Bridge of Souls (Cassidy Blake #3)(37)

The words reserved for a ghost.

But they hold true for the living, too.

I meet my gaze in the compact mirror’s reflection. “My name is Cassidy Blake,” I say softly. “I’m twelve years old. Last year, I stole from Death. I lived when I should have died. I stayed when I should have gone. I survived once, and I’ll survive again. My name is Cassidy Blake,” I say again. “And I will not be dragged into the dark.”





There are two ways to find Death.

Either you go looking for it, or you wait for it to come to you.

We chose the latter, but as the morning goes on, I’m beginning to regret that choice. Lara, Jacob, and I trail my parents and their film crew through haunted hotels. Apparently, it’s hard to find a hotel in New Orleans without a resident ghost. According to Lucas, half the hotels were schools or orphanages once, until, like the Place d’Armes, all of them burned down.

Where are you? I think as we stand in a room in the Bourbon Orleans, while Mom’s EMF meter warbles and whines, and once, I swear, it even giggles. I shiver and retreat, leaning against a wall, only to feel the Veil lean back, whispering mischief.

“Come and play.”

But I resist the pull. Ghost hunting is officially on hold.

We go to more hotels: the Monteleone, the Andrew Jackson, the Dauphine. At each one, the cameras roll, and Dad recounts the history of the hotel and Mom recounts the stories of its ghosts. Of shadows that sit on the edges of beds and children who play in the halls. Of things that go missing and things that are found.

It’s hard to focus on the filming. My nerves tighten, my senses bristle. I keep my ears tuned to the air, waiting for any shift. For the sound to drop out of the room, or a chill breeze, or a voice drifting through the dark.

We will find you, it said.

Come and try, I think.

I can tell that Jacob and Lara are just as jumpy, though he’s no good at hiding it, and somehow she’s able to smile and pretend that she’s listening to my parents’ show, that the only thing making her shiver is one of Mom’s stories.

Lara keeps her hand on her backpack, ready to assemble the banishing spell as soon as the Emissary makes its move.

But several locations later and still no sign of it.

The sun is high and hot as we pass the Old Ursuline Convent, a massive building that looms behind tall walls and sculpted hedges.

According to Dad, the convent is older than the United States. According to Mom, it’s the birthplace of the American vampire. Or at least, one of the vampire legends. Apparently, teenage girls were sent over from France, and they arrived in New Orleans pale and gaunt, clutching casket-shaped boxes. The boxes—called caskets—were supposed to contain their dowry. But the myths grew until people believed that the boxes were literal caskets, and the girls undead.

As Mom and Dad narrate, I keep one hand in my pocket, fingers tight around the glass evil eye, and wait, and wait, and wait. But I don’t feel anything strange, save for the rise and fall of the Veil.

Maybe I should feel relieved. But I don’t. Instead, I feel like someone who’s holding her breath, and running out of air.

*

I knew we would end up here eventually.

The most haunted place in New Orleans.

We stand in front of the LaLaurie Mansion, looking up at the squat stone building, stretching as wide as the block.

“You know,” says Jacob, “I was just starting to think, as far as ghosts go, this city isn’t so bad.”

I stare at the house. It’s three stories tall instead of the Quarter’s usual two, which makes it loom over the low buildings to either side like a shadow, despite its pale gray stone.

And I shudder, despite the heat.

I’ve been to Mary King’s Close, where people were bricked into the walls while still alive.

I’ve been to the Catacombs of Paris, with its millions of bones.

Places where the past seeped through, the voices and emotions carried on the Veil.

And even from the street, I know this is one of those places. And suddenly, I think I’d rather face my own death again than go inside.

The front door sits back from the curb, crypt white beneath a stone arch, the entrance barred by a black iron gate. The tips of the bars are spiked like arrows, and it feels like the opposite of an invitation.

Go away, the building seems to say.

I look around, almost hoping for a visit from the Emissary, but there’s still no sign of it as Lucas pulls a key from his pocket and unlocks the door, a stale draft seeping out.

I remember Adan’s story from the first night, about the call coming from inside the house, even though no one else was home. And I know it was the kind of ghost story you tell instead of the true horror, the kind you tell about places after they’re haunted, instead of the ones that explain how they got haunted in the first place.

“There are many shadows in New Orleans’s past,” says Dad, “but this is one of the darkest.”

His voice is low and stern, but I can tell he’s speaking to the camera.

We step through the door, and the Veil slams into me.

A wave of hatred and pain and fear so sharp it knocks the air from my lungs. Lara sucks in a breath, and I can tell she feels it, too. The weight of ruined places. The anger of the dead. Smoke burns my eyes, even though the front hall is cold and bare, and a heavy beat sounds in my ears, like knuckles knocking on wood.