Holly didn't move from her hiding spot. Her keen sense of hearing allowed her to hear everything Tarek said. It made her quite sad, frankly, she had grown rather fond of Tarek... For the first time in a long time, she'd not been lonely in the woods. She had someone she could consider a friend. Not anymore. She wanted to trust Tarek, but with the humans from the village coming around and hunting for something, maybe even her, she decided that it would be in her best interest to reject humans. Even if that added Tarek to the list.

Holly didn't notice the tears sliding down her cheeks. Wiping them away as quickly as she could, she slowly stood from where she was hiding in the foliage and walked away. She didn't have a destination. She just wanted to get as far away from Tarek and the skull as quickly as she could on tired hooves.

As she was walking away, something caught her attention far off in the distance... Something... glittering. Holly took one look behind her shoulder, seeing if Tarek was following her. Then, she started off in the direction of the thing glinting in the sun that shone through the leaves of the trees. Her tired hooves were now aching as she took off running.

The closer she got to the thing, the less it started to shimmer and the further off it appeared to be. Holly was out of breath by the time she "reached" it, but by then the glimmer was nowhere to be seen and instead she found herself standing in a pile of dried leaves in a sunny spot in the forest. There was absolutely nothing to see there. She waited a few minutes to catch her breath, then took a step out of the pile.

SNAP.

Holly screamed as a terrible wave of pain wracked through her nerves from her right hoof up to her horns. The pain was terrible. Instinctively, Holly dug through the pile of leaves, thinking that she had been bitten by a snake, or otherwise attacked by some unknowing animal. To her surprise, the thing hiding under the pile of leaves was some sort of metal jaw, with teeth that were digging further into her leg the more she struggled against it.

Laughter. Holly heard laughter in the distance, her eyes going wide as she looked around, surprised she didn't smell the presence of anyone else there. A human appeared from behind a tree and laughed,

"We finally caught it, boys!" He declared. "That'll prove it to 'em."
"Yeah, and they said faun was just a legend!"
"Should we bring 'er back alive?"

Holly struggled against the metal teeth that held her in place. These humans were going to kill her. No, they were going to try to kill her. Holly kicked her hooves frantically in an attempt to escape, but the men only grabbed her hands and her one, free hoof and began to bind her. Holly screamed, she cursed her body that she wasn't born with more defenses. All she had was her powerful hind legs, which, were not so powerful when they were bound and injured, and her horns, which were also not very powerful.

She continued to kick and struggle, aiming for the human's head, but though she'd kicked their heads a few times, the most harm she had caused was some bruises and maybe a black eye. "Let me go!" She growled. "Let me GO!" The men ignored her and began to lift her into the air, where she continued to kick and writhe.

"Shut up!" One man called. "We went through a lot of trouble to get that damn tail of yours and we aren't leaving until we get it."

Holly was perturbed. Her tail? What would they do with her tail?! Still, she kicked and struggled, she was not going to let them take her tail.