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Kory
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#26
Old 10-30-2015, 09:08 PM

It saddened Holly that she'd spend another night alone in the forest, before at Tarek and the other humans showed up, she was happy being alone. Or...she thought she was happy. The sky was already dark and the moths had come out and begin to whisper to her all the people and things they had seen.

But Holly wasn't interested in what the Cosmia moths had to say, she simply wanted to feel less lonely. The moon had risen in the night sky, but it didn't feel as bright or as full tonight as it usually did. Holly tugged on her clothes and laid down in the fallen tree trunk, the moths fluttered around her, one fluttering into her hair. Holly sighed,

"I never experienced that before." She admitted to the moths, "He was so nice. Do you think he will be back?"

The moths responded with warm regards as they flew off into the shadows of the forest. Holly sighed again, the woods were dark and noisy. She wondered about the human village and how Tarek was fairing there. She started to worry that the other humans may have hurt Tarek and that caused her to lay awake for a while, fearful. But Tarek was kind, Tarek was smart, he traveled all the way through the mountains in his own, she was sure he could handle some unruly humans just as well...

Holly's sleep was filled with a mixture of happy memories of Tarek, as well as horrid nightmares of the man's doom with bad humans. With each time she woke up, she wondered why Tarek couldn't stay in the forest with her, though he'd explained it many times, she still had hoped that maybe he was just afraid to live in the forest. Maybe there was some way she could persuade him to stay next time.

The moths returned while Holly tossed and turned, trying to fall back asleep. They whispered to her to encourage her that she'd not be alone forever. After a while of twisting on the tree trunk, Holly returned to blissful sleep.

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#27
Old 11-01-2015, 02:54 AM

After such a long day, Tarek sleep easily and deep. In his dreams, he saw lush woods, like the ones from his childhood dreams. The forest Holly resided in looked different, but a few notes of it colored his familiar fantasy, like the addition of ripe red berries next to the wild yellow flowers with white fluff underneath. Did such a flower really exist except in the stories of village elders? Tarek blinked the sleep out of his eyes with the question still echoing.

Morning light streamed into the quaint room that would be his home for hopefully only a little while. As always, he woke not long after the sun, no need for help in keeping this schedule. He enjoyed the first light of morning and often rose to watch it out of sheer joy. Now, he stretched and set about clothing himself in a spare set of clothes not roughened by traveling. They fit his same aesthetic, but with a more tailored edge.

It didn't take long to find the best place for information there--the inn where folks often went for their breakfast. He sat and talked until a few hours into the mornings, learning the names of those more likely to learned. Of course, he didn't share details of his mission just yet. As important as it was to him, he wouldn't let it get ruined easily. No, he spent his morning collecting information and talking. By the time noon came around, he knew nothing concrete except for a place to start.

"I suppose this counts as a good day." Tarek smiled as he stepped up to the front gate once again. He left his travel bag and his notes in the room, but carried his walking stick and the ocarina instead. With these, he set out for the woods just before the sun reached its zenith in the sky. He felt excited for his day and longed to tell Holly of his success. Maybe then she would see he must do things his way. And once it was over, maybe then they could play all day.

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#28
Old 11-05-2015, 02:59 PM

Holly woke early that morning, before the sun rose. Since it was still dark when she woke, she thought, perhaps she'd hear a song from Tarek soon... Though, she remembered his words. When the sun reaches its highest point... Which meant she'd still have a while to wait. It gave her quite a bit of sadness. Such sadness that she could feel in the pit of her stomach.

She stood on her hooves and began to walk away from the fallen tree trunk, towards the berry bushes. Holly didn't get sad often, but her plans to comfort herself were very simple. Eating. Holly would eat whenever she was sad, and sometimes it was a wonder how she remained so nimble. Still, Holly trudged along towards the berry bushes and sat besides them and began eating. It wasn't too strange of a choice, after all, she hadn't eaten anything since she'd woke, and she wasn't in the mood for flowers or grass.

Holly ate... and ate. The Cosmia moths approached her, whispering words of encouragement to her, but her ears were not listening. Instead, she kept eating and ignored the moths. Holly didn't have a great sense of time... To her, five minutes seemed like hours. Perhaps it was simply her animalistic nature? Or, perhaps it was because she was alone...? Whatever the reason, Holly was slowly beginning to lose faith that Tarek would return, and this only made her eat faster and in larger quantities.

