Years earlier, Baral used a supposed death and a metal memento to torment Pia in the Dhund. His account did not give her a truthful view of Chandra's fate. It helped turn imprisonment into a weapon against the family left behind.
In the intervening years, Pia organised inventors, artists and citizens against restrictions on the city's aether. As Renegade Prime, she teaches and encourages practical skill rather than merely supplying a famous name to a rebellion.
When Chandra reappears, Pia enters custody to pull danger away from her daughter's reckless advance. The decision costs them another separation. Their reunion is not evidence that the missing years can be skipped; both women must learn what the other became while believing the other dead. The story's earlier Baral cruelty and Pia's more recent role as Renegade Prime are not one continuous imprisonment. Baral once used false claims about Chandra's death to torment Pia during her years in the Dhund; she is later a working organizer teaching young inventors such as Tamni. Her visible surrender to Tezzeret and Dovin is a choice to divert the immediate hunt away from Chandra, not ideological agreement with the Consulate.