Riley
We found the bear site mid-morning.
You couldn’t miss it. The trail told the whole story in mud and hoofprints — two horses moving at a steady pace, and then chaos. Churned ground, a wide skid mark where something large had gone sideways, and in the soft mud at the trail’s edge a clear impression that stopped me cold.
The shape of a person. On their back, arms flung wide, pressed into the earth like a seal in wax.
Woman shaped. A quick sniff confirmed that it was Kaida, not Maggie. Maggie seemed to have landed a bit aside.
I stood over it for a long moment and said nothing.
“Horse went over,” Finn said, from behind me. He was reading the ground the way he read everything — quietly, methodically, without drama. “Reared and fell backwards from the look of it. Both riders came off
