Xuanyan stood there for a moment after Yanmei disappeared down the corridor. He exhaled slowly, rubbing his palm once against his robe as if that might ground him, then turned toward the room Yanmei had indicated.
Lingling's room-
The scent was the first thing anyone would notice. Sandalwood, faint but constant, laced with the sharper bitterness of medicinal herbs. A bronze incense burner shaped as a coiled serpent rested on a low table, a thin ribbon of smoke curling from its mouth, twisting upward in slow, deliberate spirals.
Xuanyan stepped deeper into the room, his gaze searching anxiously for Lingling but there was still no sign of her. Against the far wall, a slender bed crafted from dark spirit-wood caught his eye, its surface gleaming softly with a muted lustre. Above it, a line of carefully pinned talismans fluttered gently, their yellow paper inscribed with ink that shimmered subtly as the light danced across them.
