This will smell horrendous but I'm guessing you want HTML in the portal header for good reason ;-)
Upload it as a Static Resource and use JavaScript UserContext.siteUrlPrefix
to resolve the path:
<script type="text/javascript">
document.write(
"<img " +
"src='" + UserContext.siteUrlPrefix + "/resource/ns__yourImagePng'"yourImagePng'" +
"/>"
);
</script>