Prozor and Strambli went back to the launch and returned with the rest of the Ghostie armour. They were getting the other two dressed up in it when we felt our ears pop. We all looked at each other without needing to say what it was. Bosa was through one of the locks. Easiest thing would have been for her to blow all the lungstuff in the Queenie, but skulls were delicate things and she wouldn’t risk ours being knocked around by decompression.

I used the lookstone again, and saw that the Nightjammer had crept in closer, thinking we were going to be easy pickings. Two leagues out now, maybe three.

‘Come as close as you dare,’ I whispered.

It couldn’t have taken more than a couple of minutes to get Surt and Tindouf into the Ghostie armour. Now there was more of us in it than out of it, but I can’t say that made me feel any safer or more able to face Bosa. We were broken, shattered pieces of ourselves, trying to hold on to the idea of who we were and what we’d been.

‘They were right,’ Prozor said.

‘Who was?’

‘The coves who decided this stuff was better off locked away in baubles. If they’d known what was right, they’d have fed it into the Old Sun, or sent if off into the Empty.’

‘I don’t care for it either.’

‘It’s when the armour starts feelin’ like a natural part of you, that’s when you need to worry.’ Then she touched a hand to me. ‘We wronged each other, Fura. I know it. And maybe one of those wrongs was worse than the other. But if I blame you, I’m only blamin’ you for what Bosa Sennen put into your head, and that’s hardly any fault of yours.’ I was content with that, but she wasn’t done. ‘Anyway, it ain’t what the rest of ’em deserve.’

‘The rest?’

‘Cazaray. Mattice. Jusquerel. Triglav. Trysil. Hirtshal – all one word of ’im. And Rack. Can’t forget Rack.’

‘It was a good crew,’ I said. ‘We were lucky to have them. Lucky to sign on with a good ship, a good captain. We hadn’t earned it.’

‘You’re earnin’ it now.’ Then she bent her mouth closer to my ear, whispering out from behind the faceless visor of the Ghostie armour. ‘Somethin’ was poisonin’ this one. Maybe it was Gathing, with that snidey manner of ’is. Maybe it was Trusko, clinging to a past he made up for himself. Maybe it was just too much bad luck, over ’n’ over again. That’ll grind any crew down. But now that we’ve lived with ’em, I know that they ain’t the worst.’

I didn’t feel like smiling, but I managed it anyway.

‘Praise indeed.’