Jack Shaftoe
The protagonist of the first book of this two book novel. Jack is a pirate coming in and out of syphilitic fugue states. He does not remember the past three years of life, but somehow he has ended up as a slave on a pirate ship. The various twists of fate bring that pirate clan to a rise and fall, but in the end, they have to disband for a season. Jack crafts a master plan and rises to power as an honored pirate king in India, but not before he kills the man who stole the love of his life from him ten years ago.
The Cabal
The Cabal is the name of the pirate gang with whom Jack ran. They intercept some silver that is being smuggled by an investor from the New World back to Spain, but when they look at the treasure, it is gold, not silver. They try and land somewhere with their unspeakable fortune, but the loot is too much of a liability, and they are clearly exposed as pirates everywhere they go. The pirate queen steals their booty forcing them to disband for a few years until everyone gets back on their feet.
The pirate queen
This strange character has a mythic vibe in the story. As an agent of fate, she is the person who exploits the liability of the Cabal, and therefore Jack, in the beginning of the novel. But in the second act, as Jack masterminds a rise to political power by dominating a competitive trade route, his karma changes, and the pirate queen's capacity to exploit Jack ends up being a good thing. She helps him exploit his newfound power by investing in his kingdom, and they collaborate.
Eliza
Jack slays a French royal for the seizure and rape of his true love, Eliza. In reality, Eliza is a femme fatale, like Helen of Troy. The death of her kidnapper is like the death of Hektor in The Iliad for the kidnap of Helen. But, like Helen, Eliza is a serpentine person with sneaky tendencies, and she finds a path in life away from Jack. Instead of being with him, she marries someone else to lay low and then sleeps with whomever she wants, and in the end becomes wealthy and powerful.
The duc d'Arcachon
This person seems to have the upper hand against the Cabal in a trade agreement. The Cabal suspects he is secretly scheming against them, that he will betray them in a deal, but before they can settle that score, Jack settles a score of his own. He emerges from capture and slays the duc d'Arcachon. In the second book, we learn that Eliza also hates him for capturing her and her mother. She crafts a plan to slay him just to learn that Jack did it on her behalf.
The Junctio
When Eliza rises to a certain level of power, her friends natural tend to be powerful people. This alchemy club is like a cult for only alchemical geniuses. In this friend group, we see both Newton and Leibniz, as well as enough local celebrities and political figures to keep Eliza's life busy with gossip and social behavior. The Junctio is philosophical and informative, and much of the action in their friend group has to do with Newton's waning health and sanity as he ventures further into his mind to formulate a theory of everything.
