Caleb did a quick sweep of the place to clean up any evidence of Lapsa that Tear might have missed before heading for the window. He took in a deep breath of the damp night, and looked down to see that life really was out to disappoint him. 

     In the dimly lit alley below stood two figures. One looked a lot like a thin human man in a trench coat with enormous shoulder pads, though something about his features -and the cartoonish proportions- said otherwise. Either way, Caleb didn't recognize him. 

     The other, though, was Jian. One of Rico's favorite enforcers.

     The duo stared back at him. Jian flashed an incisive simian grin, the other made no expression at all.

     "Why hello down there!" Caleb greeted brightly, like he wasn't shitting himself over the situation. "Don’t I just feel like Repunzel up here in my tower. Too bad I went and cut off all my hair or I’d give you princes a lift. Gimme a month or so, it grows back quick-"

     The tall one lost patience first. His shoulders shifted, then rolled back and collapsed into themselves as beetle-like wings erupted from the storm flap of his coat. He launched up to eye level in an instant, and hovered politely until Caleb backed away before landing on the windowsill.

     Caleb's carefully arranged glass shards didn't seem to faze the guy even slightly as his head smashed them out of the frame.

     Up close he looked like a bad impersonation of a mannequin. The smooth planes of his face were the uniform generic flesh tone of a bandaid, while his eyes, motionless and awkwardly protruding, were a glossy veinless white. They sported pupils with no iris, which seemed to drift around instead of move with the eyeball. A stiff brimmed hat obscured whether or not he had hair, but Caleb was guessing not.

     He was soon accompanied by Jian’s silvery furred hands, scrabbling up over the sill and shoving him out of the way to make room. 

-Frankly, I'm not that creative when it comes to creating fantasy languages themed after existing ones. Maybe I should work on that, and maybe I will in future revisions of this story, but for now everything in here is just real world languages with the occasional made up names. Kathibi is essentially Arabic, and Midlands Trade is referential to the historical Lingua Franca of the Mediterranean. That said, while the cultures are heavily inspired by certain aspects of real world nations, they are very much fictional and not intended to reflect on real world cultures or peoples.

-Despite intending to create a fantasy world where I can take all the creative liberties I want, I've still been researching the hell out of things to get an accurate vibe for the era and regions. That's included an hours long deep dive into the history of dye and textiles, and I am now drowning in indigo factoids

-Anyway, Ramuwa's attire is intended to fit the height of european-esque fashions, with an emphasis on wealth, mostly to piss people off with maximum effect. Now, my first impulse on color choices was black and red, but I figured, "Nah, that's too vampy and unrealistic for the era and fashions. European aristocracy wore a lot of bright colors, I'm just biased by my own tastes." So, with a wealthy image in mind, I spent three hours researching the relative values and scarcity of fabric dyes in western europe circa 1600's-1700's, and sure enough, just to spite me specifically, it just so happens that the top most valuable colors were vivid red and deep black. So that's that. Ramuwa may be dressed like pirate dracula with a musketeer hat (cavalier hat -historically fashionable and extra af), but that's not my fault. (but it is interesting to note that black and red has become the classic aesthetic of rich villains in media, I feel like this finally explains why)

-The names of Zubair's cousins, Hakim and Jasur, mean wisdom and bravery respectively.