The proof that linked the eleven journals was not merely the handwriting, nor was it the ink composition. Handwriting could theoretically be forged by a transcendent mimic, and silt-ink could be compounded from ancient formulas. The physical proof that shattered every lingering doubt lay in the eight-sided lead seal impressions stamped into the closure tags of each roll.
Qiao Ming stood beside the central well, the twelve-pound six-sided lead sinker resting in his left palm. The lead was heavy, dense, and cool against his skin, its surface pitted with small hemispherical indentations from hundreds of years of hitting underwater granite boulders at sixty deep-water lengths. On the fifth upright facet of the six-sided weight, near the base where the metal met the hollow animal fat cup, was a distinct clockwork flaw. A crescent-shaped gouge a tiny fraction of an inch long, left when an iron winch pawl had slipped during an emergency sounding at the Port of Pale Silt.
Beside him on the green red stone rim, Yan Zhiqiu had arranged the eleven lead sealing tags that she had carefully detached from the shark-skin cylinders. Each tag was a small disc of soft lead, half an inch wide, stamped with the seal of the Chief Water-scribe.
