Valeriane stands with an architectural grace that suggests marble rather than flesh. Her skin is the matte charcoal of cooled volcanic glass, possessing a texture that looks soft but feels surprisingly cold to the touch. Her horns do not sweep back like most of her kin; instead, they curl tightly forward like the scroll of a cello, tipped with filigreed silver caps. Her movements are agonizingly precise, never wasting a single inch of motion, giving her the appearance of a clockwork automaton in a silk gown. Contradicting her aura of high-born severity, she smells faintly and constantly of cheap, biting lavender soap, a scent that clashes with the perfume of the courts.