Characters:

Main Characters:

Angus McAllister – Fiona’s Uncle – her father’s older brother – age 50, lives in Inveralba. Light brown hair with gray, blue eyes. Lives in a croft and has lots of cats.

Callum McAllister – 10 years old, brown eyes, dark brown hair, cousin to Fiona and Elspet

Elspet McAllister – 10 years old, reddish hair and blue eyes, cousin to Fiona and Callum, artistic, draws

Fiona Isabella McAllister – 11 years old, blonde hair, green eyes, lives in Inveralba and is a descendant of King Kegan and King Dugan.

Mairi Anna Ferguson McAllister – Fiona’s mum, makes honey from heather and bluebell and thistle.  Sells it in the shops to tourists and also sends it off to Edinburgh and Glasgow. She also is a good cook and works part time at McKenzie’s bakery in town.  Age 35, brown hair and fern green eyes

Drayton Steele – Descendant of King Dugan and Princess Isabella and owner of the necklace stolen from King Kegan – Age 19. Son of Shardow Steele and Penelope McAllister.

Jack Thomson/ Artur - Pearl – Pretending to be a brother of Johnny. He is actually Artur, one of King Kegan’s 12 men and hid the 3^rd jewel, the pearl, in Seychelles. He is from Arabia with dark hair and eyes, about 32 years old.

Jacob Thomson/Gamlas – Opal – One of the 12 men who hid the 8^th stone, opal, in Nepal. From Burill in Arabia, with Arab features – olive skin, dark eyes and hair. He is 26 years old.

Jared Thomson/Chessa – Amber – One of the 12 men, who hid the 7^th stone, amber, in Mexico. From Burill in Arabia, with long dark brown hair that he wears in a pony tail, brown eyes. He is 28 years old.

Jason Thomson/Buntabi – Ruby – One of the 12 men, who hid the 6^th stone, the ruby, in Jordan. From Burill in Arabia, with African heritage, so he has short, curly black hair, brown eyes, and dark brown skin. He is 31 years old.

Jasper Thomson/Collos – Sapphire- One of the 12 men, who hid the 9^th stone, the sapphire, in La Mancha, Spain. Blue eyes, Germanic and Frank heritage. 30 years old.

Jeffrey Thomson/ Kitar -  Emerald – One of the 12 men, who hid the 4^th stone, the emerald, in Yukon. From Burill in Arabia, but with Germanic descent, so has blond hair and blue eyes. His mother was Arabic, but his father was of Germanic blood  and he came to Burill to live. He is 39, the oldest of the 12 men.

Jeremy Thomson/ Serbel – Tanzanite - One of the 12 men, who hid the 10^th stone, the tanzanite, in Argentina.  He is 31 years old, has Arab features, dark hair and eyes. Well built, strong, muscular. Tallest of 12 men with a Schwarzenneger-type build.

Jesse Thomson/ Pond - Spinel -  One of the 12 men, who hid the 2^nd jewel, spinel in Iceland. From Burill in Arabia so he has dark hair and brown eyes. His is 27 years old

Jimmy Thomson/Cowan – Black Obsidian -Pretending to be the brother of Johnny. Is actually Cowan, one of King Kegan’s 12 most trusted me and he hid the 1^st jewel in Hydra, Greece. He is from Arabia – so he has dark hair and eyes.

Johnny Thomson/ Alroy Cathmore - Posing as a tourist from London, come to Inveralba to fish and hunt – Age 37 – He has light brown hair and brown eyes – his ancestry is Persian. King Kegan’s scribe and author of the book the children found.

Julian Thomson/ Edwi – Topaz – Hid the jewel in Tasmania, one of the 12 men who hid the 5^th stone, Topaz– has black hair and dark brown eyes and is 28 years old

Minor Characters:

Ackley- Head cook at Castle Athdara during King Kegan’s reign, a male, born in London, England.

Amira – Daughter of Ishan and Gulshan

Princess Anna – Daughter of King Kegan and Queen Sarmantha, wife of Robert of Ferguson in Scotland and mother of Jorbi. Also ancestor of Fiona and Mairi. 14 at time of capture by King Dugan. 15 when she gave birth to Jorbi.

Ailen – The baker at Castle Athdara for King Kegan and family, female, from Salisbury, England

Petiso Orejudo Aquilino – One of the prisoner ghosts at the prison in Ushuaia

Azhar – Eldest daughter of Ishan and Gulshan

Allinus Cambiera– One of the crewmen on the Lucky Lady who saves Fiona

Carling – One of the cooks at Castle Athdara during King Kegan’s reign. A female from Normandy, France.

