Kain had dreamed of the Tower of Zot for years without realizing it, an ominous monument darkening the skies of his nightmares. It called to him, beckoning, urging him closer, to the very heights of the world never seen by any other mortal.
Now, finally standing within, Kain understood it. The Tower of Zot, with both the Wind Crystal and Wind Archfiend, hummed alive with alien power. Its walls had been constructed with thin slits through each wall of stone, to allow the passing of currents throughout all the rooms, embracing the outside wind and taking in their whispered secrets. Barbariccia swept through the floors of the tower, slicing across each floor like a determined tornado, tasting the winds from each face of the tower: north, south, east, and west.
The first time she went through the tower, she returned to the top floor, where Kain and Golbez awaited. "I hear everything," Barbariccia said, words heavy with the weight of her newfound knowledge. "The whole world over. I…" She swayed uncertainly and Kain stepped in to take her by the elbow, holding her steady; she didn't seem to notice, her eyes wide and glazed over, unfocused.
She continued, "Baron hangs a prisoner, legs kicking in the air as she strangles. Overhead, crows fly in wide circles, patiently waiting for the feast." Barbariccia sucked in a breath, as if she felt it herself, and Kain wondered if she did. She exhaled audibly, now sounding relieved. "Richard and the Dragoons return with Rubicante, flying fast toward us, with the stink of blood on their weapons and hands." Barbariccia blinked hard a few times, lashes fluttering, then steadied herself, no longer needing Kain's support. "There's much more, but it is hard to know what to focus on."
Other times, Barbariccia would suddenly appear to declare something.
"Troia searches for something in the woods, but will not say it out loud, for fear of discovery," she told them in a breathless gasp, before disappearing again.
Another time, "There's smoke in the chimneys of Mist again; a new people have settled there and are repairing the village."
Whatever Golbez made of her news, he did not say.
But it wasn't until she blew in and announced, "Off Baron's coast, the sailors of a sinking ship cling to debris, crying out for salvation," that finally caused a reaction.
"Was it Cecil's ship?" Kain asked before he could stop himself, the question coming from both himself and from Golbez's pressing thoughts.
Barbariccia closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them, nodding. "They're Fabulian sailors. Their prayers are to the lost Wind Crystal."
"Ready a ship," Golbez said tersely.
Kain was still not sure where the Tower of Zot actually was in the world, but when they emerged from the clouds, they were close to Baron. Kain felt a strange emptiness at the thought of returning. Being home meant nothing without Rosa and Cecil, but he knew there was no way to go back to how it was before. Now, Rosa was a prisoner and Cecil lost at sea; Kain doubted either would survive.
As the ship descended, Baron Castle came into view, only now it seemed just lifeless stone, without the energy and joy it used to contain within its walls.
Together, Kain and Golbez disembarked, and made their way through the castle to the throne room. As they moved through the halls, servants actively avoided them, hurrying to be in another hall, while the guards stood as unobtrusive as possible as Golbez and Kain passed. Golbez did not acknowledge them, while Kain kept his eyes on the floor, trying to ignore the range of emotions he saw openly on people's faces.
In the throne room, Odin awaited, seated on his throne.
"Lord Golbez," Odin said, sounding somewhat surprised. But that quickly faded as Odin asked formally, "Have you come to report?"
"A ship from Fabul sank on its way to Baron and there are reported survivors," Golbez told Odin. Kain knelt before the throne, as was custom, but Golbez ignored the protocol and remained standing. "Send your men to check the coast for any who may wash ashore and capture them alive," Golbez continued; it sounded strangely like a command. "I want to know what their mission was."
Kain was surprised when Odin did not scowl at being ordered about, but instead, nodded in agreement. "If they're in the waters, I'll find them," Odin said with an eerie smile that showed all his teeth.
Hours later, Kain and Golbez stood on the shores east of Baron, watching the ocean stretched out before them, mirroring the sky above. Red Wings marines walked up and down the beach, watching the surf line for any bodies that might be thrown out by the ocean's current.
The methodical lap of waves against the rocky beach was suddenly disrupted by a large wave that crashed violently against the shore. In its foamy wake were four men, gasping for air, crawling through the shallow water and sand. Behind them, rising from the sea foam was the strange turtle man – Cagnazzo – looking triumphant, his empty mouth wide in a terrible smile.
"Lord Golbez," Cagnazzo said, sweeping into a bow. "The water brings its tribute."
For one heart-wrenching moment, Kain hoped one of the men might be Cecil, but saw only three sailors in foreign uniforms, and, to Kain's surprise, the monk who had tried to protect Cecil in Fabul's Crystal Shrine. Somehow, the monk's presence was infuriating – how could he survive but not Cecil?
