Lady June seriously needed to fire her nursery maid, Kira.
Whenever Lady June went out and Katara happened to be around, Kira would pass off the responsibility of looking after two-year-old Sen, Lady June's youngest child, onto Katara while she fooled around with her stable boy lover. Kira always disappeared before Katara could object, leaving poor Sen alone. Katara couldn't leave a toddler unattended, couldn't she?
Thankfully, Katara had plenty of experience babysitting from looking after the small children in Wolf Cove.
Katara picked up a crying Sen, who'd been bitten after trying to pet one of Lady June's spoiled lap dogs. Damn that Kira. Why couldn't she do her job instead of whoring around in the stables?
"Come now, little one," said Katara, stroking Sen's hair. "Let's go see your friends."
Little Sen was fascinated by the family of turtle ducks that inhabited the carp pond in her mother's garden. She loved to sit beside Katara by the pond, feed the turtle ducks, and watch Katara do her water-bending. Nothing amused Sen more than when Katara used her bending to create waves and ripples for the turtle ducks to ride. Sen would clap her hands and squeal "again, again." Katara did it until her wrists cramped, Sen got bored, or Kira finally returned, whichever came first.
Kira had an uncanny ability to be back before Lady June returned, but her good luck couldn't last forever. Unfortunately, Katara wasn't around the next time something terrible happened.
Katara accompanied Lady June to have tea with Fire Lord Iroh. A lowly maid-of-honor like her wasn't permitted to enter the Fire Lord's study, so she had to wait in the gallery outside. Katara passed the time by looking at the portraits in the gallery. Fire Lord Iroh collected portraits of the most beautiful women in the world, many of whom were his relatives or had been his mistresses. Lady June and the Fire Lord's sister-in-law, Lady Ursa, were among them. Each of them was lovelier than the last. Katara couldn't decide who had the best eyes, lips, or hair or whose dress was the prettiest.
"Dreaming about being up there someday?" Katara turned around. Lady June emerged from Fire Lord Iroh's study. She laughed and stroked Katara's cheek. "With eyes like yours, missy, maybe you will." 
The bells of the Temple of Agni rang eight times, marking the Hour of the Ram. All was quiet when they returned to Lady June's villa because Sen always took her afternoon nap at this time. No servants greeted them when they walked through the door. The only other creatures to be found were the snoring lap dogs taking their own afternoon naps under tables or atop cushions. Lady June tiptoed into Sen's room to check on her daughter, and Katara started preparing tea. Jasmine tea for herself and a contraceptive tea made from mugwort for Lady June (No more children for her, thank you very much. Two was enough). The embers in the hearth popped and sizzled as Katara poked them back to life.
Lady June rushed out of her daughter's bedroom. "She's gone," she said.
Sen wasn't in her cot or the day bed in Lady June's boudoir, where she also sometimes took her naps. Something whispered into Katara's ears that she should check the garden. A door had been left open, and a child's shriek made both women jump to attention. Katara hiked up her skirts—the carp pond. Lady June dashed outside after her.
Poor little Sen must have tripped and fallen in while wandering too close to the carp pond. When Katara pulled the motionless toddler out of the water, the long skirts of Sen's robes were twisted around her legs like a fish's tail. She rested an ear on Sen's chest. Sen was breathing but had water in her lungs.
"Where is that bitch!" Lady June smashed a pot of lantern plants against the garden wall like she probably wanted to do to Kira's head.
Katara held her tongue, probably with the stable boy's eel two inches deep in her cave. She placed Sen on the ground and propped her up against her knee. One of Katara's hands hovered over the little girl's chest and throat, using her bending to draw the water from Sen's lungs. The other hand patted Sen on the back. Sen coughed up water until her voice was hoarse. "Mama," she croaked.
Lady June went to her daughter's side and wrapped Sen in her arms. "I'm here, baby."  She looked up at Katara as if she were the Goddess of Mercy. "Thank you."

Kira was noticeable by her absence when Lady June sent for Katara the following evening. All the other servants had been quick to rat Kira out. If they threw her to the lion wolves, no one would ask where they were when Sen fell into the carp pond. The accident hadn't made Lady June's staff more diligent but gave them something to gossip about when they should be doing their jobs.
"She'll be demoted to the scullery," said Sara, a chambermaid promoted to Sen's nursery maid until a suitable replacement could be found. Sara giggled at her predecessor's downfall. "Or the laundry."
Katara shook her head. Where had Sara been when Sen was all alone in the house? Napping under an apple tree.
Another chambermaid named Tombe put her hands on her hips. "If I were the mistress, Kira would be out on the streets."
Tombe's self-righteousness made Katara roll her eyes. And hadn't Tombe been too busy in the kitchen, flirting with MeiMei, the cook, to look after her mistress' daughter?
"Good evening, ladies," said Katara.
