She remembered the strange intensity of their first meeting, how Estella, Urania, had asked her are you studying astronomy?, followed closely by why not? and would you like to see the research lab? How flabbergasted she'd been that Dr Estella Herschel had noticed her, how she'd blown up Lyra's phone afterwards with flailing, fangirling texts.
Astronomy had noticed her. What could you even say to that?
What came out, in an anxious rush of words, was. "I see things in them, the stars. Visions and... things. That, that's why Clio introduced me to Merlin, that's why he's teaching me."