Rusty Iron Rings That Bind

Serpico, with Puck alongside, tracks Isidro down outside the Seahorse and shares Schierke's plan to work a ritual that will locate Casca. He explains that with the island's foundation and its great cherry spirit gone, most of the witches are losing their power, though the visitors from elsewhere are spared the worst of it, leaving Schierke as their last hope. She begins the rite and asks Farnese and the others to guard her body while she falls into a trance, telling a curious Roderick that the working needs everyone present to fix their attention on a single point, magician or not.

Magnifico assumes she has merely dozed off, but his sister hushes him: their mistress is stretching her awareness into the Astral World and beyond. Schierke's luminous body drifts free of the ship, and she spots branching shapes across the sky she knows as the dragon path reaching to the horizon. Drawn by a thick current of Od flowing in one direction, she reasons that only a single place could pull in such concentrated energy and follows it. Below, Guts stumbles toward the Dragon Slayer as the blade throws off a dark shadow and the Beast of Darkness springs loose, tempting him with promises of strength.

Shaking, Guts seizes the sword and swings at the Beast, and as it seems to scatter he sees a naked Griffith poised atop the blade, an image that leaves him sweating cold and vomiting on the floor. The Beast keeps goading him, insisting that while the Brand of Sacrifice still marks him, his body and soul remain fit for violence and revenge. At that moment fighters in Kushan dress storm the Seahorse, brushing past the young mages with ease and pressing on until they reach the hold, where they find Guts face down and gripping his sword's hilt.