Kire followed, though not too close, still feeling wary of traps, or at least attempts to deceive her and lead her down some other path to keep her from discovering their real hideout. Though when the woman led her to the stone, Kire had an inkling it was a hidden passageway of sorts. More testament to this sorcerer’s prowess, then. The aura grew stronger with each step, and as she passed through the ‘stone’, Kire could faintly smell tobacco. She cocked an eyebrow at her guide; for some reason, she seemed to delight in the whole affair. The expression didn’t seem malicious, so Kire shook her head, paying it no more mind. 

The smells down here were much more pleasant than the welcome she had the other day at Ziad. This was place the exact opposite of that: alive, and somehow thriving. It felt like a proper refuge, the kind Kire wanted for her own family in exile. Even more, Kire wondered how Rulitus could refuse this life, if he really did know who this sorcerer was. What could have been so terrible that the man would cut himself off from others the way he had? Kire, though was startled out of her thoughts upon entering the main chamber. 

[i]A boy. How many people were living here? Are they all survivors from Ziad?[/i] She was about to ask her guide when she saw finally what her features were like under her hood. The similarities to the Kartaians were there, as she had wondered earlier, but the differences were even more pronounced. [i]Envy?[/i] When the woman turned to her and complimented her hair, Kire broke into her first real smile since coming here, albeit a small one. The woman had such an easygoing manner about her, or perhaps her first two days with Rulitus had weighed her down so much she hadn’t expected to encounter this sort of warmth. “Thank you. I like your eyes,” she said, allowing herself a brief grin as she returned the compliment. Kire decided she liked this person. “Uh. What, or who, is ‘Envy’?”