The moths fluttered by without whispering another word, leaving Holly to wallow in her self pity. She didn't realize how much she hated being alone until she had the epiphany that she was, in fact, alone. She loved and hated that Tarek came, now she felt conflicted and confused. Why must she be by herself? Why aren't there any other fauns in the forest? She wanted to follow Tarek into the human village, but her fear of being attacked kept her grounded in the forest.

Holly let out a long, heavy sigh. If Tarek returned she'd make sure he never left again...

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#29
Old 11-13-2015, 11:22 PM

Tarek picked his way through the trees with the sun beating down on him. At least through the foliage, it's heat felt lessened and he found the air here just a light cooler than home from the start. Perhaps because they lay in a valley? Still, his brown vest grew a little warm and he undid the strings for comfort.

How long did he walk through the trees? They all looked the same, but he remembered the general direction he needed to walk and he didn't think he got turned around. Tarek wanted to reach Holly's berry bushes of his own power and not a minute late either, but he felt the sun must have passed it's zenith already, though not by too long. He sighed. He would just make her worry like this. Taking out the ocarina from his pocket, he fingered it for a second. He didn't really know how to play it, but he figured he might as well try. A part of him just wanted to play it to play because it was a gift and he felt it would make Holly happy. Taking a deep breath, he blew into the little instrument.

A horrid, dirt clogged sound came out. He frowned and knocked it against his leg a few times before trying again. It took a few more tries, but eventually, he got a musical-ish sound to come out at least loud enough to carry in these woods. He started walking slowly again, making another small noise as he went before he gave up and stood there waiting for Holly to come find him.

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#30
Old 11-29-2015, 06:11 AM

If Holly's ears weren't so sharp, she may have missed that soft, squeaky noise that sang out quietly through the trees. She was resting on the forest floor, beneath the shadows of the berry bushes. Normally, she would have napped, but she still carried a fear of being attacked and she forced herself to stay awake and alert. She didn't trust the villagers and she didn't trust she'd be safe to fall asleep during the middle of the day. The sound reached her ears and Holly jumped to her hooves.

It was the ocarina. Of course, it didn't sound anything like the way she was used to it sounding, but she recognized it faint tunes in a heartbeat. Her ears twitched, trying to locate the direction that the music was coming from. It didn't take very long for her to pick up a location and she started to walk through the bushes, into the foliage and into the direction of the noise. She started with a slow pace that quickened the closer she got. Within a short while, she found she was sprinting through the woods, trying to get to Tarek as quickly as possible.

When the noise stopped, so did Holly. She found she was frozen in place as if her veins turned to lead in her body. An overwhelming fear of the unknown crept into her throat and she slowly melted back into movement, taking slow, careful steps at first. Worried that perhaps Tarek had brought dangerous company, or that he'd dropped the ocarina and lost it and moved on. Holly took off sprinting through the woods again, headed in the direction she last heard the ocarina's tune.

When she came to a small clearing in the woods, she found Tarek. It was certainly good to see him again, and even better to see he had brought with him no weapons (that were visible) and no suspicious humans. When Holly approached him from the shadows of the trees, she took a whiff of the air that surrounded him. There were many new, strange smells on him now. A mix of things that Holly didn't have the vocabulary to recognize or identify. She approached.

"You did not bring any weapons..." She stated. Idly, she began to pull some twigs and leaves from her hair with one hand, while with her other she wiped the dirt from her fur. "Tell me, did you find the information you were seeking? Certainly you found it!" Holly found her excitement was growing with each minute she spent breathing his unfamiliar scents. She wanted to grab his hand and drag him deep into the forest. However, she simply stood in front of him with her tail wrapping around one of her legs as she stared at him with bright, curious eyes. She was hoping that he'd respond that he found the answers and that he'd be with her in the forest, so as to keep her company so she'd never be lonely again...

But who was she kidding? Tarek said he couldn't live in the forest like she could. That probably meant he didn't eat flowers or scratched his ears on tree bark either. They were so different, it got Holly to thinking, to thinking that if only he were a faun, or she were a human. Things would be so different.

"You came back like you said you would!"

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#31
Old 12-04-2015, 09:25 PM

Tarek stood there for who knew how long. Eventually, he just sat on the soft leaves with his knees crossed as he stared up at the sky. It really was beautiful here. And yet, the sky above looked exactly the same as it did over his home, no matter how different everything else seemed to be. Why did the two sides of the mountain have to be so different? This sort of beauty should be revered.

