That night, Eleanor dreamed again of Rag-a-bone and Shatterblack, their lolling pink tongues and snapping white teeth. But this time, as their hot breath panted on the back of her legs, she was suddenly lifted out of the dream by a soft voice.

“Eleanor.”

She startled awake as Wander’s fingertips brushed her brow. The woman bent over her, glass shards drifting like dust caught in a beam of sunlight. Eleanor sat up, sitting back against the headboard. “I was dreaming about the hounds,” she said.

“I know.” Wander sat on the end of the bed. “They can’t harm you in your dreams, but they can keep you from sleep. Here.” She twisted her fingers, and a loop of shining silver thread appeared, braided into a bracelet. She settled it around Eleanor’s wrist. “That will keep your dreams protected.”

Eleanor ran her fingers along the bumps of the braided thread, and the bracelet made a sound like a sigh, settling snugly against her skin.

“Eleanor. I think you and I need to talk,” Wander said quietly.

Eleanor’s lip began to quiver. She bunched her hands into fists and took a sharp breath through her nose. “Otto and I—we’re becoming Stories, aren’t we?” she asked.

“It is not a certain thing for you, yet. Not as it was with Pip. Do not despair.”

“Otto’s Story is the hedgewitch, right?” Eleanor asked. “The hedgewitch is all about knowledge and naming things and learning, and that’s totally Otto. So that leaves the world-walker. But why would it want me? I’m nothing special.”

“You are the daughter of two Stories. That is a very rare thing. One that makes you more suited to slipping between worlds.”

Eleanor looked over at Thirteen Tales of the Gray, which sat in its customary place on her bedside. “In the book, it says that the girl with backward hands was the daughter of a princess who was taken by Mr. January,” she said. “It’s implied that—I mean, it seems like Mr. January is—I mean . . .” She trailed off, not sure how to ask such an awkward question.

“The tale implies that the girl with backward hands is the daughter of Mr. January and the stolen princess,” Wander said with a wry twist of her lips. “I promise you, I am not Mr. January’s child. Bartimaeus Ashford took significant liberties when he recorded those stories.”

Eleanor nodded. The stories had hints of truth in them, but rarely stated things outright.

Wander picked up Thirteen Tales, paging through it with her spidery hands. Her fingernail ran down the title page, rasping softly against the paper, and then she flipped ahead. She held the book out for Eleanor to see. “This is my story. Or what little I remembered of it, embellished by Bartimaeus’s imagination.”

“The Glass-Heart Girl?” Eleanor asked, seeing what story it was open to. Wander nodded, and Eleanor read aloud the familiar words.