Aiden
Aiden reached the ridge before the second horn.
The route marker stood beyond a shallow ditch, its blue ribbon snapping in the wind. He had enough time to collect the token and return with the best pace in his group. Jonas was already smiling beside the scoring post.
Then someone shouted below the path.
Aiden stopped.
Three students stood beside the lower crossing. Their practice supply frame had tilted into the ditch, one end trapped against a stone. A fourth student knelt near it, holding a hand against his shin.
The instructor stationed at the lower crossing had seen them. She was moving down from the far bank, carefully, because the ground between them was wet.
Nobody was dying. That made the decision less easy to explain to the people waiting at the scoring post.
"Keep going," Jonas called. "The instructor has them."
Aiden looked at the marker.
