Red. The colour of seduction, heat or love- representing a strong vibrant woman. Also however the colour of blood and danger. But most of all red the colour of determination. And this was when Neji the colour of white belonging to purity, light and innocence would meet the colour of blood, danger and desire. This was when red met white.
Neji gasped as he was suddenly transported, he landed with a thud in what felt like the cool soft feeling of snow. His head was pounding from that transporting magic, it felt like his brain was being crushed.He had defeated Hinata's step-mother, but just before she died she gave Neji the parting gift of transporting him somewhere, who know's where the hell he was now. He sat up looking around, everything was white, sure there was the trees but the snow made everything white.
That was until he caught a flash of red. He began to rise until he felt something sharp on the back of his neck, an arrow? "Move and this arrow goes through you." It was a woman. She had a high pitched voice- not too high but high enough for him to tell her gender.
Neji raised his hands like a surrender "I don't mean harm."
There was a scoff. "What are you doing here?"
"I have no idea." Neji shrugged "where am I?"
"You're in the snow village." The woman sounded confused "you don't know where you are?" He could feel the pressure from the tip of the arrow begin to soften.
"I was teleported."
She snorted in derision and then said "stand up."
Neji rose, his boots digging into the snow, it was chilly here, he wondered where Hanabi was, but when he was taken he did see their Step-Mother die. So maybe she was still back at the kingdom safely.
"Turn."
Neji turned around, and there was a woman pointing an arrow at him with her bow the string pulled back to her cheek. She had steely brown eyes with matching coloured hair tied up into two braided buns. She wore a long red cloak with the hood pulled up, snow falling on her lightly along with Neji, she looked at him with fire and radiance in her eyes.
"Who are you?" She asked.
"I'm Neji Hyuga."
She lowered the bow pulling the string back down "Well what is a prince of a destroyed land doing in our village? It's a full moon tonight you know."
"I told you, I was transported, by a witch."
Her eyebrows raised "witches, they're troublesome aren't they?" No one liked witches in this land, they only seemed to cause trouble and spread their wrath. And no one would ever want to meet a witches wrath.
"Right." Neji nodded, he lowered his hands placing them back down. "So if I'm in the snow village I shouldn't be that far from the Kingdom?"
She nodded "sure. But I'd suggest now going now. Night is coming and you don't want the wolf to go after you."
"The wolf?"
She rolled her eyes putting her weight on her left side making her cloak swish slightly "the wolf that attacks our village every full moon. It eats someone every full moon without fail." She had a disgusted face thinking about it.
"Why don't you just leave?"
She shrugged "I like the snow."
"Are you lying?" He narrowed his white eyes at her.
She nodded "I have a grandmother, but she's too old to leave." The woman had a small smile as she studied him in curiosity, "and I do like snow!"
Neji asked "what's your name?"
"Tenten."
Tenten. He knew that name, she was the greatest weapons maker in the entire land of every kingdom, people always came to buy her weapons. Sasuke owned a bow created by her, "you're the weapons maker."
She nodded "yeah. Look come with me, night is coming. And I'd rather not wake up tomorrow to find out you were eaten by the wolf."
"I don't-"
"You'll stay with me." Tenten interrupted raising her leather gloved hand.
"I really need to get back." Neji decided he should probably take his chances and just go, he needed to see Hanabi. He did wonder, why did Hanabi think he was dead? Did her Step-Mother tell her he was dead?
Tenten shook her head "you will stay with me. For one night, I'm not letting someone go off on a journey tonight and the next day find out he was eaten by the wolf." She ordered "the wolf is dangerous, you can't just hope to be lucky. It's vicious."
He sighed, the wolf seemed dangerous, and if he did take his chances to go find Hanabi and Hinata if the wolf caught him he would never meet them. He just needed to be patient. "Alright."
"Follow me then." Tenten turned around and Neji walked next to her along the snow. She asked "so your living in the Uchiha Kingdom?"
Neji nodded.
"Why not try re-build your Kingdom. I used to go there when I was a child, it was always my favourite place to go people were always singing and dancing." Tenten shrugged. "I think you should try re-build it."
"I was too focused on looking for the two missing princesses, but now that I found them I can try re-build it." He never really considered it, but no, he could re-build the kingdom, and he would be the King, he was next in line to be King even if he was a branch Hyuga. Hiashi had told him Hinata was too kind to be the ruler, so he was next in line. There was still many Hyuga in the Uchiha kingdom, they would help re-build the kingdom.
