You play as Cyrus, a Redguard in search for his sister, and a mercenary pirate. After receiving a letter from your old friend and Nord captain Tobias about your sister's disappearance, you sail to Stros M'kai, your sister's home, and site of the final clash between the Redguard Crowns and the Empire. The game begins when you arrive at the port.

A departure from the open-ended entries in The Elder Scrolls series, Redguard follows a single predetermined hero through a story set on Stros M'Kai, an island off the coast of Hammerfell in the closing years of the Second Era. The tale takes place amid the Tiber Wars, shortly after Tiber Septim's expanding empire has conquered and occupied the region. A civil war between rival factions has left the island under the ruthless provisional rule of the imperial governor, Lord Richton, who holds power at the expense of its downtrodden residents. Into this simmering unrest sails Cyrus, a battle-hardened Redguard mercenary summoned by a letter from an old friend with troubling news: his sister, Iszara, has vanished without a trace. Determined to find her, Cyrus arrives on Stros M'Kai and quickly discovers that her disappearance is tangled up in the island's dangerous political intrigue, drawing him into a web of conspiracy far larger than a simple search for a missing sibling.