A sad tale's best for winter; I have one / Of sprites and goblins

Seanan McGuire's The Winter Long (October Daye, volume 8) is coming out next week, so it's time to start making guesses about which mysteries the book will solve. I keep seeing dark hints that this book is a major transition in Toby's story. I'm really looking forward to finding out what's going to change this time.

( Loose ends, mysteries, speculation; contains major, book-destroying spoilers for all seven previous volumes )

What do you all think? azurelunatic? muchabstracted?