The morning arrived soft and golden.
No wind, no rain. Just warmth that slipped in through the windows like a kindly guest. Sunlight danced across the teacups drying on the shelf and painted long rectangles on the tatami floor of the Stillness House.
Xu Qingling sat in the garden with a linen cloth spread before her, sorting petals from the morning harvest. Each one had been picked in silence, the way she believed flowers listened best.
Meanwhile, Lin Mu trimmed the plum trees by the stream, careful not to cut what the birds might need.
Neither of them spoke.
They didn't have to.
Some mornings carried their own dialogue—spoken in rustling leaves, poured into tea steam, or placed gently in a woven basket.
---
After breakfast, Xu Qingling opened the guest journal to a new page and drew a small sketch of a flower drifting across water.
Below it, she wrote:
> "Some things never arrive loudly. But they arrive all the same."
She smiled faintly and set the book aside.
It was a quiet day.
They didn't know yet that the petals drifting in the wind would bring something unexpected.
---
Just after midday, a young girl appeared at the gate.
She couldn't have been older than ten. Her school uniform was neat but dusty, and her black shoes were scuffed at the toes. She held no bag, carried nothing with her, and said only one sentence:
"Is this the place that helps you find lost things?"
Xu Qingling knelt in front of her.
"Sometimes," she said gently. "What have you lost?"
The girl bit her lip. "Not a thing. A person."
"Someone important?"
The girl nodded.
"My mother."
Xu Qingling didn't press. Instead, she reached for Lin Mu, who had just stepped into the courtyard.
"Would you like a cup of tea while you wait?" he asked.
The girl hesitated. "Children don't drink tea."
"This one's different," he said. "It listens."
---
They sat her in the Wind Room and brought her a warm cup of Dreampath, softened with milk flower and a drop of honey-leaf.
She sipped slowly, legs swinging from the bench.
No tears. Just silence.
After a few minutes, she spoke.
"My mother didn't die. She just left. One morning she said she was going to get dumpling wrappers. But she didn't come back."
"How long ago was that?" Xu Qingling asked softly.
The girl looked up. "Three years."
---
They didn't ask how she had found her way here.
Some places don't require directions—only a need.
Lin Mu offered her a linen pouch with loose tea leaves.
"You can steep these in warm water when you feel lonely," he said. "They won't bring her back. But they'll hold you for a while."
She turned the pouch over in her hands. "Does it have a name?"
Xu Qingling glanced at Lin Mu.
He smiled. "Not yet. But maybe you can name it."
The girl thought for a long moment.
Then whispered, "Not Gone."
---
She stayed for another hour, then stood up, bowed like she'd seen in old movies, and walked out the gate.
Neither Lin Mu nor Xu Qingling followed.
But they left the door open a little longer than usual.
---
That evening, the sky turned the color of apricot skin just before dusk.
Xu Qingling returned to the portable world to collect wind-blossom petals. She found them spread like snow beneath the newly expanded Memorybloom vines. The standing stone circle shimmered faintly in the distance, unchanged but watchful.
She plucked a single petal and held it in her palm.
It fluttered once, though there was no breeze.
When she returned, Lin Mu had already brewed a fresh pot using a handful of jasmine, osmanthus, and a trace of Not Gone.
The blend was soft, almost fragile in the mouth—like something you could hold but not keep.
They sat on the porch, drinking slowly.
"This place keeps becoming," Xu Qingling said.
Lin Mu nodded. "The more we give it, the more it gives us back."
---
The next morning brought an older man—shoes worn, jacket torn at the sleeve, but eyes filled with alert kindness.
He walked straight to the Wind Room, bowed to the structure, and sat without saying a word.
Xu Qingling approached gently.
"Have you come for tea?"
He shook his head. "I've come to listen."
Lin Mu brought him a cup anyway—Windkeeper, steeped with extra snowmint.
The man drank slowly, staring at the sky above the open roof.
After his second cup, he spoke.
"My wife passed last winter. Fifty-two years we were together. She used to whistle through her teeth when she cooked fish. I hated it. Now I miss that sound more than anything in the world."
Xu Qingling sat beside him.
He pulled something from his coat pocket—a tiny carved wooden whistle. He handed it to her.
"Put it somewhere the wind can carry it."
She accepted it with both hands and, after the man left, hung it on the edge of the Wind Room, where the breeze gently coaxed out soft, uneven notes.
Not a song. Not quite.
But close.
---
A new idea took root that evening.
Lin Mu suggested a Petal Table—a round surface in the courtyard where guests could leave something small. Not offerings. Not burdens. Just fragments.
Xu Qingling carved the tabletop from an old camphor slab. She sanded it until the grain gleamed like flowing water. Around the edge, she engraved a single sentence:
> "Things left gently may return in kind."
By the end of the week, the Petal Table held:
A single origami crane, folded from tea paper.
A bundle of sage tied with red string.
A bus ticket dated ten years ago.
A broken wristwatch that still ticked when held close to a cup of tea.
Each item was left anonymously.
Each day, one would vanish.
Not stolen. Not moved by hand.
Just… gone.
And in their place, sometimes a flower bloomed where none had been planted.
---
That night, Lin Mu looked out over the tea fields under the stars and whispered, "How far can this go?"
Xu Qingling joined him, resting her head on his arm.
"As far as someone needs," she said.
They brewed a pot of Petals in the Wind, their newest blend—rosebud, honey leaf, and one single wind-blossom steeped just before boiling.
The flavor was gentle, hopeful, and fleeting.
Perfect for the changing season.
---
End of Chapter 24