Rogues is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Copyright © 2014 by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois
Introduction copyright © 2014 by George R. R. Martin
Individual story copyrights appear on this page
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Bantam Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Random House LLC, a Penguin Random House Company, New York.
BANTAM BOOKS and the HOUSE colophon are registered trademarks of Random House LLC.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Rogues / edited by George R. R. Martin and Gardner Dozois.
pages cm
ISBN 978-0-345-53726-3
eBook ISBN 978-0-8041-7960-7
1. Short stories, American. 2. American fiction—21st century. 3. Rogues and vagabonds—Fiction. I. Martin, George R. R., editor of compilation. II. Dozois, Gardner R., editor of compilation.
PS648.S5R64 2014
813’.0108352—dc23 2014010317
www.bantamdell.com
Jacket design: Beverly Leung
Jacket illustration: © Oleg Zhevelev/Shutterstock (celtic ornament)
v3.1
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Introduction: Everybody Loves a Rogue
by George R. R. Martin
TOUGH TIMES ALL OVER
by Joe Abercrombie
WHAT DO YOU DO?
by Gillian Flynn
THE INN OF THE SEVEN BLESSINGS
by Matthew Hughes
BENT TWIG
by Joe R. Lansdale
TAWNY PETTICOATS
by Michael Swanwick
PROVENANCE
by David W. Ball
ROARING TWENTIES
by Carrie Vaughn
A YEAR AND A DAY IN OLD THERADANE
by Scott Lynch
BAD BRASS
by Bradley Denton
HEAVY METAL
by Cherie Priest
THE MEANING OF LOVE
by Daniel Abraham
A BETTER WAY TO DIE
by Paul Cornell
ILL SEEN IN TYRE
by Steven Saylor
A CARGO OF IVORIES
by Garth Nix
DIAMONDS FROM TEQUILA
by Walter Jon Williams
THE CARAVAN TO NOWHERE
by Phyllis Eisenstein
THE CURIOUS AFFAIR OF THE DEAD WIVES
by Lisa Tuttle
HOW THE MARQUIS GOT HIS COAT BACK
by Neil Gaiman
NOW SHOWING
by Connie Willis
THE LIGHTNING TREE
by Patrick Rothfuss
THE ROGUE PRINCE, OR, A KING’S BROTHER
by George R. R. Martin
Dedication
Story Copyrights
Other Books by these Authors
About the Editors
Introduction
EVERYBODY LOVES A ROGUE
by George R. R. Martin
… though sometimes we live to regret it.
Scoundrels, con men, and scalawags. Ne’er-do-wells, thieves, cheats, and rascals. Bad boys and bad girls. Swindlers, seducers, deceivers, flimflam men, imposters, frauds, fakes, liars, cads, tricksters … they go by many names, and they turn up in stories of all sorts, in every genre under the sun, in myth and legend … and, oh, everywhere in history as well. They are the children of Loki, the brothers of Coyote. Sometimes they are heroes. Sometimes they are villains. More often they are something in between, grey characters … and grey has long been my favorite color. It is so much more interesting than black or white.
I guess I have always been partial to rogues. When I was a boy in the fifties, it sometimes seemed that half of prime-time television was sitcoms, and the other half was Westerns. My father loved Westerns, so growing up, I saw them all, an unending parade of strong-jawed sheriffs and frontier marshals, each more heroic than the last. Marshal Dillon was a rock, Wyatt Earp was brave, courageous, and bold (it said so right in the theme song), and the Lone Ranger, Hopalong Cassidy, Gene Autry, and Roy Rogers were heroic, noble, upstanding, the most perfect role models any lad could want … but none of them ever seemed quite real to me. My favorite Western heroes were the two who broke the mold: Paladin, who dressed in black (like a villain) when on the trail and like some sissified dandy when in San Francisco, “kept company” (ahem) with a different pretty woman every week, and hired out his services for money (heroes did not care about money); and the Maverick brothers (especially Bret), charming scoundrels who preferred the gambler’s attire of black suit, string tie, and fancy waistcoat to the traditional marshal’s garb of vest and badge and white hat, and were more likely to be found at a poker table than in a gunfight.
And, you know, when viewed today, Maverick and Have Gun—Will Travel hold up much better than the more traditional Westerns of their time. You can argue that they had better writing, better acting, and better directors than most of the other horse operas in the stable, and you would not be wrong … but I think the rogue factor has something to do with it as well.
But it’s not just fans of old television Westerns who appreciate a good rogue. Truth is, this is a character archetype that cuts across all mediums and genres.
Clint Eastwood became a star by playing characters like Rowdy Yates, Dirty Harry, and the Man With No Name, rogues all. If instead he had been cast as Goody Yates, By-the-Book Billy, and the Man with Two Forms of Identification, no one would ever have heard of him. Now, it’s true, when I was in college I knew a girl who preferred Ashley Wilkes, so noble and self-sacrificing, to that cad Rhett Butler, gambler, blockade-runner … but I think she’s the only one. Every other woman I’ve ever met would take Rhett over Ashley in a hot minute, and let’s not even talk about Frank Kennedy and Charles Wilkes. Harrison Ford comes across rather roguishly in every part he plays, but of course it all started with Han Solo and Indiana Jones. Is there anyone who truly prefers Luke Skywalker to Han Solo? Sure, Han is only in it for the money, he makes that plain right from the start … which makes it all the more thrilling when he returns at the end of Star Wars to put that rocket up Darth Vader’s butt. (Oh, and he DOES shoot first, no matter how George Lucas retcons that first movie.) And Indy … Indy is the very definition of rogue. Pulling out his gun to shoot that swordsman wasn’t fair at all … but my, didn’t we love him for it?
But it’s not just television and film where rogues rule. Look at the books.
Consider epic fantasy.
Now, fantasy often gets characterized as a genre in which absolute good battles absolute evil, and certainly that sort of thing is plentiful, especially in the hands of the legions of Tolkien imitators with their endless dark lords, evil minions, and square-jawed heroes. But there is an older subgenre of fantasy that absolutely teems with rogues, called sword and sorcery. Conan of Cimmeria is sometimes characterized as a hero, but let us not forget, he was also a thief, a reaver, a pirate, a mercenary, and ultimately a usurper who installed himself on a stolen throne … and slept with every attractive woman he met along the way. Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser are even more roguish, albeit somewhat less successful. It is unlikely either one will end up a king. And then we have Jack Vance’s thoroughly amoral (and thoroughly delightful) Cugel the Clever, whose scheming never quite seems to produce the desired results, but still …