Benzie appeared alongside Elina Hogsbreath in A Thyme of Trouble. As Thyme was Elina’s first story, they’ve been a team since the beginning.

I write him as an overly-enthusiastic, young, naive, helpful, yet inadvertently troublemaking sidekick.

A lightfoot, young, fit, and thin - admittedly too thin by halfling standards - Benzie Fernbottom prefers to keep his chestnut-colored hair disheveled and untrimmed, his pointed ears poking out along the sides. He has thick eyebrows, a sharper nose than most, and an eager, wide smile that would give a stranger the impression he was up to something. He wears a white collared, button-up shirt with a handsome brown and green vest and matching pants cut at his knees. And like all halflings, Benzie didn’t wear shoes - he goes through the world barefoot.

Benzie is what I’d refer to as a typical halfling. I see him as good-intentioned and kind but flawed, sometimes going to extremes.

He lives a life of service in the Parishes; he’s happy and comfortable and will never leave.

I use Benzie as a way of expressing typical halfling attitudes and opinions in an environment exposed to outside ideas - the inn, the Swindle & Swine.

He might not appear in every one of Elina’s stories, but I do try to mention him or point out where he may otherwise be.