James Galloway - The Tower of Sorcery

Now he was mad at her. He'd built up a perfectly acceptable reason to hate her, and she'd managed to destroy it with that one eloquent sentence.

They travelled for the rest of the day moving in a southerly direction, through virgin forest that had probably never known the footsteps of man. Tarrin listened to Jesmind during those times that she spoke, describing the trick of willing the change into cat-shape, and warning him in advance about how the change would affect his body and mind. When he wasn't listening to her, he was watching her. He had to admit that he was fascinated by her. He was used to dealing with strong women, but his mother was nothing like this . Every move she made was like a demonstration of her power, and she carried herself as if she owned the world. Every little move she made was a clear symbol of her dominion. She was strong, wise, authoritative, and she knew it. But on the other hand, her movements and some of the looks she gave him were not overbearing, but interested, curious, compassionate. She was a woman of strength, but she didn't beat him over the head with it. She was content with herself and her life, and that fact was obvious in her demeanor.

"I'm starting to think I have a hole in my shirt," she said bluntly after a time.

"What?"

"You're staring at me," she told him. "If you didn't notice, that makes our kind a bit uncomfortable."

"Sorry, just seeing what it looks like from the outside," he told her.

"The same as it does on me," she said. "Except for certain differences," she added as an afterthought, motioning at her breasts.

Tarrin looked away from her, wondering at the wild changes of attitude he'd felt towards this woman just since the morning. From hate, to distrust, to suspicion…and now to the first inklings of respect, and even a bit of trust. He trusted this woman, he discovered. In very many ways, he was a child, and almost instinctively, he was reaching out to someone that he thought could make everything better, someone to quiet the fears, someone to put an arm around him and guide him. Jesmind represented that person, he realized. She was that person, the only person, that could help him make sense out of the chaos that had become his life. Her sincere regret and resolve to help him had helped break down the anger he'd felt for her just that morning, allowing him to look on her with new eyes.

And look at her with new eyes. She was beautiful. There was no doubt about that. And he was starting to dread having to disrobe in front of her.

"The cat is strong when we carry its form," she told him later that day, after his long contemplation of her and his situation. "The longer we stay a cat, the stronger it gets. Expect to have to take a lesser role concerning some of the instincts when in that shape. But for you, I think it will help, because those things that try to affect your mind now will be much clearer to you when you allow them to express themselves, instead of bottling them in."

"I hope so," he said sincerely.

"Have you been having dreams?"

"Yes, but I can't remember them," he replied.

"They do go away, in time," she assured him. "They're your mind getting used to the instincts. As you settle in with them, the dreams will get weaker and weaker, until they go away." They stopped for a moment next to a huge oak tree, that was on the edge of a small clearing that was dominated by a fallen log and a large carpet of moss. The light was starting to dwindle. They had walked all day. "This looks like a good place to stop," she said. Then she pulled the strings of the laces on her white shirt.

"What are you doing?" Tarrin asked.

"I'm taking off my clothes," she told him with a steady look. "You do the same. Chop-chop, I want to get you through this at least once before sunset." And with that, she pulled the shirt over her head.

Tarrin made himself look. In just a moment, there wasn't going to be anywhere on her that would be safe to put his eyes, and he wasn't about to fuel her amusement. She stared right at him as she pulled her long, thick red hair out of the neck of the shirt, and he returned her gaze with the same calm. He did well, right up until she unbuttoned her trousers. He looked away right as she pushed them over her hips, working on the laces of his own shirt.

"Look at me," she commanded. "It won't do you any good not to look. You're going to see me, no matter how hard you try not to."

He met her gaze shyly, and she smiled at him. It wasn't an amused or malicious smile, it was one of compassion. "I know it makes you uncomfortable, but the quickest way to get over that is to meet it head on," she told him. "Don't look at my face. Look at me, all of me. I'm not embarassed, so you don't have to be either."

She stood there calmly as he did as she said. He looked at her. From toes to the top of her hair, he looked at the muscular form of her body. He noticed that her muscles were very defined, but not overly developed. She did have a washboard stomach, but it gave her a very slender waist compared to her full hips, and the muscles in her back heightened the seeming smallness of her middle. She even turned around slowly for him, allowing him the full view. He noticed how shapely her backside was, even with the white-furred tail sticking out of the top of it. Just like his own tail, the fur on her tail stopped right at the base of it, with no fur anywhere else. "Just one thing, Tarrin," she said. "Looking is one thing. Touching is altogether different."

"I didn't even think of it," he said sincerely.

"I didn't say it was bad," she said huffily. "I just said it was different."

"It sounded like you meant it was bad," he grumbled.

"Then I'm sorry," she said. "But touching is the same for us as what looking at a naked woman does for a human male," she warned him. "It goes for you as much as it does for me. Believe it or not, I think you'll find that standing there with no clothes on isn't half as bad as you think. Even with me standing here. But the instant I touched you in a place you considered to be intimate, well, let's just say that it would give you a different reason to blush."

He blushed anyway, pulling off his shirt.

"The same goes for me," she said. "I don't recommend you putting your paws on my more sensitive parts, unless you want to fend me off with a stick."

"I find it hard to believe that," he said with a sniff, unbuttoning his trousers and steeling himself for the act of disrobing in front of her.

"It's been a long time since I've had a man," she warned bluntly. "Believe it or not, human women get the same urges as human men. Well, among my kind, females get that urge even more often than human men, and we're not afraid to go after what we want." She crossed her arms, waiting deliberately. "I'm being nice to you because you're still unfamiliar with what's happened to you, but if you'd have been any other male, we'd be-"

"I thought you didn't want to talk about it," he said through gritted teeth. In one fast, jerky move, he whisked off his trousers, and stood there, self-consciously, under Jesmind's appraising eye. "And why is that?"

"Is what?"

"Why do the women, um-"

"Oh, that," she said. "Because there are seven women for every man."

"What?"

"There are seven females for every male," she repeated. "So we have to share." She put a finger to her chin, staring at him in a way that made him feel distinctly uncomfortable. "Turn around," she ordered. he did so, gritting his teeth. "My," she said. "My, my, my."

"What?"

"You've got a very handsome body, Tarrin," she complemented.

"Can we get on with this?" he asked plaintively.

"You're ruining my fun, do you know that?" she said with an evil little smile.

"I'm glad one of us in enjoying this," he growled.