FSE

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Part One: Sinoe

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Martin tossed the last folded shirt to the side as he emptied the backpack onto the leaf-strewn floor of the woodland. Four full changes of clothing, a can of mystery meat, some dried fruit, and a mostly dull pocketknife: these items were all Martin was able to mug off the kid aside from 30 cred. The clothes likely wouldn't even fit him.

The traveling thief stood over his meager conquest and felt a twinge of regret, which he promptly pushed aside. Allowing himself to feel remorse would do nothing to help him finance his next meal, let alone the boat he needed to charter. The man sighed. Mugging broke adolescents because they made easy marks wasn't really helping reach this goal either. With pursed lips, Martin kicked up a small patch of soil, near the road but far enough into the flanking woodland so as to not be easily visible, and threw the discarded clothes aside, burying them beneath the wood litter.

At least 30 cred would buy him enough whiskey for him to sleep easily tonight.

The down-on-his-luck footpad continued making his way along the road southwest toward Fordham, his destination for the night. He walked parallel to the trail, far enough to be mostly obscured from the road but close enough to where he could still see where it carved through the broadleaf forest. In addition to concealing him from passersby, the shade from the forest along the side of the road worked in combination with the breeze rustling through the Sinoe oak and redbark dogwood to prevent the heat from the early fall sun from being too intense.

Despite being one of the largest routes connecting Eastbrook and Fordham, traffic was light on the road. He continued alongside the path for more than an hour without encountering any more than some curious lizard-birds picking at carrion. Another hour and the man only spotted a horse-driven caravan of merchants' wagons, which were far too secure for him to make a move. And so Martin continued toward Fordham, resisting the urge to dwell about his fortunes.

When the blazing disc of the sun began to lower through the tree canopy, its color faded from a scalding white to a slightly less unforgiving pale orange glow. Shortly after he had passed the junction of the road he traveled and the main road heading northwest to Darcyville, Martin's unsuccessful attempts to avoid brooding about his fate were interrupted by the sound of singing coming faintly from behind him, the direction he had come from. He listened carefully, concluding the voice was definitely from one person: a woman, he inferred, judging by the airy timbre of the voice. He found a spot to camouflage himself and scope out the target, crouched by the side of the road between a redbark dogwood and a large, woody bush, its species unknown despite how frequently he encountered it along the side of the road as he had traveled south. Martin hunkered down and waited as the woman approached the fork in the road he had recently crossed, hoping she would continue heading in his direction rather than turning north.

As she closed the distance between them and her singing grew louder, Martin had expected to be able to make out words, but she sang in a language that he not only did not comprehend, but also couldn't remember ever having heard before. Martin was no linguist, but the language sounded rich in open vowel sounds, such that it almost sounded as if she were scat singing rather than singing actual lyrics. The singing was passable, if he had to admit.

Martin blinked to refocus and to keep track of her position. She eventually rounded the corner of the fork in the road and he spotted her, his first glimpse of the woman partially obstructed by trees on the other side of the road. He blinked again to make sure he was seeing what he thought he was seeing. Less than fifty meters away, it was clear that he was not hallucinating. The woman loping down the road was clearly non-human: between her wide, cloven-hoofed feet; long legs, seemingly with extra joints compared to his; ellipsoidal ears that projected laterally from the sides of her head; and tawny fur that covered much of her body, it was clear that this woman was a faun, even though the man had only seen them in illustrations from the accounts of explorers he had read during his childhood. From a distance, she almost looked like a strange hybrid between a two-legged reindeer and a human, with some almost cat-like qualities to her facial features.

As she approached his location along the road he got a better look at her. She looked young, maybe around his age or a year or so younger—assuming fauns aged similarly to humans, of course. She wore an intricately hand-woven cotton skirt and shawl of vibrant cyan, yellow, and black, decorated with intricate geometric images that seemed to represent figures and faces. The clothing covered her chest, shoulders, and neck but left her arms, lower legs, and midriff bare, save for her natural fur coat on her arms and legs. Beaded jewelry woven with colorful thread that matched her clothing adorned her wrists and neck, jostling this way and that as her jovial gait carried her toward him along the road. The woman's hair was pulled up in a silvery-white knot, which contrasted with the buff fur of her arms and legs. Conspicuously, she lacked the antlers that he had heard adorned fauns' heads. With both arms braced against her shoulders and the fabric of her shawl, she carried a large rucksack. Even with the fabric barrier, the size of the bag looked like it must have been chafing to carry for long distances, but her demeanor was not outwardly indicative of a road-weary traveler. The hapless thief was surprised to see a solitary faun, and particularly so far from one of their known settlements, where he had heard they tended to keep to themselves. He supposed it made no difference. Preying on lone travelers was his specialty, regardless of whether that traveler had feet or hooves.

The woman approached his position along the road. Forty paces out. He unholstered his revolver. Thirty paces. The man steeled himself for the confrontation. Twenty paces. A deep breath, in and out, and then one more. Ten paces.

He leaped from the bush onto the road and brandished his firearm threateningly. “Stop. Keep your hands where I can see 'em." The faun yelped—or, perhaps, bleated was a better term—in surprise, stopped in her tracks, then raised her hands in front of her chest, palms out. Martin continued: “Very good. Now, hand your bag over. No funny business or you're dead." His tone of voice was cool and calm despite his heart beating in his ears and threatening to betray his composure. He hoped that she at least understood English.

