Isaac is a mess of pain and fear, oozing distress to the point where Erica can feel it physically affecting her.
Wordless, she laps at his snout, trying her best to calm him down, but she's not their mom, she's not even Derek, she's just a scared seven year old girl slash wolf right now and even if she could talk she doesn't know if there is anything she could say to calm him down.
They might be in great danger, this might be the moment Derek always warned them about when they asked to stop running. This boy who found them, Stiles- he hasn't hurt them yet, and he doesn't seem like he wants to, but he is human, human like the hunters who killed her family, human like the hunters who shot Derek and Isaac.
Erica tenses at the thought, mentally readying herself to claw out these people's eyes if they try to hurt Isaac, the boy's, and the vet's.
"I know it hurts...but he's just trying to help," Stiles says to Isaac as though was talking to a person, which he cannot know he is.
He smells of pity and sadness though, not malice, just like he did back in the woods. Emotions cannot be faked, Erica knows this, the smell always gives them away.
The only reason she didn't try to maul Stiles' leg when he picked up her brother was that smell, that honest empathy. It told her they'd be safe, even as instinct still screamed at her to run. And they do seem safe for now. The boy has brought them to an animal clinic, and there are no hunters, no weapons. The vet is bandaging up Isaac's shoulder with surprising care.
"The mother might be dead," he says to Stiles, who nods, looking unhappy.
"What shall I do? I can't just leave them to themselves out there, not hurt, not when someone may have tried to hurt them."
He looks over Isaac and then Erica, so sad that the sandy wolf feels like whining and lapping at that frown.
"I cannot take care of them here," the vet says, "and it's unlikely anyone will want them. They're wolves after all, predators."
"Are you kidding me?" Stiles asks, indignation in his voice, "Look at their cute like faces, they're nothing but little bundles of fluff."
Erica knows it's stupid, but she cannot help but mewl happily at that. Stiles looks over and smiles slightly, sighing.
"I'll take them home with me...until his wound has healed. Then I'll see if they can be left to their own devices."
Deaton finishes up the treatment and Erica doesn't fuss when Stiles picks up her and Isaac, who is pretty groggy still.
She may be little still, but she understands the risks of going with this boy. They are smaller than being out all alone with a hurt Isaac without Derek to take care of them. She doesn't know where Derek is, how badly he is hurt...but if he can, he will find them, and until then someone will have to take care of her brother.
Everything Stiles has said and done so far inspires confidence in him.
"You hungry, Sandy?" Stiles asks after he sets her down in the driver's seat.
That pretty much seals the deal.