Excerpt from Volume 1 of F.M-P’s folklore anthologies. The author’s notes have been preserved, and the editor’s notes have been included.

To those who have not met them (which is the majority of people), I must explain that the stereotype of the cowardly Halfling, while not the truth, is based in it. Halflings are predisposed to anxiety, but the way each one handles this is dependent on their upbringing and circumstance. They are easily spooked, sure – but they are just as easily cornered, as the grotesque fragments of numerous would-be-conquerors’ ghosts could (theoretically) attest.

I got to hear this story during one such occasion, when Caethe’s military made the mistake of trying to claim control of a tiny halfling village so their supply chain would be a few kilometers shorter. This failure to take note of vague rumors that a dragon had flown overhead a few centuries prior meant they were 2 weeks, 29 lives, and 124 square kilometers of literal scorched earth into what would prove the closest Orthia came to winning that war.

As you may have guessed, I was on Orthia’s side in this conflict.

I was making small talk whilst splinting a man’s broken arm when one of the halflings, intending to cheer him up, told him “The fact it’s hurting means it’s still fine. It’s when things stop hurting that shit’s gone bad.”

Our visible confusion at this statement revealed a quirk of halfling biology. See, the halflings do not process pain in the same manner as the other races […]¹

With this discovery out of the way, I naturally came to ask why it was so, which lead to the tale at hand:

The Ones who Stayed Behind² #

There was a village, once. It was neither big nor important, but it was home and that’s what mattered. We were farmers, once, with bountiful harvests and worry-free lives. After all, what was there for us to be afraid of?

Then came that cold autumn, harsh and early. That year, the harvest rotted on the vine, shot through with a blight not even the elves could cure. Hunger infested our homes, and we did the best we could to feed ourselves, but there were only so many deer. Many left the village, taking to the road in search of another way to die.

We were the ones who stayed behind.

There was a lord, once. We had never seen him before, but he was clearly eating well: he had a large belly, a loud laugh, and a smile just a touch too wide. He approached in a gilded carriage, which was carried by eight slim identical men with smiles just as wide as his. When he stepped out of the carriage, it was with a flock of dopey pheasants, one (and only one) for each person who’d remained.

“Come out! Come and eat! I have heard of your plight, and come to aid you! So come out and eat your fill.”

We descended on the pheasants. We threw them into soup pots, we wrung their necks, and we speared them: the only thing they did to defend themselves was slowly attempt to walk away. As we did this, the lord’s servants moved to aid us – carrying water, offering spices, and lighting cooking fires with fancy tinderboxes – always in pairs, and always with that same eerie smile.

Once we were finished, and naught but bones remained, the lord called our attention with a bell, then spoke again.

“Now that I have offered you a meal, I shall offer you something else! See, I have a need for servants; should you choose to accept me as your lord, I will feed you and cover you in the finest things this world has to offer. You would want for nothing under my employ! So, who wants to come with me?”

Some people did take that lord up on his offer, and rode away with him in his carriage. We did not see them again.

We were the ones who stayed behind.

That cursed autumn bled into winter; the deer all fled and the rats all hid. We did what we could, of course – nobody chooses to starve – but there were only so many river roots and edible seeds.

There was a funeral, once, to mourn the little ones. Back before we realized death had come to linger.

The smiling lord returned, two and a half moons after his first visit, his entourage expanded to thirty six men – all identical to each other and to the ones who had come round the first time. These identical men came – always in pairs, and always with that same eerie smile – carrying tables and chairs, platters and plates, a whole feast on their backs. We smelled the food worthy of kings while they were setting it out in the town square, and our hunger came back stronger than ever.

“Come out! Come and eat! I have heard of your plight, and come to aid you! So come out and eat your fill.”

We’d thought it was safe to sit down for the feast. “After all,” we’d said, “the last time with the pheasants went well.” We knew his timing was odd – why not sooner, if he was an altruist, or later, if he wasn’t – but figured this was one of his eccentricities.

Still, as we sat at the table, which had one (and only one) chair for each person who remained, we couldn’t shake our unease. A few of us were ruled by our uncertainty, and could only pretend to eat the feast before us. A few of us ignored our senses, and fully gorged themselves at this banquet. Most of us lay in the middle; we ate, but could not fully enjoy ourselves there. All of us had been sat in the chair of Damocles.

This state of affairs lasted until the smiling lord called our attention with a bell, then spoke again. “Now that I have made you a meal, I shall make you something else!”

With this, and a wave of his hands, we watched as our neighbors who had gorged themselves stood up, entranced and glassy-eyed, wracked with unnatural twitching. We heard their necks crack of their own accord, leaving their heads dangling from their shoulders; their hollow eyes stared at us as their bones snapped like twigs, twisting under their skin like our neighbors were bags of glass instead of people. No screams nor whimpers of pain came from their lips as this happened, and we did not see what happened once their legs gave out and they splashed onto the floor. Many were struck dumb by what we witnessed; others made to hide in their homes, or tried to vomit up what they had eaten.

We were the ones who ran.

Behind us, we heard the lord, still with that saccharine smile on his face, call out. “My men: would you gather our guests?” His identical men made to obey – always in pairs, and always with that same eerie smile – their feet hitting the ground like marching army men’s.

We all screamed, first in panic, then in pain as our own bones began to shudder, twist, and snap. Some of us made to hide, tearing up our clothes to shove into our mouths so our screams might not be overheard. Some of us ran as far and as fast as we could, hoping to make it to the next village over before our bones gave out or our pursuers caught up. And some of us simply gave in, collapsing onto the ground and screeching like dying animals as the hunger and the pain finally overwhelmed their last fragments of reason.

There was a village, once. It was neither big nor important, but it was a place we will never find again. We knew worry free lives once, before the smiling lord came to claim us for his own devices. That winter changed all of us: we’re small now, and quiet, with hunger and pain as our constant companions.

This world has so many things to be afraid of. But we’d rather die than sit back and let these events repeat themselves.

With this, the oddities of the halfling make somewhat more sense: their bizarre genetic mutations are not a mere matter of luck, but part of their nature as an incomplete form of whatever the Smiling Lord was manufacturing. Additionally, once we consider the tale of Pam Lenora³, it would appear that halflings/gnomes are somehow attractive to the fae, and that they genuinely are closer relatives than most species within genus Homo.

Although I must note that whatever the fae were trying to create, hinted at by this story and confirmed by the halfling’s unusual propensity for bone spurs, is not something I ever want to meet.

The Ones who Stayed Behind © 2026 by CaerbannogMochi is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0