The woman, however, was less fearful than he had expected. After her initial ungraceful sound, she quickly regained her composure and unsaddled her bag. “Oh, well drat. This is just no good," she muttered to him, though she didn't sound too terribly displeased. “Here, 'course I can share a little something with you. I don't have none of your precious human money, but are ya hungry?" Her accent was utterly foreign to him and equal parts amusing and endearing. “It's like I always say, there's nothin' like sharin' a snack to turn an enemy into a friend, don'tcha know?"

Martin's aim wavered for a moment, then his hand tightened on the gun. “What? No, you're not going to negotiate, and quit stalling. Just set the bag down and step away."

The faun woman effectively ignored him. “Oh dear, you know, I have just the thing that will make you feel better. Just… give me, one second…" She began rummaging through her bag, not even looking at the man who was currently pointing a gun at her. She pulled bundles of plant stems and small canvas pouches out of her rucksack, opening the drawstring on each and peering inside. After pulling four bags out of her rucksack and inspecting each, with an “Aha!" she tossed the fifth one to Martin, who caught it out of the air.

“What the hell is this?" Martin said, holding up the bag full of some squishy substance but not looking inside.

The faun woman had begun replacing the items she had removed from the oversized bag. She gave an excited giggle. “Take a look in the bag and see for yourself!"

Martin's patience was wearing thin. “No! Absolutely not. Fuck this and stop fucking stalling. Just hand over the fucking—" He stopped as he heard and felt a low thrumming from the northeast, a sound he was deeply familiar with: hoofbeats.

“Shit. Shit shit shit! Hand over the bag now, or I'll fucking end you!" He waved the gun at her. Despite his bluff, they both knew it was too late. The horse—or horses—were approaching at full gallop. He holstered his revolver and began to make for the woods, but the faun woman grabbed the arm holding the pouch of unidentified paste before he could. “Wait! Don't run. I have an idea. Just trust me a second." He tried to pull his arm free but her grip tightened—despite her lithe upper body, and the fact the top of her head only came up to his neck, she was deceptively strong.

Martin could see the horse approaching in the distance now and could only assume that it was a lawman, or bounty hunter, or something similar. “For fuck's sake, fine. I'd probably just get shot in the back if I tried to run anyway," he said, probably disclosing too much but too frustrated to care in the moment. Surely enough, the horseman approached the two travelers and Martin noticed the shiny silver badge over his chest pocket: Darcyville Sheriff Deputy. The mustachioed deputy was a well-groomed man, a likely a few years younger than Martin but, judging by the way he carried himself, no stranger to interrogating armed travelers on the road. “Good afternoon, you two," he said, with the characteristic cold courtesy that stemmed from the position of absolute authority. Martin realized, heart beating in his throat, that the faun woman was still clutching his wrist. “Good afternoon," the two replied in near unison, the faun understandably more upbeat in her response than Martin was.

“My name is Deputy Gomez with the Darcyville Sheriff. Good day to be out traveling, don't you think?"

Martin replied with a curt affirmation, feeling sick to his stomach, but the faun took the opportunity to spin a yarn. “Ohh, absolutely! We're just on our way to Fordham from Eastbrook and, I gotta say, between the lovely breeze and seeing some of our early fall plants start to get ready to bloom, it has us really happy to have picked such a lovely day to be out on the road. Not too hot either. Just lovely, if I may say!"

The deputy considered her response and her repetitious use of the word lovely. “Yes indeed, it is a lovely day. So lovely I'd say, that there's a footpad who seems to think it's perfect for robbing good, law-abiding folks. We've gotten a report that a couple travelers have been robbed in broad daylight along this road. Are you traveling with this gentleman, miss?"

The faun looked at Martin and finally let go of his wrist. “Oh, why yes, of course we're travelin' together. We were actually just about to stop and have ourselves a little lunch time! We haven't seen no footpads though, if that's what you're wonderin'."

At this point, Deputy Gomez wasn't even looking at the faun, but instead focusing his searingly dubious gaze toward Martin and his holstered revolver. “Is that so? Because we've heard that the description of the footpad matches this gentleman exactly."

Without missing a beat, the faun replied with a disarming laugh: “Well, yes, my dear Tuu'ko here does have a bit of a common look about him, don't he? But I hope you don't hold that against him, sir deputy! He's just a bit of a strong, silent type who don't trust strangers all too well." As if to emphasize her point, the faun sidled up to him and looped her arm through his. It took Martin every ounce of restraint to not shove her aside and make a break for it, but against his better judgment, the man maintained composure and even turned to smile at the faun. Her large brown eyes, the color and warmth of a cup of coffee, smiled back at him and her broad, flat, cat-like nose twitched once as she grinned.

A long moment of awkward silence passed among the three. Deputy Gomez raised an eyebrow, but relented. “Very well, you two. Enjoy yourselves and be safe out there, because the man was last seen heading this way. If you do cross paths with him, let law enforcement know as soon as you can, and don't attempt to negotiate."

Martin nodded, but the faun continued. “Of course, sir deputy. And I'll make sure my Tuu'ko here don't go actin' outta turn so nobody don't confuse him with no bandits or nothin'!" Martin was staggered by the amount of negatives she could effortlessly chain together in a single sentence.

After a moment to consider what exactly the faun had meant by that statement, and with a tip of his wide-brimmed hat, the deputy spurred his horse in the direction of Fordham, perhaps hoping to intercept the mysterious brigand. Once the deputy had put some distance between the pair, Martin extricated himself from the faun and dashed to the bush he had sprung from a few minutes prior, expelling the pent up nerves from his body along with what remained of his breakfast.

“Oh! That there's a common mulberry! The fruits make great pies, don'tcha know! Too bad it's too late in the season for 'em."