Fingering the ocarina in his lap, he wondered how much time passed since he last played a note. An irrational part of him expected that Holly might burst from the bushes seconds after he played and throw her arms around him. But perhaps he did not play loud or long enough and she didn't hear him at all. He didn't want to try playing the instrument again though because the noises that came out of it made him sad. He made a mockery of the gift with his lack of skill. Sighing, he continued to wait, growing more restless despite the soothingness the forest should have given him.

Tarek jumped at the sound of Holly's voice. He didn't noticed her approach and he found her with his eyes immediately, trying to calm his beating heart. "Holly! You gave me such a fright!" he exclaimed. This faun woman always seemed to and he resisted the urge to chide her for it. A man like him shouldn't be jumping so easily. A second later, his expression turned to one of puzzlement. Weapons? Why would he bring any except for the knife he kept hidden in the belt under his coat for protection and hunting. Pointless violence was always shunned by his people.

"Ah...yes, I did find some information," he exclaimed after clearing his throat. "It's wonderful actually! To have come all this way, I've finally started to find some answers. I can't wait to go back to the library and learn as much as I can. I told you this journey would be worth it. They have everything there. You should see it..." Tarek sighed with his bliss and excitement showing through his voice. He was happy and he wanted Holly to be happy for him as well.

Taking a step forward, he closed the last of the distance between them. "But you needn't worry. I am a man that keeps my promises," he said, holding out his pinky to remind Holly of the words they shared the day before.

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#32
Old 12-29-2015, 01:16 AM

A part of Holly felt as though it had died a hundred deaths when Tarek had mentioned that he'd found the information he'd been searching for. This would mean that he would probably return to the village. Though, that would also mean that he'd (hopefully) continue to return to the forest to see her. But Holly didn't like the loneliness that accompanied living alone in the forest. The longer she went without seeing Tarek, the more the loneliness sunk in.

Holly gave her best attempt at a sad smile. She was happy that he was happy, but growing up alone in the forest could make one rather selfish. She wanted him to stay, or she wanted to go. But after that last experience with the humans of the village, she decided against following Tarek into the village. Holly was still scared of them, after all.

She idly began to play with her tail.

"Tarek...?" She asked this question, but it came out on a long, drawn out breath, like a sigh and a question at the same time. "... When you have found the information you need, you will return to your own village on the other side of the mountain range?" Holly avoided eye contact, it was too much information for her to read his facial gestures, listen for his vocal cues and his body language all at once.... And her ears were oversensitive.

"... If... if you go back after this," Holly quickly sucked in a deep breath and rushed out her question in a big, blurred mess of tangled words and punctuation. "...canIpleasecomewithyou!!!?"

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#33
Old 01-02-2016, 10:23 PM

Tarek frowned after a second. He expected Holly to be happy for him. She just looked sad though and did none of the energetic things he'd already come to expect from her. Did he really make the wrong decision before? But he too was selfish in completing his selfless quest for his people. "Y-yes..." he answered, startled by this sudden question. Of course he would go home after he found the things he needed or else it would be for naught. And that would mean--Tarek finally caught on.

"I-! Of course you can!" he exclaimed after a stunned silence. Tarek took a swift step forward to capture Holly's hands, pulling them away from the tail they twisted. Half desperate him, but trying to comfort her, his own expression couldn't settle on one thing. "Holly, I would take you anywhere if you would go with me. Even though we've just met I like you so much, but...isn't this your home? Won't you miss the trees and the berries? I warn you that where I come from has no trees like this." He wanted her to come. He didn't want her to come.

Sighing, Tarek shook his head, but never let go of her hands. "But I'm no where near ready to go home yet. There's still so much to learn here, so please don't worry over such things now. I'll keep sleeping and learning at the town during the night and come to you at the day until it assuages your fears, okay? After all, it's your smiling face that I like most." He offered his own smile in encouragement.

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#34
Old 01-14-2016, 07:04 PM

When Tarek grabbed Holly's hands it really caught her by surprise. She noticed his eyes and was able to study them for a while as he spoke to her. Though, the words didn't quite register in her mind. After staring at him for a few awkward seconds, Holly shook herself and answered back,

"It's... so lonely here. I've lived my whole life in this forest... but I've been alone most of my life. Only the butterflies, moths and woodland creatures keep my company. But they have each other. I have no one." Her solemn mood made her uncomfortable. She wasn't normally like this, then again, she wasn't normally NOT alone.

