Chapter 421 Nothing would stop him

Viola held out her hand, and Wave rested his watery one on top of it. A soft light emitted from where they touched. At first, nothing happened, and just as she was about to point that out, a familiar voice began to speak inside her head.

“Serena, it’s me, Ivy. If my message reaches you, I believe you already know that I am doing fine, and I want you to know that I am in desperate need of your help…”

Viola’s eyes became emotional at the sound of her sister’s voice. However, Ivy sounded so distressed that Viola forced herself to push her emotions aside and focus on the message.

“Yasmin, our cousin, has been captured by some of the land-dwelling werewolves. I need your help finding her exact whereabouts. She has a family back here, a child, a mate, and our aunt, her mother. Serena, I don’t want to burden you or reach out to you like this after so many years apart, but I am desperate. I just need you to follow my instructions and sing so we can track her. If anything happens to her, her mate will never forgive me… nor the werewolves…”

Viola listened as her sister explained her relationship with Yasmin, unaware that Viola had already met the mermaid and had seen their relationship through her memories. Ivy went on to describe how everything would fall apart for their aunt if anything happened to her only child.

“Please, Serena…”

The message ended there, and Viola stared at Wave, who looked back at her as though silently asking what she planned to do now.

Until now, Viola had only seen her sister through Yasmin’s memories, but hearing Ivy’s voice made everything feel so much more real. Her heart swelled with a happiness she hadn’t thought possible after believing Ivy was gone forever, though that joy was dimmed by the desperate circumstances that had finally brought them back together.

“I’ll need to talk to Sebastian before I see Zoe.”

Saying that, she stepped back into the shower to rinse off before heading into her closet, with Wave trailing behind her. Under normal circumstances, Viola would have told him to stay outside before he drenched all her clothes, but she was too preoccupied with how she was going to start the conversation with Sebastian.

Once she finished getting dressed, she didn’t even stop for breakfast. Instead, she headed straight for Sebastian’s office, where she assumed he would be.

However, when she got there, neither Sebastian nor Matt was there, and she frowned before walking away.

Viola even checked his penthouse but still couldn’t find him. After searching every place she thought he might be, she asked one of her bodyguards to mind-link the warriors at the training grounds and confirm whether Sebastian was there.

When they told her he wasn’t, Viola suddenly had a feeling she knew exactly where he was, and she immediately started walking in that direction.

“We’re going to see the Mermaidia in the nobody water!” Wave exclaimed excitedly as he leaped ahead of her.

By the time Viola reached the place, she had already begun preparing herself to sing in pink again.

Instead, she was met with a shocking sight.

The guards were gone.

The door had been left wide open.

Her heart skipped a beat.

She quickened her pace, but before she could even step into the lab-like room, Wave came leaping back out, shouting,

“The other Mermaidia is gone!”

As if refusing to believe him, Viola hurried inside.

True to his words, the tank stood empty, just like every other tank in the room.

Her heart slammed painfully against her chest.

“Where could she have gone?” she whispered, her face paling. A horrifying thought struck her.

“Could it be Sebastian already…”

•••

Meanwhile, far from where Viola was, in another part of the building, the unconscious mermaid was wheeled into a room where the Supreme Alpha, Doctor Gilbert, and Matt stood watching as the prized creature was brought in.

Sebastian stepped aside as Gilbert opened the large, coffin-shaped glass containment pod where the creature lay unconscious, looking almost peaceful.

The doctor ran his fingers lightly over the shimmering scales on her tail before saying,

“She is still well hydrated. We only have two days before the sacrifice, Supreme Alpha, and just as my grandfather’s books say, we need her to become dehydrated. It takes two full days for a royal mermaid to reach that state.”

“I thought mermaids couldn’t survive out of water and would begin dehydrating immediately,” Matt questioned, looking down at the magnificent creature, her glowing scales shimmering across both her tail and midriff.

“The royals are different.” Gilbert examined one of her shimmering scales, a jewel so precious that only the pearl tears of a royal mermaid were considered more valuable.

“They possess a natural water reserve within their bodies. Even if they remain out of water for several hours, it won’t immediately affect them. It takes approximately forty-eight hours before dehydration truly sets in.”

He gestured toward the unconscious mermaid chest. “Right now, her heart is protected by a powerful enchantment, gifted by their Goddess. Even unconscious, we cannot cut it out. If we tried, her heart would release a deadly toxin that would affect everyone around her instead. That is why I ordered her removed from the water first.”

Sebastian silently studied the creature as he listened to Gilbert’s words.

Although he had heard countless stories about mermaids throughout his life, this was the first time he had ever seen one in person… and in her full glory.

Her tail sparkled brilliantly beneath the lights, though Gilbert had assured him the glow would disappear once dehydration set in over the coming days.

What he couldn’t ignore, however, was the faint resemblance she bore to his wife.

The shape of her nose… the curve of her face…There were similarities.

They were likely related through the mermaid who had given birth to Viola, Sebastian concluded.

Even so, that changed nothing in his plans for the creature. He had reached a point where turning back was no longer an option.

His conscience, already small when it came to the creatures he blamed for the curse he’d carried all his life and suffered through it, had become even easier to silence.

As long as she wasn’t Viola’s twin sister, he didn’t care who he had to sacrifice to achieve this long awaited goal.

He would use the mermaid to protect his wife from the consequences of his mark…and to cure the disease he himself had inflicted upon his brother.

This month, there would be no switching. This full moon, his wife would finally carry his mark, and his mind would finally be at rest.

“Hang her up.” Sebastian ordered, stepping back from the glass and allowing his men to move forward and pull the creature from the water. While Gilbert filed his reports, the men hung her against a tall stand, binding her with rope woven to withstand tremendous strength.