Apricots! Oh, Simnia would never eat another apricot again. She would smell of apricots for months. People would begin to know her by her stench, they would call her Apricot, and she would become a cruel and hateful old dwarf and burn the apricot fields to extinction.

The facts were these: In a brilliant touch of dwarven insight, while governing the boxcars of a moving supply train, Simnia had pried open a crate of apricots and had dumped the pretentious little fruits out of the boxcar door. She had watched them sail like yellow stones over the edge of the rail bridge and into the ravine far below. Thus satisfied, she had squished herself into the apricot-less crate and had pulled the lid down on top. Only after she had sealed herself inside did she realize that a reeking stench of apricots was sealed in with her. Eventually the train had stopped, and she felt the bump and sway of her crate being picked up and transported, and then the weightless sway of the net that drew her higher and higher toward the floating city of Riviqin. She couldn't see any of this, of course, because she was stuck in a crate, but Simnia had watched it happen to hundreds of crates before her. From this moment she would be free of slavers and shackles. She would, for the first time in her life, have the chance to live.

Simnia waited, silent and patient inside her crate, until everything had stopped moving and the noises of people had faded into the distance. When she thought the coast was clear, she shuffled around inside the box until she got a good foothold, and pushed with all her might. With a sudden CRACK the crate splintered and toppled apart entirely, leaving the dwarf sitting surprised and sooty and stinking like apricots, with nowhere to hide and no clue where she was.

It seemed, after some observation, that her escape crate had been delivered to the supply dock of an outbound ship, which she inferred by the fact that she was now sitting on a dock and there was a ship being loaded in front of her. There was a curious brilliant banner strung up on it, but seeing as she couldn't read she paid it no attention, and she instead crawled to her feet and sniffed her sooty dress with a puckered face. Apricots! But she'd barely had time to register the fact that she was [i]free[/i] before she noticed there was some commotion nearby. Human commotion. Excited commotion, laced with more than a bit of confusion, as like strangers about to embark on a vacation into the unknown. The very thought of the word [i]embark[/i] sent a pleasant chill through Simnia's veins. [i]Away![/i] Freedom! She could enlist onto a ship and would never be found again!

She puffed her chest, lifted her chin, and strode up to the group as if she had been free all along, never a slave at all but one of them, a Free Dwarf, an aristocrat, perhaps, who had fallen into some soot and apricot juice on her way -- and she looked proud and brave, though inside she shook like a leaf, certain that all that awaited her were chains, anywhere she turned. As long as she didn't [i]act[/i] like a slave they couldn't call her one, right?

She paused at the sight of one of those ratty cat-people people that always made her sneeze, and she crept around the other side of the group -- the grizzled tall elf (she had to look twice at his ears, because indeed she'd never seen an elf like [i]that[/i]), the blonde and the redhead (who both seemed to be pleasant if improper young ladies), and a chestnut-haired young woman who was almost as small as Simnia herself, which she took to be an encouraging sign. Surely, a human as short as this could understand at least a modicum of the dwarven dilemma.

There was a second elf -- much fairer to look at than the first -- leaning over the littlest lady and asking questions that the poor shy girl was apparently too frightened to answer. Full of pity for [b]Anisa[/b], Simnia made her way over to rescue her from undesired attention, and she waved a hand over her head to gain [b]Elani's[/b] attention. Simnia was always more comfortable with elves before humans, and she thought she was a good judge of character with this one. She saw a trustworthy soul, and one that might not be quick to send her back to the stocks.

"I'm of your opinion, friend," she said gently to Elani, forcing a more polite voice than the one she usually used at the trainyard. "It's a curious mix, clamoring for those papers. I'm sorry to ask a favor, but can you read by chance? I'd like to know what that banner and those papers say, out of curiosity. I thought I heard someone say [i]sailing off[/i]."