Bridge of Souls (cassidy Blake, #3)

Cassidy Blake is a twelve-year-old "in-betweener," a person who nearly died and now exists between the world of the living and the Veil, a ghostly realm where spirits of the dead linger. She can cross into the Veil, confront ghosts, and send them on using a mirror pendant that reveals to them the truth of what they are. She travels to New Orleans with her parents, who host a paranormal TV show called the Inspecters, and her best friend Jacob Ellis Hale, the ghost of a boy who drowned trying to retrieve a toy. Jacob pulled Cassidy from death when she nearly drowned after falling off a bridge, and she pulled him into the land of the living, binding them together. Their bond lets Jacob read Cassidy's thoughts, and he has been growing disturbingly stronger, able to fog windows, turn pages, and interact with the physical world in ways ghosts should not. Cassidy's fellow in-betweener, Lara Chowdhury, has warned her to send Jacob on before he becomes dangerous, but Cassidy refuses.

At the Hotel Kardec, named for Allan Kardec, the founder of Spiritism, Cassidy has recurring nightmares in which Jacob's eyes turn red and she must choose between saving him and saving everything else. Exploring the French Quarter, she collides with a man in a skeleton costume and flashes back to a Paris train platform where she saw a figure in a skull mask remove its face, revealing only empty darkness. She texts Lara, who mentions that New Orleans is home to the oldest branch of the Society of the Black Cat, a secret organization dedicated to the paranormal. Cassidy photographs a black cat with lavender eyes outside a shop called Thread & Bone, suspecting a connection to the Society.

Cassidy meets the family's guide, Lucas Dumont, a young professor. That night, filming begins at the Place d'Armes Hotel, a former schoolhouse where children died in a fire. When Cassidy touches the wall, the Veil reaches for her, and an inhuman voice rasps, "We are coming for you." At Muriel's Restaurant, she crosses into the Veil, sends on a ghost, and barely escapes when the Veil erupts into flames. That evening, during a séance at the hotel, the same inhuman voice speaks through the medium, addressing Cassidy: "We have seen you, little thief. Light burning in your chest." It warns that she stole from Death and will be returned to the dark.

Cassidy video-calls Lara, who identifies the creature as an Emissary of Death, a messenger from the realm beyond the Veil that hunts those who have cheated death. Lara warns Cassidy to stay with her parents, avoid wandering off, and never cross the Veil, which makes her easier to find.

During "Cemetery Day," a tarot reader draws a card signaling an unavoidable crossroads where any choice means losing something. At Metairie Cemetery, Cassidy and Jacob feel a compass-like pull toward the north, toward Lake Pontchartrain and the Causeway Bridge. At St. Roch Cemetery, Cassidy wanders from the group, and the Emissary appears between the crypts, freezing her in place. Jacob flings himself at it but passes straight through. Cassidy holds up her mirror pendant, but the Emissary is not a ghost: It grabs the pendant and shatters it. Just as it reaches for her, Lara appears atop the crypt, having flown from Chicago on her own. She topples the crumbling stone onto the Emissary, and they flee through a jazz funeral procession whose blend of life and death confuses the creature into dissolving.

Lara and Cassidy locate the Society of the Black Cat inside Thread & Bone. They meet Philippa, a young medium; Renée, the Society's president; and Michael, a specialist in wards and charms. In the Veil, the Society's deceased former members explain that the Emissary wants to reclaim the life Cassidy "stole" when she survived drowning, represented by the blue-white thread glowing in her chest. If caught, she will be dragged to a final realm from which there is no return. They devise a banishing ritual: a circle of stones filled with grave dirt and scented oil that, when lit, should sever the Emissary's connection to Cassidy. Cassidy also learns that Lucas is the Society's current historian. Michael gives each girl a protective evil eye charm. Jacob fears his growing power makes Cassidy easier to track, but Lara argues his presence actually confuses the Emissary.

Cassidy realizes that crowded places prevent the Emissary from finding her and chooses the séance room in Muriel's as a quiet place to spring the trap. They arrange the ritual circle, and Cassidy crosses into the Veil to issue a challenge. The Emissary materializes, and she lures it into the circle. Lara lights the oil, and flame begins to close around the creature. But the spell also begins severing Jacob's bond to Cassidy; he collapses, gray and soaking wet, as though drowning again. Cassidy drops to his side, her shoe crossing the circle's boundary and breaking the seal. The Emissary breaks free. Lara throws herself between it and Cassidy, and the Emissary seizes Lara. Both vanish.

Cassidy spots a horseless black carriage in the Veil speeding away with Lara. Lucas explains that the Emissary is taking Lara to the Bridge of Souls, a crossing point at the far edge of the Veil. Jacob points to the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway on a map, and Cassidy connects it to the pull she felt at Metairie Cemetery. Philippa drives them to the lake in a hearse. Before Cassidy crosses the Veil, Philippa ties a braided red thread around her wrist to help her remember what is real. The Causeway transforms into a stretch of polished black stone vanishing into fog, with no railings and a drop into shadow on either side.

On the bridge, Cassidy plunges into a vision of her near-drowning. The red thread helps her break free, and she finds Jacob underwater, reliving his own death. She saves him, and they surface back on the bridge. Deeper in, Cassidy finds Lara trapped in a vision of her childhood scarlet fever. The bridge replays near-death moments to claim its victims. Cassidy grips Lara's hand and speaks to her the way she would use a mirror on a ghost, telling Lara who she is and why she matters. Lara wakes, and they return to the bridge.

The Emissary appears in its true form: bone-white talons, a halo of darkness, every step staining the stone with ink. Cassidy assembles the last scraps of ritual supplies, but the oil runs out. Jacob hurls himself at the Emissary, making contact for the first time, but his fists sink into its body. Cassidy cracks its mask with her camera. The Emissary drives its hand into her chest and grips the thread of her life. Lara distracts it by declaring she also stole from Death, and Jacob tackles the creature over the edge of the bridge. Cassidy catches him with her camera strap as the Emissary plummets into the dark.

They hurry back along the bridge, but Jacob can no longer feel the curtain between worlds. Cassidy refuses to leave without him. Lara takes Jacob's other hand, adding her own in-betweener energy, and together they pull the curtain aside, falling through to the living world. Jacob survives but is diminished, more translucent and unable to move objects. On their final day, Lucas delivers gifts from the Society, including a new mirror pendant that makes Cassidy feel whole again. In a last trip into the Veil, the three send on the ghost of the Axeman of New Orleans, with Jacob pulling out the ghost's thread himself for the first time. A fortune-teller offers Cassidy a reading, but she declines, choosing not to know the future. She walks through the French Quarter with her parents and Jacob, grateful to be alive, carrying Lara's words: Living in fear of death is no way to live at all.