let's cut to the chase. strike while the iron's hot

Sakura hung by her wrists in the bandit's shack, her toes barely touching the ground to keep her arms from going totally numb. They had set up several grass shelters, nothing permanent but set aside from any obvious trails to hide out in. A storage shack was set aside to hold the peasant hostage, wearing thin garments barely better than rags that were darkened with her heavy sweating in the hot shack.

She was a girl with dark hair, fresh into womanhood and possessing soft but significant curves. There had been grim talk of what the bandits would do with her, but their leader had been clear to leave her so far untouched. It was a flicker of hope for her that they intended to return her home, and all that was holding her together, even with dirt swept away from her face by her tears.

The frail door crashed inward, Shiro looking over the single room and wiping blood from her blade on the woven grass of the doorway. Sakura didn't recognize the newcomer as one of the bandits, hope in her dark eyes as they met Shiro's.

"You're from the village?" Shiro asked, some certainty already in her voice.
Sakura nodded meekly, and blushed at the samurai's shining smile when she did. Shiro's eyes ran approvingly over the younger girl's body, and all the inviting flesh it bared temptingly.