Jade Fern Grove did the stars whisper on the day you were made?

Once more, the coywolf had to stop and stare for a moment. If she'd been a little younger, he might've found all this terribly cute. And maybe he did still, just a little. But the girl looked like a yearling, and these were concepts he thought she ought to have grasped by now.

"It's not about being," he told her, "it's just what I'm called. My daddy liked roses, and when I was born, I was red all over — but not bright rose-red. So he called me Dusty Rose. It's like your Riverclan. Your pack's not a river, but they call themselves that. It's like lightning bugs. Or fireflies, if that's what you call it here. They're not lightning or fire — we just call them that."

He plopped his ass down right there. He had to sit for a minute, because this girl was taking up all his mental faculties. He felt like he had to use enough for the both of them.

"Esma," he said, "All kinds of folks live just fine in the desert. I'm gonna ask you though: can you sit there and believe that while I tell you about it? Or are you just gonna be thinking up ways it's impossible or wrong?"

Because he had better things to do, depending on the answer.