‘But I see it plainly in your face. It’s all right, Fura – you can speak your mind. Look, you have my word that we’ll get her home eventually.’

‘But she won’t be the same, will she?’

‘No, but then none of us are the same as the day we set foot on this ship. The skull drove her mad, but there’s no one it doesn’t leave some sort of mark on. Understand this, though: do well by the Monetta, do well by me, and you’ll never have a more loyal crew around you.’ He sighed, as if something needed to be said and he’d been bottling it in long enough. ‘May I speak candidly?’

‘Isn’t that what we’re already doing?’

He smiled at that, but it was a sad sort of smile. ‘I had a daughter once, and she was very dear to me. She sailed with me everywhere, knew every part of the ship, from sails to squawk. She was about your age when I lost her, and I’m afraid you remind me more than a little of her.’

I was careful in my choice of words, but I couldn’t think of any kind way of putting things. ‘What happened, Captain?’

Rackamore looked back to the sweeper. ‘A stern-chase. The only one I ever lost.’

‘She died?’

‘Yes. Yes, she did. And in you I see something of Illyria, and that makes me take more than the usual interest in your welfare.’

‘I don’t want to go back to Mazarile, Captain. Not yet. And I know Adrana’d feel the same. You shouldn’t worry about Vidin Quindar, whatever he says. I knew exactly what I was doing when I agreed to join your crew, and by the time six months are out I’ll be able to decide my own fate.’

‘Your father might disagree.’

‘He’s a good man, sir. But after Mother died he made one bad decision after another. This is just the latest of them, and now it makes me even more determined to stay and earn our prize money. You won’t signal the other ship, will you?’

There were creaking noises from the metal thing in his hand as he worked it in and out. ‘We could see how things lie after the first bauble, I suppose. If I know Jastrabarsk, he’ll mean to have the crumbs we leave behind.’ His face set as he made his decision. ‘We’ll speak no more of it. I’ll squawk Quindar and tell him that you remain under my authority. In the meantime . . . do you wish a word or two to be relayed back to your father?’

‘I thought you said there wouldn’t be any messages, sir.’

‘I am making an exception, Fura.’