Taru escorted Lexi from the gleaming, bustling veneer of the Capitol into the portside shadows of the Bottoms. It didn’t take long for the pair to come upon the young woman and her daughter, both wrapped in filthy rags. The girl’s mother looked up at them briefly with unafraid yet defeated eyes before returning her gaze and attention to her daughter. She was attempting to soothe the barely conscious girl, who awoke to convulse painfully every few moments.

Lexi managed to ask the girl’s name before the full import of the scene truly struck her. Char’s mother had told them in a whisper without looking up from the girl.

The color has been drained from Lexi’s face. She removes the Gen Stalbraid pin from the breast of her wrap and practically shoves it into Taru’s gloved hand.

“Go to the nearest steamer’s and bring back as much rice as they will give you,” she instructs her retainer.

“Te-Gen, I cannot leave you unattended—”

“Go!” Lexi orders them. “Now! I will be fine.”

Taru hesitates for a moment longer, but the steel and fury in Lexi’s gaze is undeniable, even to the hardened retainer.

“There is a shop just past the edge of the Bottoms,” Taru informs Lexi. “I will only be a few moments.”

Lexi watches them turn and quickly tromp away with the determination of a soldier double-timing it on a march. She gathers the flowing portion of her wrap and slowly crouches until her eyes meet the level of the woman’s.

“What is your name?” Lexi asks the young mother.

“Does it matter?” she whispers back, raggedly, still ignoring Lexi with her gaze.

“It does to me,” Lexi assures her.

“Shaheen.”

“My name is Lexi, Shaheen. May I ask, do you have any family?”

Shaheen’s voice becomes hoarse. “Just her,” she says of the girl in her arms.

“Were you born here, in the Bottoms?”

Shaheen shakes her head. “I was a scullery maid for Gen Vang. They put me out after… after she was born. No other Gen would take me in to serve them. I had no way to leave the Capitol.”

Lexi suspects the child’s origins are an entirely other and more disturbing tale, but she doesn’t press the young woman.

Taru returns in impressive time with a small bamboo bowl, the rice piled within it releasing tantalizing steam into the alley.

Taru kneels and offers the bowl to Shaheen. “Feed her very small bits at first,” the retainer instructs her. “You will make her worse otherwise.”

Shaheen accepts the rice with a surprised expression on her face. She seems to really look at the pair of them for the first time.

“Thank you,” she says quietly.

Lexi looks down at the small bowl, then moves her gaze to Taru.