‘What are we doing, he could ask?’

‘But he’s not, and we are.’ Having defeated me with this inarguable response, Prozor went on: ‘Who else? Strambli’s the Opener. Think she might have been good once, but something happened to her. Seen the way her hands shake, that lopsided fizzog of hers? Something went knotty in her grey.’

‘She said she had the glowy in her.’

‘If it stayed in her too long, it’d have jumped into her grey, and started playin’ merry havoc. Flushin’ it out then’s a lot harder. Leaves scars – inside and out.’ She gave me a knowing look then, as if to say that I’d be wise to heed her words about the glowy. But all that did was get me setting my jaw and hardening up my resolve. ‘All right, that’s Strambli. Tindouf, the cove with the clay pipe, he’s the master of ions. Plays the harmless idiot, and no mistake. Question is how much of that is fakery. Some coves’ll play it that way to hide that they’re smarter, but others’ll do it to make you think they must be putting it on, they can’t really be that simple-minded. And they are.’

‘He can’t be a complete idiot, if he makes the ion engine work.’

‘No, but beyond that we ain’t seen evidence that he can tie two shoelaces together. Verdict’s out on Tindouf. That leaves two more. You and me.’

‘They’ve accepted you,’ I said.

‘Difference is I don’t have to fake much. Credit to you, though, with the way you dredged up all those ship names. Best hope no one checks up on them.’ She gave me a sideways look. ‘But you’ve changed, Fura. You even had me persuaded at times.’

‘We can’t fail at this,’ I said. ‘Whatever I’ve got to turn myself into, that’s what I’ll do.’

‘And this plan of yours . . . about how we end up as bait.’

‘Yes.’

‘You’ve worked it out, wrapped your noggin’ around all the knots of it?’

‘More or less.’

‘Then now might be the time to share it.’

‘I’ll give you a name, Prozor. You can work out the rest of it at your leisure. But I guarantee you won’t like it.’

‘Why don’t you let old Proz decide that for herself.’

‘All right,’ I said, sighing. ‘Setting ourselves up as bait is for later. For that we’ll need to know where Bosa is, or’s likely to be. But before that, we have to make ourselves ready for her. You said it yourself, Proz. She’s fierce, but she ain’t magic. Which just means we need to be fiercer.’

‘Plenty of folk already tried it, Fura.’

‘Maybe they did. But how many of ’em had Ghostie stuff on their side?’