Three generations ago the water went out of the bay and stayed out. What it left is a basin of grey silt eleven miles across, with the old harbour towns still standing around its rim, still calling themselves ports.
Living on the rim
The towns kept their piers. They run out over nothing now, and the families that own them have not given them up, because a pier is still title to the water that is coming back.
Going down
The silt holds a footprint for about a day and swallows anything heavier than a person within the hour. Everything anyone has ever taken out of the Hollow was carried by hand.