Su'alhazi presents as an unsettling blend of graceful predator and disheveled grifter. From the waist up she is lithe and angular; her shoulders are lean, collarbones sharp beneath sun-bronzed skin, and the long, narrow face of someone who learned to read expressions early. Her lower half is a long, sinuous serpent tail patterned with her mother's distinct amber-and-olive scales that catch light like burnished metal. She moves with a quiet, coiling smoothness, sliding more than walking. Her gestures are economical; she favors small, precise motions rather than grand sweeping ones. Unexpectedly, she keeps one hand frequently in a pocket stuffed with scraps of paper and tiny tools, and when nervous she hums old lullabies in a low voice. She often wears a torn, oversized hooded cowl that hides the crown of her head and a band of jeweler's wire braided around her tail near the tip as a personal talisman.