She saw the bandits laugh as they finished tying up their prisoner. The young tavern owner from Disa had made enemies of the wrong people, it seemed. Meryn had always liked her. She always lent a sympathetic ear, even if Meryn didn’t talk much. And she always had Meryn’s back when she would win a game of cards or dice and people accused her of cheating.

It was possible Meryn also had a crush on Kila, the pretty blonde owner of The Iron Flagon, Meryn’s favourite hangout in the Ikaatan capital.

The young crime fighter often gathered her best information at the place and that’s all it was at first: a hive of information. But Meryn had taken to Kila after a few visits and found herself thinking about the tavern owner more and more. Still, Meryn refused to break her stoic demeanour and remain resolute in her pursuit of justice. Just as her parents were.

She hadn’t been doing it long, either. Less than a year, in fact. And she was just barely out of her teens, having only turned twenty a month ago.

Peering through her spyglass with one of her shining, golden eyes, Meryn felt a breeze toss her shoulder length, bobbed red hair. She collapsed her spyglass and reached to her hip for the small, one-handed crossbow she held there.

Another breeze came up and ruffled the skirt of her knee length yellow dress. The dress was sleeveless and bore her well toned, strong biceps. Her forearms were protected with black bracers adorned with a yellow sort of crosshatch pattern. Her knee length boots matched the dress as well. Around her hip, she wore a black, cloth belt that held both her crossbow and her sword at her hip.

She had run into these bandits before. They and their leader were notorious kidnappers but they often made shady deals with desperate business owners and muscled in on their territory. Indeed, Meryn had run into many of Fa’rah’s bandits inside The Iron Flagon and used the place to put more than her fair share behind bars.

But it seemed Kila had been having some bad financial trouble with her tavern so, when Fa’rah came calling, she saw no other choice but to accept and save her beloved tavern. Being unable to make a single payment led her to this situation as a bound and gagged prisoner of Fa’rah and her bandits.

Kila was a tall and slender blonde woman with sharp green eyes and a face Meryn often caught herself dreaming about. She was still in her tavern outfit: a white dress with a brown corset and plunging neckline. It was a short dress, too, stopping just below Kila’s knees with a split up both sides of the skirt and reveal her pretty legs.

Simple leather sandals covered her feet, though that didn’t matter since Kila couldn’t walk at the moment. Her legs were tied with thick rope around the ankles and above and below the knees. A heavy coil wrapped up her arms and torso from just below her shoulders to just above the elbows. With her wrists tied behind her back, Kila couldn’t possibly reach up and remove the white cloth that covered her mouth and held another cloth inside it.

“Mmmph!” she said, struggling against her tight bonds inside a wooden cage. She was surrounded on all sides by Fa’rah’s all female bandit clan, who laughed and teased their captive as she struggled.

Meryn kept her eyes on them, one hand still near her crossbow. They seemed to be waiting for something so Meryn waited, too. As soon as they were distracted would be her time to strike.

In her mind, she kept one simple word at the forefront as she placed a hand on her crossbow. Serenge...

It was one of the few spells she knew and it made her crossbow glow with a bright, golden light. Though her power was faint, she could still use it to her advantage. And besides, she had to test her limits today. She had a new spell she had been practicing with and the bandit leader would be perfect to try it on.

As if on cue, Fa’rah stepped into the clearing of the bandit camp from out of the trees. All at once, her bandits fell silent and Kila stared, wide eyed, at the leader as she approached.

The tall, muscular woman who approached was just as big as Kila remembered. Fa’rah was an impressively tall woman who looked young for her rumoured age. Thick but shapely legs, with well toned muscles, a pair of strong, equally muscular arms and broad shoulders made Fa’rah an intimidating sight. She had angry brown eyes and long, golden blonde hair. Her face was youthful; round and slender with a well defined jawline. She approached the cage with a cocky smirk curling her lips.

Fa’rah wore a short grey tunic without sleeves. The bottom half came down to about halfway down her thighs, covering part of her strong legs like a skirt. On top the sleeveless tunic she wore her brown leather cuirass, covering her chest, back, and the tops of her shoulders. Matching, fingerless leather gauntlets covered her hands and forearms and she wore knee high, strappy leather sandals on her feet. On her right hip she wore a heavy mace and a short sword in a sheath on her back.

She walked silently and, by the look of her, she could wield those weapons very well indeed. Fa’rah the bandit leader often didn’t need to draw them, since her very presence was often intimidating enough.

