Rage, hot, sharp, and pure, flared in Leonotis's chest. He tightened his grip on his sturdy branch-sword. Low, standing beside him, her face a mask of cold, silent fury, was already palming the smoothest, heaviest stones from her pouch. They had to act, and they had to act now.
The moment the bounty hunters' attention drifted, their greedy eyes momentarily fixed on the misty peaks as they fantasized about selling Jacqueline, Leonotis and Low struck.
Leonotis, his injured hands still tender but fueled by a surge of pure adrenaline and a desperate need to protect Jacqueline, slammed his newly acquired branch-sword into the thin mountain soil. A surge of raw green energy pulsed from him, and the earth around the bounty hunters erupted. Thorny, grasping vines, thick as pythons and tipped with razor-sharp barbs, snaked upwards with terrifying speed, lashing out like angry whips. They tangled around the legs of the closest hunter, Borok, yanking him off balance and sending him crashing to the ground with a surprised curse.
Simultaneously, Low launched herself from their hiding spot with speed and ferocity. The simmering resentment she felt towards Jacqueline seemed to have transmuted into a raw, untamed power. She moved like a whirlwind of contained fury, her small frame strong as she slammed a heavy, driving kick into the other hunter's knee. Kell yelped, a sharp, undignified sound, as his leg buckled beneath him. Before he could recover, she followed up with a swift, brutal elbow strike to his ribs, the solid impact echoing through the thin mountain air.
Even bound as she was, her wrists tied tightly with rough, biting rope, Jacqueline was far from helpless. Seeing her chance, she focused her will, drawing upon the moisture in the ever-present mountain mist. The spray from a nearby stream responded to her silent, desperate command. Thin jets of water, sharp and forceful as flying needles, shot out from the air around her, stinging the faces and hands of the bounty hunters, a thousand tiny, irritating cuts that momentarily disrupted their focus. They cursed and swatted at the unexpected, stinging assault, their attention completely fractured.
The clearing erupted in a chaotic flurry of desperate motion. Thorny vines writhed and snapped, hindering the hunters' movements as they tried to regain their footing. Low, a blur of motion and strength, pressed her attack on Kell, her small fists and feet landing with jarring, bone-rattling force. Jacqueline's water jets, though not lethal, were a constant, maddening distraction, forcing the hunters to constantly flinch and shield their eyes.
Borok, roaring in frustration, finally managed to tear his legs free from the thorny vines, his leather breeches shredded and bleeding. His companion, Kell, hobbled by Low's brutal and precise knee strike, tried to draw his rusty sword, but Low, anticipating the move, was already upon him, her enhanced strength allowing her to knock his arm aside with surprising, almost casual ease.
For a brief, exhilarating moment, it seemed they might actually succeed. The element of surprise, combined with their desperate resolve and burgeoning, synergistic abilities, had thrown the experienced bounty hunters completely off balance. Leonotis, wielding his new, thicker branch-sword, had managed to completely entangle one of the bounty hunters in a writhing cocoon of thorny vines he'd conjured from the rocky floor. Borok lay sprawled and cursing, momentarily incapacitated. Low was trading blows with the other hunter, her movements agile and brutally unpredictable. Jacqueline, though still bound, had managed to summon a concentrated jet of water from a nearby stream, drenching the remaining upright hunter, Kell, and momentarily blinding him.
Victory felt tantalizingly close, a fragile, flickering hope in the tense, spray-filled air. But desperation is a potent weapon for all sides. The blinded hunter, Kell, flailing wildly, his vision blurred by Jacqueline's watery assault, stumbled backward until his hand grasped something solid—Jacqueline's bound arm. With a yell of pure, animal panic, he hauled her towards the edge of the cliff, the roar of the nearby waterfall growing deafeningly louder with each frantic, stumbling step.
"Don't!" Leonotis shouted, his heart leaping into his throat as he saw the sheer, unforgiving drop just beyond them. The hunter, his face a mask of crazed, cornered resolve, swung Jacqueline's bound form like a crude, living weapon, then with a final, brutal heave, hurled her over the precipice.
A strangled cry tore from Jacqueline's lips as she plummeted into the churning, misty air, her form disappearing almost instantly into the vast, roaring abyss.
"Jacqueline!" Leonotis's voice was raw with disbelief and terror. Without a second thought, without even a glance at Low or the incapacitated hunter, he sprinted to the edge of the cliff. The roar of the waterfall was a physical force now, the spray a cold, stinging mist on his face. He saw nothing but the churning, angry white water far, far below.
His eyes darted back and forth, desperately searching the void for his friend. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't think. He only knew, with an absolute, soul-deep certainty, that he couldn't let her fall. He couldn't lose someone else.
Clutching his sturdy branch-sword, a desperate, irrational lifeline in his hand, Leonotis cried out Jacqueline's name one last time, a sound completely swallowed by the thunderous, indifferent cascade of the misty void, and leaped.