Sick of combat and betrayal, Cordelia Vorkosigan is ready to settle down to a quiet life. But when the Emperor dies, her husband Aral becomes guardian of the infant heir to the imperial throne of Barrayar and the target of high-tech assassins in a dynastic civil war.

But neither Aral nor Cordelia can guess the part that their cell-damaged unborn will play in Barrayar's bloody legacy.