Concentrating solemnly on her timing, they walked in that classic halting rhythm of bridal processions.

'Herethere?' asked Shep.

'Herethere,' Dylan urged, 'Herethere!'

The assembled guests had risen from their seats and turned to witness the entrance of the bride. Their interest would be captured so entirely by the wedding party that it was unlikely a one of them, except perhaps a certain pigtailed girl, would notice three figures vanish from a far, shadowy corner.

With fingers still wet with Jilly's blood from when he'd touched her on the hilltop, Shepherd reached once more for her wounded hand. 'Feel how it works, the round and round of all that is.'

'Here to there,' Jilly reminded him.

As a second bridesmaid with escort followed the first out of the narthex, everything in Dylan's view folded away from him.

43

With the carved frieze to Dylan's right and a neck-breaking drop to his left, the work platform atop the scaffold unfolded under their feet, creaked, and trembled with the assumption of their weight.

The first of the three gunmen – a bearded specimen with unruly hair and a big head on a scrawny neck – sat only a few feet from them, his back against the nave wall. An assault rifle lay at his side, and six spare magazines of ammunition.

Although the processional music had begun, the bigot hadn't yet assumed firing position. At his side lay Entertainment Weekly, with which he'd apparently been passing time. Only an instant ago, he'd extracted a thick circlet of chocolate from a roll of candies.

Surprised by the shudder that passed through the scaffolding, the gunman turned to his left. He looked up in amazement at Dylan looming no more than four feet away.

As far as the candy might be concerned, the guy was on automatic pilot. Even as his eyes widened in astonishment, he flicked his right thumb and popped the chocolate morsel off his index finger, directly into his open mouth.

Dylan chased the candy with a kick to the chin, perhaps knocking not only the chocolate but also a few teeth down the bastard's throat.

The chocolate-lover's head snapped back, rapping the plaster frieze. His eyes rolled up, his head sagged on a limp neck, and he slid onto his side, unconscious.

The kick unbalanced Dylan. He swayed, clutched the frieze with one hand, and avoided a fall.

***

On the work platform, Dylan arrived nearest the gunman, with Shep behind him.

Still feeling how it worked, the round and round of all that is, Jilly unfolded third in line and released Shep's