A Call to Fate

Chapter 9 - Cold and Cowardice

Talani turned around slowly from the door, looking back out into the tundra. True to form, there was nobody there. This was becoming a pattern. Talani sighed.
"What does that mean?" he spoke out into the air. The chances of getting a straight answer were, of course, slim to none, but he thought he might as well try. Nothing answered him except the howling wind that continued to ring out. By now the cold was beginning to bite, and he knew he had to find a way out.

He tried the handle again, and it turned, but still the door would not open. He shoved hard but it barely moved. Like the door to enter the barrow, he wondered if it was enchanted in the same way. He closed his eyes and tried to walk through, but it remained as solid as ever. He considered using his axe but even to him it was clear that this would be magic.

"I have conquered this puzzle" he asserted. "The fire is out. There are no games left to be played here. Release me". His tone remained bored, edging towards anger. The gods of this world were tricksters, and Hel was by no means exempt from that. The voice came again.
"You must yet know dishonour's shame" it whispered.

Dishonour was not new to Talani. He had dishonoured himself in the past, that much he knew, and he was still trying to atone for it.
"I have known dishonour" he called out "and its shame has led me to here."
"Then show me" came the reply "feel it burn anew. Let the flame of dishonour be reborn in your heart. As your blood has extinguished it, so too shall it rekindle it."

This was the closest he had come to an instruction so far, but it still made no sense. The cold was biting still, deeper and deeper into his thick skin, sapping the energy he had left. He had something to prove here. He knew he had to be better than this voice, better than what they all thought of him. He returned to the brazier. Picking the scab that was forming on his arm, he let his blood flow back out into it. He willed this new blood to light it again, but it just spilled more blood.

He reached for his flint and steel, and threw a few hopeless sparks. The fire had been sustained by magic, and he had none that could help him here. He was trapped, on his own, and with no way out that he could see. He walked around the door, which was standing by itself. There was no entry he had missed from the back, just smooth stone. He pushed on it anyway, willing it to give, but nothing moved. It was just rock.

His thoughts and movements were getting more and more sluggish. Each new gust was a gale driving a thousand shards of ice into him, and as sturdy as he was, he didn't have long left here to solve it. Maybe he was missing something on the door. He examined it carefully, checking for markings, looking at the hinges, the handle, the wood. None of it gave him any clues. He tried the handle again since he was here. The definition of madness is sometimes said to be 'doing the same thing over and over again and expecting results'. At this point, it wouldn't surprise him if madness was setting in.

The voice rose up to taunt him again.
"Dishonour yourself, and know freedom. Or die proud. The choice is yours." The wind snatched the last words, the whisper disappearing but the meaning settling in all the same. One gambit remained open to him, and he unslung his axe, holding it with fingers that could hardly grasp it. The last time he had tried this it had almost literally exploded in his face, but there was no other choice he could see.

Bringing what little of his strength he had left to bear, he swung the brutal axe in a wide arc, the heavy end picking up speed once it had reached beyond the tipping point. The wickedly sharp axe swept cleanly, and to his surprise, buried itself in the wood of the door. Splinters flew, and hope blossomed. He pulled it out of the gash with some effort, and swung again. Changing angles, he widened the hole, and a few swings later it was wide enough to start reaching a hand into. He tore into it, but something was wrong. There was nothing on the other side. He pressed his face to it, and the other side just held blackness. There was no sign there had ever been another room, only the endless void stretching out, like Ginnungagap itself.