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She stretched her arms above her head, examining her long, elegant fingers with evident delight and confusion. Every movement was fluid, predatory—unmistakably the same being I’d known, but revealed in her true form for the first time.

“I…” she began, her voice both achingly familiar and thrillingly new—the same voice I’d heard before, but now vibrating through the air with rich, melodious tones.

She pressed a hand to her forehead, eyes wide while flashes of memory seemed to surface.

“I remember…fragments. I am Melo, but I’m also…

something more. Tilki Ruhu.” The ancient words came hesitantly, as if from a dream she was only beginning to recall.

“What—” I stammered, quickly pulling off my traveling cloak and throwing it to her with trembling hands. “Melo?”

She caught the cloak with inhuman grace and wrapped it around herself, though she seemed entirely unbothered by her previous nakedness. Her movements were still uncertain, as if she were rediscovering her own body.

"The pieces are falling into place now, but it's like trying to remember a dream. I wasn't transformed into a fox—I was trapped in this form, my true nature suppressed." I stared at her, my mind struggling to process this revelation.

"You mean... all this time..."

"All this time, I was something else entirely. Your father's binding was meant to protect both of us—me from those who would misuse Tilki Ruhu's power, and you by ensuring my complete loyalty. But it required making me forget what I truly was."

The implications crashed over me in waves. Every conversation, every moment of companionship, every time I'd confided in her—she'd been so much more than I'd ever known.

“But what were you being punished for?” I asked softly.

Melo’s expression grew rueful while fragments of memory coalesced.

“I was reckless. Young. Stupid. I used my abilities to interfere in human affairs, to play tricks that had consequences far beyond what I intended.” She shrugged with elegant nonchalance, though uncertainty still clouded her features.

“The Council of Spirits decided I needed to learn…something. Humility, responsibility. The details are still hazy, but I remember being bound to a family they described as ‘self-sacrificing do-gooders.’”

Her voice softened, more memories surfaced. “But they couldn’t have known that being bound to your family would teach me something far more valuable than whatever lesson they intended.”

“What?” I asked softly.

"Love," she said simply, the word coming with surprising clarity.

"Real, unconditional love. Not the kind that comes with conditions and expectations, but the kind that simply is.

" She took a step toward me, and despite her transformed state, I still felt the same protective warmth I'd always known from her.

"I was assigned to you as punishment, but I became your protector by choice. That much I remember clearly."

“Your power has grown, Ada,” she continued, and gestured to my still-glowing skin while more understanding dawned.

“Far beyond what it once was. And your desperation to reach Kiraz, your fury at being caged…it awakened something in me that had been sleeping for centuries. The binding was strong but not absolute. Until now.”

A distant rumble of thunder shook the castle walls, pulling us both back to the present moment. The air grew heavy, charged with an energy that raised the hair on my arms.

“Well,” Melo said, her lips curving in a smile that was both familiar and entirely new, “that didn’t take long.

I can feel his rage from here—it’s practically radiating through the walls.

He’ll feel it,” she continued, her head tilting as though she listened to something I couldn’t hear.

“The destruction of his precious things. The bond between you two?—”

“He knows,” I whispered, a mix of satisfaction and apprehension coursing through me.

The temperature in the room plummeted without warning. Frost crystallized on the shattered glass, on the scattered papers, creeping across the floor like skeletal fingers. A cold wind howled through the corridors, carrying with it the scent of winter and barely controlled rage.

“Brace yourself,” Melo murmured, and moved closer to me with that predatory grace that was somehow even more pronounced in her human form. “Here comes your shadow lord, and he is not happy.”

The doors flew open with such force they were torn from their hinges, splinters of wood exploding inward as shrapnel.

Hakan stood in the doorway, darkness undulated around him as if they were living things, his eyes burning with blazing green fire. Power radiated from him in waves, the air trembling with contained violence.

For a moment, his gaze swept the devastation—centuries of collected knowledge reduced to ash and splinters, artifacts of immense power now nothing but glittering fragments on the floor.

Something flickered across his face—not just anger, but genuine loss.

This room had been his sanctuary, his center of control, and I had obliterated it.

When his eyes returned to me, the cold fury in them had intensified tenfold.

“Who the fuck is this?” he demanded, shadows coiling tighter around him while his gaze fixed on Melo.

“This is Melo,” I said. His confusion satisfied me. “My pet fox. Turns out she’s been much more than that all along.”

“Your fox?” His eyes narrowed, shadows flickering while he processed this information. “Impossible.”

Before I could answer, Sarp appeared behind him, weapon drawn.

He turned back toward the corridor and gestured sharply for the responding guards to stay back, then entered the room fully.

The moment he caught sight of Melo, he stopped short, his mouth actually dropping open.

His sword lowered as he stared at her with undisguised fascination, his eyes widening while he took in her ethereal beauty wrapped in my cloak.

“I—” he started, then seemed to lose his train of thought entirely.

His gaze traced her form with almost reverent attention, the weapon in his hand completely forgotten.

A flush crept up his neck, and he swallowed hard, his usual composure utterly shattered.

He kept glancing between Melo and the potential threats in the room, clearly struggling between duty and fascination.

Melo’s eyes gleamed with ancient knowledge as she assessed him, though uncertainty still flickered in her expression.

She seemed to find something that pleased her despite her own confusion about her transformation.

She favored him with a smile that was equal parts predatory and flirtatious, her fox-like nature evident in the calculated grace of her movements.

“We haven’t been formally introduced,” she purred, and moved to stand slightly in front of me, protective despite her apparent nonchalance. She extended a hand toward Sarp with elegant precision. “Though I’ve heard quite a lot about you from Ada.”

Sarp’s eyes flickered briefly toward her outstretched hand before returning to her face, as if afraid she might vanish if he stared away too long. I’d never seen him so thoroughly captivated.

“Sarp!” Hakan snapped, his voice cutting through the spell. “Watch her. I need to remind my wife of her place.”

Something dangerous flashed in Melo’s eyes—a reminder of the powerful being beneath the beautiful human exterior, even if she was still piecing together what that meant. But she moved aside with calculated grace, though not before shooting Hakan a look that could have frozen fire.

“Don’t do anything you’ll regret, Shadow Prince,” she warned, the title coming across as an insult from her lips.

Hakan’s attention returned to me, to the destruction I’d wrought on his private sanctuary. The temperature dropped further when he stepped fully into the room, frost spreading from each footfall.

“What,” he said with deadly quiet, “do you think you’re doing?”

I stood my ground, refusing to cower. My plan was working—he was furious, off-balance, focused entirely on me. His rage was exactly what I needed to break through his defenses. Now comes the dangerous part.

“Redecorating.” I let defiance ring in my voice. “I thought the place could use a more chaotic aesthetic. Something less…controlled.”