Teagmháil le Ferres or: The Red-Haired Myth

It is a commonly held belief in the Island of Fog that those with red hair are touched by the fey. This belief dates back farther than anyone can remember and old midwives will still make certain, curious signs when a red-headed child is born to parents who do not have red hair themselves. Should a child grow older and their hair become red, it is whispered that they either have stumbled into the clutches of some fairy lord or lady or, worse, have been replaced with substitute. Scholars and the collectors of old stories have not been able to determine where this notion comes from, other than red hair is a rarity among the people of the Island of Fog; consisting of hobgoblins and humans, the former of whom rarely see shades of hair beyond brown and the latter of which red hair is uncommon enough speaks to a simple superstition that sprang up from that oldest and most dangerous habit of mortals--a need to explain the unknown.
There is no midwife nor mother nor even old soldier who will not insist, despite the best efforts of reason and truth, that their cousin or daughter or neighbor is not in fact, touched by fey. A red-haired resident of a village or town will almost always be the first suspected when milk goes sour before its time or honey is stolen in the night or a horse's mane is braided between dusk and dawn. A great number of such unfortunate souls once had reason to fear burning at the stake or being crushed beneath a block of iron but these days they most often will be placed into the pillory or subject to fines without much due process--or until the actual culprit is captured. Even then, there is no dispelling the suspicion that some form of glamour was cast upon the criminal to induce them into the activity and there has been many a weighty testimony laid out by such scoundrels about how a red-haired 'fairy' beguiled them into their service.