“Indeed.” He cleared his throat. “You say this girl was taken from the past? And the Wending, it was opened from here in Eden Eld? Then the hedgewitch is right—that does explain the eclipse. Time has fractured, and the fracture is centered here, on Eden Eld. My goodness. Using the Wending without training is dangerous enough. You never know which whim it might pluck from your mind.”

Eleanor quailed. “All of this is my fault? I . . . broke time? I brought us straight to Halloween?” They’d lost months to plan and prepare. They’d lost Jenny and Naomi and Lily and Pip’s dad and who knew how many other people. And it was her fault.

“We broke time. That’s . . . kind of epic,” Otto said. Eleanor and Pip looked at him. He spread his hands. “Bad, obviously. But also epic.”

“Can we fix it?” Ben asked hopefully. “Can we bring everyone back?”

“If you returned the girl to her time—” Bartimaeus started.

“No,” all three of them snapped at him.

Eleanor set her jaw. “We’ll find a way to fix things and save Thea,” she said.

“Okay. But . . . how?” Otto pressed. He looked at Pip. She looked at Eleanor.

Eleanor sighed. “I have no idea.”

Fifteen

Eleanor woke up in her bed, and for one blissful moment she didn’t remember how she got there. Then she rolled over and spotted the eclipse outside the window. She groaned and sat up. How long had she been asleep? She and the others had sat up for a long time, talking to Bartimaeus and the hedgewitch about ways to fix time. At some point Eleanor had started drifting off, and Ben had insisted everyone under the age of a hundred go get some sleep.

Eleanor slipped out of bed. Thea was asleep in the armchair by her desk, a blanket tucked over her. Pip and Otto were passed out on the floor in sleeping bags. There were plenty of rooms in the house, but none of them had wanted to sleep alone. Eleanor stole out into the hall, not wanting to wake them, and crept downstairs. Her stomach was rumbling. She didn’t really like the idea of eating Mr. January’s weird groceries, but if the alternative was starving, she’d give them a try.

She found the hedgewitch in the kitchen, clearing away the trash and putting away the dishes. “Is housework part of your Story?” Eleanor asked dryly as she padded in.

The hedgewitch gave her an amused look. “No, but orderliness is always helpful for my work. You don’t want to add the wrong herb and end up with a poison instead of a love potion.”

“Good point,” Eleanor said. She moved to help, putting the dishes away in the dusty cupboards. They worked in silence for a few minutes.