Tallow Thorn is a striking, unsettling presence, elegant as a cathedral candle and dangerous as a snapped bone. Her body is tall and narrow, with a dancer's stillness and a predator's readiness, as if every movement has been rehearsed to save time. Her skin resembles polished wax stretched over marble, pale and faintly translucent at the wrists and throat, where slow shadows drift beneath the surface like oil in water. Fine thorn-like ridges trace her cheekbones and collarbones, but her hands are unexpectedly delicate, with long, ink-dark nails that look almost ceremonial. She wears layered robes of black velvet and gold-threaded ash silk, yet the hem is always dusted with fresh garden soil, as though she has just walked out of a graveyard orchard. Her face is beautiful in a severe, disquieting way, and one eye is warm amber while the other is milky white, clouded like a candle made from old prayer.