An hour before dawn, fog rolled off the outer reef. It smelled of dead kelp and sulfur. It swallowed the horizon and muffled the slap of water on the Sea-Serpent’s hull.
Pei Jing stood at the stern after another two hours of practice begun after midnight. The Ledger counted them on the new day. Drops of salt water gathered on his robe and ran to his wrists. The schooner slowed as it entered the deep channel through Dead Tide Shallows. Limestone teeth rose through breaks in the fog. Five feet below the water, shelves of coral waited to tear the keel open if the helmsman strayed.
Old diver Bao was checking the diving bell near the mast. His hands stayed on the valves. His eyes kept going to the port rail.
“The wind died twenty minutes ago,” he said. “Tide’s slack. A man who knows this reef can take a catamaran over it on push-poles. A boat this heavy will sit here like a beached whale.”
Jin Shan stood at the aft stairs in an oiled sealskin coat, a compass in one hand and an ironwood staff in the other.
“Two on the sounding lines,” he called softly. “If it shoals any more, drop the kedge.”
