Diabolical Taste

By Ros Jackson

Kenssie just wants her fellow demons to respect her. A little hero worship now and then wouldn't go amiss either. But as the lowly thrall of Rak, an embarrassment demon, she'll take whatever crumbs she's offered.

When the demon council turns against her master, Rak and Kenssie are forced to relocate to the countryside. It seems Rak has been holding out against his thrall and keeping a secret that will shake her trust in him forever.

When someone from Rak's past returns to claim him, Kenssie has to fight for much more than his attention. The lives of innocents and not-so-innocents are on the line. How much of herself is she willing to sacrifice for someone else's happiness?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ros Jackson
• Release date: Sep 30, 2014
• ISBN: 9780957573239

Ros Jackson

Ros is the author of a number of works of fantasy. She lives in Lincolnshire, England, where she combines a love of politics and putting words on paper with the more serious responsibility of being a full-time cat minion.

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Diabolical Taste

Ros Jackson

Diabolical Taste

Copyright © Rosalind Jackson 2014

First ebook edition

Published by Rosalind Jackson at Smashwords

The right of Rosalind Jackson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions of this book in any form.

ISBN 9780957573239

Cover art: Laura Hollingsworth

www.rosjackson.co.uk

To Mum and Dad

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Acknowledgements

About the author

Books by Ros Jackson

Chapter 1

The man didn’t look like much, a middle-aged investment manager with a scraggly beard and a lapsed gym membership. He wore a dull grey jacket that no longer closed over his belly, and his eyes were slightly too far apart. He was doing the Telegraph crossword with a chewed biro, and not getting far with it.

To Kenssie he tasted delicious.

They were in his office, a spacious room on the top floor of an old Georgian building, and the noise and smell of London filtered in through the half-open window. The air was warm and dry, and it carried the heavy scent of a big secret. The man didn’t look up at Kenssie, even though she was standing about a metre and a half away from him. She had been there five minutes, and he hadn’t shown any flicker of awareness that there was anyone else in the room. Good. That meant her power of invisibility was holding up.

Hopefully the man was hiding something evil. Those were always the best meals, when simple feeding combined with a sense of social justice. Kenssie’s mouth watered. Her toes and the tips of her fingers tingled as she gathered her power, and it built quickly like electricity, surging through her whole body and focusing on her mouth. She sent the magic flying out to reach the man, then sucked it back in again, swallowing his secrets.

The man’s memories hit her in a series of immersive images and sounds. She heard lies, and excuses made to justify inexcusable behaviour. Adultery played out in her head. There were tax fiddles to pay for forced abortions. The sight of a woman’s heavily bruised stomach.

The man was an ogre. Kenssie had never been able to eat hot fudge sundae, but this meal was exactly how she imagined it tasting.

His name was Peter, and he had beaten his first wife for six of their seven years of marriage, and his second for all twelve years. He was the second biggest fundraiser for the animal shelter near his home, the leader of a benevolent choir, and a school governor. If word about his private life got out he’d be ruined.

Peter’s eyebrows furrowed and he yawned. He turned back to seven across, but did not fill it in.

Kenssie swelled with the juice of below-the-neckline beatings and memories of elaborate excuses for his wife’s absence from social gatherings. As Kenssie fed, his shoulders slumped and his eyelids drooped. He was too rich, she couldn’t hold it all in.

Kenssie burped.

Peter jerked his head left and right. Who’s there?

Kenssie bit her lip with pointed teeth. Since she’d fed so well, the human couldn’t see her. She suppressed her urge to breathe too loudly. Frozen in place, she tried not to think of belching.

In the corner by the filing cabinets, Rakmanon sat chuckling drily at the scene, the pink pom-poms tied to his horns bobbing in rhythm. She caught this, and felt ashamed. Rak was her master, a higher demon who stood nearly seven feet tall. His black-tipped wings were folded neatly back. They, along with his cloven feet, rich tomato-red skin, and curling horns, were outward signs of his purer blood. Rak’s very body was a constant reminder that she was not the demoness she wanted to be. After Kenssie had extracted Peter’s secrets, Rak would move in and suck him dry using the information she’d gleaned. They were an effective team.

Kenssie angled herself so her wingless back was out of Rak’s line of sight.

Peter shivered, then turned back to his puzzle. He soon put it down again in order to lean forward and rub his eyes. He propped his elbows on the solid oak desk, and then lowered his head into the crook of his arm. Seconds later he was snoring.

Kenssie turned to Rak. Wife beater, she mouthed silently.

Rak gave her the thumbs-up.

She moved closer, and rifled through Peter’s jacket pocket. She could read secrets, but not minds: if it wasn’t a guilty secret, it wasn’t available to her. She drew out a brown leather wallet with a selection of credit cards and a dog photo. Luckily it also had an address, in a part of Kent that was increasingly being swallowed by London. She copied it onto a post-it, and carefully replaced the wallet. Peter shifted and snorted, but he didn’t wake.

While she’d been doing this, Rak had opened the window wider. The still, warm air created no breeze. Then he unlatched the office door, and pulled it back gently and slowly, as though it were swinging open on its own as the result of a draught.

The room beyond was an open-plan office where several employees worked behind cheap pine desks and glowing monitors. At first they didn’t notice their boss slumped on his desk, they were so intent on what they were doing. Kenssie and Rak grinned at each other and waited.

Kenssie could have fed off the people in this room, but that wasn’t the plan. The first to look round was a young man, with a white name badge that announced him as the Director of Investor Relations. A smart title that didn’t merit an office. He glanced at the open door, and did a double-take when he saw his boss asleep. He gently nudged his colleague, an older woman with heavy jowls and heavier red lipstick. Her jaw dropped and she looked around the room in mock outrage, catching the attention of even more of her co-workers. And so it spread round the room, in whispers and nudges, until Red Lipstick led a crowd of them to the office door to stare, camera phones poised to attack.

