"Oh, they're for her, really," he answers, easily enough. "Starting with 'why the hell did you think that was a ship,' I should think. You don't actually enjoy drinking tea that cold, do you?"

Reflecting, again, on his own sojourns at the Ninth House, about umpty-zillion years ago, he adds: "Although, come to think of it, I don't suppose she ever had been on a station otherwise... certainly the Cohort transport shuttles seldom enough had passenger manifests leaving the Ninth, in recent decades."

(There used to be an actual pilgrim trade.)