‘Good. Way we like it. Someone else comes aboard this ship, we don’t want ’em stumblin’ on the bones too easy.’

We were at a grey door, armoured like an airlock, with a wheel-shaped locking mechanism. We’d passed a dozen similar doors already. ‘Put it here for other reasons, not just to make it hard to find,’ Prozor went on. ‘Needs to be somewhere quiet, not too close to the bridge or the galley or any of that stuff. Can’t be too close to the sail-control gear or the engine room, either. This is the prime spot, and you’re welcome to it.’

‘Do you ever go inside?’ Adrana asked.

‘Couldn’t pay me enough, girlie. I read baubles. That’s what I’m good at.’

‘You’re forgetting your talent for charm and hospitality,’ I said.

‘You think this is funny, what you’re getting into? Let me tell you about baubles. Readin’ baubles will drive you mad, but that’s only because it’s knotty and a lot depends on making the right interpretation. Lives. Quoins. Reputation. Readin’ skulls . . .’ Prozor trailed off with a sadistic little shudder, before adding: ‘I like my head as it is. Don’t need no alien ghosts rattling around inside it, givin’ me shivery dreams.’

With the bone room dealt with, Prozor took us to a compartment full of clothing: cupboards, drawers and hoppers full of trousers, tunics, belts, gloves, all of it jumbled up with no rhyme or reason with regards to size or fit. ‘Find what suits you. Long dresses might look fancy on Mazarile, but here they’ll only trip you up.’

Prozor wore trousers, leather slippers and a black blouse, with various items of tarnished jewellery rattling around her throat in the weightlessness.

Adrana sifted through the musty, mould-spotted contents of one drawer. She pulled out a glove, jutting her finger through a hole.

‘Did a bullet do that?’

Prozor examined it thoughtfully.

‘No, girlie, that’d be a rat.’

‘We’ll keep our dresses,’ Adrana said.

The galley was up front, between the bridge and Captain Rackamore’s quarters. By the time we arrived, the other crew had gathered there to welcome us. Even though we were still weightless, they were all managing to sit on chairs around a large circular table that was patterned with black and white hexagons, with items of food and drink fixed onto it by some means. Two windows of similar size bulged out into space on either side of the room – Mazarile was visible through one of them, turning slowly as we orbited it. There was a console in one corner, a few screens and readouts lit up, and some smaller controls and displays dotted elsewhere around the place, glowing like little flickerboxes, but mainly it appeared to be somewhere for the crew to eat, relax and discuss plans, and none of them seemed to be paying any heed to the equipment.