The third watch of the night arrived without the chiming of bells or the calling of the watchmen.
Qiao Ming stood upon the northern stone railing of the threshold terrace, forty arm-lengths above the floor where the refugees lay sleeping. His bare feet gripped the rounded coping of white banded limestone, his horn-hardened toes curling over the carved relief of stylized sea-reeds that decorated the top stone ledge. The stone was smooth and dry, having shed the dark stone dampness of the lower nine hundred entry halls. Below him, three thousand four hundred living souls rested upon mats of dried eelgrass and bleached hemp. Small cook-fires of dried willow drift-wood had burned down to glowing crimson embers, their thin, sweet smoke rising into the vaulted darkness like incense offered to an empty sky.
In his left hand, Qiao Ming held the Folded brass star-compass. He had loosened the brass wing-nut that secured the rete, allowing the pierced silver plate of star-patterns to rotate freely against the climate plate. In his right hand he held the small bone straight-line, its narrowed weight hanging steady against the graduated limb of the instrument. The eight facets of the plumb-bob were calm, untouched by the underground drafts that usually swept through the lower galleries.
