his young son, the new king Afonso V of Portugal, and the kingdom became distracted. At length, the upper hand was gained by Edward's brother, Peter of Coimbra, who became regent of Portugal in 1439. The fulfillment of the treaty was among the new regent's first orders of business. Peter of Coimbra immediately dispatched two emissaries, Martim Tavora and Gomes Eanes, to Asilah to negotiate the logistics of the swap of Ceuta for Ferdinand. In theory, Ferdinand was Salah ibn Salah's hostage, even though he was de facto in Fez, in the custody of Abu Zakariya. Salah recently died and his brother (whom the chroniclers call Muley Buquer – Abu Bakr?) had succeeded him as governor of Tangier and Asilah (Salah's son was then still in Portuguese captivity). It was Muley Buquer who put the preliminary conditions for the swap – firstly, that the Ceuta governor Fernando de Noronha must be relieved from office (his reputation was such that the Moroccans believed he would contrive to prevent the swap), and that upon fulfillment of that, Muley Buquer would request from Abu Zakariya the transfer of Ferdinand from Fez back to Asilah. How exactly it would proceed from there is unclear, but presumably the swap would follow. Receiving the report, Peter of Coimbra appointed D. Fernando de Castro (the head of Henry's household and an experienced diplomat) in charge of the operation. In April 1440 (sometimes dated as 1441), Castro set out with a Portuguese flotilla to Ceuta, to take over the city from the governor Fernando de Noronha, and begin the evacuation of the Portuguese garrison and the handover to the Marinids. In the meantime, the embassy of Martim de Tavora and Gomes Eanes was to return to Asilah to receive the released Prince Ferdinand from the Moroccans. The operation started out inauspiciously. The flotilla went out in a celebratory mood – the ambitious Fernando de Castro openly fantasized that the released Infante Ferdinand might be persuaded to marry his own daughter on the spot, and prepared a rich and well-stocked expedition, packing the ships with banquet finery, an entourage of notables, and a bodyguard of some 1,200 troops, but on the outward journey, around Cape Saint Vincent, the Portuguese flotilla was ambushed by Genoese pirates. The lead ship was boarded and Fernando de Castro killed before the other ships could reach him. The pirates scampered away (suspicions that Noronha