On the porch, the image of Gestra Ishmethit sat, peering intently at the partially built model of a sailing ship sitting on a table. The man himself had his own suite of rooms, off one of the Sleeper Service’s warship-stacked General Bays, but he had been persuaded, by Ren, to allow his real-time image to join them most days, and had even started to appear personally for important celebrations. These consisted mostly of Ren’s birthdays, which according to her occurred on a weekly basis.

Zreyn Tramow looked over at Dajeil. ‘Have you ever thought,’ she said, ‘of asking the ship to re-create the old place where you used to live?’

‘There’s still a version of it in that Limited Bay, isn’t there?’ Dajeil said, looking at Amorphia. The avatar, which sported a simple black pant-skirt and skin which looked like it would never tan, was holding a long blonde hair up to the sun-line, and peering at it. It realised it was being talked to and looked at Dajeil.

‘What?’ it said, then, ‘Oh, yes; the bay where Genar-Hofoen was kept. Yes; the tower’s still there.’

‘See?’ Dajeil told Zreyn. She rolled along the rug, out of the parasol’s shade, closed her eyes, put her hands under her head and lay on her belly, to even up her tan.

‘I meant the whole thing,’ Zreyn said, stretching out on the rug. ‘The cliffs and everything. Even the climate, if that’s possible,’ she said, glancing at the avatar, which was still studying the sunlight through one of Ren’s blonde hairs.

‘Perfectly possible,’ it muttered.

‘The whole thing?’ Dajeil said, grimacing. ‘But it’s so much nicer like this.’ She reached out across the sand and pulled a straw sun-hat over her head.

Zreyn shrugged. ‘I’d just like to see it do stuff like that, I suppose.’ She looked up at the sun-line. ‘Making and moving all that rock, creating small oceans . . . You have to remember I don’t take all this . . . power for granted the way you do.’

Dajeil folded the sun hat’s brim up and squinted at the other woman, who made an awkward gesture.

‘Sorry; is my primitiveness showing?’