Beginning of the Endless Night

Shaken but yielding, Charlotte gives herself over to the moment as Griffith guides her toward the bed and coaxes away her fear before slipping off her dress. Their night together plays out in silence on his part; even as the princess cries out, his mind stays locked on the man who left him that morning. A handmaiden, drawn by the noise, peers through the keyhole, catches sight of the pair, and flees. Across Wyndham, Casca searches the band's inn for their commander. Judeau, Corkus, Pippin, and Rickert tell her none of them have seen Griffith since Guts rode off. Heavy-hearted, she wanders into the room Guts once used and runs her fingers along the grip of his broken blade.

Once Charlotte drifts off from exhaustion, Griffith lies awake with tears on his face, his fingers pressed to the shoulder Guts grazed in their duel. Grief folds him inward until he curls into a ball. Come morning, the princess wakes alone; her calls go unanswered, though she finds the lodestone charm she had entrusted to him returned, exactly as he had promised. Lifting the sheets, she notices the blood from her lost virginity. Slipping out the way he came, Griffith is cornered almost at once by a ring of soldiers. Weaponless and outnumbered, he offers no resistance, and their leader orders him hauled away. Moments later the King forces his way into Charlotte's chamber, where her feigned innocence collapses under the evidence: the bruising at her throat, the rain pooled on the floor, and the stain beneath the covers he tears back. Understanding at last, he can only speak her name.

The chapter belongs to the Golden Age Arc and first ran in Young Animal issue 13, dated June 24, 1994, across twenty-two pages. It marks the pivot where Griffith's carefully built ascent starts to come apart, setting up his imprisonment.