Red Seas Under Red Skies

What's inside (8 sections)

1. After Camorr
2. Tal Verrar and the Sinspire
3. Stragos and the poison bargain
4. Learning the sea the hard way
5. The Poison Orchid
6. A double ending that stings
7. Key takeaways
8. FAQ

I came to Red Seas Under Red Skies the way you come to a second drink with old friends, a little nervous that it will not be as good as the first night. I had loved The Lies of Locke Lamora and I was still sore about how it ended, with the crew dead and Locke and Jean sailing off hurt and broke. Scott Lynch published this one in 2007 with Bantam Spectra, 558 pages in the US hardcover, second book of the Gentleman Bastard series. I started it on a Friday and kept going because I wanted to know if Locke was still Locke after all that loss. The answer is yes and no, which is why this book stuck with me even where it sags.

You do not strictly need book one fresh in mind, but it helps a lot here. The deaths of Calo, Galdo and Bug hang over every joke here. So does what Locke and Jean did to the Falconer, the Karthaini wizard they left without fingers and tongue. The Bondsmagi do not forget that kind of insult. Early on they start speaking to Locke and Jean through market sellers in Tal Verrar, ordinary voices saying very cold things about payback. It rattled me more than a fight scene would. These wizards could probably kill them outright by making them turn on each other, and the fact that they hold back and work sideways instead makes every later risk feel heavier.

After Camorr

The book opens out of order, with Locke and Jean on a pier beside a burning ship and crossbows pointed around, Jean suddenly turning his weapon on Locke. Then it jumps back two years. I liked that cold open on first read and liked it less on second, because you spend a long time waiting for the story to catch up to it. Still, it sets the tone well. These two are alive but cornered and almost out of options.

After Camorr they wash up in Vel Virazzo and it is grim. Locke drinks and picks stupid fights. Jean keeps them alive by running the local crew. There is a bit where Jean locks Locke in a room and dares him to pick the lock, forcing him to remember he is good at something. Locke answers with a wild theft run around town.

They decide on Tal Verrar because it is rich and strange and far enough from Camorr ghosts. Tal Verrar is a city state run by two powers that hate each other politely. There is the Priori, councils of merchants who hold the money, and there is the Archon, a military ruler who holds the soldiers and wants more power. Into that split walks a casino called the Sinspire, a tall tower where the rich go to gamble and show off. That is where Locke and Jean plant themselves, posing as professional gamblers with deep pockets and thin pasts.

I should say I love Lynch on cities. Camorr felt like Venice with sharks. Tal Verrar feels hotter and more mercantile. The Sinspire is vivid without needing a map. Nine floors of games, each higher and richer than the last. The rule everyone knows is simple. Cheaters die, no matter their birth.

Tal Verrar and the Sinspire

Requin is a great creation. He is patient, courteous, funny in a dry way, and completely willing to have you killed. His second is Selendri, a woman with a brass prosthetic hand and a stare that ends conversations. She notices everything. When Locke and Jean start climbing the Sinspire by cheating in small clever ways, dusting cards with a soporific powder here, reading tells and feeding each other signals there, it is Selendri who first marks them as interesting rather than just lucky.

Their long plan is to rob the vault and win Requin's trust enough to get close. Locke walks in and admits part of the truth. He says he was hired by a secret employer to rob the place and now wants to switch sides. Requin puts him on probation instead of killing him.

There is a slow section here about gifts. Locke commissions four ornate chairs with hidden spaces inside and gives them to Requin as a present. What is really inside is climbing gear for later. I grinned at that.

The trouble, and this is my main gripe which I will come back to, is that this Sinspire thread then has to share the book with a whole second plot. Just as the casino game gets tense, the Archon grabs them off the board.

Stragos and the poison bargain

Maxilan Stragos, the Archon of Tal Verrar, is the other pole of the city. He rules from a palace called the Mon Magisteria and commands a private force called the Eyes of the Archon. His field officer for this job is Merrain, a capable soldier woman who watches Locke and Jean with open contempt that slowly turns into something more complicated.

Stragos knows who they really are. The Bondsmagi told him, in dispatches that basically say do what you like with them. He invites them in, pours wine, talks politics, and tricks them into drinking poison. The dose kills in about two months unless you get regular antidotes, and only his personal alchemist can make it. I found those chapters deeply uncomfortable in a good way. There is no fight to win. They are sick from one cup of wine and they know it.

What he wants sounds simple and gets ugly fast. He wants them to learn to sail, take a ship, go south across the Sea of Brass to the Ghostwind Islands, win over pirates there, and sail back to raid Verrari shipping. The fake pirate crisis will scare the city into giving him money and ships for a stronger navy, which means more power for him and less for the Priori. He promises a permanent cure when the job is done. Locke and Jean, who know nothing about the sea, have about eight weeks to become sailors and villains on command.

Locke does the only thing he can. He lies to everyone. He tells Requin that Stragos is the secret employer, so his absences look like loyalty. He invents a fake thief called Calo Callas to explain gaps, naming him for a dead friend. He tells Stragos what Stragos wants to hear.

There is a short passage from Stragos's side telling us Merrain does not really work for him. She answers to other masters. I liked the chill of it and felt cheated we never learn much more.

Learning the sea the hard way

Lynch does not hand wave sailing. He makes Locke and Jean suffer through it.

