"They're pretty upsetting no matter how he says them because they're not true so I have to correct him and he doesn't always want to be corrected which is weird."

"I think this girl is one of Arke's," Veles stage whispers to Perun.

"What's that mean?"

"You're weird so you belong to our sister, the goddess of weird kids."

"I'm not weird! You're the weird one!"

"You're a weird human."

Foot stomp. "Am not!"

"You so are."

"I'm normal, it's everyone else who makes no sense whatsoever!"

"You don't even understand the word normal!"

"I do so!"

"Define it."

"Standard, or setting a standard. Sane. Regular. Natural. Easily predictable."

"So if you're not like anyone, you ain't normal."

"I'm the predictable one, you're the weird one."

"Two gods, one mortal. You're outnumbered."

Before she can do more than make a frustrated noise, a boy rides up on an enormous silvery wolf. "What'cha arguing 'bout?" he calls, leaning forward to rest his crossed arms on the wolf's head and his own head on his arms. He's wearing simple clothes, a split skirt made of roughly stitched together furs and a one-shouldered shirt.

"The definition of normal."

"And her obvious weirdness."

"That's silly. Normal's notta thing. I'm weird, you're weird, my sister's weird, we're all weird here."

"That's dumb."

"Well, gods are by definition not normal. So you're weird. My sister doesn't like having opposable thumbs, so she's weird. I sometimes get frozen and stop reacting to stuff, I'm weird. I think weird's neat, it'd be extra creepy to be perfectly normal."

"Speaking of weird, how do you have clothes?"

"Clothing," he says sagely, "Is merely a state of mind."

"My sister really lets you guys get strange."