The emergency council meeting convened within an hour of Meridian's departure. Every settlement leader, every military commander, every person with relevant expertise crowded into Shadowhaven's council hall.
"Meridian was clear," Elion began without preamble. "The third assault will be total war. The Empire intends to destroy us completely, civilians included. We need evacuation protocols—now."
"Evacuate where?" Thomas asked. "The Empire controls most of the region. Where can thousands of people go that's beyond their reach?"
"The Verdant Sanctuary can absorb some," Yuki offered via communication crystal. "The eastern jungles are effectively impenetrable to Imperial forces. I can hide maybe two thousand people in the deep jungle territories."
"New Frost has similar capacity," Kira added. "The mountain territories are defensible, and I can create shelters from ice. Another thousand, perhaps fifteen hundred."
"That's three thousand people," Magnus calculated. "The League has over six thousand across all settlements. What about the other half?"
"The Coral Court offered underwater sanctuary," Naia spoke up. The mer-folk ambassador had been quiet throughout the war, observing. "Queen Meridian's palace can house surface dwellers temporarily. The magic sustaining underwater breathing is exhausting, but possible for weeks or months. We could take another thousand."
"That still leaves two thousand unaccounted for," Mira said.
"The Free City of Portside offered refugee status," Elion reminded them. "They can't provide military protection, but they can house people. And the Empire won't attack a neutral trade hub—too many international complications."
"So we have options, but they're scattered and insufficient." Garrick studied the maps. "We need to prioritize. Who evacuates first?"
The debate was painful. Children and elderly obviously took priority. But what about the fighters? The builders? The leaders? Everyone had arguments for why their group was essential.
"We can't evacuate everyone before the assault," Kael said bluntly. "Intelligence suggests the third fleet will arrive in three to four months. Moving six thousand people across hundreds of miles, some to difficult terrain, while the Empire watches? Impossible."
"Then we move people gradually," Mira proposed. "Small groups, using multiple routes, looking like normal refugee movements rather than mass evacuation. Spread it over the next three months."
"The Empire will notice," Senna warned. "Population decline will be obvious."
"Let them notice. By the time they realize what's happening, most vulnerable people will be safe." Elion looked around the room. "We start immediately. First group—all children under ten and their parents. They go to the Sanctuary where they'll be safest."
"Second group?" Helena asked.
"Elderly and infirm. They go to Portside where they'll have access to medical care and won't need to survive harsh terrain."
"Third group—skilled craftspeople, teachers, healers. People who can rebuild if the worst happens. They get distributed across New Frost and the Coral Court."
"That leaves the fighters," Garrick observed.
"Fighters stay until the end. We hold the settlements as long as possible, buy time for evacuations, then conduct fighting retreat to join the evacuated populations."
It was a plan that acknowledged reality—they couldn't win the coming battle. They could only survive it.
The evacuations began the next day. Ships departed carrying the first groups of children and parents. The separations were heartbreaking—families torn apart, children crying, adults trying to be brave while their worlds fell apart.
"We'll reunite after the war," parents told children. "This is just temporary. We'll see each other again."
Some believed it. Others knew better but pretended for the children's sake.
Elion watched the first evacuation ship depart, carrying eighty children and forty adults toward the Sanctuary. Yuki would care for them, hide them in the jungle where the Empire could never find them.
But how many more ships? How many more separations? How many families would never reunite because parents died defending the settlements?
The cost of freedom kept mounting. Elion wondered when the price would become too high.
Over the next weeks, the evacuations continued. Small groups departed regularly—sometimes by ship, sometimes overland, sometimes through magical means arranged by allied powers. The settlement populations declined steadily.
Shadowhaven: 680 → 520 → 380
Shadowhaven West: 180 → 110 → 70
New Frost: 1,420 → 1,100 → 850
Island Outposts: 85 → 30 → 15
The settlements were becoming ghost towns. Buildings stood empty. Markets grew quiet. The vibrant communities they'd built were slowly dismantling themselves.
"It's necessary," Mira kept repeating, like a mantra. "Saving lives is more important than saving buildings."
But it hurt nonetheless.
The Empire noticed, of course. Imperial scouts reported the population movements. But by the time they understood what was happening, thousands were already beyond easy reach.
"They'll hunt the evacuees," Kael warned. "Once the settlements fall, they'll try to track down everyone who fled."
"Then we make sure the settlements don't fall easily," Elion said. "We make the Empire pay such a high price that hunting refugees becomes secondary to licking their wounds."
The defense preparations took on new urgency. Every person remaining was a fighter or essential support personnel. The settlements transformed into fortresses, with every civilian comfort stripped away in favor of military efficiency.
Shadow soldiers drilled constantly. Militia trained until they could perform complex maneuvers unconsciously. Defensive positions were reinforced, supply caches hidden, fallback routes prepared.
"We're preparing to lose," Garrick observed. "That's the strange part. All this preparation isn't about winning—it's about losing slowly enough that others survive."
"That's still winning," Elion replied. "Just a different definition."
Two months into evacuations, Rashid approached Elion with a proposal.
"I want to return to the Emirates," the former flame-dancer said. "Not to retake territory—that's impossible. But to organize resistance. The Empire controls the land, but they don't control the people's minds. If I can build an underground network, keep resistance alive..."
"It's incredibly dangerous," Elion said. "You'll be in Imperial-controlled territory with a price on your head."
"I know. But I have two hundred loyal followers who came with me into exile. We're fighters, saboteurs, survivors. We could do more damage from inside Imperial lines than we could defending settlements."
It made strategic sense. A resistance network in occupied territory would force the Empire to divert resources to internal security.
"If you're caught, the Empire will make an example of you," Elion warned.
"If they catch me. I didn't earn the title Flame-Dancer by being easy to capture." Rashid's grin was fierce. "Besides, my people deserve better than exile. They deserve hope that their homeland can be free again. I need to give them that."
"Go with my blessing. But stay in contact. Your intelligence will be valuable."
Rashid and his two hundred fighters departed a week later, slipping into the occupied Emirates through smuggler routes. The Sovereign League now had an operative deep in Imperial territory.
As the third month of evacuations began, the settlements had been reduced to skeleton populations:
Total League population: 1,847 fighters and essential personnel
Evacuated: 4,320 people (safe in Sanctuary, New Frost, Portside, Coral Court)
Status: Awaiting third Imperial assault
The communication crystals flared with intelligence reports. Imperial fleets were gathering at four major ports. The assault was weeks away now, not months.
"This is it," Kael said during final strategy meeting. "Whatever we've prepared, we're about to find out if it's enough."
"It won't be," Elion said honestly. "The Empire's coming with everything they have. We'll fight, we'll inflict casualties, but eventually they'll overwhelm us."
"Then why fight at all?" someone asked. "If we know we're going to lose, why not evacuate everyone and abandon the settlements?"
"Because these settlements matter," Elion replied. "They're symbols. Proof that people can resist Empire, can build alternatives, can choose freedom. If we abandon them without fighting, that symbol dies. But if we make the Empire destroy us? If we force them to commit atrocities, to reveal their true nature? That symbol becomes a martyr that inspires others."
It was a grim calculus—trading their lives for propaganda value. But sometimes that's what resistance required.
That night, Elion walked through empty Shadowhaven. Most buildings were dark. The market square was silent. The docks had only a few ships remaining.
This place had been his vision, his dream of a free community. Now it was a fortress awaiting destruction.
But across the region, in the Sanctuary's jungles and New Frost's mountains and Portside's markets, four thousand people lived because of this dream. They were safe. They would survive. They would remember.
That had to be enough.