Hilda and Kana: Treasure of the Bandit Queen - Part 1

Part 1

Motes of flame rose from the bonfire. It's light beat back the darkness and cast long shadows. Strange winds blew through the trees. Leaves rustled. Branches cracked. Ghosts watched and listened.

The warrior women Hilda and Kana sat before the fire, eyes upon it, the heat almost too hot against their faces. In her hands Hilda held a simple straw doll, pinned with a lock of hair. It was a grave doll, a funeral offering for a departed friend. Isha… Her name hid in the howling wind and in the crackling of fire.

Hilda took a gulp of alcohol from a bottle and hissed. "That stuff never seems to go down easier, but fuck if I don't like it."

Kana nodded.

Hilda splashed a measure of drink onto the doll and then sloshed a second measure into the fire. Blue flames flickered into the sky.

"Do you want me to tell this story?" she asked. "I don't think the ghouls and ghosties would mind if I tell it too much. We're meant to take turns, yes, but the main point is that the spirits of the dead get to know their new companion."

Kana shook her head. "No, this is my story to tell. Isha, she would want it this way, and this is her funeral." She closed her eyes and when she opened them, they were hard. "So, the Treasure of the Bandit Queen."

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Kana's Tale - The Treasure of the Bandit Queen

The East Tower of the Bandit Queen burned. Hilda swung her giant sword and drove an axe wielding bandit back into the flames. I faced off against the Bandit Queen herself, the dread Matilda. She stood in my path, mace in her left hand, shield in her right. For armour she wore a well-used breastplate, painted the crimson that was her mark. Between us stretched the narrow stone bridge that joined East Tower to West.

"Come at me ya little cunt," she slurred, the old burn scar on her cheek twisting her words. I did as bid.

She swung her mace. With a great clang, I knocked it aside with my shield and struck back. My sabre darted out in the swan pattern. She got her shield up in time and in the next moment drove forward, trying to batter her way through my defences. Sloppy. Shields make fantastic offensive weapons but you can't leave yourself vulnerable.

I rolled my weapon around her shield with practised ease and circled. For a brief moment she was vulnerable and I slashed at her side. The chest plate protected the front and the back plate the back but in between hung a narrow gap of weakness. Blood dripped from the wound but it wasn't fatal.

She let loose a roar that rattled my ears and swung to face me. Rage and pain fuelled the blow. I took it on my shield but that was a mistake. The impact ran up my arm and rattled my teeth. It sent me back a staggering step. She converted her swing into an over hand strike and drove a second blow home. The clang of metal mace against metal banded shield rung out like a great city bell. My knees almost gave out but I kept my shield up. The wood cracked and groaned.

With a grin made horrifying by her burn, she raised her mace high for a finishing blow. I rolled to the side, a desperate manoeuvre to be sure but I didn't have much choice. Her mace shattered the stone sidewall of the walkway. A red hot flying chip scythed across my exposed calf, leaving a trail of burning blood. I rose and struck in the fish pattern, two fast blows that made my sabre dance like a flashing fish. Clang, clang. She twisted at the last second and took both on her armoured breast plate. All I did was scratch the paint.

She drove forward with her shield like a charging bull, and I could see in her eyes she wouldn't fall for the same trick twice. I met her full-on, shield to shield. She tried to bring her mace down in an overhand blow but I blocked it with my sabre. We strained there, my muscles burning as I tried to push her back and hers bulging as she did the same to me. I was taller and bigger but she had a squat power I'd seldom before seen.

We might have stayed locked for hours, but this was not the time to fight according to the rules of the Seven Bronze Plates. I drove a kick up at her injured right side, and she twisted away - cursing and spitting. The blow didn't quite connect but countering cost her.

We circled slowly, trading testing blows. I watched her footwork and torso movement. There was weakness there, certainly, but how much was real and how much a trap to draw me in? The slight grimace on her lips must be genuine but the fractional hesitation... That could be fake.

"Feeling tired?" I taunted. "You wouldn't last five minutes on the training fields of Malat. The priests of the Ardent Warrior would throw you back in the gutter you came from." In truth, she had a certain raw skill and cemented that advantage through squat hard muscles. No sense in admitting that, though.

She laughed at my insult, which I suppose wasn't too surprising. Bandits aren't known for their exalted discourse. Still, it did draw a more substantial attack out of her.