It was all so much to digest. Just the other day she was alone and didn't know anyone else existed in the world. The next thing she knows, there's humans! Only, they are trying to harm her. Then comes Tarek... Who is human... yet, doesn't want to bring her any harm. He carried no weapons (that she could see) and he didn't seem interested in harming her. Besides, he claims he had come from the other side of the mountains. Maybe things are different there.

It was all so much to digest. She didn't realize how lonely she was until Tarek had arrived in the forest. Not only did he arrive, but he'd have to leave every night to go back to the human village. The village with humans that wanted to hurt Holly. She didn't want her fear to be realized... That maybe one day he'd go into the village and come back to her with the intentions to harm her.

"Why do they want to hurt me?" Holly thought out loud. She wasn't really asking Tarek a question, her mind's thoughts just slipped passed the barrier of her tongue. She shook herself again, this time to shake off the solemn feeling that was weighing her down. She perked up again and smiled at Tarek. Well, if he was going to have to return to the human village, then she'd at least spend the few moments she had with him in a productive way.

Holly's hands slipped out of his and she looked at his eyes, still smiling. Then, she began to giggle and she tapped her hooves on the ground with excitement and cheer that wasn't there before. Or, maybe it was, it was just hidden. She tapped him on the shoulder. "Tarek, you're the one. You're the one, now you have to chase me!"

Holly could have taken off at full speed into the shadows of the trees, but she knew he'd not be able to catch up that quickly, so instead she slowly backed away to give him a chance to register that she wanted to play.

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#35
Old 01-20-2016, 04:20 AM

"I know, I know, Holly," Tarek murmured, still trying to smile for Holly. He let go of her hands, thinking that he finally got through to her. "But you don't have to be alone now. That is..." He trailed off, not sure how to complete the thoughts he almost rambled on with. Maybe best to keep this from getting too serious even though Holly also looked unusually solemn. Just what did she think about? Did she still feel sad?

Tarek paused, tilting his head so that his hair fell over his shoulder, the brown color not shining even the sunlight. "What?" he started at her question. Though it looked like she didn't mean it for him, he heard the words none the less. And they bothered him. He couldn't stop himself from answering. "I don't why they do. Maybe I can find out. I want to! Because I also don't understand. Holly..." He trailed off in confusion once again.

"...Um?" The second he started to get serious, Holly stopped. Suddenly, she was tapping him on the shoulder and backing off. It took him multiple blinks to comprehend the change in situation. "Holly! What are you-? I'm being serious here!" he exclaimed after here, following the paces she retreated. Did she want to play now? At a time like this? He found himself raising his voice with a chiding tone. "Get back here! This is unreasonable behavior you know. I wasn't done talking to...hey!" As she continued to back away, he took off after here, intent on finishing this conversation that he started.

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#36
Old 02-05-2016, 12:36 AM

In a weird sort of way, Holly always seemed to somehow confuse or otherwise annoying Tarek. Still, she was a little too innocent to understand why she had such an effect on him. Once he began to follow her, she took off running, not running too fast, mind you, in case she lost Tarek in the foliage. She ran just fast enough that he could still, hopefully see her between the trees.

Holly laughed whole heartily for a little while, her smile growing bigger as she heard the echo of her laughter ring through the natural calm of the forest. She turned her head to look behind her shoulder to see if Tarek was following her... But he didn't look like he was having as much fun as Holly was. In fact, he seemed rather serious. Holly slowly came to a halt.

"Tarek!" She giggled as she turned around to face him. Her tail swung by her legs and she looked at Tarek with wide eyes. She didn't wait for him to speak, though, she probably should have. Instead she wanted to get what was on her mind out in the open before hearing him finish what he wanted to say. Selfish of her, certainly, but she still had a rather young mentality. "Tarek!" She exclaimed, "You're supposed to catch me. Then I will be 'it' and I will catch you... I just want to have fun... Before you have to leave again." Holly fought her hardest not to look sad. Though, her smile faded a little.

"Please, Tarek...? Let's play!"

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#37
Old 02-11-2016, 02:01 AM

Chasing after Holly, Tarek did his best to keep up. He wouldn't have such a hard time of it if he weren't trying to catch her attention and end this at the same time as running. If she didn't stop and let him catch up from time to time, he'd end up fuming alone in the middle of the trees. Finally, the faun girl paused to spin and face him. He skid to a stop some feet away before holding out a hand as if to beg her to stop.

"Holly!" he exclaimed back with an exasperated sigh. "Won't you just-" But she wouldn't and kept talking over his words. He just paused to breathe since his own stubbornness got him worked up. At her last words though, he bent over, giving up, if only just for now.

