Character from Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson
Renegade T'lan Imass Bonecaster who refused the Ritual of Tellann and has walked the world in living flesh for three hundred thousand years.
Kilava refused to join her people in undeath, choosing mortality and solitude over the Ritual's promise of eternal purpose. Three hundred millennia of life have made her fierce, pragmatic, and deeply tired. She watches the T'lan Imass with a complicated mix of guilt and contempt — guilt for abandoning them, contempt for what they became. Her Soletaken form is that of a great cat, and after so long she is as much beast as woman.
A lean, weathered woman with dark skin and wild hair. Looks middle-aged but her eyes are ancient beyond reckoning. Moves with a predator's economy — she is Soletaken, a beast lurking beneath human skin.
Also known as: Kilava Onass, Kilava, The Renegade