In the quiet center of the Tier 2 pool, the surface of the stone water was as still as polished black glass.
Lin Xiao remained swelled in his broad, semi-clear blue raft form, bobbing weightlessly beneath the rising twin moons. The warm water cradled him with easy floating lift, its heat humming at a constant thirty-nine point five degrees. Beside his floating edge, Xiao Hei’s steady, deep breathing provided a gentle, rhythmic anchor to the silence.
A small trickle of water, displaced by the gentle movement of bathers on the lower steps, escaped over the notched cedar coping at the pool’s northern edge.
Trickle... Drip... Trickle...
The sound was faint, barely louder than the rustle of a moth’s wing against a paper lantern, but in the calm night air, it caught Lin Xiao’s undivided attention.
His fluid senses tracked the little stream as it slipped over the dark, oiled storm-cedar lip. It didn’t force its way through the timber. It didn’t roar or demand passage with violent pressure. It simply found the lowest notch in the wood, cascaded softly into the smooth dark rock drain, and flowed smoothly down toward the lower terrace gardens to nourish the roots of the wild alpine irises.
