Alfirin smiles back even though she doesn't have much to say to Lily because her English is terrible. On the other hand Lily is seven and cursed and maybe Alfirin's English is good enough for a seven-year-old cursed child.

"Hello. Me Alfirin. You Lily. Me..." She does not know the English word for 'slave', nor does she know if she's supposed to call herself that - "Me live that house today?"

"Foster child," says Iomedae helpfully. "America has made us all foster childs of Evelyn."

"Me foster child of Evelyn."

"Bi'sis'r?" Lily says hopefully. 

...She has no idea what Lily just said.

In Taldane, "she's not any good at talking because of the curse."

Probably Iomedae followed it, but also this is honestly just an awkward conversation to be inevitably among the first ones they have. "Lily wants to know if she can call you her big sister while you live here," she explains. "She didn't have older siblings before and it makes her very happy." 

Hopeful look at Iomedae for Taldane translation, in case Alfirin just doesn't know enough words to even understand the clearly spoken version? 

Right, they have to pretend to be a family.

"She can call me her big sister while me live here."

Awwwwwwww. Does Alfirin want a BIG hug??? (Alfirin is probably getting a big hug whether or not she wants one. Lily isn't incredibly good at reading body language of whether people want hugs.) 

Yes, part of pretending to be a family is hugging a lot.

Aaaaaand once Alfirin is done eating, it's probably a good time to bundle Lily off to bed and then do the tour of the rest of the house and explain the house rules. 

(Evelyn is so tired and she's going to have log notes to write tonight and she feels, once again, like she's about to thoroughly lose the plot here.) 

Lily wants two stories from Mummy and a song from Iomedae. Maybe Alfirin can just hug her Barbies and teddies goodnight, since she doesn't seem to know very many words and Lily doesn't know if she knows any songs. 

Iomedae will sing the hymn for ancient Azlant, the one that ends 'rise up and build anew', and can show Alfirin how to hug the Barbies and teddies if Alfirin seems to find Lily's instructions confusing. 

She does find Lily's instructions confusing, but can hug the toys once Iomedae explains.

And once Lily is tucked in, Alfirin can have a tour of the bathroom (this time very thorough and complete with demonstrations of how to control the water temperature and which bottle is the shampoo versus conditioner versus bodywash), and of her bedroom, which is the smaller one with the boy decoration theme. Which Evelyn is YET AGAIN having regrets about because YET AGAIN here she is with three girls, not that Alfirin probably even notices that blue and spaceships and footballs are boy-associated. 

"No, I don't know why they have us in different rooms from each other. Even if we were Evelyn's real children who in the world would do that?"

"Even though there are so many rooms, the rooms could be for other things? Maybe one is for boy children and one is for girl children and one is for guests, but there are no boy children or guests now? Does Jeremy have his own land?"

"I think Jeremy is at a kind of apprenticeship and sleeps there, or with friends who live near there, and only comes to visit in the daytime. I don't think he has his own land. I did ask if he'd inherit Evelyn's and she confirmed that he would."

...She should talk to Evelyn about the knife before she gets distracted again by the excess of space and also the showers (do they have snakes in the wall? Or some other way to get water? If it's snakes how do the snakes make it hot?? Is it another breed of water snake?)

"Iomedae said is - prohibida - hold knife. Me have knife - mis padres me lo dan - You have knife or me have knife in room, not hold?"

Evelyn frowns. "People younger than eighteen aren't supposed to carry knives in public, no - although Iomedae has a multitool and I can get you one if you want." Evelyn still isn't sure how that actually interacts with the law but, like, it's so normal to own a Swiss Army Knife as a kid, it's literally a Boy Scouts thing, it just feels weird for it to be illegal. "Also, nobody, even adults, are supposed to carry knives that are bigger than four inches - this long." She gestures. "Can I see your knife? I think it would be a good idea to keep it in your room, probably, just to be safe." 

Hopeful glance at Iomedae for translation? 

"She says yes, the law is you cannot carry a knife because you are not old enough, though she can get you a little tool set with a tiny blade in it like I have, and even if you were an adult it would be illegal to carry a knife with a longer blade than she just showed. I don't know what weapons the guards carry but maybe she just means unless you have permission from the congressmember. And she asks to see your knife, and says probably keep it in your room."

Alfirin will reach into her shirt and pull out the knife and sheath. The blade is about twice as long as Evelyn gestured and it's made of bone.

Yeah, wow, that does not look like anything made in the US. And Evelyn's hindbrain is yelling an insistent warning that it will go badly to change her mind about letting Alfirin keep it in her room just because she hadn't been picturing...that...despite the fact that Iomedae had a sword and this is still a lot tamer. It might be a family heirloom or something. It certainly looks like something that deserves to be a museum piece. 

"You would get in trouble for carrying that outside the house," she confirms. "Even if you were grown-up. The laws are different here from where you come from. - It's really not that dangerous, I know it's - going to take a long time for either of you to really believe that - but I've never carried a knife with me and nothing bad has ever happened." 

(She did used to carry her keys in her hand, and had pepper spray in her purse in college, but, well, it's not like anything bad ever actually happened in that case either.) 

"I will not carry that outside the house."

Neither of them are going to point out to Evelyn that she owns land and they are slaves who barely speak the language and this affects how safe one is around other people, are they.