Red Country

Red Country is a standalone novel set in Joe Abercrombie's First Law world, a grimdark fantasy setting. Though it functions independently, it features characters from earlier books in the series, including The Blade Itself, Best Served Cold, and The Heroes.

Shy South is a young woman with a buried criminal past as the outlaw "Smoke" who now works a hardscrabble farm in the Near Country, a lawless frontier territory. Lamb, the large but seemingly meek Northman who served as surrogate father to Shy and her younger siblings, Pit and Ro, accompanies her to the boomtown of Squaredeal to sell grain. When they return home, they find the farmhouse burned, their old friend Gully hanged, and no sign of the children. They follow the raiders' trail south.

Meanwhile, in the Union province of Starikland, the aging mercenary captain Nicomo Cosca commands the Company of the Gracious Hand. Temple, Cosca's notary and lawyer, is a clever but morally compromised man who enables the Company's violence while telling himself he has no choice. The Union's Inquisition hires the Company to cross the mountains into the Near Country, root out rebels, and capture their leader, Conthus, for a bounty of fifty thousand marks. Temple begs Cosca to refuse, but Cosca accepts. The Company also receives a fortified wagon containing a secret weapon: a tube that fires explosive projectiles.

Shy and Lamb track the raiders, finding more burned farms and stolen children. They encounter Leef, a teenage boy whose family was attacked by the same band. In the town of Averstock, Lamb attacks three members of the raiding party with shocking violence, revealing a hidden capacity for killing that stuns Shy. The surviving raider reveals that Grega Cantliss stole the children and is transporting them by keelboat toward the frontier town of Crease. They meet Dab Sweet, an aging scout, and his partner Crying Rock, an old Ghost woman, one of the indigenous peoples of the plains. Sweet offers to guide them with a Fellowship of prospectors heading west.

The Company rampages through the Near Country, torturing suspected rebels. Temple's friend Sufeen insists on entering Averstock to offer the townspeople a chance to surrender, but the Company attacks early and Sufeen is killed. Devastated, Temple deserts, riding west alone.

From Ro's perspective, roughly twenty stolen children are herded across the plains by Cantliss and his men. They travel by keelboat into increasingly empty territory. Ro hopes Shy is following but fears the odds.

Shy and Lamb join the Fellowship, a diverse column of wagons carrying merchants, herders, and dreamers toward Crease. Among them are the merchant Abram Majud, the drover Raynault Buckhorm and his family, the actor Iosiv Lestek, and the taciturn Savian with his sharp-eyed "niece" Corlin. Shy discovers Savian bears rebel tattoos but keeps silent. Temple, after a near-death experience, washes up in a river and is pulled out by Shy. Penniless, Temple is bought into the Fellowship by Shy, creating a debt he must work off.

The journey is grueling. Ghost warriors attack the Fellowship; the battle kills Leef and several others. During negotiations with Sangeed, the aging Ghost leader who styles himself Emperor of the Plains, Lamb attacks without warning and kills Sangeed and his companions. The Ghosts withdraw.

Cantliss delivers the children to Ashranc, a city carved from a volcanic mountainside where the Dragon People dwell, a secretive community who follow the teachings of "the Maker." Their leader, Waerdinur, pays Cantliss in ancient gold and takes the children as his own. Ro learns their customs but refuses to forget her old life, while Pit adapts more easily.

The Fellowship reaches Crease, a lawless boomtown split between the Mayor, a calculating woman, and Papa Ring, a ruthless crime boss. The Mayor offers Lamb a deal: She wants him to fight Ring's champion, the famous pit fighter Glama Golden, in a bare-fist duel to the death, and in exchange she will help them reach Cantliss and the children. Lamb accepts. Temple finds satisfaction building a shop for Majud, and he and Shy grow closer, eventually spending the night together.

When Cantliss returns, he captures Shy, but she escapes with help from Savian and Bee, Cantliss's former lover who reveals he sold the children to the Dragon People. The fight proceeds in the amphitheatre: Lamb faces Golden. Golden dominates early, but Lamb absorbs punishment and reveals his identity by holding up his three-fingered fist. Golden recognizes him with terror as a legendary Northern killer. Lamb beats Golden to death while the Mayor's forces simultaneously burn out Ring's side of the street. Ring and his lieutenants are hanged.

Cosca arrives in Crease with his Company and the Inquisition. Cantliss, now a prisoner, tells Cosca the Dragon People paid in ancient gold. Cosca proposes an alliance to march on Ashranc, and Lamb pragmatically accepts. At Ashranc, Lamb demands Waerdinur return the children, but Waerdinur refuses. The Dragon People march on the Company's camp and are devastated by an ambush using explosive weapons. The Company storms Ashranc, massacring its defenders. Temple finds Pit and takes him to safety. Shy chases Ro across a narrow bridge over an underground abyss; Lamb fights Waerdinur but enters a berserker rage and nearly kills Ro before being restrained. In a vast chamber, they discover a colossal mechanical dragon, a creation of the Maker, atop a mountain of gold. Cosca claims the hoard.

During the return march, Cosca has Savian arrested as Conthus and hangs Cantliss. Lamb goes alone to rescue Savian from the Inquisition, while Shy and Temple steal the treasure wagon, with Sweet stampeding the horses as a diversion. The wagon crashes in a canyon. Corlin arrives with rebel fighters and takes the gold, revealing that she, not Savian, is the real Conthus; Savian was her uncle and decoy. At the fort, Lamb frees Savian and the two make a last stand. Cosca deploys the cannon, destroying the fort and killing Savian, but Lamb survives.

Temple and Shy race to Crease, where Temple devises a ruse: the actor Lestek impersonates the feared Imperial general Legate Sarmis. When Cosca arrives with his depleted force, the deception works, and Inquisitor Lorsen orders Cosca arrested. Later, Cosca escapes and takes hostages at Buckhorm's farm, demanding the gold. Temple tells him the truth: The gold is gone. As Cosca reaches for his sword, his biographer Sworbreck stabs him from behind. Cosca dies in the mud, still smiling.

The group returns to the Near Country. Shy buys Clay's old store in Squaredeal; Temple opens a practice across the street. Ro remains resentful, grieving for Waerdinur, but slowly begins to adjust. Caul Shivers, a scarred Northman with a metal eye who has been hunting a nine-fingered man on behalf of the Northern king Black Calder, arrives and faces Lamb in a tense standoff but decides to let Lamb go, saying he will report the nine-fingered man as dead and gone. Lamb immediately packs to leave, telling Shy his violent past will always draw enemies and the only way to protect the children is to take that danger with him. Shy calls him a coward but cannot stop him. Lamb rides off alone; Shy, Ro, and Pit watch from the porch until he is gone.