Bearclaw Valley distant stars come in black or red.

He closed his eyes, and kept them tightly shut. He did not want to see his master tear him apart. To have that be the last image in his mind. . . No. His mind wandered to his old masters instead, to a lush green yard and lovingly mangled tennis balls. To scratches behind the ears, walks in the park, sleeping curled up in a bed fit for a dog-king.

Ah, he had found freedom—but there was a cost!

And it hurt. The pain was nothing he had ever felt before, and as Merrick's teeth tore into his flesh, he loosed a bloodcurdling scream that reverberated off the walls of the valley. Every blow was a new agony, but—but—

Tennis balls. Fetch. Fetch! "Fetch, Fraser!" He may be pinned and bleeding in this world, but in his mind's eye, he leapt high into the air, jaws wide.

Caught it!

And as he descended, his humans clapping their hands with glee, things grew dark. Fraser was swooning, the pain too much to bear. A great numbness overtook him, and before he slipped away for good, he opened his eyes, and saw sky.

The same sky he'd always known. No amount of running could have released him from it. There was no liberty from the world in which he dwelled. No freedom. Only a different pair of shackles. And he had been a fool to think that Merrick's savage law was at all preferable to the life he had enjoyed.

I'm sorry, Fraser thought, then lost thought altogether. His chocolate eyes, pointed skyward, began to glaze over.