Nicolette van Rensselaer

Nicolette cuts a striking figure in any room she enters, though it's not mere beauty that commands attention—it's the way she carries herself. In her early forties, she possesses the kind of elegant poise that comes from a lifetime of knowing exactly how to present herself, yet there's an edge beneath the polish that wasn't there a decade ago.

Her reddish-blonde hair is typically styled in an artfully tousled updo, wisps escaping to frame her face in a way that suggests deliberate carelessness. Her eyes are perhaps her most arresting feature: cool, assessing, the color of winter skies. They're framed by expertly applied dark eyeshadow that gives her gaze an intensity that can be either inviting or intimidating depending on the situation. Those eyes have seen betrayal, public humiliation, and things that don't quite make sense in polite society—and they miss very little. When Nicolette looks at you, you get the distinct impression she's cataloging everything: your tells, your weaknesses, what you want and what you're hiding.

Her expression in repose often carries a slight guardedness, a poker face honed through years of society politics and sharpened by a brutal divorce. There's a set to her mouth that suggests she's learned to keep her thoughts to herself, to reveal only what she chooses to reveal. But when she smiles—truly smiles, not the practiced social smile—there's a warmth there that hints at the fierce determination and passion beneath the controlled exterior.

But it's the way she holds herself that truly defines her presence. Even in a candid moment, there's a straightness to her spine, a deliberateness to her posture that speaks of boarding school deportment classes overlaid with hard-won self-possession. She takes up space without apologizing for it—the bearing of someone who's been knocked down publicly and gotten back up, someone who's reclaimed her power and has no intention of surrendering it again. Not just because she's wealthy, though everyone knows the van Rensselaer name. They notice because she radiates the kind of poised confidence that can only come from surviving what should have destroyed you and refusing to be diminished by it.

She looks like exactly what she is: a woman who's played the game, lost spectacularly, and came back to win anyway.

Nicolette van Rensselaer doesn't walk into a room so much as she ignites it. Her skin has taken on the cool gray-blue of smoke given form, ethereal and shifting in certain lights. Golden filigree patterns swirl across her shoulders, arms, and collarbone like living henna - intricate arabesques that seem to move when you're not looking directly at them, reminiscent of the decorative chains that once bound her.

But it's her hair that truly marks her - deep wine-red at the roots that ignites into flames of orange, gold, and crimson at the ends. The hair moves with its own wind, never quite settling, tongues of fire licking upward as if she's perpetually emerging from her vessel. When she's angry or her emotions run high, the flames burn brighter. When she's at peace - those rare moments with her family - they dim to a soft, warm glow.

Her eyes burn like molten amber, sometimes flickering with inner fire. They miss nothing. Those who meet her gaze often feel exposed, as if she can see straight through to their deepest desires and most desperate wishes. The perfume bottle hangs at her throat on a delicate chain, the crack in its crystal surface visible to those who can see past the Mask. Sometimes, just for a moment, observers swear they can see smoke curling from within it.

When she moves, there's a sinuous, almost hypnotic quality to her gestures - the remnants of a decade spent granting wishes, compelling desire, being irresistible. Even standing still, she radiates heat and presence, commanding attention without demanding it.

She is beautiful, dangerous, and utterly captivating - exactly what the Merchant of Turned Wishes crafted her to be. But now she wields that beauty like a weapon of her own choosing, and the fire in her hair burns for no one but herself.

Nicolette is a study in elegant contradictions. She possesses extraordinary composure and willpower—the kind forged by surviving public humiliation and rebuilding an empire from the ashes of a devastating divorce. Yet beneath that poised exterior beats the heart of a calculated risk-taker who's done playing it safe.

After years of being the dutiful Mrs. Rothschild, she's reclaimed her freedom with fierce determination. She chooses impulsive actions deliberately—investigating supernatural patterns she doesn't understand, exploring underground art scenes, pursuing experiences that make her feel alive. She knows when she's making dangerous choices; she makes them anyway.

Socially, she's a master strategist. She reads people with surgical precision, understands their motivations, and positions herself as indispensable. She can work a museum gala or a warehouse club with equal authenticity, code-switching seamlessly between worlds. Her social toolkit—persuasion, fast-talking, the ability to inspire—makes her formidable in any room she enters.

• Acute Senses
• Allies: New York Library Society 2
• Allies: New York Foundation for the Arts 3
• Allies: Broadway League 4
• Barfly
• Closed Book 2
• Contacts: Agents, Clubs, NYPD
• Empath
• Etiquette 2
• Fixer
• Fast-Talking 2
• Indomitable
• Iron Will
• Professional Training: Socialite 5
• Pusher
• Resources 5
• Status: High Society 5
• Striking Looks: Beguiling 2
• Advanced Striking Looks
• Gentrified Bearing

• High Society: Nicolette was born into the upper Manhattan wealth and has survived existing in their orbit despite a very public and humiliating divorce.
• Patron of the Arts: Nicolette sits on several boards in New York City for the libraries, arts, and even what gets to run on Broadway. Thousands have received personalized letters from her expressing her regret or congratulations for the grant they were being offered.
• Divorcee: Nicolette spent decades as Mrs. Eric Jonathon Rothschild IV, and when the initial rumors of his infidelity spread she stood by him, but as he continued to rub his lack of duty and honor in the public, their relationship grew strained. Not many know what happened between them, but it was the subject of many a gossip article.
• Hedgefresh: After a extended weekend away in real time, but a decade in Arcadian, Nicolette has returned to find that while she's changed a great deal, very little else has.