“Well well. I thought you and I were very clear about making payments, Kila,” Fa’rah said.

“Mmmph! Lmmt mm gmmm!” Kila said, struggling against the ropes.

Just a bit longer Meryn thought. Wait till they’re all looking at her...

“Kila, my dear sweet girl,” Fa’rah said, kneeling down to meet the tied up woman’s eyes. The smirk left her face in an instant and she glared at the tavern keeper withing. She slapped her right palm with the back of her left hand as she spoke each of her next words. “Never. Miss. My. Payments,” she said.

Clearing her throat, she stood up again. “So where’s my money, Kila? Two weeks I’ve gone without it. I don’t normally let things slide for that long.” Fa’rah knelt down and smirked again. “But I made an exception this time for that pretty face. But two weeks? That’s pushing it, even for you. So where is it?”

“Mm dmmt hmmph mmt! Mmmph!”

Fa’rah leaned down and cupped her ear, smirking. “Sorry, what was that? I can’t quite understand you...”

“Mmmrrghh! MMMPPHH!!”

The four bandits with Fa’rah were now all staring, chuckling at their leader’s antics. Go time Meryn thought.

Eyeing up her target, one of the larger women standing to Fa’rah’s left, Meryn drew the crossbow at her side and gripped the rope she had tied to the bough of the tree was hiding in. She fired one bolt toward the ground and the glowing, golden bolt whipped through the air It stuck in the ground and a bright flash of light exploded from it, blinding the people on the ground.

“Gah! What is that!?” one of the bandits said, forced to shield her eyes.

Without hesitation, Meryn jumped to action and held the rope with both hands, quickly hooking the crossbow back to her belt. Meryn swung herself down to the ground, landing near to the bandits, and rolling forward to soften her impact. In one swift motion she stood up and drew her sword, gripping it tight in her left hand.

“Cahya!” Meryn shouted, and her sword glowed with the same golden light as her crossbow. Another of the few spells she knew, imbuing her sword.

Striking out at the bandit, bright light emanated from it when it impacted the woman’s chest. It didn’t cut through, as Meryn swore she would never take a life, but the stunning power of the strike blinded the woman yet again and knocked her to the ground where she quickly lost consciousness.

Three to go... then Fa’rah Meryn thought.

Fa’rah still seemed a little stunned by the exploding light of the bolt, not engaging in the fight with Meryn. Although, if Meryn had looked closer, she would have seen the wicked smile on Fa’rah’s face as though she had been... expecting this.

But Meryn was concentrating on the other bandits, now fully aware that they were under attack. Two of them attacked her at once and, though her sword was still imbued, her magical energy was not strong and it was hard to hold the word in her mind.

Still, she kept it there and turned aside one woman’s blade with a deft parry. The impact caused another explosion of bright light and knocked the bandit back. She tumbled to the ground, landing on her stomach, and fell unconscious.

Still hanging on to the spell, Meryn ducked as the blade of the second bandit missed her head by inches. Moving faster than the woman could react, Meryn kicked out her legs from beneath her and she fell to the ground on her back and Meryn was immediately on top of her.

A pommel strike from Meryn’s sword blinded her with light and she was unconscious beside her ally in seconds. One bandit remained and she stared at the scene in front of her, unable to think. Meryn had been so quick that she didn’t know what to do.

In a panic, she dropped her sword and fled into the woods to escape the woman known in Ikaatan as the Gold-Eyed Maiden. Not forgetting the leader, Meryn turned around and swung her sword, sensing someone there. Fa’rah smirked as Meryn’s sword came in contact with her mace.

“Good instincts,” she said. “You know when you’re in trouble.”

Meryn said nothing and stepped back, the glow of her sword dissipating. Her mind was tired and she’d need to rest and stall to get the spell to work on Fa’rah. But she could keep a fight going if she had. Still, she had never faced someone quite as large as Fa’rah before so it wouldn’t be easy.

“Having doubts, Goldie?” Fa’rah asked, the confident smirk still curling her lips.

“No,” Meryn said.

“Your mistake.” Fa’rah lunged at her and moved far quicker than Meryn had been expecting. She got hold of Meryn’s left arm and pulled her close, wrapping another arm around Meryn’s waist. She couldn’t fight the iron grip of the much larger woman.

“Time to find out if you can fly, little bird,” Fa’rah said into Meryn’s ears.

Effortlessly picking Meryn up off her feet, Fa’rah used both her powerful arms to toss the smaller woman through the air and into a nearby tree. Meryn’s back slammed into the trunk and she hit the ground hard, landing on her stomach. In spite of the impact, she managed to hold onto her sword and slowly get back to her feet.

