Bearclaw Valley distant stars come in black or red.

but merrick did not sleep.
compelled to remain on guard through the remainder of the darkened hours, the boy's vigil broke as the voice of his baby daughter floated into the nightfall air.
merrick came alive; his teeth glinted in the dim light cut by tree-cast shadow.
no one would stop the new young father from approaching the den. it was his right, she was his right, ursus was his right.
tongue lapped at dry lips; single eye burned like the last flame upon an altar. 
he thrust himself inside the den, snorting at the thick scent of blood and birth and milk that clung to the inside of his nostrils at once.
there, the grubs. there, a pair of them, snuffling and mewling at the side of his raven, and she gone from him into exhaustion. saliva dripped down upon the babes.
these were the beings that had stolen her? to think, all had begun so weakly. 
she reeked of motherhood.
merrick seized the infant @Aventus and began to lift him from the nest.