You can't take a 5-ft step with a move action. You might be thinking of the Withdraw action, though. Also, I already am using a melee weapon... with the worst dice rolls so far.<br/><br/>That being said, if Shiru pulled back, Ayanah would have had to retreat via a Withdraw full-round action AND risked an AoO that would have likely knocked her down on a hit. In addition, it would make it more likely that she would be flanked/dealing with more opponents if she chose to take a 5-ft step. Instead, Shiru acts as a bit of a buffer - decent AC with the Ironfang Survivor trait, can deal a bit of damage if I can roll half-decent. That early difficult terrain really mucked things up more than anything, to be honest.<br/><br/>Also, I dunno how DM is handling potions, but typically it is a Move action to interact with an object (e.g. pull out a potion), so Myranda may be out a little longer? The best bet honestly is to make sure Inkut doesn't get flanked and keep her up. Those of us running low on options can focus on things like Aid Another.