Aris is a broad-shouldered human woman wrapped in layers of faded fleece, quilted wool, and hand-stitched red thread charms that clink softly when she walks. Her skin is weathered by cold wind and lamp smoke, with a surprisingly delicate scatter of freckles across her nose and cheeks. Her silver-black hair is cropped short except for one long braid bound in copper rings, and she carries herself with a slow, deliberate sway as if always feeling for the safest place to set down an invisible burden. Her left hand is scarred and stiff from an old frostbite injury, yet she wears a bright, almost childish scarf in sunflower yellow that looks absurdly cheerful against her solemn face. She smells faintly of sheep lanolin, rosemary, and wood ash, and the warmth around her feels slightly out of season, like a hearth found in the middle of snow.