Hugh "Seven Sins" Felix

Hugh is a pirate in the Red Sea and around the Arabian peninsula who is an old crusader from the failed second crusade. He is a fun-loving Greek man who has been sailing since he was old enough to walk. He was first a merchant in Durres, a port of call between Italy and Greece for crusaders and traders. He expanded his business out to Crete and inland to Calabria in Italy but then he had a vision of Christ and the holy temple in Jerusalem and started preparing for a crusade. When the second crusade is called, he joins up, offering to ferry many Latin and Frankish knights and nobles to Jaffa and Aachen, in the Holy Land.

Unfortunately, his five-ship fleet was destroyed and he barely escaped the Islamic fleet, taking refuge in Egypt with merchant friends. From Egypt, he went south, to the old Christian Kingdom of Aksum in modern Ethiopia. He stays there for a while, setting up connections for the next few years before he is employed by a merchant company in Aksum to protect their shipments in the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. Being almost 40 by then, he accepted the commission, working for a couple of years before being able to afford his own pirate ship and crew.

He used his knowledge of merchant routes to attack smaller Islamic ships and makes himself a comfortable living by selling his stolen goods to the Christians in Aksum and Islamic traders coming down from Fatimid Egypt. He is a portly older man when Syres meets him in the ocean, being rescued from drifting, and is offered help and passage to Oman, where he can make his way home to Egypt. Syres enjoys the balding old man, who is fond of his own onboard harem and quirky but loyal crew.