It was destroyed by ogres. His bet was that Hinata's step-mother did it so she could live in the Uchiha kingdom and try marry either Itachi or Sasuke. He had a strong disgust for their step-mother so he never tried to find her, thinking about it now it was foolish since Hinata and Hanabi were there the whole time. She was just a woman who would marry for money and power.
Tenten shrugged "well I'd visit again if it was re-built."
"Thanks." Neji smiled. "That's a nice cloak." The red cloak reached her ankles and the hood circled comfortably around her head, the rich red matching the colour of a rose or the colour of blood. There was also darker red swirls on it giving it some design.
She smiled "thanks." She put the bow behind her back and slid the arrow back into her quiver. "By the way I don't stay with my grandmother so she won't feed you a bunch of food like she tries to do with me." She laughed trying to become more comfortable with the man staying in her cabin tonight.
Tenten seemed pretty nice after she trusted someone.
"So this wolf. Have you tried to kill it?"
Tenten nodded "many times. Even I did with my weapons but it's vicious, many villagers have tried to but failed." They came out into a clearing which revealed the village, it was rows of wooden built homes like cabins, a well was in the center of the village.
It was afternoon so not many were out, Neji noticed a lot of villagers smiling to Tenten, Tenten helped keep the village stable with her popular weapons shop. She pointed to the right at a wooden made cabin with a sign 'RED WEAPONS.' "Red?" Neji asked.
Tenten shrugged "my grandmother calls me Red because of the cloak."
"Oh."
They continued walking and a man with what looked like a needle was in between his teeth paused looking at Tenten "new friend?" He had a slouched attitude with his hands encased inside his pockets, he stared at Neji.
Tenten shrugged "just a traveler."
"Sure." He shrugged and continued his walk giving a suspicious look to Neji.
Tenten apologized "sorry, a lot of people in the village are kind of cautious."
"Why?"
Tenten made a left and they stopped at a cabin with a red door, "people think the wolf is a person." She opened the door and let Neji inside, she closed the door over "sorry it's kind of messy I wasn't expecting a stranger to be staying the night."
"That's fine. I'm just thankful you've let me stay. So they think the wolf is a person?" He looked around the house, there was a living room to the left and kitchen to the right. Then wooden steps up to a bed, there was weapons scattered to the edges of the hallway. Papers around the place too with weapon designs.
Tenten nodded and pulled her cloak off sitting it up at a coat peg, "when we were going to try kill the wolf in day because we thought it would be sleeping. We followed it's paw tracks in the snow, and then it's paws turned into boots."
"Boots?"
"Like it turned from wolf to human." Tenten shrugged. Underneath she was wearing slim black trousers with brown hunting boots, a white tunic with a pulled in brown corset over it was under her chest and pulled in by string. She pulled off her leather gloves "you can take off that fancy cape."
He arched a brow "fancy?"
"Yeah it's fancy."
Neji sighed and took off his white cape hanging it up next to her red one, he frowned noticing a large axe leaning against the wall. But he said nothing of it as he followed her to her kitchen "everyone closes up early. In case the wolf comes early, it never does, but I close early anyway because no one's going to come to my shop at this time anyway."
"So why were you out in the forest?" Neji asked.
"Me? I was hunting."
He nodded slowly.
"Tea?"
"Sure." How exactly did this happen, their Step-Mother teleported him to the snow village and now he comes across a red cloaked woman. The woman then let's him stay the night because of a wolf that kills someone every full moon? "Can I sit?" He pointed at the chair by a round table.
"Go ahead."
Neji took a seat. He looked around the room, there wasn't many framed pictures he did see one of her as a child hung up. It looked like she was in his kingdom, she was smiling widely pointing at the castle, that castle was burned to flames now. And there was one next to it when she was older with a woman looking the same age. They were smiling in the picture. The woman he didn't know had blonde hair tied up in two bunches and dark green eyes... Wait wasn't the the Princess of the Sand Kingdom?
"So how did a witch manage to teleport you here?" Tenten walked over to him sitting a mug of tea in front of him, a white mug, she had a red one. She sat across from him taking a drink of her tea looking curiously at him.