"Oh, very well. But I'm no good at games like this. I'm really more of a scholar type..." Tarek shook his head at Holly before starting after her again, falling into a run a second in, almost grinning. "But I'll have you know, I'm never much for giving up!"

Last edited by Kat Dakuu; 02-11-2016 at 02:03 AM..

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#38
Old 03-06-2016, 05:50 AM

Holly did notice that Tarek was very intellectual. It wasn't a surprise to her that he was more of a scholar than a playmate. Still, he was the only other person in the woods. And Holly didn't have much on an education except for what little she's learned from her parents as a young faun. That was summers ago.

As Tarek began to follow Holly, she began to take off running the second she saw he did. Holly's face lit up with a joy she didn't think any facial expression could properly express. She laughed whole heartedly and ran. "You can't catch me, Tarek!" Holly teased. She hadn't felt this excited in a very long time. It felt so nice to have real company instead of the Cosmia moths and the butterflies in the summer.

Holly didn't know very much about humans, but in the past day that she's known Tarek, she noticed that humans can't run that fast. So she eventually slowed down a little to make sure he could catch up. As she slowed down she realized she'd run into an open area without trees... And there was a path. She could only assume that it led somewhere in the human village. The path was dirt... Just a patch a land where no grass grew.

Holly froze. She let her ears search for any signs of danger before making the decision to move or not. She liked Tarek, but her experience with other humans haven't exactly been the greatest. All she could hear was the sounds of the forest. No humans. It seemed safe. But Holly's curiosity always overruled her logic at times.

She lifted her hoof and lightly tapped it against the path, not fully trusting that there weren't any traps or ambushes waiting for her. When nothing happened she took another step, then another. She didn't plan to go far down the path, she just wanted to see where it led. She took a few more steps, then waited for Tarek, still worried about traps.

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#39
Old 03-06-2016, 05:07 PM

As he ran, Tarek found himself quickly falling behind the faun girl. He expect as much, but twisted the loose tassels of his coat behind his neck so they'd stop catching on the branches. Whatever skills he'd learned in navigating forests flew out the window as he focused just on keeping up with the excitable girl. "Holly!" he yelled as he caught sight of her tail flitting between some trees. "I may not catch you, but...." he gasped for breath, nearly losing one of his boots in a rut beside a newly fallen tree. "...you're not going to lose me either!"

He said that, but he was on the verge of getting left behind anyway. If Holly hadn't slowed down, he'd be sitting on a tree stump sulking by now. He hurried to catch up, feeling an odd sense go through him. He realized he couldn't hear Holly's hooves on the ground anymore. Did she decide to wait for him? But that didn't sound much like her. "Holly? Why did you stop?" he asked as he finally pushed his way out of the trees. A clearing opened up and his eyes went wide. He got so turned around in the forest, but he realized they just came out at the path that led to town.

Holly wandered there, slowly making steps in the wrong direction. Tarek grabbed her arm, by the faun's side in a moment. "Hey, where are you going?" he asked, trying to keep the alarm out of his voice. It wasn't that he thought Holly couldn't walk into the forest. He trusted the hearts of these humans, but still he worried. Shouldn't she show more caution in the first place?

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#40
Old 03-11-2016, 01:58 AM

To Holly, it felt almost as though she were in a trance for a while. The path piqued her curiosity and seemingly called to her to explore. After all, she'd spent so many years alone in the woods, it was a wonder why she hadn't explored sooner. When Tarek grabbed her arm, she blinked a couple of times and the spell vanished.

"...I-I just thought..." Holly began, but there was really no way to explain why she was going to walk down a path that lead to a town that had people who were trying to bring her harm. But, if the people knew Tarek, they couldn't be that bad... Could they? "I just thought... I just thought I heard something." She lied. "I wanted to see what it was." Holly stepped backwards, out of the direction she was originally walking. Her tail swung low by her side as she walked off the dirt path.

She looked around, feeling nervousness slowly encompass her. Out of nervous habit she grabbed her tail and began to wring it between her hands. "Tarek...?" Holly thought to censor herself, maybe she shouldn't ask... But before she could change her mind, the words spilled out. "... Are there other humans... like you?" Holly bit her bottom lip... Well, there was no taking the words back now that they were out in the open.

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#41
Old 03-11-2016, 10:36 PM

Tarek let his land slide away after a second. Standing in front of Holly, he regarded her for a second. Her face said she hadn't been aware of the actions she did. Really, she could be so foolish, but he didn't mind that. "Heard something?" he tilted his head, listening. Maybe her faun ears just noticed more. Only the sounds of the forest behind them reached his ears. Tarek shook his head. "You still shouldn't run off though.

