Read The Shadows of Night for Free Online

the moisture that must have gathered between her thighs, imagined touching her there, running his fingers through her liquid heat, caressing her most intimate flesh…
    Abruptly he realized the harp was shaking because his hands were trembling.   He dropped the instrument in disgust, and the drone immediately zipped across the chamber and placed it back on a table.
    What had the woman done to him?   He’d never had such a strong reaction to a woman in his life.   She was a stranger to him, not even a member of his society, yet he longed to bed her.   Vivid sexual images rioted in his mind, and his body was so hard it ached.  
    He drew in a long breath, trying to steady himself.   His reaction was all the more puzzling because he loathed the Claw.   When he closed his eyes, he could still see the circle of half-grown Claw, various kinds of great cats, their mouths open, displaying their savagely sharp teeth.   He could still feel the fear and rage that had filled him as a black panther lifted its paw and struck its claws deep into Prong’s shoulder…
    He shuddered and flung the memory away with an effort, but the loathing he felt remained.   So why did he ache for this particular Claw?
    It must be her very strangeness that he found exciting, he decided at last.   Everyone believed Claw women were wild in bed.   Antler men laughed raucously and told vulgar tales about them over ale, though he suspected it was mostly myth—he had never heard of a true Antler/Claw mating.   It was all rumor and innuendo.   The potent lure of the unknown.
    And it was ridiculous.   He had no true desire to bed the woman.   There were plenty of Antler women who would be more than willing to lay with him if he so much as crooked a finger in their direction.   He didn’t need a savage, half-wild woman who was probably at this very moment trying to escape.
    As if on cue, an alarm went off, and he grinned.   If nothing else, the barbarian was predictable.
    He headed for the stone spiral stairs that led to the tower.
     
    *****
     
    Finding herself locked into a chamber, even a spacious one, made Katara feel anxious.   Restless.   She needed to escape.   She craved the freedom of the forest, the fresh smells of the open air.   She wanted to shift, too, but she’d have to worry about that later.   Getting the collar off seemed an impossible task.
    Escaping this tower did not.
    She approached the large, open window, which was open to the sky, with no glass or screening that she could see.   Beneath her spread out the green meadows that surrounded the keep, where a few Antler grazed in their animal forms, and beyond them sprawled a mass of buildings built of the same silvery stone that surrounded her.    She assumed they were houses, although they looked nothing like the crudely built longhouses of her people.  
    The Antler Kindred must be quite numerous, she thought, observing the thickly clustered buildings, and the people bustling in the streets, with an unwanted feeling of awe.   Her own people lived solitary lives, only one Pride occupying a single longhouse, and the dwellings scattered widely through the forest.   She guessed there must be at least a hundred buildings in this town.
    The people in the streets presented a problem.   She wasn’t sure how she could make her way through the streets of the town undetected.   But she’d worry about that after she determined a way out of this tower.  
    Leaning out the window, she studied the way the wall was constructed.   The outer wall was built of the ubiquitous silvery stone, and there were jutting stones that she could use as handholds.   Even in her human form, she was a good climber.   She thought she could descend to the ground without falling.
    If she did fall—well, it was best not to think about that.
    She scrambled up onto the ledge of the open window and began to swing her legs out to the right of the window.
    Suddenly she encountered an obstruction.
    She