Sara and Tombe turned around, their faces as white as sheets. They bowed to Katara. "Good evening, young miss."
Lady June waited for Katara on the peristyle that overlooked the garden, where her son, Haku, Sen's big brother, sparred with his fencing master.
"My dear," she said, taking Katara's hand. "There's someone I'd like you to meet."
Katara braced herself for some chinless nephew or bug-eyed brothers-in-law. Every noblewoman had one or two lying around, and no eligible maiden was safe from them. But instead of dragging Katara into the drawing room to face a potential suitor, Lady June whisked her away to the lakeside Royal Boating Pavilion.
The rosy and graceful Hisei Convent stood on the eastern shore of Lake Sukuni, a brief walk from its austere, whitewashed brother, the formidable Miyaru Monastery. Along with housing a religious order devoted to prayer and charity, Hisei Convent provided a comfortable retirement for aristocratic widows, including Mai's grandmother, who Katara had visited with the Ukanos earlier that month (Mai had been correct when she said a meaner old lady never drew breath). Miyarou Monastery's reputation was much less favorable. It was a glorified prison for the Fire Lord's most dangerous enemies. Court gossip said Fire Lord Iroh disposed of his brother, Ozai, there.
Hisei Convent and Miyaru Monastery shared a dock, where the ferry left Katara and Lady June. Inside the gatehouse, Lady June rang for the porter. "I'm looking for Master Hama," she said, handing the porter a fat pouch of coins.
The porter bowed and brought them to a secluded wing in the back of the convent's main building. His ankle bells warned every nun they passed on the way to scurry off in the opposite direction to protect their purity. At the end of a narrow corridor, whose floorboards chirped like songbirds when they walked over them, was a spacious and comfortable apartment not unlike the one Grandmother Ukano inhabited. The only real difference was the locked door and the bars over the widows.
A frail-looking old woman dressed in the white robe and blue hood of a lay sister sat spinning flax in the corner. She didn't look up when the porter announced, "Lady June and Katara of the Southern Water Tribe."
"Hello," said Katara. Perhaps the old woman hadn't heard them come in? The elderly are often hard of hearing. "Hello."
"I heard you, girl," said the old woman. Her spinning wheel stopped, and her sunken eyes shot up at Katara. Blue Water Tribe eyes set in a coppery, Water Tribe face.
Lady June bowed to their hostess. "Good evening, Master Hama," she said.
"Have you come for more mugwort?" scoffed Master Hama. "Spirits, you're worse than a bitch in heat."
Her insult left Lady June unruffled. "No. This is the water bender I was telling you about." She pushed Katara forward.
"It's an honor." Katara followed her mistress' lead and bowed to Master Hama, her legs wobbling. This old hag might be the most terrifying person she'd ever met.
A kettle hanging over the fireplace whistled. Master Hama rose to take the kettle off its hook. "I guess I should make you some tea."  
Master Hama prepared tea in the Water Tribe manner. Back home in the South Pole, the only tea available was weak and of poor quality. Mom and Gran-Gran often added spices and citrus juice ( expensive imported luxuries also) to improve the taste. Better grades of tea were available in the Fire Nation, but, like Katara, Master Hama must prefer it this way.
Katara sipped her tea. "You have a lovely home, Master Hama," she said. Courtesy was an excellent way to break the ice.
"Lovely for a prison," said Master Hama. Next to the tea things, she placed a tray of round pastries covered in powdered sugar. Snowball cakes. Another Water Tribe treat and one of Katara's favorites.
A prison? Katara bit into a snowball cake. That explained the locked door and window bars.
"Girl?" Master Hama raised an eyebrow at Katara sucking powdered sugar off her fingers. "You're a water bender?"
"Katara is training under Master Pakku," said Lady June.
"That old hog-monkey. I doubt she's learning much from him."
Katara laughed. Old hog-monkey indeed. Master Pakku was stuck in his ways and didn't believe girls should study combat bending. He pissed and moaned about having to teach her but still accepted Lord Ukano's coin. But it wasn't as if she'd learned nothing from him.
Beads of condensation lined the inner rim of Katara's tea cup. She twirled her fingers and the water droplets danced. Master Pakku said that water benders needed to be resourceful when outside their homeland of ice, sea, and snow. He told her stories about water benders who'd escaped from prison by using the dampness coming off stone walls and survived in the desert on their own sweat.
The water droplets became snowflakes that landed on the tips of Lady June and Master Hama's noses and melted in their tea.
Master Hama shook her head. "So this is what the proud Southern Water Bending tradition has come to," she said. "A silly girl performing tricks like a trained monkey." She pulled water from thin air and froze it around her fingers like the decorative nail guards some of the ladies at court wore. These ice darts flew in Katara's direction. Katara ducked. Spirits, what was wrong with this nasty old cow? "Come back next week and we'll see if we can make something out of you."