Nellie McAllister Crawford – Fiona’s great aunt on her father’s side, age 72, sister to Catriona and Penelope, oldest of the 3 sisters. Aunt of Drayton Steele

Diya – Son of Ihsan and Gulshan

King Dugan - Descendant of King Bartolf, evil king, who lived in Zanaad, North Africa. Father of Ithgar and Jorbi (birth father).

Durrah – Daughter of Ihsan and Gulshan

Fadwah – A daughter of Ihsan and Gulshan

Gibaldi – Captain Navarre’s personal cook on the Lucky Lady

Gulshan – Wife of Ihsan

Talon Hormdin – King Dugan’s scribe

Ihsan – A Bedouin man who lives with his wife and children where Zanaad used to be, in the Sahara Desert in northern Africa. Married to Gulshan.

Jalal – Son of Ihsan and Gulshan

Jibran – Son of Ihsan and Gulshan

King Kegan  - Descendant of King Rolfin – good king, he lived in Burill on the Arabian Peninsula and left, taking his family to Scotland and built Castle Athdara. Father of Isabella, Anna, Cerdic, Gelis, Rayad and Gilian. Married to Queen Sarmantha. Died at age 43. Son of King Abbasan and his wife, Queen Nadia.

Wizard Lehimna - King Rolfin’s wizard, who made the orb, from Xilia

Wizard Lephimah – Wizard, Son of Zerahemna, lives in Xilia and is now caretaker of Cloudwaltzer, the black dragon.

Locke – female, one of the cooks at Castle Athdara during King Kegan’s reign. She came from southern Spain near Barcelona.

Malcolm McAllister – Callum’s father – is a gillie. When people come to the highlands to shoot grouse, partridge, or hunt a deer, or want to go fishing, he takes them and shows them where the best places are. He has a few hounds that he uses to scare out the grouse. He often brings home fish he’s caught in the loch and streams for his family and also venison. Age 38, brown hair, brown eyes

Ricardo Bernardo Mauro- One of the prisoner ghosts in the prison in Ushuaia

Malik – Tour guide in Sousse (Hadremutem)

Masud – Son of Ihsan and Gulshan

Michel – Cooks for the crew on the Lucky Lady

Muhair – Eldest son of Ihsan and Gulshan

Wizard Nahimena – Chief Wizard of Xilia

Nasri – Son of Ihsan and Gulshan

Captain Vito Navarre – Captain of the Lucky Lady, a cargo ship

Wizard Phelan - King Dugan’s evil wizard, wizard of Xilia

Qahtan – Ancestor of Temani, who lived in Burill

Prince Rayad - 2^nd son and 3^rd child  of King Kegan and Queen Sarmantha, dark hair and dark eyes like his father’s ancestors. Likes to read, quiet in nature. 6 years old when killed

Rico – Captain Navarre’s First Mate on the Lucky Lady

King Rolfin - Owner of the original orb – good king, brother of Bartolf. Lived originally in Hadrumetum, near Carthage, but fled and moved to Burill on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula(Yemen)

Wizard Samothi – Phelan’s father. Former Chief Wizard of Xilia

Queen Sarmantha – Wife of King Kegan, mother of Princess Anna, Princess Isabella, Prince Cerdic, Princess Gelis, Prince Rayad and Princess Gilian. Comes from Viking stock, born in Norway.  Her father, King Aluric, did trading with Kegan’s father, Abbasan, and when Kegan and she met, they fell in love. She had fair hair, violet eyes, and was 35 when she died. Her mother was Queen Finna.

Penelope McAllister Steele – Drayton’s mother and wife of Shardow Steele, who is now dead, age 51. Youngest of the 3 sisters, Nellie McAllister Crawford and Catriona McAllister McAllister

Shardow Steele – Drayton’s father – dead, killed by Gnarlfi- a redcap possessed by Phelan

Stroud – male, one of King Kegan’s hunters in charge of hunting food (A lowland Scot from Fife)

Temani – A blind wise man in San’a Yemen. Descendant of a Burillian man, Qahtan.

Tomkin – male, one of King Kegan’s hunters in charge of hunting food. He came from Devonshire, England.

Uzma – Baby daughter of Ihsan and Gulshan

Whit – One of King Kegan’s hunters in charge of hunting food, male, from Yorkshire, England.

Pedro Virgilio- One of the prisoner ghosts in the prison at Ushuaia

Rosa and Gomez Xinbal – Rent two rooms to Fiona and the gang in Ushuaia. Friends of Captain Navarre.

Yagans, Yamana, and the Canoe Indians – an aboriginal tribe of Indians that lived in this area. The last of the tribe died in 1977.

Wizard Zerahemna - King Kegan’s wizard, from Xilia, long nose, eyes sparkle like diamonds, but his iris are white, long dark brown hair that hangs down his back, wears purple hat and robe decorated with symbols from Xilia. Lehimna’s son.

