Aurelia POV
The word cut through my panic with startling clarity.
They wanted me alive. Not torn apart in this clearing the way rogue wolves typically dealt with trespassers stupid enough to wander into contested territory.
Someone sent them to me.
The realization should have terrified me further, and some distant part of my mind understood that it did, that whoever ordered this hunt clearly knew exactly who I was and where I might be found. But underestimated instructions carried their own peculiar weaknesses, and exhaustion had sharpened my mind in ways fear alone never could.
Alive meant they couldn't simply kill me if I fought back.
they had to actually catch me, not just wound me enough to stop running.
The largest wolf took another step forward, and I forced myself to stay per