“Well well. You are as tough as they say,” Fa’rah said.

“Guess it’s no secret you’ve heard of me,” Meryn said.

“Not when you’ve been putting all my girls in prison. They’re as tough as they come, too. I make sure of it.”

Meryn gritted her teeth as she tightened the grip on her sword. Her mind was reeling but she had to try the spell at some point. If she was going to save Kila....

“I see the way you look at her,” Fa’rah said.

“What?”

“Kila. The tavern keeper. I’ve heard things about you two.”

“Nothing but stories,” Meryn said.

“I know you haven’t had the spine to act. But I’ve heard about the way you look at her. You’re even doing it now. Shame that she’s in on it...”

Meryn’s eyes narrowed and her stare went hard.

“What are you talking about?”

Her eyes shifted to Kila, who couldn’t look her in the eye. She just stared at the ground.

Kila... what did you do?

“It’s a good deal for her. She gets to keep her precious tavern, our protection, and even forget about that payment she missed. All in the name of getting the Gold-Eyed Maiden off our streets.”

“She... she wouldn’t do that.”

“If her other option was to be my prisoner then yes. She would.”

Meryn looked to Kila again, meeting her eyes. Kila couldn’t hold her gaze for long, looking to the ground once again and letting a breath escape her nose.

Damn it... it’s true...

“So she’s bait,” Meryn said.

“Naturally.”

“Too bad it’s not going to work out for you,” Meryn said.

Fa’rah raised an eyebrow. “Really? You think so? How’s your back, by the way? Any pain?”

“Shut up,” Meryn said.

Fa’rah laughed. “You’re a fun one. Wish it didn’t have to end here.”

While they had been talking, Meryn had been recovering. Now her mind felt rested enough to try and cast her new spell. But before she could, Fa’rah lunged at her and, instead of swinging her mace, waved her hand in a triangular motion.

“Apiil!” she said. A pillar of flame shot out of her hand toward Meryn. The Gold-Eyed Maiden rolled to one side and avoided the deadly fire and it scorched the tree she had been standing in front of.

“You... you know the old magic?”

Fa’rah chuckled. “Sure do. Lots of it.” At this, Meryn raised an eyebrow. There was something in Fa’rah’s voice a... wavering. It was subtle but it was there. She had learned a thing or two in her short time about picking up on verbal tics to know when someone was bluffing. Playing cards all the time certainly helped with that.

“No you don’t,” Meryn said. “That’s the only spell you know, isn’t it?”

“You don’t know anything,” Fa’rah said, her facade returning. “You really calling my bluff?”

Meryn waved her on with one hand. “Go ahead. Hit me with it again. Though they say the old magic can make you... tired. Sleepy. Feeling light-headed, Fa’rah?”

Another chuckle escaped Fa’rah’s lips. “You’re wasting your time. But I don’t need to beat you with magic. I prefer the old fashioned way of beating my opponents... brutally!”

With a sudden surge of energy, Fa’rah rushed at Meryn again but, this time, Meryn was prepared. She dug in her heels and lowered her shoulder. Fa’rah may have been a bigger, taller woman but that meant she had a higher centre of gravity. And in Meryn’s experience, that made opponents like her easier to take down.

She crouched low just as the bandit leader reached her and leaned forward with all her strength, her shoulder connecting with Fa’rah’s stomach. The heavy collision still hurt Meryn a bit but Fa’rah was far worse off, with the gut-wrenching pain in her stomach and she was completely knocked off balance.

Her momentum carried her forward and she tumbled to the ground, rolled, losing her mace in the process, and collided with the ground hard, landing on her back. Meryn decided now would be the perfect time to strike.

Concentrating hard on yet another word, Meryn shouted out the new spell and thrust her hands forward toward the sprawled out bandit leader. “Naaleni!”

From thin air, thick, glowing ropes lashed out at Fa’rah and began wrapping around her body. She tried to fight it but the air had gone from her lungs with the impact and it was hard to catch her breath. By the time she did, the ropes had latched on and wrapped around her ankles, above and below her knees, and higher up on her muscular thighs.

“Get... get off me!”

The ropes continued, pulling Fa’rah’s wrists behind her back and binding them in place, crossing them over each other. More of them placed her torso and breasts into a sort of harness and pinned her arms in place at the biceps and just below the shoulders.

