descended with soundless grace to

The gathered shards became Mysterious Caller, whom Fric had most recently seen pictured in the Los Angeles Times in the rose room this afternoon, whom he had last encountered life-size in the memorabilia maze the previous night. As the guardian angel had on that occasion glided without benefit of wings from rafters to attic floor, so now he descended with soundless grace to the carpet only a few feet from Fric. “You have this knack for entrances,” Fric said, but his shaky voice belied his cocky Hollywood-kid attitude. “Moloch is here,” the guardian declared in a tone of voice so dire that it would have made Fric’s heart clench and then punch his ribs even if the message had been a fraction as terrifying as this. “Run to your deep and special place, Fric. Run now.” Pointing to the stained-glass dome, Fric said, “Why don’t you just take me up there, out of here, where you came from, where I’ll be safe?” “I told you, boy, you must make your own choices, exercise your free will, and save yourself.” “But I—” “Besides, you can’t go to the places I go or travel by the means I do, not until you’re dead.” The guardian stepped closer, leaned forward, thrusting his pallid face within an inch of Fric’s. “Do you want to die horribly just to be able to travel more conveniently?” Fric’s hammering heart knocked all the words out of his throat before he could speak them, and as he struggled to sputter through his silence, he was lifted off his feet and held high by his weird guardian. “Moloch is in the house. Hide, boy, for God’s sake, hide.” With that, Mysterious Caller threw Fric as though he were only a bundle of rags, but threw him with a magical knack that prevented [557] him from crashing hard into furniture. Instead, he tumbled in slow motion across the library, over the club chairs and tables, past the islands of bookshelves. As he rotated on a curious axis, head over heels, Fric saw the photograph of the pretty lady, his make-believe mom, which had slipped out of his pocket and now drifted lazily beside him through the air, in his sphere of influence. Like an astronaut reaching for a floating tube of food in the gravity-free environment of a space shuttle high in orbit, he grasped for the picture but could not quite close his hand on it. Abruptly he hit the floor on both feet, near the Christmas tree that was hung with angels, hit the floor running, whether he wanted to run or not, as if his legs were spellcast to churn him out of here.