Golbez gestured at the men, and marines surrounded them. At first, the sailors looked relieved at their rescue, but that quickly faded, as each was yanked roughly to their feet. The monk betrayed nothing, his face calm and neutral, even as he was being marched across the sands to be presented to Golbez.
"Yang Fang Leiden," Golbez announced, naming the monk. "What is a Fabulian ship doing in Baron's waters?"
"What do you care what worms do?" Yang asked, echoing Golbez's words back to him, of their first encounter in Fabul's Crystal Shrine. "Be a shark in the sea if that is your nature but concern yourself with bigger prey. Fabul offers no resistance."
Golbez chuckled. "I underestimated you back then. But I will not make the same mistake twice." He took a step forward toward Yang. "Was Cecil Harvey on your boat?" Golbez asked, all humor gone.
Yang said nothing, still infuriatingly calm.
"Perhaps I will have to find a more persuasive way to ask," Golbez remarked as he turned away, cloak swirling around him with the movement. "Come," he said, gesturing to the marines, who began closing in on Yang and the sailors. "Let's show our guests their due hospitality."
To Kain's surprise, Yang did not resist, allowing himself to be lead off the beach and onto the road that led into Baron. Kain became aware of Yang watching him, but the monk's expression was tranquil and blank, with no apparent comment on what he might think of Kain or his situation. It made Kain wildly uncomfortable, and he hurried ahead, trying to ignore the weight of Yang's gaze on his back.
Inside the castle, Golbez sent the sailors straight to the dungeon, but kept Yang, instead taking him into the royal wing. Kain's stomach sank when he realized their destination – Odin's sparring room, where Golbez had first violated Kain's mind and corrupted Kain from the inside out.
"I find the best measure of a man is muscle against muscle," Golbez said, striding across the sandy pit of the sparring room, following the script of when Kain was first here, the words paralyzing Kain in place. But Golbez did not make any move to start taking off his armor, but said instead, "Fight my champion, monk, and we shall learn much of each other."
Kain, now compelled into action by the unspoken command, began pulling his helmet off. He felt Yang's eyes on him again, heavy but still without comment, making Kain wonder if the monk feared or pitied him. The uncertainty continued boiling within him as he unarmored himself.
Would you rather have pity or fear? something in him prompted. He thought suddenly of Cecil on the first day they met, fear making his eyes go wide as Kain lifted his fist over him. Hadn't Kain liked that so much better than later, after Richard had supposedly died, when Cecil looked at him with such crushing pity?
Which would you prefer? the voice asked, despite already knowing the answer.
Help me, begged another, somewhere deep and hidden within Kain.
Barefoot and bare-fisted, Kain took up a spot in the sand circle.
"I will not fight you," Yang said. Despite the declaration, he took up position opposite of Kain, his arms folded neatly over his chest.
"It's not me you need to worry about," Kain said through gritted teeth, looking momentarily aside to Golbez. He stood tall and silent, imposing in his dark armor, watching them both from the empty eyes of his helmet.
Something flickered over Yang's face, a brief betrayal of what lurked under his calm surface: fear. The monk's posture shifted subtly as he settled into a defensive stance and brought his fists up.
Kain couldn't help himself and grinned madly, but there was no real humor in it, only a delirious relief that Golbez's attention was focused on someone other than Kain and Rosa (or Cecil), at least for the time being.
Kain wasn't specifically trained in hand-to-hand combat but had learned the fundamentals from his boyhood brawls with Cecil and cadet training. He could never hope to best a seasoned monk of Fabul, where martial arts were not just a part of the military, but a cultural art form. Kain saw it now, in how Yang gracefully avoided each of Kain's punches, either ducking under or spinning nimbly away, or redirecting the force of each blow, turning it harmlessly aside. It reminded Kain of a river rock poking up above the water's surface and how the water easily parted around it.
But it wasn't Kain that truly threatened Yang, but Golbez, lurking nearby, patiently watching the fight unfold. Yang seemed to eventually sense it, casting quick glances aside to Golbez, worry knitting his brow.
Just as Kain was starting to flag, his last punch lacking the strength of the previous, Golbez spoke softly from the side, "On Mount Hobs, was it hard to watch your men die? To be so helpless as they were slaughtered?"
Yang froze, his eyes distant in remembered horror, but was brought quickly back to the moment as Kain tried to strike again. Instead of repelling the attack, Yang seized Kain by the wrist, and, using the forward momentum of Kain's body, flung Kain aside, sending Kain sprawling to the ground.