Finishing off the bindings, the spell further launched a wide, glowing strap that plastered itself over Fa’rah’s mouth, instantly filling it with some soft and gooey but hard enough to hold her mouth open.

“Mmmph!” she growled, thrashing around in her strong bonds.

But it wasn’t over for Meryn. She felt the spell resist her control as though it were fighting back. And, to her surprise, she felt something wrap itself around her ankles and pull them together.

“Ahh... damn it!” she cursed, now unable to control the spell. It was now more evident than ever that she was nowhere near as adept with magic as she was in a hand-to-hand fight.

The ropes further rebelled and wrapped up her legs just as they did to Fa’rah; above and below the knees and higher up on her thighs. This caused her skirt to ride up and showed off her own well-toned and shapely legs.

Finally losing her balance, the magic ropes swarmed Meryn from all directions, pulling her tight with a chest harness like Fa’rah’s, binding her arms to her sides, and crossing and binding her wrists behind her back. Another wrapped itself around her waist to hold her wrists to her back while yet another attached her bound wrists to her arms, pulling them further up. Another closed snugly around her neck and formed a sort of collar. It wasn’t enough to choke her but she could definitely feel its tightness and couldn’t really turn her head anymore.

Another rope wrapped itself into her bobbed hair and forced her head back, pulling taut to her wrists and then forcing her ankles upward. Her ankles were then attached to her wrists and her hair and Meryn was tied in a strict hogtie position. The spell was nearly dissipated but it had another couple surprises for the Gold-Eyed Maiden. A thick strap like Fa’rah’s gag covered and filled her mouth, wrapping around her head and yet another tightened over her eyes, blinding her to the world.

Barely able to move, tightly bound and gagged, Meryn was now just as stuck as the other two women still conscious in the bandit camp.

“Mmmph!” Kila squealed, realizing she couldn’t escape her ropes nor her cage to help either of them or get herself free.

“Grrmmph! MMMPH! GMMT MMM MMT MMPH THMMPPH!” Fa’rah screamed, still furiously battling her restraints.

“Mmmph...” Meryn sighed. At least the spell had worked on Fa’rah. But it had backfired even worse back onto her.

Trying to struggle proved pointless. There were no knots to untie and it was clear these magic ropes would be tough to cut even with a well sharpened knife. Someone experienced with magic would have to free her. And they were all alone in the woods.

“Mmmph!” Fa’rah grunted, struggling to a sitting position. She glared at Meryn and then chuckled a bit behind her gag when she saw her predicament. She would have taunted Meryn if she wasn’t gagged.

Shuffling her way over to the tree she had scorched with her own magic, Fa’rah pushed herself to her feet and wobbled a bit but she held her balance. Taking a quick look at her surroundings, she knew which way to go to get to town. She had magic users in her bandit clan. One of them could get her free. It would be a long trek to town, bound and gagged like this, but she would have to do it to have any hope of getting free.

Hopping forward, Fa’rah held her balance for all of four steps before she fell to the ground again, growling into her gag. Though she knew now that she could at least get back to her feet. With Fa’rah the most able to move, she stood the best chance of escaping. Though her inability to keep her balance meant she wasn’t getting free anytime soon.

Meryn could only hope someone found her and Kila. Perhaps that woman who had rescued her before, the leader of the Order of Ikaatan, would find her again. She prayed to the Goddess that Artema, the great warrior, was somewhere on her trail. Or else, she and Kila would be in big trouble. After all, there was no way they’d be getting help from Fa’rah or her bandits.

Kila... Meryn felt so betrayed. Heartbroken, even. In the back of her mind, she thought there might have been a chance for something special but after this... she wasn’t sure she could ever trust her again. Count her as another one. One more heartbreak... Meryn thought to herself.

With the bandit prisoner and the two combatants now thoroughly bound and gagged, there was nothing any of them could do but wait. Though Meryn thought she could hear the sound of someone battling through the trees. A strong voice echoing around the forest... a woman’s voice. And a familiar one. If it was Artema, then perhaps she was saved. Until then, however, she was stuck bound and gagged beside the bandit leader. She shook her head and sighed into her gag. Well this didn’t go to plan...

She settled into her bonds then, preparing for a long wait. And she knew it would be a long wait, tightly tied up, gagged, and blindfolded in her hogtie. The only other thing she knew, in that moment, was how much she hated Fa’rah. And she had the feeling that they would meet each other again. Time and time again. Something about the woman just screamed ‘thorn in the side.’ And Meryn always knew to trust her instincts...