The Grand Amphitheater of the Drowned Dao was a huge half-round theater carved directly into the living granite of the ocean-facing cliffs.
Fifty tiers of stone seating rose from the central orchestra floor toward a huge vaulted opening eighty arm-lengths wide that looked out upon the gray, foam-streaked waters of the outer ocean. Outside, the winter gale howled against the headlands, throwing plumes of white salt spray high into the overcast sky. Inside, the air was cold, clean, and filled with the somber, ringing boom of the breaking surf echoing through the submarine drainage water chutes.
At the center of the half-round stage stood the ancient Stone Altar of the Sea-Keepers. A slab of unpolished black red stone twelve arm-lengths long, carved with the names of the thirty-two coastal dynasties that had drowned beneath the rising waters of the first cataclysm.
Beside the altar stood Qiao Ming.
His oilskin coat was buttoned tight against the damp ocean draft that swept through the cliff-opening. His bare calloused feet were planted upon the granite threshold. His toes gripped the rough stone with the unbending security of an anchor fluke bedded in shale. The folded brass star-compass rested on the corner of the altar. The knotted lead line hung from his left wrist, its lead metal tube steady in the cold air.