Sighing, he took Holly's hand and reveled in the strange ease that he twined their fingers together. Somehow it just felt natural. "Of course there are other humans like me. Am I so different?" Though he remembered Holly's first experience with his people, it felt distant now. The people in the town acted similar enough to him. Humans were humans in the end. "Look, let's just go back to the forest. I spend the nights at the town, so I'm not going back until the sun sets. Didn't I say I would spend my day here with you in the forest?"

He led the way back toward the trees, not realizing he picked a slightly different direction than they came from. It went deeper into the forest, toward where it bordered with the mountains, still far closer to the town though than his previous entrance to the area. The trees here looked older, no doubt hiding far more secrets.

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#42
Old 03-16-2016, 03:00 AM

Holly opened her mouth to say something, but no sound came out. Somewhere deep within herself, she wanted to claim that Tarek was, in fact, very different from her first encounter with humans. However, the truth was, she never really knew any humans besides Tarek. She closed her mouth and noddedin agreement to go back into the forest.

Holly allowed herself to be led into the woods, all the while, she kept looking behind herself to watch the path to the town shrink into the distance. She probably didn't want to know what the townspeople were like anyway. Maybe they really did just want to harm her. Holly sighed, she wasn't looking forward to sunset.

When they moved deeper into the woods, Holly slipped her hand out from Tarek's. She smiled. "I'm glad you're here, Tarek." She wasn't exactly talking to him directly, more so just thinking out loud. Holly's ear twitched and she sucked in a deep breath before letting out a short huff. "It gets lonely here sometimes..." She started to talk about the woods with full intentions on telling Tarek that she really did enjoy his company, but her mind shifted almost immediately to a completely different subject.

"Hey, are you hungry?" She gave a toothy grin. Holly then looked around the forest floor for something to eat. "Ah!" She bent over and began to rip up some weeds growing near a tree and she turned back to face Tarek, she divided the fistful of weeds in half and took one half into her mouth, while the other half she held out to Tarek, "Here." She mumbled with her mouthful of grass, "These are really good!"

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#43
Old 03-23-2016, 08:34 PM

Tarek kept Holly in sight, glad to feel the comfort of her hand in his. He just...wanted to keep her as herself and he couldn't explain it well. It must be the bubbly sunshine of her personality because even his friends and the younger girls in his home village never made him feel this way before. He hummed with understanding at Holly's words, but otherwise didn't react until she so suddenly switched topics. He focused, really turning to look at her for the first time since they walked back into the forest.

"What? Good?" he asked in confusion just as she thrust the weeds out. By then, they made it to a corner of the woods he didn't recognize at all. Staring wide eyed, he was at a complete loss as to why this jerked him out of his thoughts so. He'd just felt some kind of instinctual need to stop walking and look, really look at the world around him. As silly as the weeds sounded, it wasn't that. And then he saw it.

In the spot Holly ripped the weeds up from, something oddly white caught the sun. "Hold on. What's that?" he murmured as he stepped past Holly to investigate. Leaning down and brushing some dirt aside, he revealed just what the patch of weeds grew on top of---a skull. Specifically, the skull of a faun.

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#44
Old 04-05-2016, 12:57 AM

Holly at first, didn't really notice what Tarek pointed to. From her point of view, the thing was covered in tall weeds. "What's... what?" She asked and she dropped to a crouch on the ground and began to pull back the grass and weeds. Holly found that she was rather... curious. When the sun bounced off the stark white of the skull, it stabbed Holly's eyes with light, and she shielded her eyes for a moment. Then maneuvered again to where she could see without the light stabbing her eyes.

Holly had never seen anything like it. She picked it up curiously and studied it in her hands for a moment... It looked vaguely familiar. She gathered so much that it was a bone. A skull. She was really curious about the horns that protruded from the top of the skull, they matched her own horns. As much as she feared it was the skull of a faun, she didn't want to panic just yet. She lifted the skull to her face and took in a long sniff.

She recognized that scent. Holly gasped in surprise and dropped the skull at her hooves, backing away from it as her mouth hung open in horror. "... Mama." Holly had lost faith decades ago that her mother would ever return to the woods. As a young faun both of her parents had left, for whatever the reason, Holly couldn't remember. So this was where her mother had been all of those long years. Holly didn't even realize she'd never gone this deep into the forest.

