Two miles below the south rim of Thousand-Star Celestial City, the drainage canal emptied through stone gates into the Boundless South Sea. Tidewater thundered against the old granite breakwaters. Salt mist hung beneath a roof eighty paces high.
The Iron Whale had left its berth well before the noon deadline. It lay against a slick ledge. The thirty-foot skiff was built of northern hardwood with river iron strapped around the hull. Green lanterns lit the faces of the six men on its wet deck.
“Current’s cresting!” Meng Tie shouted. He held his injured arm in his jacket and hauled the stern line with the other. “It’s clearing the mud out of the grotto. Watch the channel under the keel.”
Hong Tao stood at the bow, letting his knees take the roll of the boat. The cedar box pressed into his left palm. The first needle lay across his right hand. In the sea spray it looked no more dangerous than a tailor’s pin.
The water fifty paces out went still. Then it rose in a broad swell that sent foam over the port side.
The crocodile came up. It was twenty-two feet long and broad as a beer wagon, with barnacles stuck to the plates along its back. Old blood darkened the spikes on its spine. Its yellow eyes fixed on the hull.
