A Call to Fate

Chapter 4 - Shadows

They looked, and true to his words, there was a door handle, but no visible way to unlock it. Tove spotted something though. "There are some markings down here". The rest of them crowded around where she pointed. "Where?" asked Gialli.
"Here" she said, tracing her hand along a section of the door. They squinted, but could only really discern a knotted section of wood, perhaps with some lines in it.
"Would you care to explain to the rest of us?" asked Reg, impatiently.
"Oh yeah sorry it's in druidic" she said. "I don't think any of you have studied that but uhhhh... this isn't very helpful".
"Oh goody"
"Again this is a translation, but it says: "Look upon the door and see the way is shut""
"I'm sorry?"
"Look upon the door and see the way is shut. It's even signed 'M'"
"Are you joking?"
"No."
"Fuck."
"Yes."

There was a brief lull in the conversation at that. Each of them tried to contemplate the deeper meaning of the message, and decided it was bullshit. They could all see that it was shut. Was this a joke by the designer of it, a taunt to any would-be grave robbers?

"Odin wanted us to get in here, so it must be possible," reasoned Teclis. "I doubt he'd have given us an impossible task."
"Then why did he need us to do it, instead of doing it himself?" said Alf.
"I think this is more meant to be a trial."
"Well I think this is just awful. At least we have this thrilling opportunity to sit around here for hours staring at a door."

Tove later decided that tempting fate like that, having just invoked Odin, was possibly a mistake. This was immediately proven correct as the light held by Reg flickered. That was not meant to happen. Not to a light powered by magic instead of fuel. It flickered again.
"Uhhh, Reg" said Tove "what's going on?"
"I don't know" he replied. "That is a bit concerning."

The light guttered and stuttered like a torch in the wind, throwing strange shadows about them. "Alf," Reg whispered "maybe you want to try". Alf obligingly held out his staff, and light bloomed atop it. Faintly. "Hmm" he opined. "That's not very good either."

They all began to look around into the mist nervously. Based on what they had seen of those figures, they didn't want the lights to go out. "If anyone has any smart ideas about the door, now would be the time to share them" said Reg. Gialli got to work, crouching low next to the door and trying to examine the hinges. He barely had time to try and make any kind of proper study of it when he heard a loud shout of "Clear!" from behind him, and he dove to one side. He made it just in time before he heard to loud thump of Talani's heavy boot impacting by the handle. "What did we just say about trying to break it?!" he cried.
"I didn't feel that your method was achieving results" Talani replied.
"And that did?" He gestured to the still very closed door.
"That, was merely a first attempt." Talani gave a barely noticeable grin as he unslung a brutally large axe, easily the height of any other person there, and much taller in most cases since 3 of them were dwarves. "I find this often works though."

Talani swung hard, ignoring a few shouts from around him. The blade impacted the wood, but the sound was more as if a great drum had been struck. Those of them who had been facing into the mist span around, just in time for a solid wall of sound and force to smack them square in the face. They went tumbling, all thrown several feet on to wet earth, the little light they had flickering again, struggling to stay lit. Talani was shifted only a short distance, but that still spoke to the strength of the blast.

"Why in the hell did you do that!" Gialli yelled.
"Nothing was moving."
"You didn't give me any time!"
"We don't seem to have very much of that."
"I have to agree with the big man here." said Reg "This is not going to plan." As if to illustrate his point, the light he was holding went out fully, leaving them just in the weak light being provided by Alf. It sparked back to life a couple of seconds later, but several of them had spotted the faint outlines of the figures in the darkness during that time.