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</div><br/><br/>The timing of Esperanza's question ironically coincided with a thinning of the bleak grey blanket of fog that stretched out before the trio.  What loomed just ahead of them upon the narrow path that was wide enough for a single wagon to traverse seemingly answered the question without Katya having to even part her lips.  As the dense mists pulled back like a curtain that was revealing a stage an aged battlement of weathered granite rose up out of the fleeing gloom that had obscured their vision for so long.  Somewhere in the distance beyond the parting veil of fog the sound of thunder echoed through the valley and broke the silence.<br/><br/>The gateway into Barovia was massive enough to rival any such structures found in Krotice.  Heavy stone walls pressed out of the thicket of impassable trees and underbrush that threatened to suffocate the narrow trail.  Jutting from the impenetrable woods on both sides of the road, the high stone buttresses loomed up out of the gray fog that fell across the ground like a slowly swirling carpet.  Towering iron gates hung wide open from the stone work, gently creaking as a growing breeze wafted through the yawning portal.  Dew clung to their rusted bars with a cold tenacity, eating away at the still sturdy gates with a timeless patience.  Silently standing guard upon the flanks of the decrepit gates of Barovia were a pair of mountainous statues.  Armed soldiers that were wrought out of stone held titanic swords that were pointed downward between their feet. Patches of damp moss clung to the cracked and fissured headless sentries.  The heads that had been removed from their broad shoulders lay buried at their feet, mostly hidden beneath dense layers of weeds and shrubs.<br/><br/>The approaching dark clouds were revealed over head as the roof of branches receded as the trail drew near the waiting gates.  The coming  outburst of the storm was preceded by a soft drizzle of bone chilling rain that fell from the angered heavens.  A light sheen of moisture began to cling to the land as the fading sun hinted to the inevitable fall of night that was soon to press away the meager rays of the sun that managed to pierce the darkened clouds that boiled above.  A flash of lightning stroked like an angry brush across the sky, it's thunder booming as the tempest began to strengthen.  Wind lashed across the trail, spreading debris and crackled leaves across the path before the group.<br/><br/>To the far left side of the gate near the forests edge a cluster of bushes and tall reeds shifted and shook in a manner unbecoming of the winds handiwork.  The source became quickly apparent as the squawk of vultures rose up out of the underbrush.  Their grizzly bloated forms were busy plucking their sharp curved beaks into some unseen carcass.  Beady pools of black from one of the handful of scavenging beasts turned to discover the group upon the road.   With a toss of its long narrow neck upwards a morsel of decayed flesh was swept down its gullet before it let out a horrid call.  Large wings flapped at the stale air as a cacophony of shrieks rose from the gathering of vultures.  Their heavy grotesque forms ascended upward, leaving their unseen meal behind as they circled about before coming to perch high above upon the upper reaches of the crumbling gates of Barovia.<br/><br/>As the vultures watched and licked their claws clean a view beyond the open gates of iron was afforded.  The weed plagued uneven dirt road carried onward in mostly a straight fashion until the covering fog painted the horizon with its deep grey glaze.  The closely clustered forest parted like a wave crashing into the bow of a galley and in the dwindling light that remained high reeds and grasses reminiscent of moors framed the roadway as it disappeared into the low hanging clouds of fog that persisted.  Without the umbrella off the forests canopy overhead the ground had grown softer.  Not quite soft enough to sink a boot into, but yielding enough to leave a print where one had tread.