The Hairless Tradesmen of the North

It was Tindle who had finally come to his [Jon's] rescue. He had been staying within the community, not because he was diseased or near dying, but because he was considered to be an outcast. 

Nathanius Tindle frightened ordinary people: as a child he appeared quite normal, but then he grew and kept growing until he stood over over seven feet tall and was thus conspicuously different. Being so large had not gone well for him as it might have in some other place or time.

On the cusp of the equinox Tindle would leave for supplies, negotiating their delivery with the hairless tradesmen of the North, who with one compact consignment distributed the agreed wares a moon month after the barter. This seasonal arrangement went beyond the grandfather’s recollection when neither village from either port ever thought that there was risk or worry in such transaction.

Gabriel Brunsdon, Finding Self - Second Guesses, Azlander Series