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.

“Madame LaLaurie was a socialite,” says Mom, with none of her usual cheer, “and a serial killer. At a time when the horrors of slavery ran rampant in this country, LaLaurie stands out for the sheer scope of her cruelty.”