Narissa Holl is striking in the way a storm-bird is striking, all elegance sharpened by restlessness. Her skin is pale with a warm olive undertone, and her hair falls in a thick river of black satin that she keeps pinned with ivory combs when she is forced into formal company. Her eyes are a pale green shot through with gold flecks, often fixed on a distant point as if she is already listening to the next conversation happening three rooms away. She is tall and narrow-shouldered, moving with a dancer's precision, yet there is an unexpected toughness in her hands, which bear faint ink stains and one thin scar across the left thumb from a broken seal knife. She dresses in tailored noble finery of deep teal and ash-white, but always with one practical contradiction hidden beneath it, a pair of dark riding boots or a plain leather belt knife, as if she cannot fully decide whether she is a lady of court or a woman preparing to flee it.