A bullish cast came over her face and she advanced - shield leading and mace held primed to strike. I danced before it, landing the occasional flicking strike against the shield, mostly to annoy. It certainly didn't achieve much else.

There wasn't a great deal of room on the stone walkway so I moved onto the next stage of my plan while I still had the space I needed. I circled right, forcing her to turn into her injury. She twisted with me, but pain showed in her eyes. Good. I attacked in earnest, slashing blows in the tiger pattern designed to make counter-strike impossible. She sheltered behind her shield but I kept circling and her defence dropped further and further.

This wasn't the time to give any quarter. My strikes grew faster and more powerful, gaining as I built up momentum. She retreated before me, and I pushed her back, further and further until she reached the very edge of the walkway. The ground spilled out below, three dozen feet straight down, a mix of patchy grass, broken rocks and mud churned up by feet and wagon wheels.

A spark in her eye gave me a split second warning, the tiny signal that she planned to use the last hidden reserve of her strength. Even as she teetered against the low wall of the walkway, she dropped her shield and swung two handed with her mace. Heavy steel thundered towards me. I jerked back and it passed an inch before my nose. A split second later I stepped forward and kicked Matilda square in the chest.

She screamed as she fell and her body broke against the ground.

"So falls the barbarian," I quoted and turned away.

After that it was all over but the burning. With their leader dead and their home aflame, the bandits fled in panic. They took what they could, of course, but the Bandit Queen's treasury was in the West Tower and we controlled the only door.

"Looting time?" asked Hilda as she cleaned blood and soot off her great sword.

"Let's," I said.

We advanced carefully, even my shining sabre only a dark moon of metal in the weak light. We'd captured a pair of bandits in preparation for this raid and those wayward lambs said the Bandit Queen kept all others out of the West Tower, but you couldn't be too careful. This wasn't a civilised part of the world. Laws were guidelines at best and criminal handbooks at worst.

The hallway was long and dark. Narrow arrow slit windows let in pale light but not nearly enough. Matilda had painted red splotches on the walls, seemingly at random.

"If I was a pile of treasure," I mused aloud, "where would I be?"

"Up," said Hilda and jabbed up with her sword. "The highest room."

Up we went. The stair was narrow and winding. I led, a sabre being better at close quarters than a great sword, and Hilda kept an eye on the rear. We reached the top most room. The windows were larger here, perhaps even enough to admit a person if they somehow scaled the outer wall. Bright light showed a somewhat opulent bed, though one well past its prime. The fine sheets were dyed a deep purple but were threadbare and patched in places. The carvings on the bed proper were worn and cracked.

A strong room door stood off to one side, large, fashioned from oak and banded with iron. A stout lock lurked in one corner. If Matilda had the key on her when she fell, we'd have a long walk to retrieve it, assuming it hadn't been looted by fleeing bandits.

Hilda approached the door slowly. She set her great sword against the wall and tried the door. It opened with a creak.

"Perhaps she had to leave in a hurry to fight us?" I said.

"Maybe." Hilda frowned, hefted her sword again and settled into an attack position. Her exposed skin shone with grime, black soot and sweat.

I readied my own sabre and shield. Maybe might be maybe but steel was always steel.

In a single swift movement, Hilda hooked open the door with a foot and dashed inside. I followed close on her heals.

The room was small and cramped. Three small chests lurked at the far end and rolled up papers filled boxes on the walls. In the middle of it all knelt a naked young woman.

She sat facing the door, back straight, eyes slightly dull. Her hands were laced behind her head. Her skin was a dusky brown and her hair silken black. Her breasts were small but topped with hard pointed nipples. Spiralling tattoos surrounded her eyes. The markings ran down her neck, along the sides of her torso and down her legs. The result was enough to take my breath away.

"Who are you?" growled Hilda, sword ready to strike the intruder down.

"I am Isha," said the woman, voice oddly high. "Where is my mistress?"

"Mistress?" I asked. The woman, girl really, met my eyes. They seemed almost red.

"Yes, Mistress Matilda."

"Dead," said Hilda and grunted. "Probably being eaten by dogs."

"Oh," said Isha and if any emotion hid in her voice I couldn't hear it. "Are you my mistresses now?"

"You're a slave?" I asked. Slavery was normal enough, but a country slave who didn't run from a dead master was fairly rare.

"I have that honour."

"Honour?" asked Hilda.

