A biography-in-progress of the Bloodwake crewmember Cristoffels De LaCroix of Flanders, formerly an abductee of pirates of the Barbary Coast, Cristo led his captors and those to whom he was sold [he had no family of wealth to redeem him] to believe that he was a willing convert to Islam. Moving from slavery to service, De LaCroix, apprenticed among the educated classes to learn medicine and Arabic, becoming an apothecary, eventually earning greater freedom. How the Fleming found himself back on European soil in a Marseilles tavern on the night a woman known as Sally gave the same pub her custom may eventually unfold here.
