The Countess is the daughter to Dutch Duke from the province of Alderondo.   Her father was a leading critic of the Spanish Empire and desired to break free.   The Spanish crown has crown tired of the small duchy's troublemaking.   She has been sent to the New World as an envoy to seek out aid from other rebellious territories hoping to break free from Spain. 

Anakello Del Vasquez

The countess's ship is pursued by an admiral in the Spanish Empire's navy, Anakello Del Vasquez.  Vasquez is a ruthless enforcer of the crown who is a seasoned veteran of hundreds of naval engagements who is down a battle scarred and broken form of a man.  Vasquez hears of the Contess's plot and intercepts her in the New World and  quickly arrested for her insolence.

Cithreto Pello & Rotodieto

(remember double ll's sound like y's in Spanish)

Cithreto Pello is a crew member aboard the  ship of the Countess.  Before her arrest he is tasked with completing her the Countess's mission.  When Vasquez boards her ship he and his trusted squawking blue macaw parrot Rotodieto, escape in the fog aboard a dinghy and rowed for shore.  They have been entrusted with the important mission of seeking out an old friend of the royal family.

Lucio Anador de Cielo

The sailor and parrot wash ashore and are found by a young farmer, Lucio,  working in his uncles sugar cane field.  The boy longs to leave the Caribbean island that has been his home and want to go to Europe and experience life of a swashbuckling adventurer.  The sailor relays his mission and Lucio, who may just now where to take them.

Obregon Quinada

Lucio takes the sailor and his bird to an old Jesuit mission to talk to Father Obregon Quinada.  Cithreto release his message from the countess.  Years earlier Obregon had be a conquistador of great fame and served the crown bravely as he carved out the earliest settlements in the uncivilized world.  He had worked alongside Vasquez and with time he grew weary of the carnage and bloodshed, renounced his land and title, and joined the Jesuit mission and sought to atone for his earlier deeds.   When he receives the message of her arrest he is obliged to fulfill an old family debt to her father and help, even though the rebellion is in part against the church.

Hernan de Sota

Getting out of the Caribbean with the information would not be easy.  Spanish ships had blockaded the ports.  They needed a man adept at getting past such entanglements.  They sought out a smuggler in a port bar named Hernan de Sota.  Hernan was no fan of the Empire but he was not a crusader either.  But, for the right price who help either side.  He agreed to smuggle them of the island past the Spanish blockade on his ship, the Halcon.

Hernan helmed his ship with the help of his first mate, a towering Hungarian named Cavel Baca.  Baca had been a slave in an early plantation in Canary Islands that Hernan had rescued.  He speaks only in his native Hungarian, which only Hernan knows.

Barto Facht

To help with the search for Cithreto and Obregon, Vasquez had enlisted the help of numerous Swiss mercenaries to canvas the seas and smaller ports.  The most notable of these mercenaries was Barto Facht, a man renowned for his efficiency in the completion of his tasks.