Azul opened his mouth, but no answer came out.
"No!" Mera snapped. "For God’s sake, no, Azul!" His hands clenched into fists. "They’ll be enslaved. The lucky ones might survive. The unlucky ones..." He swallowed hard. "The unlucky ones won’t."
Azul stared at him in silence. "The Devourers don’t care about us," Mera continued. "They don’t care about our children, our elders, or our homes. To them, we’re nothing more than prey."
The young prince lowered his head. His hands trembled. To be honest, he wanted to argue, he wanted to tell Mera that there had to be another way, maybe a better way.
However, deep down, he knew his brother wasn’t lying. Another violent tremor shook the ground beneath them and the palace walls groaned.
Somewhere in the distance, people were screaming. "They’re here! The Devourers! The Devourers are here!"
"Listen to me, Azul," Mera said as he grabbed both of his shoulders. "I know you’re scared. I am too."
For a moment, the older prince looked nothing like the calm and reliable brother Azul had always known. He looked exhausted, terrified, and heartbroken.
"But we don’t have time anymore," Mera added.
Azul bit his lip so hard it almost bled. "What about Mother?" he whispered.
Mera’s expression softened for a moment. For the first time, he looked away from Azul. "I don’t know," he admitted softly. "All we can do is hope for the best."
Azul lowered his head. He still didn’t agree with what his parents were planning to do. A part of him wanted to argue, to insist that there had to be another way, but Mera’s words had finally started to break through his stubborn thoughts.
For the first time, he found himself questioning all the simple, ideal answers he had been holding on to.
In the end, he stopped resisting and allowed Mera to guide him wherever they needed to go.
The moment the two brothers climbed into the carriage, one of the soldiers immediately snapped the reins.
The giant seahorses at the front let out sharp cries before surging forward, pulling the carriage away from the palace as fast as they could.
Azul and Roxanna stood behind the carriage, staring at the kingdom fading behind them. The Devourers, made up of many different sea beastkin races, surged through the water like a storm.
Spears flew through the city and slammed into buildings, sending debris drifting into the sea. Cries of fear echoed everywhere as people swam desperately toward safety.
The soldiers did their best to guide the civilians away, but not everyone was lucky enough to escape.
"Sybill..." Azul gasped. His eyes locked onto one of his older sisters and realized that she was still inside the city.
Her long blue hair flowed behind her as she moved through the water. Her expression was serious and focused as she helped the citizens escape one by one, refusing to leave anyone behind.
"Why isn’t she running away?" Azul asked.
Roxanna took a deep breath before answering quietly. "Maybe she knows her chances of surviving are very small, so... she chose to stay."
"But that will be dangerous for her!" Azul shouted. His pupils darted wildly as he kept looking back and forth between his younger self inside the carriage and his sister. "The Devourers will certainly make her life a living hell if she’s captured!"
For royalty, death at the hands of an enemy was often considered a mercy, especially for women.
The younger Azul might still have been too innocent to understand that, but the Azul standing beside Roxanna knew better.
Captivity was a nightmare. If he, a man, had suffered so much during his time as a prisoner, then Sybill would suffer even more.
People who had never experienced captivity often believed they could endure it, but once they were trapped inside that nightmare, they quickly learned the truth that sometimes death was easier.
Azul had never suffered as much as Calen or Cyrus had, but he had suffered at the hands of people who found him on the beach and at the hands of the evil Roxanna.
"We have to save her." Azul suddenly looked panicked. He slammed against the back of the carriage and shouted at Mera and his younger self. "Hey! Hey! Look behind you! You have to save her! You have to save her!"
His memories were still tangled and incomplete, but he could remember that Sybill was one of the sisters who had helped him collect colorful pearls and shells. In fact, most of the things he had brought to the Vixeria Settlement had been gifts from her.
"Azul. Azul." Roxanna tried to hold him and calm him down. "Azul, this is just a memory. You can’t ask them to save her." Her voice trembled slightly because she wanted to save his sister too.
"But she’s going to suffer!" Azul shouted as he turned toward her. "If I don’t save her, then—"
The words died in his throat because a moment later, he realized he was yelling at the wrong person. His shoulders slowly dropped as he whispered, "I’m sorry..." He rubbed his face roughly. "I’m sorry for shouting at you. I didn’t mean to."
"No, it’s alright," Roxanna reassured him. She cupped his cheeks, trying to ground him. "It’s alright, Azul. How about you close your eyes so you don’t have to see it?"
"I have to watch." His voice was barely above a whisper. His eyes darted back and forth, filled with fear, but no matter how scared he was, he forced himself to keep looking. "I have to see my memories."
Roxanna stared at him for a moment before giving a small nod. "Okay," she said softly. "Then we’ll watch together."
They turned back toward Sybill and neither of them spoke. They could only watch as the Devourers finally reached her.
Sybill fought back, but there were too many of them. In the end, they dragged her away and threw her into the iron cages they used to capture mermaids.