Doren is a slight-framed dwarf whose narrow shoulders and quick, economical movements make him look more like a nervous clerk than a tunnel-born survivor. His skin carries a permanent gray-gold cast from years beneath the Smoldering Vaults, with soot lodged in the fine creases around his knuckles. Sandy-brown hair sticks out in uneven tufts and is pulled back with a scrap of copper wire that has been twisted so tightly it bites into the braid. His eyes dart constantly when he is idle, measuring exits, boots, windows, and hands, but become utterly still when he reads. Ink stains climb from his fingertips toward his wrists in branching blue-black smudges. He walks with a soft, sideways shuffle designed for crowded corridors, yet when pursuing evidence he moves with startling certainty, sliding between workers and machinery like a needle through cloth. The contradictory impression he leaves is of fragility wrapped around a hard, almost predatory attention. His clothes are threadbare and dusty, but every hidden pocket is meticulously organized.