"It is a great honour," said Isha and for the first time a note of passion entered her voice. "I trained to serve within the schools of House Brasil and earned the title slave. My bloodline is impeccable, selected over many generations by the blood-smiths of Brasil. My body, mind and training represent the pinnacle of their art."

Hilda stared with wide eyes and even her sword dropped a fraction. "A golden whore," she whispered in slight shock.

"What?" I asked. I was clearly missing something.

"Don't you get it?" asked Hilda. "She's from the city of the slaver wizards."

Oh.

Hilda and I left the room and gathered in a huddle, just outside of easy hearing. Isha continued to kneel in place, seemingly immune to stiffness or boredom. "Do you know how much she'll be worth?" said Hilda in a low excited whisper. "If what she said is true, she's no gutter whore. She's the real deal, one of the wizards' high end sluts."

I knew about the slaver wizards, of course, even though their city, Cho, was at the opposite end of the world from Malat. They produced slaves of all types unified by only two factors - their supreme quality and unquestioning loyalty. From its gates left warriors, whores, coin counters, priests and more to serve the rich and powerful of the world. The greatest families of Malat had slaves from Cho. None served better and none were fairer.

"How much do you think she'll be worth?" I said. My family was nowhere near great enough.

"Fucked if I know. This is high end city-shit. No one where I came from could afford shit like this. Let's just say a lot."

I looked back at Isha. If the hard stone bothered her she didn't show it. She sat as if her sole purpose in life was aesthetic perfection, like a statue of blood, flesh and soul. And yet, that statue contained a youthful innocence combined with an exotic passion that drew the eye and quickened the loins. I walked back into the room. "Isha?" I said.

She looked up.

"Isha, I am your new mistress."

A lamp lit behind her eyes, a smile bloomed on her face and she launched herself at me.

"Mistress," she cried. "Please, how can I serve you?" She kissed my boot and I looked down at the erotic lines of her back and ass. If I placed my sabre along that line, her body would have perfectly matched the curve.

I blushed slightly and pushed her away. "Stop that. Stand up and be attentive. Can you answer my questions?"

She sprang to her feet and stood tall. "Yes Mistress!"

"How did you come to be here? This tower I mean."

"I was travelling with my master, Mistress. We were attacked by bandits. I tried to defend him but my training in arms is limited. He died and the leader of the bandits became my mistress. She took me here and kept me with her other treasures. Then she died and now you are my Mistress." Her eyes sparkled as she relayed her tale.

"Other treasures indeed," muttered Hilda. "What else is here?"

"I do not know," said Isha. She blinked, long eyelashes fluttering, and cocked her head as if asking how she, a mere slave, could possibly know such a thing.

"Then let's find out." Hilda grinned like a shark.

She opened the first chest by the simple method of shoving her sword through the lock. It broke with a metal scream and she kicked the lid up. Coins glittered inside, thousands of them, everything from jade strips to snapped square pennies. It was a small fortune drawn from a hundred cities, tribes, leagues and counting house mints.

The second box contained jewellery. Hilda turned out a small velvet bag and spilled two dozen rings into her large palm. They glittered small and golden. Some were set with sparkling stones, which captured what little light entered the room and amplified it. Others were engraved with delicate designs such as curling vines, leaves, writing in unknown scripts and even battlefields. Further investigation produced a great number of other pieces. A jewel and finery encrusted dagger caught my eye, as much for its shear impracticality as the wealth it represented. It was clearly no service weapon, just a great name's toy. The torques, necklaces and bracelets were also impressive. They matched the fashions of Malat, at least what those fashions had been during my adolescence.

The last chest proved the most resistant to forceful opening. Hilda beat and swore at it for some time before it finally gave way. Apparently it was a slut, a whore and deserved to be fucked sideways with a broad sword, among other things. Inside, on a bed of straw, lay twelve golden bars. Each bar bore the mark of the Counting House of Isis Maley - the nightingale in flight, carrying the broken arrow.

"Gold," I whispered, staring. Even Isha went very still, barely breathing.

Twelve whole bars of gold. The gold in coin is diluted, alloyed with other metals to make a workable currency, and even there it's extremely valuable. This was beyond even that, a prince's fortune.

"And you thought this trip wouldn't be worth it," said Hilda. She brought a hand down on my shoulder, about ready to dance a jig or whatever folk dance tribal folk favoured.

"Is this good, Mistress?" asked Isha.

"Yes," I said. "This is very good indeed."

Continued in Part 2

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