Red Seas Under Red Skies

Red Seas Under Red Skies

Author	Scott Lynch
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Fantasy
Publisher	Gollancz (UK); Bantam Spectra (USA)
Publication date	June 20, 2007
Media type	Print - Hardback & Paperback
Pages	558 pp (US hardback edition)
ISBN	(US Edition) (UK edition)
OCLC	85690373
Preceded by	The Lies of Locke Lamora
Followed by	The Republic of Thieves

Red Seas Under Red Skies is the second novel (of a projected seven) in Scott Lynch's Gentleman Bastard series. It continues the adventures of protagonist Locke Lamora and his friend Jean Tannen as they arrive on the exotic shores of Tal Verrar, where they must face the dangers of their past, as well as new rivals that wish to stop them at all costs while they try to pull their most ambitious con yet.

Two years after Locke Lamora and Jean Tannen fled Camorr, they have created new secret identities for themselves in the island city of Tal Verrar as professional gamblers at an opulent casino called the Sinspire. The establishment, run by a man named Requin and his disfigured lover Selendri, has a policy that anyone caught cheating at the games is to be killed no matter how high-born they may be. Locke and Jean have been constantly cheating at the games despite this, primarily by manipulating the subtle weaknesses of their gambling opponents, and have gone through many procedures across Tal Verrar and nearby regions to find a way to break into Requin's heavily fortified vault. But they begin to fear for the success of their scheme when the Bondsmagi of Karthain, speaking through the possessed bodies of night market vendors, threaten revenge against the duo for torturing and mutilating the Falconer.

Locke decides to enact the next phase of their plan by revealing to Selendri that they have been cheating. When brought to Requin and ordered to explain both their actions and his seemingly suicidal confession, Locke claims that they are working for some unknown party who is paying them through proxies to rob his vault. He claims to have confessed to the cheating because he is tired of this secondhand connection to their employer, wishing to instead work at the Sinspire. Requin and Selendri grudgingly decide to spare the duo's lives for the time being.

Soon after Requin's interrogation, Locke and Jean are captured by the Eyes of the Archon, elite soldiers who work directly for the leader of Tal Verrar, and brought to the Mon Magisteria, the capital building of the city. There, they meet the archon Maxilan Stragos, who tricks them into drinking a poison which kills a person in two months if periodic antidotes are not taken. Stragos had received dispatches from contacts among the Bondsmagi about their true identities, their activities in Camorr, and the Bondsmagi's satisfaction with letting Stragos use them as he pleased. The archon decides to exploit Locke and Jean's impersonation skills by having them learn to pretend to be competent sailors. He then wants them to command a ship, sail across the Sea of Brass to the Ghostwind Islands in the far south, gain the support of pirates in that region, and then return to Tal Verrar's waters to pillage ships. Stragos hopes that the supposed pirate threat will make the Verrari people desperate for a strengthened navy, which the archon, the commander-in-chief of Tal Verrar's military, would provide. This would also give the archonate far more power relative to the Priori, the governmental council which co-rules the city with the archon but desires to avoid war to preserve their economic interests. Stragos gave Locke and Jean the poison, the antidote to which only his personal alchemist can concoct, because the two month window gives them just enough time to get to the Ghostwinds and back with pirate allies; Stragos promises to give the duo a permanent antidote once their assignment is thoroughly completed. Upon talking to Requin again, Locke is able to fit Stragos into his story as the supposed true identity of the mysterious employer he discussed earlier.