Tears began to sting her eyes and felt sick to her stomach. Immediately Holly picked herself off the ground and began to walk away, mumbling to herself about how ashamed she was that she never thought to seek out where her mother had gone. Holly began to fear for her life. "... am I...? Am I the last one?" Holly's ears dropped to her cheeks. She decided it was now okay to panic.

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#45
Old 04-06-2016, 09:40 PM

Tarek realized immediately just what the skull belonged to when Holly picked it up. He couldn't say anything though. He just couldn't tell her that the thing she held was a piece of one of her own kind, glimmering in the sun like some kind of jewel instead of a dirty skull. Swallowing hard, he reached out to take it, but hesitated a second too long.

"Holly..." he murmured as she threw it down with an exclamation. Another shiver went through him, her words sinking in. Mama? How did she know? She couldn't really know that could she? But it didn't matter. This faun was dead and Holly panicked, starting to back away. He regretted very much picking this direction, no matter if he knew the forest or not. If he just walked back the way they came, at least for now. His own curiosity peaked, but not Holly. She didn't need to see this ever.

He closed the distance between them again and wrapped her up in a hug. "I'm sorry. I didn't realize what it was or I would have warned you. I would have..." He shook his head. He would have done anything else. Happily lied and said he didn't see a thing, investigate it all by himself later. That's what he should have done, but he couldn't take that back. "Please don't go running off now. Let's just go somewhere else and sit down okay? I don't want you to be alone right now.

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#46
Old 04-07-2016, 02:12 AM

Holly tried to rationalize, tried to think of all the logical reasons why they'd just found the skull of a faun that was so close to her, here, in the forest. Why someone would kill a faun? Holly hadn't seen her mother or father in years, but the last faun she'd seen was, in fact, her mother... Many years ago. That scent that radiated from the skull when she sniffed it gave it away. She cursed her sense of smell.

Holly tried her hardest to be rational. But, it was as if all logic had vanished from her and her panic became rage very quickly...

"You..." She whispered at first, her voice cracking as she tried to speak through the sadness that got caught in her throat. When Tarek came closer to her, she shied away, holding her tail in her hand and wringing it out of nervous habit. "You!" She roared. "Get away from me!" Holly felt overwhelmed. Too many emotions, too many discoveries in too little of time. "This is your fault!" Holly screamed. She knew that wasn't entirely true, she hoped somewhere deep in her heart that Tarek truly didn't know. But again, reason was not a strong point at this time.

She backed away from Tarek and tears finally began to roll down her cheeks as her lower lip stuck out and quivered. Holly's voice became quiet, just above a whisper... "Fauns are supposed to live for centuries. The humans killed her... and you're going to kill me." Holly turned so her back faced Tarek and she started to openly weep. "I don't know what you humans want... But I won't let you kill me too."

Holly took off into the woods, however, she didn't go very far. She just ran into the shadows until she knew she was (hopefully) out of sight. Still, from where she hid she watched Tarek through the bushes, wanting to know if he truly was as honest as he had made her believe.

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#47
Old 04-14-2016, 05:39 PM

Tarek recoiled when she raised her voice. For a second, he just stood there in shock, never expecting Holly of all people to get angry. He only wanted to help, but feared he might not be able to even if he could relate in some ways, having not been raised by his own parents. He knew what it was like to be alone even when surrounded by other people. His face falling with hurt, he just let Holly continued to back away from him though. The words he could say, none of them seemed to come out right.

"Please. You're being..." he begged without even finishing his thought. He couldn't go nearer to her, but he couldn't turn away either. "Holly, you're just hurt right now." Tarek didn't admit it hurt him to be the center of her rage. Could she really think that some day he might become a bad human? He told her he wasn't any different from them, so maybe he wasn't? If it came down to it, he could become that person in order to survive. Humans were too selfish, too...cruel. His hands clenched as if he could feel the weapon in his hand that hurt these fauns, whatever it had been. He didn't even know. He realized, he didn't know if a weapon actually existed, but Holly turned away without considering that.

As she took off, he blinked back his own tears that came unbidden. His feet refused to move though. Almost a minute later, his knees hit the soft leaves. "You don't even know humans killed her..." he whispered. Holly didn't know, but he'd find out if that was what it took to win her trust again. He didn't think he could take this pain his entire life that came from her distrust.

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#48
Old 04-26-2016, 04:16 PM

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.