"I could make it so you're never powerless again," Golbez said, barely audible, but Kain knew that the words were also echoing inside Yang's head, searching for a way in. "You'd be more formidable than any foreign soldier who dared set foot in Fabul."
As Kain pushed himself up off the floor, his ego more bruised than anything else, Yang was slowly shaking his head. "I know the venom you hide behind your honeyed tongue. I will not be swayed by your offers, no matter how tempting."
"No?" Golbez countered. "We shall see."
Both fighters took up position again, only this time Yang seemed less sure of his stance, blinking hard several times as if to clear his head. Still, he was ready to meet Kain's fists again as their fight began anew.
Golbez's insidious probing became apparent as Yang gradually slowed down, until Kain finally made his first successful hit, his knuckles cracking on Yang's cheek. Yang stumbled back, looking stunned, his eyes glassy and unfocused.
At Golbez's nod, Kain attacked again. After that, Yang's defense crumbled away, and like Kain only weeks prior, it was all Yang could do just to protect his head. It was not unlike fighting a target dummy. Kain struck wherever he could reach, a new fury fueling his muscles. Kain knew the real battle was now inward, inside of Yang's own mind, as Yang fought to keep Golbez out, while Golbez searched for a crack in Yang's resolve, some unfulfilled want or desire that Golbez could manipulate.
As it went on, Yang soon fell to the sandy floor and was unable to get up again. He curled up on his side as Kain kicked him repeatedly in the stomach, his attacks now lacking finesse and preciseness, only striking wildly, like an angry child. Kain's rage continued to burn in growing outrage – how could Yang still be resisting? Kain wondered, the thought growing bitter as he continued to dwell on it. Was Yang so much stronger than the average man, that he could offer such a stalwart resistance, or was Kain simply weak-willed and fell too easily?
"Stop," Golbez said, the command halting Kain in place, mid-kick. For one giddy moment, Kain considered disobeying, his new desire to break Yang nearly overwhelming his fear of Golbez. But as Golbez pulled off his helm and set it aside, Kain was halted by Golbez's eerie resemblance to Cecil, and felt a new wave of shame, as if Cecil himself was judging him.
Golbez approached the sandy circle, and knelt beside Yang, who had rolled to his back, sand clinging to the sticky blood that streamed down his mouth and nose. Yang coughed wetly as he spit out both blood and sand. "Tell me to make it stop, and I will," Golbez said, voice softly soothing. "You need only ask, and I can give you anything you've ever desired."
"I will not yield to your temptations," Yang said, his calm tone in sharp contrast to his terrible condition.
"Enough!" Golbez growled in a rare display of frustration. "If you are the kind of man who will not compromise your ideals for wants, then perhaps it's better if you remember nothing at all." He sighed, then looked up at Kain. "Go and say your goodbyes to Baron, you won't be returning for a while. Be ready to leave tomorrow morning."
"But—" Kain started to protest.
"Go," Golbez repeated, looking suddenly weary. "Take your complicated feelings elsewhere for now. I need to concentrate, and you…" he hesitated, then finished more quietly, "You think and feel too loudly."
"I…" Kain sputtered, feeling painfully embarrassed at Golbez's comment. Leaving his armor behind, he hurried out of the door, abandoning Yang to whatever fate awaited him.
Kain moved through the halls like a possessed man, unaware of anything or anyone around him, his mind empty, as if to hide from Golbez's accusation. He continued in this daze as he exited the castle, ignoring all he passed and any words they may have muttered in his wake.
Down the road into Baron Town, he immediately Jumped to the rooftops, desperate to avoid everyone. Whether it was instinct or a deliberate choice, Kain could not tell, he soon found himself on the Inn's roof, looking across the market square at Rosa's house.
Rosa was not there, Kain knew, and she probably would not help him even if she was. No, that wasn't true, Kain corrected himself – Rosa would always help, no matter how at odds they might be. All Kain would have to do is utter two words (Help me) and Rosa would do anything to save him. This knowledge shamed him, that even as a captive, Rosa was selflessly brave and still looking out for him. While Kain, free in his body if not his mind, could not muster the strength to help himself, only continuing to cower from the terror of what Golbez might do next.
It was nearly evening, and at this time, the market square was typically busy with last minute purchases while vendors closed their stalls and people hurried home for dinner. Kain became aware of the suffocating silence; he looked around to see only guards on patrol.
Kain heard the creaking rope before he saw the body, spinning idly in the wind. It hung from a tree beside the Item Shop, at the entrance to the market square, as a warning to all who entered.
