Iolana Staff appears as a baby in book 2 and a toddler in book 3.  In The Young Sorceress we get to see her as a precocious little girl.  As I was writing this, I was already thinking about what I was going to do with the character in the future, and indeed right now she is one of the main characters in The Sorceress and her Lovers.  In fact, in the first half of the book, she appears more than anyone else.  Here she is from book 4, getting little respect from her elders.

In the kitchen two more lizzies were cleaning but the crowd that she had expected was not there.  Just past the kitchen, Yuah almost ran into Mrs. Colbshallow.  The former cook now occupied a position in the household akin to a dear aunt.

“Shouldn’t they be preparing tea, Yadira?” she asked.

“It’s already on the table.  I was just about to summon everyone to the dining room.  How was your shopping trip?”

“Barely acceptable.”

Mrs. Colbshallow paused and peered over her glasses.  “Then I’m barely glad to hear it.”

Neither Iolanthe nor Radley were at home for tea.  Yuah had expected as much of course, since she had just seen the latter in town and seldom found the former at home during the day.  Mrs. Colbshallow was seated on one side of the table next to Iolanthe’s daughter Iolana.  Yuah, between her two children, sat opposite them.  Augie was now almost two and a half and had mastered the intricacies of family dining, though he had to sit on a stack of books to reach the table.  He looked so much like his father it made Yuah’s heart ache to look at him.

“Good afternoon Mama,” he said.  “Did you bring me a tin soldier?”

“Of course I did.  You may play with it after you eat.

“Mine?” asked Augie’s little sister Terra.

The girl was a less than a year younger than her brother.  She had a round little face framed by thick black hair and brown eyes.  She was unusually thin for a child her age.  This along with her pale skin and scratchy little voice made her mother constantly worried for her health, despite the best medical opinions which said she was completely fine.  She, like her brother, was quite advanced for her age.

“I brought you some blocks.”

The girl tipped her head back, opened her mouth, and shrieked.

“I want a soldier!”

“Girls don’t play with soldiers,” said Augie.

“I want a soldier!”

“No they don’t,” said Yuah, brushing the little girl’s hair.  “Boys play with soldiers because they grow up to be soldiers.”

 Terra shrieked again.

“What is it now?”

“I don’t want to be a block!”

“Quit crying!  You’re going to grow up to be a princess.”

“The warrior-priestesses of Ballar were soldiers,” offered Iolana from across the table.

“You be quiet,” snapped Yuah.  “I won’t have any of that nonsense in this house.  You’re five years old.  How come you talk like a college professor?  No man’s going to want to marry a know-it-all.”

Iolana slumped down in her chair.  Terra climbed out of her high-chair, still crying, and into the lap of the seventh diner, who was quietly sitting on the other side of her from Yuah.  Though many humans might not have been able to tell Cissy from the other lizzies in the Dechantagne home, she occupied a special place there.  She was slightly less than six feet in height, about average for members of her sex and species.  Her skin was smooth, without the mottling and scars of many of the reptilians.  Her face and the top of her head were a deep forest green which down her back, punctuated with darker stripes just below her shoulders.  Beneath her long powerful jaw, on her dewlap, and extending down her front, was a lighter, pale green.  Her chair had been modified so that she could sit without discomforting her long, powerful tail.  She reached out a scaly hand and picked up a cucumber sandwich, which she fed to the tiny human now curled up in her lap.  Terra was forced to stop crying to eat.