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The tone of her day may soon change: what rises must fall, and good may sometimes turn to bad. After she has exited the square and turned upon an emptier street, a soft tap-tapping comes quickly up behind her, the sound of running feet. She will have time to do little more than begin to turn to look before someone bumps rudely into her shoulder, hard enough to stagger or knock her down. As if this is not bad enough, the stranger will knock at her hands, grabbing at the small sack with its treats and trying to wrench it from her grip; in his other hand he holds a little knife, its blade five or six inches in length. "Gi' o'er," he hisses at her, and if his cruel theft is not bad enough, the stench of his breath adds further insult to injury. He is thin and wiry, with muscle enough to push about a young woman; it is possible that he has never cleaned his teeth or washed his clothing in his entire life.

The street is mostly empty, and there will be few who show even a passing interest in this scene, save for a man who's just come from the market himself. He is a tall fellow, broad-shouldered and distinctively muscular, with skin of a color that marks him as a strange creature here in paler Palisade, a rich bronze with jet black hair. While there are many who would find him the frightening apparition, he is clean and well-dressed in a neat uniform, and when his gaze passes over the scene taking place in a huddle just down the street he stiffens and a frown passes over his handsome face. He cannot quite see what is happening just yet, but from where he stands he likes not the look of it, and picks up his pace.

It may bring to mind the old saw about paranoia, if Chole has ever heard such a thing: that just because one is paranoid, it doesn't follow that there isn't someone following them .. because in this case, there is.

It's hard to say whether the scrawny thief is a fool or just desperate, to think that someone like Chole might have something that he would want, but he does want it. He shakes her off of the bag with a cruel snarl, and at the sound of her cry whirls in place and goes sprinting down the street, just in case someone heeds her cry before taking a closer look at her.

And before her heart can plummet too far, before she can even get out another call for help, there's another set of footsteps coming up behind her. These are heavier, much more measured, and accompanied by a fellow that would fright most genteel souls: dark-skinned, a touch foreign, smooth and polished in a way that isn't ordinary for folk of their class. He pauses only briefly beside her, to deposit into her arms a bulky satchel that feels like clothing and smells faintly of perfume. "Do hold this," he asks her politely, and then he is gone -- launching himself after the thief, his long legs and muscular body propelling him after the thief, soon to catch up.

At Chole's side also stops a brown feline shape: the grimalkin does not seem particularly concerned about his master's behavior, and is far more interested in Chole herself, sniffing at her arm and then snuffling at her face if she does not sit up or move away.

Whsst is happy to lick the palm of her hand and then press his head into her hand to be scratched: he likes to be scratched, even by strangers. He's learned that women are especially good to beg scratches from, especially when they're all slumpy over like this -- he doesn't quite understand that they're sitting on the floor or folded in on themselves because they're distressed, he just knows that when they're within reach they're easier to bully attention from.

Down the way, Harmon has caught up to the thief in short order, and stopped him abruptly in his tracks. He accomplished this by running until he was just in front of the other man, then holding out one muscular arm -- which the thief then ran smack into, rebounding and crashing into a wall before coming to rest on the ground. Harmon responded by putting one foot on his chest while he wrested the bag out of the man's hands, and then to make the lesson stick even more thoroughly, he seems to be going through the thief's pockets. He is also saying something, though little Chloe will not be able to hear what, and his words are causing the thief to shake his head fiercely, over and over.

At the end of the confrontation, Harmon lets the thief up, and he stands and slinks away, watching fearfully. When he is gone Harmon returns to her, offering her the bag with the apple in it and then reaching to help her gently to her feet. "You are all right, little miss? He did not hurt you?"

Tucking his own parcel casually back under one arm, he regards her with a small smile that has an odd little touch of sorry in it: he is not sure why he has made her uncomfortable, and puts it down to his own exotic appearance. There are not many of his coloration here in the city, and though it lends his looks a catchet no other can claim, sometimes he wishes there were more of his ilk about.

That he could have disturbed her with his dealings with the thief does not even occur to him. He was, after all, perfectly aware that a young lady watched his dealing with the thief, and therefore kept that dealing as gentle as possible. No matter that the man deserved a beating and a trip to the gaol.

"I am glad. A lady should not be troubled by such cruelties. May I escort you to your destination? It would bring me sorrow if further harm should come to you."

If he is bemused that he has gone to such effort for nothing more than an apple, he does not show it; he merely nods again, glad to have stepped forward to defend her. A single apple may not seem like much -- but she is a young lady, and he will not leave her unprotected. Instead, the comment that causes him some hesitation is the one regarding the children; to him, she seems hardly more than a child herself, and he does not wish to think of her as a mother, dear me, no!

"You are -- " he pauses, then hazards a guess, " -- a caretaker, then?" It is the outcome he would prefer; too, too sad to think of her as a very young mother, or to think of her as the support for siblings even younger than herself.

"Ahh," he says, with sudden understanding -- and surely he must guess that she does so not as an idle past-time, but because that is also where she herself is from. It is not so rare, not so unusual, in even this prosperous day and age, and certainly Harmon himself could not judge her, for if he has a family of his own no one has ever seen nor heard of them. There is only Harmon and the little grimalkin that trots loyally at his feet. "That is good of you, to contribute your time and your effort there -- by what efforts do you earn your coin?"

As he speaks to her, Chloe may find that there is something in this exotic man's voice that encourages her to trust him: something subtle, something soft, a gentle lure. At his feet the grimalkin purrs, and if she can hear it the purr is encouraging, too. As a hedge witch, Harmon has never been greatly powerful, but then he has never needed nor wanted to be: all he has needed is this, a thread running through his words that says, trust me.

"I do not believe we have crossed paths, though at times my reputation can precede me. I have a flock of my own that I care for: I am bondsman at the Red Bird." His tone is nonchalant, and he is of course not distressed by the path that they are taking into a poorer area of town. He wouldn't be, for even if the Red Bird is in a nicer area, it's still a brothel, and known as nothing else .. and by his own words even poor little Chloe has something he does not: her freedom.

Harmon belongs to whomever holds his debt.

"As lowly as my position may be, I may yet have influence enough to offer you a temporary position there." And though that particular phrase may horrify her, he blithely continues: "One of my sweet flowers has regrettably fallen ill, and I am looking for someone of a patient disposition to watch over her. If you are accustomed to children, you would have the patience I seek."