signals to Fez about Portuguese intentions.) Negotiations resumed, this time swirling around potential hostage-swapping and material guarantees to supplement verbal promises. However, there was little trust between the parties. The Portuguese failure to fulfill the treaty promptly in 1437, and Henry's failure to return Salah ibn Salah's son after the evacuation from the beach, essentially undermined any new Portuguese offers. Abu Zakariya knew that Ferdinand was his only trump, that he was the only reason the Portuguese negotiators were there (and barely so). Abu Zakariya would not, could not, release Ferdinand until Ceuta was safely in his hands. On the other hand, back in Ceuta, the young and inexperienced Álvaro de Castro, surrounded by suspicious captains and veteran soldiers, could not simply hand over the entire city to the Marinids for anything less than Ferdinand. In late October-early November, the Nasrid sultan Muhammad IX of Granada stepped in and offered to break the impasse. He proposed that Ferdinand be placed in the hands of a group of Genoese merchants under his protection, giving his solemn promise to Abu Zakariya he would not allow them to hand Ferdinand over to the Portuguese until the evacuation of the city was confirmed. The Portuguese did not give an immediate reply to Granada's offer, and an outbreak of pestilence in Morocco delayed matters further. Three of the noble beach hostages, then being held in Asilah (separately from Ferdinand in Fez), João Gomes de Avelar, Pedro de Ataíde and Aires da Cunha, died of the plague at this time. By September, disappointing news arrived of the breakdown of Granada's offer and Ferdinand was once again chained. Death of the prince Whatever hope remained for a peaceful solution was dashed in March 1442. According to Álvares, that month, a certain Moroccan noble (identified by Álvares as Faquyamar, a tutor of a Marinid prince) was arrested by Abu Zakariya's men, and on his person were found several Portuguese letters, originating from Queen Eleanor's council, outlining a hare-brained scheme to break Ferdinand out of jail. The Moroccan noble was flogged and executed in Ferdinand's presence, and Ferdinand moved to isolation in a dank dungeon in Fez. It was now clear to Abu Zakariya that the Portuguese had no intention to yield Ceuta, that nothing remained to do with Ferdinand but to extract the largest cash ransom that he could get, but nothing came of this. After 15 months