Genar-Hofoen looked away. ‘If you mean Dajeil; yes, she and I lived in a tower like this one once, on an island that looked like this place.’

‘Ah-hah!’ the bird said, jumping up and down and shaking its feathers. ‘I see! You’re the bad guy!’

Genar-Hofoen scowled at the bird. ‘Fuck you,’ he said.

It cackled with laughter. ‘That’s why you’re here! Ho-ho; you’ll be lucky to get off at all, you will! Ha ha ha!’

‘And what did you do, arse-hole?’ Genar-Hofoen asked the bird, more in the hope of annoying the creature than because he really cared.

‘Oh,’ the bird said, drawing itself up and settling its feathers down in a dignified sort of way. ‘I was a spy!’ it said proudly.

‘A spy?’

‘Oh yes,’ the bird said, sounding smug. ‘Forty years I spent, listening, watching. Reported back to my master. Using the Stored ones who were going back. Left messages on them. Forty years and never once discovered. Well, until three weeks ago. Rumbled, then. Maybe even before. Can’t tell. But I did my best. Can’t ask better than that.’ It started preening itself.

The man’s eyes narrowed. ‘Who were you reporting back to?’

‘None of your business,’ the bird said, looking up from its preening. It took a precautionary couple of hop-steps backwards along the parapet, just to make sure it was well out of reach of the human.

Genar-Hofoen crossed his arms and shook his head. ‘What’s this fucking crazy ship up to?’

‘Oh, it’s off to see the Excession,’ the bird said. ‘At some lick, too.’

‘This thing at Esperi?’ the man asked.

‘Heading straight for it,’ the bird confirmed. ‘What it told me, anyway. Can’t see why it’d lie. Could be, I suppose. Wouldn’t put it past it. But don’t think it is. Straight for it. Has been for the past twenty-two days. You want my opinion? Going to give it you anyway. I think it’s stooping.’ The creature put its head on one side. ‘Familiar with the term?’

Genar-Hofoen nodded absently. He didn’t like the sound of this.