Seven-year-old Luna dropped her small silver fork with a soft clink against her porcelain plate and stared wide-eyed at the empty wooden chair across from her.

"Mama," she whispered with a tone of absolute certainty, her voice trembling but steady, "the man at our dinner table says he’s sorry for interrupting."

Emma’s stomach twisted with a sharp stab of worry. Her gaze flicked to the chair—an ordinary, unoccupied chair that now felt unnervingly ominous beneath the warm glow of the kitchen light. "Luna," she said carefully, forcing calm into her voice, "there’s nobody there."

"Yes there is," Luna insisted, her pale-blue eyes shining with a mix of innocence and eerie authority. "His name is Mr. Peterson, and he died yesterday. He’s waiting to decide if he wants to use his resurrection power."

Emma’s hands began to shake violently. The fork in her grip clattered against the plate before she set it down. This was getting worse—so much worse. Luna had been seeing dead people for nearly four years now, ever since she could first speak in full sentences. But recently, her little girl had begun encountering something darker—souls who lingered in a strange, fragile state between life and death.

"What does he want?" Emma asked, her voice breaking with tension as she tried to hold herself together.

"He wants to know if coming back to life will hurt," Luna replied solemnly, her childish face clouded with concern. "He’s scared."

Emma’s throat tightened. She turned helplessly toward Kael. He had been sitting quietly beside her, eating his meal in his usual calm, methodical way. Now, he set down his fork with deliberate care and leaned forward, his expression gentle. He spoke directly to the empty chair as if it were perfectly normal to address an invisible guest.

"Mr. Peterson," Kael said softly, his voice calm like a steady river, "resurrection doesn’t hurt your body. But it might be hard emotionally. Sometimes the heart struggles with returning."

Luna nodded firmly, her small chin lifting with seriousness far beyond her years. "Daddy says you should only come back if you have something important to finish. Not just because you’re scared of being dead."

Emma watched in stunned silence as her daughter carried on an entire conversation with someone she herself could not see. Luna’s tone was steady, compassionate, almost wise. She spoke as though she had been born to counsel souls caught between two worlds.

"He says thank you," Luna announced at last, her little lips curving into a sad but satisfied smile. "And he’s decided to stay dead. He just wanted someone to tell him it was okay."

The air in the kitchen shifted. The once icy chill lifted, and the suffocating heaviness seemed to dissolve. The temperature slowly returned to normal. With a casual grace that was both comforting and unsettling, Luna picked up her fork and resumed eating her mashed potatoes, as though nothing extraordinary had just happened.

Emma excused herself abruptly. She stumbled into the bathroom, locked the door, and collapsed against the sink. Hot tears poured down her face as she broke down, sobs echoing off the cold tiles.

This wasn’t normal. None of this was normal.

Her little girl—just seven years old—was sitting at dinner, calmly guiding dead souls into their final choices, offering counsel about resurrection like it was no different than talking about math homework. Other children her age worried about crayons, homework sheets, scraped knees, and playground quarrels. Luna, however, bore the impossible burden of helping the restless dead find peace.

When Emma finally returned to the kitchen, wiping her swollen eyes with trembling fingers, she found Kael bent over the table, helping Luna with her math problems. The child absent-mindedly waved toward the empty space in the corner, clearly saying goodbye to another invisible visitor.

Emma’s voice cracked as she whispered later that night, when the house was quiet, "How do you do it, Kael? How do you stay so calm when she... when she talks to the dead?"

"Because getting upset doesn’t help her," Kael replied simply, his dark eyes unwavering. "She needs at least one parent who treats her abilities as though they’re normal."

Emma shook her head, frustration and fear bubbling in her chest. "But they’re not normal!" she snapped.

"They’re normal for her," Kael said quietly. "Emma, she has never known a world where ghosts were hidden from her sight. To her, we’re the strange ones because we can’t see what she sees."

Emma felt fresh tears burning her eyes. "I just... I just wanted her to have a regular childhood."

Kael’s expression softened, but his tone was firm. "She can’t. And if you try to force her into one, you’ll only make her feel broken."

Emma swallowed her grief like poison. Deep inside, she knew Kael was right. Still, it pierced her heart. She had dreamed of raising children in a world filled with laughter, scraped knees, birthday parties, and simple joys. Instead, she was raising another child cursed—or perhaps blessed—with dangerous supernatural gifts.

A few days later, Marcus appeared in their living room as though stepping out of thin air. Luna was sprawled on the carpet, surrounded by dolls and crayons, her childish humming cut short when she saw him.

"Hello, little Bridge-Keeper," Marcus said warmly, his tall frame radiating an aura of calm power.

