Isabella

* Lore
**Isabela Selena de la Trinidad** (known most commonly by her anglicized first name **Isabella**) is a notorious Venezuelan former Spanish cavalrywoman, naval captain and war veteran, privateer, slave liberator and masterless pirate matriarch-turned Pirate Lord of the Brethren Court. Born the daughter of a Wayuu woman and a wealthy Italian-Spanish cocoa magnate from Majorca, she and her younger brothers enjoyed a relatively luxurious childhood on their father's plantation, on which she enjoyed the finest cuisine and exposure to the arts from every part of the globe. By the age of 12, already fiercely intelligent and more adventured and rambunctious still, she was ecstatically sent to a military academy in Valencia as part of the *Cienfuegos* project to induct wealthy Spanish colonial children into the imperial government and military structure.

As one of a handful of *mestizo* children sent and indeed the only female, she shattered expectations and was a polyglot and armaments expert by the age of 17, by which time she had been made a cavalrywoman on the front lines. She first saw action in the summer of 1732 during the Spanish conquest of the northern Algerian city of Oran, leading the outstanding charge on the moors. After a yearlong station in Oran during which she led the repeated repelling of the resurgent moors under Bey Hassan from the city, she was reassigned to the Italian peninsula and participated in the Bourbon recapture of the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily during the War of the Polish Succession, marching from Naples to Palermo. There, noting her exceptional performance, the Spanish high command commissioned her and a handful of other elite *Cienfuegos* soldiers to crew the state-of-the-art frigate, *La Liberación,* plated with crimson-hued steel and armed to the teeth.

Entrusted now to sail the Spanish Main and the Mediterranean in service of Spain and her prospective allies, Isabella and her crew privateered for the Ottoman navy during the Russo-Turkish War of the late 1730s, and were a commended instrument in repelling the invading Russians from the Crimean Peninsula. Due to the mostly terrestrial nature of the war, the *Cienfuegos* fought mostly in said peninsula and farther north in cities such as Azov, making strong alliances with the Crimean Tatars of the area. *La Liberación* functioned mostly as a patrol and supply ship. So respected were her crew and likeness among the Turkish soldiers and Tatars that she was given the byname *Od Ana*, after a Turkic goddess of fire.

After a brief stay in *Ḳosṭanṭīnīye,* the *Cienfuegos* crew sailed for the Spanish treasure fleet, guarding Spanish ships carrying valuables to cities in New Spain such as Acapulco, Lima and Havana. This, too, would prove brief, as the crew was dragged into warfare once more at the outbreak of the War of Jenkins' Ear. Isabella was tasked primarily with aiding in the protection of the coast of the Viceroyalty of New Granada, and *La Liberación* was instrumental in ending the British sieges of the Spanish gem city of Cartagena de Indias. However, the crew engaged in valiant naval warfare throughout the Caribbean, from Puerto Bello to St. Augustine. Isabella also advanced a personal mission of boarding slave ships and ruthlessly massacring all but one of the crew, rescuing the captives onboard, and liberally plundered EITC ships all over the Caribbean and Sargasso seas, earning herself a seat among the company's most feared figures.

At this point having amassed a vast personal fortune and following, as well as unconditional favor from the Spanish elite, Isabella established a minute rogue queendom on Samana Cay in the Bahamas, meant as a personal estate for the crew and a resting point for liberated slaves as they chose their destination. The pirate monarchy was virtually anarchic and founded on the principles of goodwill and friendship, and was overseen in shifts of months by different crew members.

As the war became absorbed into the greater War of the Austrian Succession, Isabella's crew continued to harass and raze British holdings and incursions into Spanish territory, becoming famous among settler and native populations alike. They were active combatants during the battles of La Guaira and Puerto Cabello, close to Isabella's home town of Maracaibo, and aided in the Spanish victories at both. As the focus of the war shifted to Europe, the crew returned to the Mediterranean Sea, privateering for Spain and France jointly and engaging in naval warfare along the familiar waters of the Tyrrhenian Sea. Disillusioned with the progress and goals of the war, the crew returned to the Caribbean and resumed as guardians of the Spanish treasure fleet while lining their own coffers with plundered valuables from the East India Trading Company and raids on slave-operated sugar plantations in islands such as Barbados and Antigua.

During a brief stay in Havana in 1747, Isabella met the young assassin and rising Pirate Lord Wolf "Zoomer" Strife, who would become her confidant in other sides of the pirate world, and piqued her interest in the Brethren Court.

The end of the war at Aix-la-Chapelle left the crew, led by the 33-year old Isabella, thirsty for riches and adventures beyond those the Spanish could ever promise. Setting sail after a brief stay in Cartagena, the crew sailed from island to island in the Caribbean, meeting with native *caciques* and Haitian witches to attune to different planes of power while engaging in smuggling, contract killings, and general plunder in British spheres of influence from the Bahamas to the Mosquito coast. Isabella, now renowned across empires for her fierce intellect, ruthless tactics, idealism, and beauty, continued her mission of furthering personal freedom in the Caribbean as she faced off against all manner of opponents from rogue EITC warlords to covens of black mages. Upon the sudden dissolution of the 9th Brethren Court, the *Cienfuegos* were joined by Zoomer Strife, who quickly became a valuable asset through his knowledge of the the Atlantic, black markets, and imperial tactics and installations as the crew sailed from the Canary Islands to the Yucatan Peninsula.

Soon after the mysterious return of Pirate King Richard Cannonwalker, Isabella was visited in her Samana Cay manse by he and Finn Hamm, who sought audience with her with the eventual goal of folding her into the ranks of the Court. The authority-avoidant lady interestingly accepted, and pledged herself as a Pirate Lord and military advisor to the Court with conditions unknowable. Her expertise in all spheres of combat and diplomacy as well as her wisdom, experience, and impressive wealth and standing make her an invaluable asset to the 10th Brethren Court.