They both look young. Late teens. One of them is wearing a drab olive-green jumpsuit without any patterning or patches, along with boots. It looks old, and the color seems faded. He has the muscular build of an athlete, or someone who works in a very physically demanding job. His hair is black and buzz cut. His skin is pale.

The one clinging to his back is wearing a puffy shirt with lace, and a blue waistcoat with yellow raised millefleur embroidery. On his head, he has something like a felt bonnet covered entirely in moss with flowers pinned onto it. It's clear from the uneven pattern of the flowers and some torn moss that some of the flowers fell or were ripped off. He has high waisted brown trousers and leather shoes stained with fresh grass and dirt.

He hadn't changed before he left, because he wanted to be early enough to do scouting. He realizes this isn't the best clothing you could have for an operation like this, but, whatever.

They are now in a room. It is not the room that used to be outside Kandrad's room. It is lit by covered lanterns mounted to the walls, and besides a few coatracks, it is empty. Opposite the door they came in is a hallway that bends to the right after a dozen or so feet. The flickering of fire light and the soft murmur of distant conversation emanate from that bend in the hallway.

The door silently closes behind them.

This is not the interior of the castle.

Kandrad puts out his arms and stops himself with his flow. He's graceful enough with it that he manages to land without making a large thud, though it does still make a sound.

Damjen almost screams, but clamps a hand on his mouth to stop himself. Unfortunately, this imbalances his hold on Kandrad, and he awkwardly flops onto the floor, cushioned slightly by the bedsheet-bag. He quickly picks himself up and steadies himself as best he can to prevent himself from exposing them in spiritual hearing.

They don't go further into the hallway. Supposing that the wall is made of dead material (green wood would be considered alive, but seasoned wood would not), he ought to be able to look through the two walls and see the people that are talking in his spiritual sight.

He can't see through any of the walls. Or the door.

Huh? But it's not being impeded by living matter...is he going blind? He looks at his hand, then at Kandrad, then back to his hand, then has his gaze rotate around his hand to keep in peripheral vision. He closes one eye, then the other, repeating the process.

He doesn't look back at the door. They are not going back to Kandrad's cell.

He can still see the energy flows of Kandrad and his hand, in all parts of both his eyes. He's not going blind. What is going on here???

He grabs Kandrad by the wrist, holding the bag in his other hand, and they walk just to the edge of the turn. He rolls his steps to make them quieter. He looks at Kandrad, taps his ears, then points to the space beyond the bend.

Got it. 

The typical technique he would use to sense without seeing is the semi-autonomic spatial sensing technique Grandpa told him. But that involves sending out his flow throughout the whole room, tying it to his breath, then detecting the minute changes and blockages. It would surely expose them to any flow or eye mages.

Instead, he relies on the passive empathic senses of his flow. What emotions are being expressed in the group? Fear, anger, frustration, sadness, contempt, happiness, contentment? How strong are they? He can try to intuit how many there are based on the strengths of the emotions, but it's very unreliable — some people can be very emotional and some can be very unemotional.

Focus, contentment, happiness, something else bizarre and difficult to read that kind of resembles anticipation. It seems like three to five people.

What an odd set of emotions. Contentment and focus are plausible together, but he can't make sense of the anticipation.

He realizes that this is his first time vicariously living through the empathic senses of another type of mage, but he quickly pushes away the thought. Now isn't the time for philosophizing about qualia.

They'll wait a few more minutes. Does the quality or intensity of the emotions change? Do some leave or enter? It won't be obvious from the emotions whether or not people enter or leave, but it would typically come with an abrupt change in the composition of the emotions — though regular conversation might cause those to arise too.

At one point there's a burst of excitement from some of the people, disappointment from others. Probably there are at least four people, plus the one with weird emotions that are hard to decipher. That one continues to feel something-like-anticipation, increasingly colored with amusement as the minutes pass, but the murky illegible depths below that surface seem to be constantly changing.

Ughhhhhh why won't they leave so they can pass...he clamps down on that thought and suppresses it, for fear of alerting the flow mages to their emotions. Is he seriously going to have to wait for hours again.

Well, he did sign up for it.

Kandrad stands ramrod straight, preternaturally still except for the movement of his breathing, a byproduct of his flow training. Unlike Damjen, Kandrad is very used to having totally nothing to do for long stretches. He can totally Just Wait.

After another half-hour or so, the normal emotional presences leave. The weird one remains, weird as ever.

Okay...he's getting kind of tired of waiting. But he also doesn't want to try and get past the Weird Emotion Entity. It's one against two, sure, and he has no doubt that Kandrad can very well handle his own, but his eye magic doesn't do anything for him in a fight. Well, theoretically he could use it to detect weak spots and strike the most vital areas...but it's all for naught, since he has exactly zero combat training.

How far away does Weird Emotion Entity seem to be? Maybe he's close enough to be able to smell them. If so, he can get an intuition as to whether or not they're the type of person quick to or slow to anger, or whether or not they're kind or cruel, on a broad level.

They aren't that far away. This person is probably slower to anger than anyone Kandrad has ever met, generally kind (although that's dependent on context) and almost entirely lacking in cruelty. He has a pretty good feeling about them, probably one of the best of all the people he's met.

His sense of smell has never failed him yet.

Fearlessly, he steps across. His posture is open, neutral, but he says nothing.

Damjen has to suppress another scream, and he angles himself to have sight of Kandrad but not of Weird Emotion Entity.

If Kandrad's instincts say it's fine, then he's not going to gainsay him. But he's also not going to allow himself to be in the sight of Weird Emotion Entity.

The hallway leads to a large room with wood-paneled walls, high coffered ceilings, and a large fireplace at the end. Comfortable-looking chairs and couches line the walls, while the center of the room is filled with round tables surrounded by chairs, some of which look like they aren't designed for humans. The only person in the room is a woman in a cream-colored dress with a veil draped over the top of her head, sitting in a chair next to the fireplace.

(She is clearly weird emotion entity. When Kandrad enters the room, her emotions change to something... strong, positively valenced, and very complex. That's about all he can figure out.)

She rises to greet him.

"Greetings, and welcome to my refuge. I am called the Hearthkeeper."

She's not speaking dzwejwej, but they both can tell what she's saying effortlessly. They might not even notice, if they're focusing on what she's saying and not the sounds she's making.

The room looks so pretty! He smiles despite himself. He's glad that she's glad and that she didn't react negatively to his presence.

"Hello, Hearthkeeper," he says.