The All-Consuming World
Page 25
Elise, in answer to Maya’s exultation: “Yes.”
This is meant to be mine, screams the Merchant Mind. You were supposed to be fuel.
Maya closes her hand and something titanic—a ring of defense systems awakening, stirring from the dirt—moves. Almost as good as her revolvers, almost as easy to move. Funny how effortless some things get when you’re having fun with friends.
“Well, come and take it from us.”
The Bethel will devour you.
“Yeah?”
An answering chorus snarls up around her. Yeah. They all know it. No one fucks with the Dirty Dozen.
“They can come and try.”
And Maya takes the first fucking shot.
Acknowledgments
This book wouldn’t exist without my editor, Sarah Guan. I gave it to her when it was mostly a strange idea, about twenty thousand words long, and mostly in pieces. She worked with me to build this into an actual novel. She had faith in me when I didn’t. She is a fucking light, and I’ll be grateful forever that she took a chance on me.
Thanks to Marty Cahill, our marketing manager at Erewhon, and the best advocate an author could ask for. He listened patiently as I wailed about my worries, was there when I needed to babble, and just was the most supportive person ever.
And thank you to Ali, Avery, Kyungseo, Linda, Olivia, Shoma, Tara. My darling siblings. I don't know how I would have survived this pandemic without all of you. Thank you to Ali for your grace and sureness, your beauty, your faith in the world, for being the voice that pierces all fears, no matter how ancient or deepset. Thanks to Avery for Verdigris, honestly, for your ferocity, for your patience, and your giving me the courage to come out to myself as nonbinary. Thank you to Kyungseo, for your wit and your warmth, for your unflinching readiness to bury bodies with me.
Thank you to Linda, for being the first person in my life to not flinch away from my feral nature, for your patience, for the steadiness of your love, and for teaching me to trust in people. Thank you to Shoma, for being so brilliant, for your bravery in the world, and for being there for me even in those days when you yourself aren’t feeling steady. Thank you to Tara, for your relentless light, for your softness, for reminding me the world is worth fighting for.
And thank you to Olivia, my beloved bear, for loving me when I don't know how to speak, for being so utterly relentless with your love, your willingness to be tender.
I love all of you so much. Though this book is, as always, filled with death and violence and dysfunctional people, all the love that is there was inspired by the gift of your presences in my life.
I would kill gods for you. I would end worlds. I would walk through a blizzard in the dead of a Quebecois winter with no shoes and no coat, and all my fingers falling off from frostbite, if you ever said you needed me right there this instant.
About the Author
Cassandra Khaw is an award-winning game writer whose fiction has been nominated for the Locus and British Fantasy Awards. Their short stories can be found in Fantasy & Science Fiction, Tor.com, Lightspeed, Uncanny Magazine, and The Year’s Best Science Fiction and Fantasy.
Content notice: The All-Consuming World contains depictions of abusive relationships, character death (mentioned), codependency, emotional manipulation, eye trauma, gaslighting, gore, grief, and surgery without anesthesia.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.
The All-Consuming World
Copyright © 2021 by Cassandra Khaw
First published in North America by Erewhon Books, LLC in 2021
Edited by Sarah T. Guan
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data is available.
ISBN 978-1-64566-024-8 (ebook)
Cover art by Ashe Samuels
Cover design by Samira Iravani
Interior design by Cassandra Farrin and Leah Marsh
Solar eclipses by Lalan / Shutterstock
Bullet hole by vectorwin / Shutterstock
First US Edition: September 2021