Baron hangs a prisoner, legs kicking in the air as she strangles, Barbariccia's words came back, this time mocking him for ignoring them.
Kain dropped to the ground and sprinted across the square, desperate to be wrong. He recognized her first by her dark brown hair, then, as she continued spinning around, her distorted yet familiar face. Her eyes were still open, wordlessly accusing Kain of his sins against her.
"Marion!" Kain shouted, as if he possessed magic and could summon her back, but her only response was the ongoing creak of the rope protesting the weight of her hanging body. Kain dropped to his knees, feeling bile in his throat, and thought he might vomit; it had been too many hours since his last meal, however, and he only gagged.
Marion, a girl whose sole crime had been loving a selfish man. How had it gotten this far?
"Get up!" A woman's voice demanded, as Kain was grabbed by the shoulders and yanked to his feet. Joanna stood before him, her face stern and serious. But as she fully saw Kain, her expression turned to surprise. "What happened to you? You look like a Ghoul."
Kain looked down at himself, and realized his hands and forearms were streaked with Yang's drying blood, now looking black in the dimming sun overhead. He laughed, the sound abrupt and jarring in the stark silence of the market square. "My mother's a Revenant, you know," he announced, biting back hysterical laughter. "My father's back, too. He's not undead, though, just an asshole."
Joanna blinked in surprise, then frowned. "Are you ill?" She reached up, briefly placing her cool palm on his forehead. "Bewitched?" she asked, now whispering. Her eyes searched his face for an indication of either. "Come with me," she suggested in a gentle voice, slipping comfortably into her role as a healer. "Before you say something that gets you arrested," she added, casting a concerned glance around, to see if any guards watched them.
Kain followed her unquestioningly, like a chocobo chick following its mother, secure in the knowledge that their mother would guide them safely through the danger. Kain had never had the feeling before, hadn't known he was missing it until that moment. But now that he knew of it, he felt its absence, a hollow, deep ache for yet another thing he would never truly have.
Inside the Farrell home, Joanna had Kain wash his hands and arms first, the water in the basin turning a murky red brown before he was finished. Then, she sat him at the kitchen table, while she fussed with a kettle on the stove.
"There's a strange, dark magic in you," Joanna said, without looking up. "And I think it's muddling your thoughts. Do you feel clearheaded?"
"No," Kain answered. "I don't know," he corrected, shaking his head. "Sometimes, I feel like my thoughts are my own. Other times, I feel a strange force leaning on me, new impulses pushing me, encouraging all my…" he hesitated, then looked aside, "My less noble thoughts," he finished, now staring at his hands in his lap.
Joanna said nothing at first, glass clinking as she opened a bottle and dumped it into the kettle. "When are you expected back at the castle?" she then asked.
"Tomorrow morning," Kain answered absently.
Joanna poured the kettle's steaming contents into a cup, then brought the cup to the table, placing it before Kain. "You look like death warmed over. This tea will settle your stomach."
Kain peered into the cup. Had anyone (other than Rosa, of course) cared for Kain like this? It was such a small gesture, so overwhelmingly maternal that Kain didn't know how to react. He looked over uncertainly at Joanna, who smiled encouragingly and gestured for him to drink.
Kain wrapped his hands around the cup, enjoying the warmth in his palms and fingers, then lifted it to his mouth and took a sip. It was too hot, burning his tongue, and he breathed through his mouth to try and cool it off quickly.
"It's not your fault Marion was killed," Joanna said, her tone almost conversational despite the grim words she said. "Odin would have found any reason to execute her. Not for anything she did, but because of her father."
"What do you mean?" Kain asked, now swallowing the tea, enjoying the warmth as it spread to his belly.
"He refused to keep making weapons for the military," Joanna said, her voice seeming suddenly distant. "He told Odin he wouldn't contribute to his war any longer." Joanna paused, and when she spoke next, she sounded strange and distorted, as if she spoke underwater, "The very next day, Marion was executed. No formal charges, no trial, no chance to defend herself."
"I don't feel well," Kain announced. He abruptly stood up, his legs tangling in the legs of the chair, making him stumble. He fell against the table, knocking over the cup, spilling a dark puddle that seemed to flow all around him. "W... what did you do to me?" Kain asked, slurring as he spoke.
"Only containing you for a short while," Joanna said, infuriatingly matter of fact, sounding so damn much like Rosa.
"You…" Kain said, pointing an accusing finger at Joanna. The edges of his vision began to darken, starting to close in on him. "You back-stabbing bi—" Kain was cut off, words lost as he came crashing down, the world going black.