Children Of Blood and Bone Chapter 22

 I pause for a moment, aghast at the number of them filling the narrow path. Before today, I caught only glimpses of the laborers brought in to staff the palace—always pleasant, clean, groomed to Mother’s satisfaction. Like Binta, I thought they lived simple lives, safe within the palace walls. I never considered where they came from, where else they might have ended up,
“Skies…” It’s almost too hard to bear the sight. Mostly diviners, the laborers outnumber the villagers by hordes, dressed in nothing but tattered rags. Their dark skin blisters under the scorching sun, marred by the dirt and sand seemingly burned into their beings. Each is hardly more than a walking skeleton.
The main idea in this passage I believe is how differently Amari had been living to Zeile and Tzain and their family and maybe how Amari was taking it all for granted.