Eleanor crept forward. The books called to her. She wanted to lunge for them. She wanted to wrap her arms around that third book with its purple cover and press it against her chest until it sank right into her rib cage. That feeling urged her to surrender, let the Story consume her. Shaking, she held herself back.

“There they are,” the hedgewitch said wonderingly. There was something forlorn in her expression. Everything she’d lost was right in the pages of the second book.

“How do we destroy them?” Pip asked.

The Editor looked pained. “They’re books. Water, fire, a good pair of scissors—any of them should do the trick.” She fidgeted. “But I do wonder if you want to destroy them. They’re marvelous things. Dangerous, but marvelous.”

Eleanor knew what she meant. The world-walker’s power was amazing. It would have been more amazing if she wasn’t constantly using it while running for her life, but still—she could go anywhere. Visit other worlds.

“I’ve barely gotten to do any magic,” Otto said, and sighed. “I wouldn’t mind forgetting third grade if I could do a few spells and make some potions.”

“Yeah, being the warrior is pretty awesome. Except for the not being me part,” Pip admitted. “But we’ve got to do it. Right?”

“Right,” Eleanor said. “We’re forgetting too fast. We’re losing ourselves.” But still she didn’t move toward the books. She looked over at the Editor. “Is there any way to keep the good parts, but not lose ourselves?”

The Editor considered. “Not normally. The Story writes itself over you. That’s how it works.”

Otto frowned. “But Bartimaeus said that the Stories have to have physical copies, because if a wild story just gets inside a person, it changes to be theirs. To be part of them.”

Eleanor tapped a finger against her lips. “When we first found out about the Prime Stories, Jack said that the Stories are a curse because stories are simple. Something that can fit in a book is straightforward. People are complicated. They’re made up of lots and lots of stories and versions of themselves, and they can hold all of it. The Stories replace that with one simple version, erasing all the rest. But what if . . .” She trailed off, frowned, a thought starting to form. She looked at the Editor. “Is there a way to take the Stories out of the books? So that they would become part of us, like wild stories, instead of replacing us?”