Vaelen is nearly 12 feet tall and appears to glide rather than walk. His robes are heavy and tattered, woven from thin, translucent sheets that resemble dried, shed eyelid skin. When he moves the robes whisper and clack like a thousand lids closing. Where a normal face should be there is a single vertical iris, mottled violet and veined with black, that pulses slowly when he breathes. Hundreds of tiny eyes, glossy and twitching, are embedded in his palms, across his elongated joints, and at the tips of fingers that end in needlelike nails. Unexpectedly, he carries a small bouquet of dried lavender tied to his belt; the scent cuts the tang of stagnant eye-skins and gives him a strangely domestic note.