Down by the ocean shore, a gate stood in front of the town. The placement seemed odd: I could only assume that a road must have once passed between the crumbling pillars and onward to the west, the track now serving caravans of crabs rather than merchant wagons.
I walked down to the beach with my travelling companion to investigate further. Passing through the gate and turning back to face the town, I could now see the giant faces carved into the front of the pillars: one on each side sculpted from smooth white stone, the details still remarkably clear considering the crumbling state of the rest of the structure. Both faces: vaguely male, bald, the necks long and broad. To my left: a face-filled with violence, a single horn jutting from the middle of the smooth forehead, leaning forward to direct the point at the sculpture opposite. To my right: a similar face, but with broken horn and leaning back with an expression of open-mouthed fear.1
I turned to my companion and asked what she thought it represented, but to my surprise it was not she who answered but rather the face on the right. This is the tale it told me:
"Long ago, before there was the sea, my brother and I marked the border between the West and the East. We both held our horns high, knowing that neither could pierce the other without himself being pierced. But the power of the East waned, and the Duke of the West, seeing his opportunity, sought to expand his domain. His army passed through the gate, the peace was broken, my horn was broken, the King of the East fled to lands unknown. When my horn is found, there will be peace again."
I glanced at the sea. "There is peace now. And the West is lost beneath the waves, unless there remains a fishing village or two on some distant island."
The face scowled. "The men who rule now are the descendants of those who came from the West."
"They seem to rule well enough, and the conflict you describe is long forgotten."
"The East demands justice!"
"Well then, where is your horn?"
"It lies somewhere on this beach, buried beneath the sand." It turned towards a stone brazier which stood near the gate. "Fill it with holy water, and I can search for my horn."2
Driven by curiosity more than anything else, my companion and I found a church in the town and discreetly obtained a small amount of holy water. We poured this into the brazier, where it burned with a pale blue flame. A tall figure stepped through the gate. The face was identical to that of the statue, including the broken horn, the body more or less human other than an odd lengthening of the proportions.
The figure immediately set about digging in the sand with its powerful arms. The holy water quickly burned down, and my companion and I took turns venturing into the town to obtain more. Several hours passed as the statue-spectre tirelessly tore apart the beach, never seeming to grow frustrated despite the lack of any trace of the lost horn.4
Finally, just before sunset, the figure paused in its digging, stood erect, and disappeared. My first thought was to check the holy water, but it still burned. My companion and I ran and looked down into the hole, but it was empty. It was only when we looked back to the gate that we saw that both statues now had their horns. However, they were not raised as the statue had told me they had originally been positioned; rather, both statues now directed their horns at one another, the tips nearly touching the other's forehead.
"Now what?" I asked the statue.
"We wait," it replied, and then fell silent.
My companion and I sat out on the beach all that night, first by the light of the remaining holy water, and then by the light of the moon. At some point we must have both fallen asleep, for we awoke in the mid-morning to the sound of jangling metal. The fog had rolled in during the night and now covered everything, so we waited for the source of the sound to draw nearer. Within a few minutes, a group of men, about a dozen in number, emerged from the mist. All were armed and wore an emblem I did not recognize, though it bore some similarity to the faces carved into the gate.
The apparent leader—a short thin man, a sword slung over his shoulder, gray of hair though he still appeared young—spared us only a quick glance before turning his attention to the gate. He stood a moment while his men waited: considering the gate, the town, I know not what. Finally the group passed through the gate and were lost from view as they turned down the streets. My companion and I followed, uncertain about what had just transpired and how it related to the events of the previous day, and whether the appearance of these strangers boded good or ill in the days to come.5
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Notes:
1The statues looked like something pulled out of a Yoshitaka Amano painting.
2This story sounds a bit like the intro to the opera from Final Fantasy VI, or like something out of Jack Vance's Dying Earth stories, what with all the empires lost beneath the waves and wars that happened so long ago that no one even remembers them. I believe I had just finished rereading Rhialto the Marvellous the night before this dream.
3Anyone who has played the later Castlevania games knows that holy water obviously burns blue.
4The digging scene again calls to mind one of Jack Vance's Dying Earth stories, in this case the episode at Flutic where Cugel takes up employment digging through the mud and slime for the scales which composed the body of some ancient god.
5Definitely some political themes going on, the message of which I believe should be self-evident.
