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The first description of Cavilo in her canon starts She was short, but astonishingly intense, slight figure and white-blonde hair cropped close to her head giving her an odd elfin look. That much is still true. Her clothing will change drastically depending on circumstances, but it is almost always chosen to make her look damn good.

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Cavilo's not one to complain about having had a hard life -- mostly because she doesn't really expect anyone to give a damn. Life's a bitch, and that's just how it is.

But dammit, things were going so well until last month. Recently risen to commander of the crack mercenary force Randall's Rangers, working a sweet triple-cross scheme in the Hegen Hub with the help of her new second in command Stanis, who turned out to have all kinds of useful qualities (both on and off duty). Just days from the planned Cetagandan invasion that would have made her fortune. And then the opportunity for an even sweeter deal landing neatly gift-wrapped in her lap, a shot at becoming planetary royalty by marriage, enough wealth and power to make her current aspirations look laughable; all she had to do was kick over the very invasion she herself had set up. Well, and seduce a lonely young runaway emperor, but that part wasn't hard at all. Or even unpleasant -- he was a very pretty runaway emperor. Stanis was tedious about it, of course, but that was only to be expected and could be dealt with. And it was working, she'd been sure it was working.

And then everything went to hell. Thanks to that very same pretty young man, who claimed to have seen through her all along. Both my parents died violently in political intrigue before I was six years old, he'd told her flatly during that last excruciating meeting. A fact you might have researched. Did you think you were dealing with an amateur?

They could have killed her right there. Or turned her over to the Cetagandans, as they'd threatened. Instead they'd offered her a deal: lead the Rangers in the front lines of defense against them, in exchange for safe passage out of the Hegen Hub after the battle was over. Assuming she survived it.

Not much of a choice. She'd taken it. And they'd been stupid enough to keep their word, and she'd taken that too -- fled with the few surviving remnants of the Rangers, abandoning six ships too damaged to Jump, heading as far away from Cetagandan space as possible. The Cetas take a dim view of treachery when it isn't in their favor.

Even that might have been a workable situation; she'd scraped herself up from worse situations before, she could have worked this one. Until that damnable persistent Ranger officer put together the last few pieces, and figured that she'd sold them out. And, just as a bonus, that she'd killed both the Rangers' previous commander and her own second in command. (She's wondered, since, whether Stanis had had anything to do with that; whether he'd left a few of those pieces where they'd be found, as insurance against her, just in case.)

So here she is in dock at tiny backwater Weatherall Station, on her own again, with a stolen shuttle, a single jump-bag, and a price on her head. Probably, knowing the Cetagandans, a higher price if it happens to be still attached to her shoulders.

There could be opportunities here, of course; there are opportunities everywhere ... but her first priority is to get away. She's not far enough from Cetaganda yet, and not nearly far enough from the Rangers. She's already resigned to abandoning the shuttle. In a pinch, she'll abandon the bag as well.

In a tight enough pinch, there's nothing she won't abandon. Which is why she's still alive.



Cavilo is from the novel The Vor Game and is the property of Lois McMaster Bujold. She is used here for purposes of the roleplaying game milliways_bar, from which no profit is being made.