Muscles tightened around her from every direction. A sea of coils surrounded her, making her body ache from the crushing force.

But she wasn't giving in lightly. She could feel the snake's flesh in her hands as it stole her breath, could feel its pulsing heartbeat speed from its own efforts, just as hers did now. She let her fingers glide along the serpent's body, finding each soft place where she might apply pressure and interrupt the flow of air or blood. It was so much stronger than her, but her body knew its shape all too well.

So she twisted and writhed, spinning her body to unwind the coils even as she dug her fingers into the vulnerable places on the snake's body. She used her feet, and her elbows, getting leverage at any possible opportunity and she grew more and more feral as she fought against his overwhelming strength. She could not change her own shape, but Jess let her body react with grace and ferocity, slamming Gel into the ground when she could by bouncing into the air just enough to send her own weight into him as they connected before using the momentum to roll back to her feat, still entangles, but slowly weakening him. She scratched, hit, squeezed, and even bit.

And whenever he dared meet her eyes, she met his gaze with resolve. She looked past his eyes into the soul that, linked as it was to her, was as familiar as her own. She looked into him and her will went with her into him, not as some magical force of coercion like before, but just the power of her own personality and all the unwillingness to fall she carried with her. Her gaze told him that she understood very well the undeniable strength inside him, and that she still didn't care. She was Jess Maraud, and no man would bind her.