Chapter 288: First Hunt
Seldom did a hare run without a reason to do so.
As Irene pulled tight her bowstring and released in what seemed to be the same second, she very nearly leapt forward to stop the arrow, but it was much faster than her and hit its intended target.
However, her reason for panic was the white fox who chased the bunny. She had been told in the past that they were one of the rarest to see in the north because of how well they blended into the snowy environment.
However, this place was shadowed by thick, never bare trees. The snow being shallower inside the forest made it so that it was more hidden than it would be if it were running across the amazing, flat plains that offered the most snow in the area.
She would have felt awful to hit such an animal. Who was she saving it for? She wasn’t sure. She simply wanted other people to see it if they ever wandered in this direction. As far as she could tell, the north was a ghost town. Everything seemed abandoned. It was all devoid of human life while the animals took over.
Perhaps the most surprising part of the whole situation was the way the fox stopped in its tracks and stared at her where she lay in the snow after trying to stop her own arrow. It acknowledged her more as something odd than something that was a threat to its life.
Its dark eyes looked from her to the dead hare before it bounded off in another direction.
If she wasn’t mistaken, its face seemed to express that it was slightly inconvenienced because she had taken the dinner it was intending to eat.
Since the animal didn’t fight for the fallen hare, she assumed that it must have had other ideas for a meal. Perhaps it knew where the rest of the hares were, which was why it wasn’t so worried about it.
Regardless, it was going to be enough for her for dinner. She might even be able to freeze some of it overnight and have food for tomorrow as well. It was a sizable rabbit, which was why she was so pleased to get it in the first place.
With a small sigh of relief, Irene assessed the forest. Seeing nothing else, she went to the rabbit and took back her arrow. She wasn’t going to waste arrows there. Everything she brought, she was trying to bring back with her.