Read Online A Tale of Red Riding: Rise of the Alpha Huntress (The Alpha Huntress Series Book 1) by Neo Edmund - Free Book Online Page B

taking cover back inside the tree. Before she was able to make a decision either way, a large cat dashed out of the bushes and ran right between her legs. Red spun around and watched the three-foot-long spotted feline fleeing across the clearing.
    “Where are you off to in such a hurry?” Red asked.
    The sound of galloping hooves thundered out right behind Red. She turned around, just as a snow white horse leapt out of the bushes and came right at her.
    Reacting on pure instinct, Red executed a dazzling backward handspring, just in time to avoid being trampled. When her senses returned, she saw the horse sprinting off after the cat.
    “Out of my way, foolish peasant,” said a white-haired teen girl riding atop the horse. She was dressed in formal purple and black riding gear, sitting with perfect posture on a finely crafted leather saddle. From over her shoulder, she pulled a bow and loaded a wooden arrow.
    Red watched helplessly as the white-haired girl took aim at the fleeing cat. The arrow soared in the blink of an eye and pierced the creature through the ribs. Crying out, it stumbled and tumbled across the wet ground until it smacked head first into the trunk of a willow tree. Red’s heart sank in despair at the sight of the wounded creature groaning in pain, but the hunt wasn’t yet over.
    With her horse charging forward, the white-haired girl leaped to the ground and dashed in a flash over to the fallen cat. With one hand she grabbed the skin on the back of its neck. With her other, she pulled a long hunting knife from her boot.
    “Don’t do it,” Red shouted.
    The white-haired girl looked Red in the eyes. She had ghost white skin and hair that made her look like a walking corpse. Her deep purple eyes glowed in the daylight. She smirked with a malevolent grin and then slit the cat’s throat.
    “How could you?” Red cried out as she approached the white-haired girl. With tear-soaked eyes, she knelt down by the cat, lying slain at its killer’s feet.
    “Listen here, peasant girl, I don’t know who you are, nor do I care,” the white-haired girl said. “What has transpired here is none of your concern.”
    “It is too my business.” Red glared up at the white-haired girl. “Who exactly do you think you are?”
    “I will not be questioned by a foolish peasant girl.” The white-haired girl turned away, dragging the dead cat along behind her.
    “Hey. Don’t walk away from me.” Red raced after her. “What was the point of killing it? You look well off enough not to need it for food.”
    The white-haired girl responded without bothering to look back at Red. “If I was so poor that I had to eat such vermin to survive, I’d sooner let myself die of starvation.”
    “Then what will you do with it?”
    “Well, peasant girl, if you must know, I’m going to skin it. Twelve or thirteen more, I’ll have enough to commission a tailor to make a blanket for my horse.”
    “Are you mad?” Red watched in disgust as the white-haired girl pulled a cloth sack from the horse’s saddlebag and shoved the dead animal inside. “I think you ought to be ashamed for doing such a terrible thing.”
    “Shame is for the weak.” The white-haired girl turned to face Red with a furious glare of irritation. "Crying over the demise of such a disgusting creature is pathetic.”
    “Maybe you’re pathetic for thinking that way.”
    “How dare you speak to me in that manner, peasant girl.” The white-haired girl swung her hand to slap Red in the face. Red’s reflexes were so quick that she grabbed the girl’s wrist, stopping the strike an inch short of her face. The two girls locked eyes in a dangerous stare-down.
    “My, my, peasant girl. You have superior reflexes and a fearlessness that I’ve scarcely seen. I have surely misjudged you.”
    Red released the white-haired girl’s hand. “Don’t let me see you killing any more innocent cats, or you’ll answer to me.”
    “Is that so? And whom will I be answering