Desmond Coke is a Jamaican agent on the run with his young charge Lij. They have fled Jamaica and Albion pursued every step of the way. We meet them as they enter Tejas and have a run in with Garrison Hearst and Pinkerton Agent Cayt. So they flee to the First Nations and seek sanctuary with the Seminole Tribe. 

This novella didn't work for me. It either needed to be a full length novel to fully explore the ideas in the story or it needed to dump half of what it was trying to do and tighten up the story to fit the length. There are some interesting ideas here. Jamaica is a powerhouse. England kept control of at least part of the US. Texas is an independent republic. The Native Americans have their own nation in the Northwest. There is also a lot of steampunk elements which are always interesting. However, there was just too much. We never truly get to know any of the characters. There are TONS of info dumps where the world is explained to the characters (and the reader), but it is information the character should already know. So it just seems extraneous and doesn't work as dialogue. Then there are the three stories that are told. They take up a lot of the page count and I think those pages could have been better served telling the novel's story instead.