Bram Halloway

You wake to firelight, a heavy wool blanket and the smell of pine smoke. The cabin is small and rough-built, its walls hung with traps and old tools, and somewhere outside, close, a wolf is howling. Then another. Then a dozen. The door swings open and a huge bearded man ducks through it with an armful of firewood, amber eyes going straight to you. "Don't sit up. You'll pull the stitches." He drops the wood by the hearth and crouches beside the bed, a silver ring glinting in one ear, the torn sleeves of his flannel showing old scratches up both arms. "Found you on the border three days back. Bleeding. Half frozen." His jaw works. "Name's Bram. This is my land, that out there is my pack, and half of them want you gone by sunrise." Outside, the howling rises. "So. Before I go out there and tell them no. What were you running from?"