Places:

River Alba – Flows through village of Inveralba into Loch Doon (where does it start and end)

al-Jami’a l-Kabir -the Great Mosque in the old city of San’a, Yemen

Antarctica - A continent lying chiefly within the Antarctic Circle and asymmetrically centered on the South Pole. Some 95 percent of Antarctica is covered by an icecap averaging 1.6 km (1 mi) in thickness. The region was first explored in the early 1800s, and although there are no permanent settlements, many countries have made territorial claims. The Antarctic Treaty of 1959, signed by 12 nations, prohibited military operations on the continent and provided for the interchange of scientific data.

Cape Horn - Cape Horn (Dutch: Kaap Hoorn; Spanish: Cabo de Hornos; named for the city of Hoorn in the Netherlands) is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile. It is widely considered to be the southern tip of South America. Cape Horn is the most southerly of the great capes, and marks the northern boundary of the Drake Passage; for many years it was a major milestone on the clipper route, by which sailing ships carried trade around the world. However, the waters around the cape are particularly hazardous, due to strong winds, large waves, and icebergs; these dangers have made it notorious as a sailors' graveyard.

Castle Athdara -Built by King Kegan on the shores of Loch Doon near today’s Inveralba

Burill – name of King Rolfin’s kingdom in the Arabian peninsula after he moved from Hadrumetum

The End of the World Café – Restaurant in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego

Hadrumetum - city where Rolfin and Bartolf were born near Carthage

Inveralba -Village where Fiona and her family and friends live in the highlands of Scotland

Inverdrochit - Mairi was born here, a village on the opposite side of Loch Doon

Loch Doon- a loch (lake) near Inveralba, Scotland

River Pipo – A river near Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego

San’a - The capital of Yemen, in the western part of the country. Settled in ancient times, it became the capital of North Yemen in 1962 and the capital of united North Yemen and Southern Yemen in 1990. Population: 926,595.

Sousse – Current name for Hadremutem in Tunisia. Also known as the Pearl of the Sahel.

Prison in Ushuaia – The city was centered around a prison for serious criminals. The Argentine government set up this prison following the example of the British in Australia: being a remote island, escape from a prison on Tierra del Fuego would have been impossible. The prisoners thus became forced colonists and spent much of their time cutting wood in the lands around the prison and building the town.

Ushuaia - Ushuaia, capital of Argentina's province of Tierra del Fuego, is the southernmost city in the world. Ushuaia is located at 54°48′00″S, 068°18′00″W on the southern coast of the island of Tierra del Fuego, in a setting surrounded by mountains and overlooking the Beagle Channel. The city has about 50,000 inhabitants and is the southernmost continuously inhabited city. The city was originally named by early British colonists after the name that the native Yamana people had for the area.

Xilia - Kingdom where the wizards come from.  The rivers look like gold when the sun shines because they are filled with tiny bubbles of air. The leaves are perfect shaped and no insects eat them. The flowers are brilliant and the birds sing perfect melodies. All animals live with the wizards in peace and harmony and it is a land of fruit and honey on every table. 

Yemen - A country of southwest Asia at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula. It was ruled by various peoples, such as the Sabaeans, Himyarites, Romans, Ethiopians, and Persians, in ancient times. It was conquered in the 7th century A.D. by Muslim Arabs and became part of the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century. The northern part (known as Yemen or North Yemen) was established as an independent kingdom in 1918 and made a republic in 1962. The southern part consisted of several British protectorates in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Britain withdrew from the area in 1967, and Southern Yemen became independent soon after. The two united in May 1990. San‘a is the capital and Aden the largest city. Population: 12,672,000.

Zanaad - Kingdom of Bartolf in North Africa, after leaving Hadrumetum

                                                                                                                 .

Food

Zhug  - Yemenite hot sauce made from a variety of spices

Plants

Coihues - morello cherry trees

Frankincense - An aromatic gum resin obtained from African and Asian trees of the genus Boswellia and used chiefly as incense and in perfumes.

Lengas-  A kind of tree from west Patagonia) start changing from
green to deep red

Myrrh – An aromatic gum resin obtained from several trees and shrubs of the genus Commiphora of India, Arabia, and eastern Africa, used in perfume and incense. Also called balm of Gilead.

Odds and Ends

Hijab – The headscarf worn by Muslim women, sometimes including a veil that covers the face except for the eyes.

Jambiya – a Yemeni knife, curved and worn tucked into front of man’s pants

The Lucky Lady – A Cargo ship docked at Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego.

Ferrocarril Austral Fueguino – The Train that takes them to the end of the world in Tierra del Fuego