"She was my two cousins step-mother. So my step-aunt. I thought the two were missing until my friend Naruto said he met one of my cousins- Hinata-sama in the forest. And my other friend informed me that my step-aunt was staying in the kingdom which I had no idea about. So Naruto and I went after them to the castle-"
"How long did you think they were missing?"
"About eight years."
Tenten tilted her head "that's quite sad."
He just shrugged. "Then my other cousin Hanabi-sama comes running out the castle towards us and we find out that their step-mother found out Hinata-sama was talking to Naruto. Naruto is a prince of the Uzumaki family, so their step-mother got a Huntsman to kill Hinata-sama."
Tenten furrowed her eyebrows "she wanted your cousin killed because she was talking to a prince?"
"She gets jealous quite easily." Neji sighed "Hanabi-sama let Hinata-sama run into the forest but the Huntsman still went after her. But their step-mother wouldn't let Naruto and I go after her, she grabbed Hanabi-sama so I decided to make an opening for Naruto to let him go. While I stayed and killed their step-mother."
"But she still managed to get you here before she died?"
He nodded.
Tenten widened her eyes "you must have had a long day."
"I just have to hope Naruto got to Hinata-sama. But he's stronger than me so I trust that he did, and Hanabi-sama is clever enough to go to the castle to get help." He did believe that, Hinata and Hanabi were strong women. He was keeping rather level headed about this, because Tenten was right if he got angered and tried to go after them there was a huge risk of getting killed by the wolf. So he needed to keep calm then set off in the morning.
"So Naruto likes this Hinata?" Tenten asked curiously clasping the mug around her hands for warmth, there was a fire crackling by the side.
Neji never thought about that, "I don't know...?"
"I mean it would be pretty romantic. The Prince saves her from the Huntsmans clutches rescuing her from near death." She said dramatically and smiled.
Neji peered at her and broke into a small smile, "maybe."
"Well think about it, she's a Princess right? Even if she was held captive. And Naruto is a Prince, so he would need a Queen to rule after the King and Queen when they step down. A Hyuga and an Uzumaki would be quite interesting right?"
"I guess."
Tenten said "I also heard that there's a ball tonight to find Sasuke Uchiha's new wife."
Neji was kind of annoyed he was going to miss all the women pressing themselves up against Sasuke, he wanted to see that just to annoy him later. "Yes."
"Were you meant to be going?"
"Yes but I don't mind."
Tenten shrugged "I'm sorry, I know I'm stopping you from seeing your cousins and all but I can't let you leave, the wolf really is dangerous."
He shook his head "it's fine."
"I've never been to a ball. What's it like?" She asked leaning forwards curiously.
"It's quite fun, if you have someone to go with you have a dancing partner. Everyone dresses up in gowns or suits, the music is nice." He shrugged, he wasn't the biggest fan of going to balls, true they were enjoyable but he didn't find a lot of things extremely fun. And even if he found things very fun he didn't express things like that.
"Did you have a partner?"
"No." He shook his head.
Tenten frowned "why not? Girls would probably love to go with you." She emphasized on the love a teasing grin forming on her face.
Neji paused and then smirked "they would? And why do you think that?"
Tenten paused and then tapped her fingers on the cup, she looked a little nervously "well look at you, your a prince, a Hyuga, that could be looking for a wife for the re-built kingdom so a Queen, your handsome and-"
"So you think I'm handsome?" He nodded folding his arms giving a sly look to her.
She sighed "okay but who wouldn't!"
He let out a soft chuckle, she was funny. She grumbled and stood up snatching his empty tea cup to clean, while Neji still looked amused at Tenten.
-
This has not been properly proof read because I'm slightly rushing because The Great British Bake Off is on in like five minutes and I'm watching it downstairs and I'm not missing the final. But after it I will go over fully reading it for errors and mistakes.
Anyway I hope you enjoyed Chapter Nine being the Prologue to Tenten as of course Little Red Riding Hood! I always imagined her as Red Riding Hood for some reason I don't really know why but I love it a lot.
I hope you enjoyed this chapter and as always the next chapter will be out next Wednesday the next one will be called Chapter Ten - I'll Have A Ball! This will go back to Sai and Ino on their travel to Corona. And as always if you liked it give me a vote I'd appreciate it and leave a comment if you enjoyed this chapter! Thank you!
(Btw did anyone watch the final episode of Kekkai Sensen? It was amazing omf!!)
07/10/2015
~Rebecca