After another moment or two, he began to make things out. The spiral staircase leading up to a simple pulpit. An enormous crucifix sunk back into the dark behind it. The gnarled shape of the figure hanging on the cross. He saw the muted colors, the faint glimmer of a stained-glass window on the wall above. But, beyond that, there were only half-delineated forms hunkered before invisible recesses. The hollow reaches of the church seemed to drift with a sort of smoke of gray darkness. Then a movement caught his eye …

And he saw three men. The featureless figures of three men. They were gathered together on the far side of the chancel rail. They were standing in a tight cluster. They were talking almost in whispers. One of them laughed, a deep chuckle. Another nodded, the black shape of his head bobbing.

Bernard strained to hear, strained to see. Raised now on tiptoe. His neck hurting as he craned it to keep the men in view.

And, as he looked, he heard another noise—a dreadful noise—a faint, low, agonized sob from somewhere in the shadows.

Bernard’s eyes moved to the sound. His mouth opened. The air came out of him in a long, unbroken gasp.

The body on the crucifix was moving.

It shifted weakly. It moaned again. “Don’t know. Don’t know.” Bernard saw the dark liquid lines trailing down from the palms. Saw the arms straining against the ropes that held them. Feebly, the crucified figure lifted its head.

Bernard gaped. The man’s eyes were gone. Pools of gore were spilling out of his sockets, running down his cheeks. His head dropped forward.

Shocked, Bernard lost his grip on the fissure. He fell away, took a step away from the church. He whispered harshly, “Jesus Christ!”

And at once, he heard another laugh, another deep chuckle.

Only this time, it came from directly beside him.

“Not exactly, mate,” the scarred man said.

Bernard was fast. Jumped back even as he spun to face his attacker. But he was still so staggered by what he’d seen, so fazed by the first jolt of it—and much too surprised by the ambush to fend it off. Even as he leapt, even as he dropped into a semblance of a fighting stance, even as he lifted his hands in an attempt at self-protection, the small, burning eyes, the disfigured mouth of the scarred man completely filled his field of vision, completely overwhelmed him.

The sap was falling before he knew it. It struck him on the side of the head full force.

Bernard saw the sky, saw the spire, spinning, wheeling. And then he pitched over, onto the railing, clung to it, hung from it—and finally slid senseless to the ground.

7