The preamp and amplifier do not communicate with each other. The amplifier gains the signal from the preamp and the preamp does a negative voltage gain on the signal (the volume pot reduces the voltage from the source then it’s amplified it to a lower voltage than the source before sending it out to the amplifier. Which is why a preamp does more harm than good with only one source attached).
For example, a CD player puts out a constant 2V signal. This is the reference voltage for the preamplifier and is designated as 0dBFS. That means that any voltage below 2 Volts will be a negative dB. So when the volume setting is at "-20dB" the 2 Volt signal from the CD player is output at 0.2 Volts. Turn the volume to "-10dB" and the preamp puts out 0.6 Volts.
The amplifier takes the preamp signal -- no matter what it is -- and gains it up by the rated dB gain. If the amplifier clips (say) at 1.3 Volt signal input, then that would be (1.3 / 2) fraction of the CD player voltage which would be "-4 dB" on the preamp volume setting, so a 16 dB range of turn from the "-20 dB" position is the amount of volume knob travel available before clipping.