When the small party of four turned the corner and saw the fork in the road, they didn't really know what to expect. 

The frowning faces above the door implied something, every single one of them knew that. What they did not know, was that the rocky faces to start talking. Hawkes and Fetch immediately moved in front of Terrence and Solace, acting as a sort of brawny barrier between whatever else might come from the stones, and the two less mighty figures in the group.

"What do you think, Terrence, have you seen anything like this before?" Solace spoke up immediately, voice harsh and raspy as xir gaze flitted between Terrence and the stone faces, trying to read what he might say before he said it. 

Over the last few days, Terrence had become the natural leader of the group, with Solace naturally falling second into the chain of command. What Terrence hadn't seen in this part of the dungeon, usually Solace had, and vice versa. However, this time, Terrence bore a look of uncertainty as his lips parted to speak. "I'm not sure. The premise seems like something I've seen before, but I've never run into anything exactly like this before." He was staring hard up at the stone faces, his vibrant pinkish-maroon eyes glinting in the light of his lantern as he stared up. "I suppose we could ask them. It may be a 'one of us lies and one of us tells the truth' type situation." He snorted. "And devils know I've been through that enough times before."

Fetch stared up, her cold grey eyes pinning to the stones above the doors as haunting words dripped from her tongue like smoke. "Whatever the way, it's rarely one and never the other." 

"Helpful as usual." Hawkes grumbled under their breath, partly turning their head to look at the hawk sitting on their shoulder. They raised their voice for all to hear. "What if I sent Hawkey down one side and see if it's the way to go?" 

Solace let out a snort, shooting a glare their way. "And what, lose your poor hawk's life on a hunch? No. This is a logic puzzle. We can't just brute strength, it that won't work." They spoke with red-hot vitriol at the idea but were staring down at their own pet. Dusty was small, far smaller than the hawk, perhaps she could safely go- but no, as much as the idea might work xey weren't about to risk her. After all, xey'd grown strangely fond of the moth. She wouldn't leave and seemed very content riding around on xir shoulder or snacking on some article of xir bags or clothes. The idea of actively putting her in harms way made xem balk, hard.

"Let's just leave that idea to rot for now. Maybe they can help with scouting later, but until we figure this out no one is to lose sight of their pets. Am I clear?" Terrence spoke up once more, his eyes never leaving the stones above the two arch ways. "Now... I suppose we ought to actually try to listen to what these doorways are trying to say..." 

As he went quiet, the air seemed to fill the air with the compelling words of those little stone faces. "Great riches lie just beyond! Follow my pathway, and you will be legendary till the end of time!"

"No! Follow my path! You will find the greatest find of the century. They lie, they lie, they want you dead. Follow my path instead!"

Back and forth the voices spoke, grating like gravel and sand against each other. Their mossy beards wagged despite their unmoving mouths. It was unnerving to watch them, neither moved, and indeed it seemed neither could move, and yet clear as day voices tumbled out from the stone mouths. It was almost enchanting, Terrence and the others having already taken one or two steps closer than they had intended. 

"They seem rather fond of blathering uselessly." Hawkes blurted with a snort. "I can't make heads or tails of it. Do you actually think one of them is lying, and the other is telling the truth? Isn't there, like, a specific question you can ask them to figure out the answer?" They looked over at Solace, expectation written all over their face. 

"Well, yes there is a question like that. But we haven't really established whether or not they want to listen, or even if they can. The voices might simply be magic left from long ago, meant to lure people to their doom." Solace responded, tail swishing behind xem as they stared at the faces. "Terrence shall-" 

Fetch spoke up, cutting xem off as she pointed towards the door on the right with her muzzle. "Is that the door we should take?" Her head tipped partly to one side, her wide eyes and unsettling expression matching the unnerving energy from the guardians of the doors. 

Neither doorway answered her. Instead, they started their shpeal all over again from the beginning. 

"If you want to go far"

"You really aught to choose me"

"What if we somehow got someone up there and kicked the faces?" Hawkes cut off the statues before they could start their next line. Not that they actually stopped talking, Hawkes just had the miraculous ability to speak very loudly over everyone else in a conversation. It had started as a habit from their foal-hood and had never quite been taught to go away. And now Hawkes used it as a valuable skill. Both for annoying others and being heard when they needed to. A shame really that they had to speak right then, though, both Solace and Terrence were straining to listen, trying to figure out if there were any clues within the long droning of the two overhead statues. 

"Hawkes, I swear I will tie you up and leave you right here if you do not shut up!" Terrence spoke up, shooting a powerful glare their way in hopes they'd get the message and stop talking for at least long enough for them to hear all that the statues said. The rocky faces continued, but it wasn't much help. They talked over each other and seemed to try and race ahead of their companion in order to persuade travelers to follow their path. If there was a clue, it was for someone who knew what it was they were looking for, and between the four of them, they really didn't know.

Solace quietly cleared xir throat. "Do you think it was a clue for those who came long before us? I feel as though I am missing something important every time they speak. As if I was expected to know some clue before I even entered the room." Xey glanced around at the others, partly hoping someone else had gotten the same feeling as xey. Terrence and Fetch slowly started to nod, the first of the two's brows furrowing slightly as if trying to think of something. Hawkes only started nodding when they saw the others. There was a reason they were there, and it wasn't for their brains. 

Terrence started pacing about the room, head down, searching and sniffing around for... something. No one was quite sure, but they soon were all snuffling about searching for clues in the room, staring into corners, poking at strange rocks and squinting at oddly specific shaped pieces of moss on the walls. Either because they were bored or they were compelled by Terrence's fervor, it was unclear why Hawkes and Fetch to suddenly start snuffling about. All the while, neither Terrence nor Solace said it, but both of them were thinking that the clue they needed to piece all the random information together was in this very same room. Maybe it wouldn't be all there, time had this bad habit of wearing things away, but if they could find even a small piece of it, maybe, just maybe they could get through this unscathed. 

After a long, quiet-ish hour of searching, Hawkes eventually spoke up. "What if we just walked through one doorway?" They raised a hoof before anyone could raise a voice. "No, I know it might sound stupid, but I really think I'm on to something. What if there is something behind the door and both faces are lying. What if they both lead to the same place? Maybe it only looks like there's a split in the path. Maybe it just widens out, and the talking heads were there to distract people and dissuade them from trying it out."

"Are you saying that you think the original designers of the place wanted to confuse and scare people out of continuing on from here, and that you think the whole thing is a ruse?" Solace asked slowly.

Hawkes nodded, then continued on with their thoughts. "You and Terrence both could agree that you felt like the answer was obvious. Well... what if it is?"

"You want us to just... go through a door, then?" Terrence blinked as he spoke, seemingly swaying between telling Hawkes they were stupid or that saying they might be on to something. Regardless, everyone was getting tired of the constant looping drone of the talking stones.

"I mean, you and Solace are supposed to be the smart guys. No offense meant. But you can't seem to put together what's what in this specific place. SO, what if we just went through the door and found out!" 

A heavy silence flooded the room as they all stared at Hawkes. It seemed like none of them could really figure out whether or not the courser had just saved them from hours and hours of pointless deliberation, or sentanced them all to certain doom. And now, now they were all waiting for Terrence's say on whether they went with the idea or continued to stare fruitlessly around a room that was filled with nothing but age-old dust and rather impressively large clumps of moss. Eventually, after what felt like ages of quiet between them, Terrence spoke.

"Well then... after you."