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#49
Old 05-13-2016, 07:03 PM

Finally Tarek managed to pull himself to his feet. He didn't know Holly watched him, or that she left. He figured she walked away from him long ago and probably didn't intend to come back. No, if he wanted to be with Holly again, this time he would have to do the chasing. With that thought, he turned to pick up the skull again. It was strange that Holly could so easily know who it belonged to. Fingers caressing the surface, he wondered what she was like. Not that wondering did anything for him. He sighed and turned to the spot where he found the skull.

Digging found him more bones. He shifted when he found another skull just a foot away. Apparently the bodies had been buried together and not very deep. With their position, it looked like they'd been tossed in and graves last minute. Erosion from the wind and rain coming down from the mountains made quick work and exposed the skull he'd first seen. It was strange to see and left a solemn feeling in his gut.

Tarek found himself following the faint path between the trees even as the sky grew darker overhead. It wasn't night yet, but he didn't care for the passage of time now. He felt drawn in that direction, perhaps by a hint in the landscape. He couldn't be sure. As he dug and dug though, the true horror revealed itself. With the last rays of the sun disappearing behind the mountains, he sat back on his heels and just stared at the scene before him.

Rather than one grave or two, dozens of haphazard bodies lay strewn in a pit just past the first grave. Deeper, older too. It had been filled in layers over some time. Just how long had this been going on? Tarek couldn't think, only stare. Overall, he counted fifteen bodies in this mass grave, and then the two newer ones. Fifteen skulls, thirty arms, sixty hands and feet, but no tails. One or two missing, a coincidence, but he couldn't explain this. Just what was going on?

Tarek finally stood after placing the skull of Holly's mother reverently in the dirt. He needed to find Holly and talk to the villagers. Something was going on here and he needed to know. Even the ground and the trees there looked wrong, too dark. They'd done something by killing these fauns and he needed to know what.

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#50
Old 11-07-2016, 06:15 PM

It seemed that the more Holly struggled, the more delight the men took in their find. Holly didn't give up, not even after she had realized that she was being brought into the human village. Though, it seemed there were not very many humans around at the time. The entire experienced scared Holly beyond her belief and she found a renewed energy to escape and caused her to kick one of the men in the head once more.

That must've been the lucky hit, her cloven hooves hit one man square in the eye with enough force to cause him to cry out in pain and drop her legs, which he was carrying. Holly scrambled to her hooves, but the rest of the men easily caught her, she wasn't nearly as fast with an injured leg.

"Hold 'er still!" One man called. "There isn't any use in struggling, if we can't bring you to the cleaver, then the cleaver will come to you!" Holly didn't know what a cleaver was, but she wasn't planning to stick around to find out what it was. They tackled Holly to the dirt ground, one man even going as far as to put his dirty boot on top of Holly's head to keep her still. Holly's head was turned the other way, she didn't see when a heavy man with a large meat cleaver in his hand approached slowly. Though, Holly could smell him and hear him.

She continued to kick and struggle, doing her best to wiggle away from the men. She was beyond scared at that point, having not the chance to see what it was she was supposed to be afraid of and having not the chance to figure out where she was or what was happening. Her tail swished in the air and she tried to fight...

It happened so suddenly.... She felt her tail being grabbed and the next second, a sharp, terrible pain shot up from the base of her tail, into her spine and into her cranium. Holly screamed, the pain sending her into a monstrous frenzy and she was able to, (finally) overthrow her assailants and take off back into the woods...

The men yelled, "It got away!", "You idiot!"

Holly didn't stop running, she couldn't hear as one man said,

"We got what we wanted. It's weak without it's tail, it'll die alone in the woods and we'll come take the body and sell whatever else we can get. Faun are so rare these days, surely some witch would want its body for something...." The other men nodded, all proud of what they'd done.

. . . .

Holly ran as far and as fast as her injured leg would carry her. The fur on her backside felt cool and sticky, she was panting much harder than she'd done so before and the pain was unbelievable. Holly stumbled into a tree when her legs finally gave out. She didn't realize just how much she was crying until she'd stopped. She waited for a second, then two... She felt nothing on her legs. "W-what...?" Holly reached back to feel the base of her tail... She felt nausea sweep over her as there was nothing there but a horrible, wet, sticky stump of flesh. When she brought her fingers back around her body, she realized the wet, sticky substance was drying blood. They'd managed to take her tail!

Holly hissed when another wave of pain split through her spine. She felt... less. It was awful, and she felt as though she'd lost a part of herself. She had bruises scattered across her body from where she was manhandled. Holly dropped to the forest floor, crying.

 


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