Their teacher is an old sailing master named Caldris, himself poisoned and therefore motivated. They crew a ship called the Red Messenger, stage a false mutiny to steal it, and point south.

Then everything goes wrong. Caldris dies before a big storm. The crew finds out Locke forgot to bring cats aboard, a serious bad omen for sailors, and sets Locke and Jean adrift. I thought, these idiots survived Capa Raza only to die because of cats.

This middle part is where the book slows for me. I skimmed rigging talk to get back to people talking. If you bounce off nautical vocabulary, read these chapters a little faster. The human stuff still lands.

The Poison Orchid

What saves the middle is Zamira Drakasha, who storms in and lifts the whole book.

Her ship, the Poison Orchid, picks up Locke and Jean within hours. Drakasha is a former naval officer turned pirate captain, strict and smart and absolutely in command. New captives start on scrub watch, doing the lowest labor. You can earn full crew standing by courage, especially by boarding first in a raid.

Jean falls for the first mate, Ezri Delmastro, and it is one of the best parts of the book. They bond over a playwright they both love. Jean, who has been carrying Locke for two years, finally gets someone who sees him clearly.

Locke earns his place harder. When the Orchid takes a ship defended by Jeremite Redeemers, Locke volunteers to board first and kills several men through nerve and luck. Jean then tells Locke they cannot betray these people to Stragos. That argument felt true to a long friendship under pressure.

Locke tells Drakasha the truth and proposes small showy raids near Tal Verrar while they hunt for a cure. She takes it to captains at Port Prodigal. Most agree. Jaffrim Rodanov of the Dread Sovereign does not. He plants a spy named Utgar aboard with a shipbane sphere, an alchemical incendiary.

Back near Tal Verrar the raids start. One on a trader is half hearted. One on a coastal town where nobles pay peasants to suffer cruel games turns into a furious assault. Locke and Jean slip ashore to beg antidotes from Stragos and soothe Requin, and each meeting gets meaner. Alley assassins keep coming, hired by the Priori after Bondsmagi whispers.

That pier scene from the opening pays off here. Jean pointing a crossbow at Locke is a trick to kill their ambushers. On reread I liked it more.

The sea battle is brutal. Rodanov catches the Orchid. Utgar threatens to drop the shipbane where Drakasha hides her children. Treganne, the ship's physiker, shoots Utgar without knowing what the sphere is. It falls and lights. Ezri hits Jean to stop him following, picks up the white hot sphere with her bare hands, and throws it onto the enemy ship. She dies burned. Jean gives her mercy with a dagger. I had to put the book down after that.

The Sovereign burns. The Orchid survives with thirty eight people left. Drakasha loses so much and keeps standing. That endurance is the heart of the pirate half for me.

A double ending that stings

Locke decides to finish everything in one night. He pulls in Marius Cordo and his son Lyonis of the Priori. Then Locke and Jean get publicly arrested by the Eyes outside the Sinspire, which is really transport.

Inside they tell Requin the Archon knows about their plan. While Requin goes down to deal with the noise, they overpower Selendri, seal doors, smash the gift chairs for the climbing gear, cut old paintings from their frames, and rappel down the tower. They let themselves be arrested on the ground, then Lyonis kills the escort, takes uniforms, and walks them into the Mon Magisteria.

At the palace Lyonis takes the room. The alchemist has only one vial ready. Merrain kills him with a poisoned blade and runs. One dose for two men. They hand Stragos to Drakasha for Ezri. The Priori take the city. Requin makes a deal and sets Selendri up to run intelligence.

Because the paintings are fakes. A dealer tells them the Therin Throne works are copies. Two years nets them twenty five hundred solari. I laughed and then felt sick.

Then the antidote choice. Jean insists Locke drink it. Locke admits he already slipped it into Jean's wine. They buy a small yacht and sail out together, joking because what else can they do.

So who should read it. If you liked book one for Locke and Jean together, you will find plenty here. Their banter is still sharp, Jean gets more room to breathe, Drakasha and Ezri are worth meeting. The pirate chapters, once they catch fire, move fast and hit hard. The casino chapters have clever mechanics for con lovers.

My fair complaints stand though. The middle is slow. Sea school, storms, councils and double errands pile up and the Sinspire thread goes quiet for too long, so the final heist feels rushed and its big twist lands as a shrug rather than a shock. Locke's luck stretches belief in places. He talks his way out of rooms where talking should fail. And the Bondsmagi threat hums in the background without resolving, which is clearly setup for later but feels thin here. Requin deserved a fuller showdown.

I still recommend it, with those notes. It is bigger and sadder than book one, less tight but more tender in spots. The friendship scenes kept me going through the slow sailing chapters, and Drakasha's crew felt like people I knew by the end. When Locke and Jean sail off at the end, one dying and both joking, I wanted book three immediately, which is probably the point. Friendship carries them when schemes do not, and Lynch writes that bond better than almost anyone in modern fantasy.

FAQ

Do I need to read The Lies of Locke Lamora first?

No, but it helps a lot. Book one explains the dead crew and the Falconer grudge that drives the Bondsmagi pressure here.

Is this book a heist or a pirate story?

Both. The first half is a Tal Verrar casino con against Requin, then Stragos forces them to sea and the book turns into piracy with Drakasha.

Is Red Seas Under Red Skies violent?

Yes, in bursts. The banter stays funny, but duels, raids, and Ezri's death are shown plainly. Readers wanting light capers should be warned.