Luna’s face lit up. "Hi, Uncle Marcus! Are you here to teach me more about the in-between place?"

"If your parents say it’s okay," Marcus replied smoothly.

Emma felt her chest clench with dread. "What in-between place?" she demanded, her voice sharp with suspicion.

"The space between dimensions," Marcus explained carefully. "Luna needs to learn how to navigate it safely. Some of the souls she helps are wandering, lost in that space."

Emma shook her head violently. "Absolutely not. She’s not going anywhere near other dimensions!"

"Mama," Luna said patiently, with a tone that sounded too old for her small body, "I’m already there sometimes. When I talk to the waiting souls, part of me goes to where they are. Uncle Marcus just wants to teach me how to come back faster."

Emma froze, horror twisting her insides. "What do you mean, part of you goes there?"

"My spirit leaves my body," Luna explained simply, as if it were the most ordinary thing in the world. "Only for a few minutes. It’s like visiting, but scarier, because I don’t always know how to get home."

Emma turned on Marcus, her voice breaking. "She’s been dimension-traveling without training?"

Marcus’s expression was grave. "It’s natural for Bridge-Keepers. But yes—she needs guidance to do it safely."

Emma wanted to scream no. She wanted to lock Luna’s bedroom door, keep her child tucked safely in blankets, shield her from all things dangerous and unearthly. But then she saw the flicker of fear in Luna’s eyes. Her daughter was already walking into peril without understanding the rules. Training would keep her alive.

"Okay," Emma whispered, her voice trembling with reluctant surrender. "But I want to know everything you’re teaching her."

Over the next several months, Marcus trained Luna patiently. He taught her how to anchor her spirit to her body with invisible threads of focus, how to sense the jagged edges of dangerous dimensional rifts, and how to call for help if she ever became lost.

Emma hovered, sick with anxiety every time. Watching her baby girl—just seven years old—learn the delicate, terrifying art of dimensional travel made her stomach churn with constant dread.

Kael, however, treated it casually, almost reassuringly. "It’s no different than teaching her to ride a bike safely," he told Emma one evening, his voice steady. "This is bike-riding for her soul."

But Emma couldn’t see it that way. Each time Luna’s eyes glazed over, her pupils clouding as she spoke to invisible souls, Emma felt as though she were losing her little girl—piece by piece—to a supernatural world she herself could never touch.

One evening, Luna was quietly helping a young woman named Jessica, a soul caught between. Jessica had died in a sudden, violent car accident.

"Jessica wants to know if her boyfriend will still love her if she comes back," Luna said gently, her eyes distant and far away.

Emma surprised herself by answering. Her voice came out soft, tender. "Tell her that real love doesn’t depend on whether someone is dead or alive."

Luna relayed the message with a solemn nod. A small smile tugged at her lips. "Jessica says thank you. She’s going to come back."

For the first time in years, Emma felt something warm bloom in her chest—a fragile glow of hope. Maybe she could help Luna after all. Maybe, even if she couldn’t see the souls, she could still share the burden.

But that fragile glow shattered in an instant.

Luna suddenly gasped, her tiny body jerking violently. Her blue eyes rolled back, showing only white.

"Luna!" Emma screamed, her voice raw with terror.

Kael leapt forward, catching their daughter as her body went completely limp, her arms dangling like a rag doll.

"Marcus!" Kael roared. "Something’s wrong!"

Marcus materialized instantly, his expression grim. "She’s stuck in the in-between space. Something is holding her there, preventing her from returning."

Emma’s heart pounded like a war drum. "What do you mean, stuck?"

"There’s another presence there," Marcus said darkly. "Something powerful. Something that doesn’t want her to leave."

Emma watched in horror as Luna’s breathing grew shallow, her skin paling to a ghostly white.

"How do we get her back?" Emma begged, her voice cracking with hysteria.

"I don’t know," Marcus admitted. For the first time, he looked afraid. "This has never happened before."

Emma’s worst nightmare was unfolding before her eyes. The supernatural world was stealing her daughter—just as she had always feared it would.

Luna’s lips moved faintly, trembling as though whispering through a storm.

"What is she saying?" Emma asked desperately.

Kael leaned close, pressing his ear to Luna’s mouth. His face went ashen. "She’s saying... ’Help me, Mama. It won’t let me go.’"

Emma’s soul cracked. She stared at her daughter’s fragile body lying motionless in Kael’s arms. Luna was trapped in a dimension Emma couldn’t reach, shackled by something monstrous and unseen.

And Emma—once extraordinary but now only human—was powerless.

She was just a mother. Just a normal, desperate mother watching her extraordinary child slip further away into a world she could never follow.