Kenssie and Rak backed off towards the window. It wasn’t that they were afraid of the people, or that their cameras would detect them. Kenssie was buzzing with anticipation. Peter snored on, eliciting nervous giggles from his employees and considerations of how best to prank him. Video was rolling. Kenssie reached across with one extended finger, and jabbed him once, hard, in the ear.

She pulled back as if she’d touched a hot pan. Peter jerked upright and pumped his head left and right. He clocked the crowd of his subordinates at the door, and for a second his jaw dropped. Then he surged out of his chair.

What are you gawping at? Get back to work! Go on, get out!

His face had turned red and his bawling hurt Kenssie’s ears. She could have sworn she felt the heat coming off his face.

Peter stalked towards the door, and the employees ran back to their desks like mice.

Don’t you have work to do? I’ve done mine! If you’ve time to stand idle it’s a sign I’m employing too many of you!

Peter slammed the door on his employees. A massive yawn broke out on his face. Behind him Rak stood with his arms outstretched, feasting in invisible waves.

***

Flying was what being a demon was all about. Kenssie whooped and hollered as a hundred feet below houses and traffic sped past. Humans were stuck in traffic, confined to their small, ant-like lives, whilst she was free. The wind whipped her dress like a flag. The city’s smog and dust filled her nostrils, but she didn’t mind. Up here, the constant racket of London faded to a hum of white noise. Her heart leapt to the roof of her mouth.

Hold tight. I wouldn’t want to drop you on that, Rak said.

She looked down, as they flew over a bread factory. She wrinkled her nose as the faint whiff of baked goods hit her, and she hung on tighter. Her arms were looped around Rak’s torso, and she only came up to his chest.

The bond between a thrall and a master was one of the closest known in nature. She’d read about male fish that spent their adult lifetimes in the belly of the female. Okay, so they weren’t that close, but it was only one step removed. She clung on, admiring the strong, even beat of Rak’s wings and the ripple of his muscles, the firmness of them beneath her fingers. They could be of one body.

Not that tight. I have a sentimental attachment to my internal organs.

Heat rose in her face. She was too grey to blush with any conviction, but that didn’t stop her feeling ashamed. Too bad her invisibility only worked on mortals.

They flew on, until they were over a well-to-do area with large, leafy gardens where a smoky barbecue wouldn’t be interpreted as an act of war by the neighbours. In one of them she spotted a yellow plastic dome-like construction.

There it is, with the giant yellow blob, she said. She didn’t dare let go to point.

Rak banked. Her stomach somersaulted as they wheeled round to land on the soft, lush grass. This was the worst part, coming down to land. She clung on and counted down the last seconds of the flight in her head. There was a jolt as they reached the ground, and a few steps as Rak cushioned his momentum. She held on, with her knees bent, and only when she was sure they had stopped, absolutely certain, did she relax them and step carefully onto the lawn. She unclasped her hands slowly from around his waist, her fingers sliding over shiny pink polyester and taut abs.

It always takes me a while to get my feet after flying, she said, not meeting his eyes.

Of course it does.

Something in his tone sounded like he was making fun of her, but when she looked up he was staring intently at the house.

Is this definitely the place?

Kenssie nodded.

Right, let’s get to it.

Nobody was home, so they flew up to the first floor and squeezed in through an open window. Heatwaves were good for business. It was a modern house, which was all to the good because it didn’t squeak and creak like older houses did, and that would be useful if the occupants returned.

They crept through the house, on the look-out for dogs and other difficulties. Canines couldn’t see them, but they would smell them and start a racket.

Here, Rak whispered, pointing to a bedroom. There was an oak bureau with a fold-down top, and when Kenssie opened it she found it crammed to the sides with papers. She took a small notepad and pen out of her pocket and started jotting down notes. Most of it was irrelevancies like bank accounts and tax bills. All these petty things humans did to each other to establish a pecking order seemed so remote and absurd to her. It was just numbers on a ledger, scrub one out or add a few noughts and what difference did it make? But mixed in there was demonic gold: emails, online passwords, friends’ names and addresses, club members, meeting times, school governor letters. All the trivia that amounted to a life, and a social network, which for an old-school chap like Peter would never be echoed on the internet.

Oh, Peter, we’ve got you now.

All they needed was the evidence to reveal to all these people, and given the day Peter had had further proof of his guilt wouldn’t be long in coming. Maybe his wife had hidden a stash of incriminating photos of her injuries somewhere in the house. Please, let there be photos!

There was the sound of a car pulling into the drive. Calmly and slowly she replaced the papers and eased the bureau shut. She wasn’t worried about being caught: worst case scenario, the woman would think she’d been burgled, or had a poltergeist. But it didn’t pay to have the food source on edge, and too busy being afraid to think about being embarrassed.

Kenssie wasn’t a moral crusader, but it pleased her that bad people made such good targets for the two of them.

I’ve got all I need. We can do plenty of damage with this. Let’s go.

Rak shook his head. You need to feed.

Kenssie could already feel her torso swelling to mushiness after gorging on Peter. She threw Rak a puzzled look.

Well, I need to feed. All that flying doesn’t come cheap. And you need to build up your stores when you can.

In her mind’s eye she pictured Marie, Peter’s wife, cowering on the floor in a torn evening gown. It had a high neckline to cover the marks where he’d choked her the previous week. They wouldn’t be going out that night. Her shoulder was bloody and raw with the marks of a toaster he’d flung at her. She remembered Peter’s hand jerking Marie’s head back, pulling her thick chestnut hair out of its up-do, such silky soft hair. Her eyes, big and white, tears falling out of the corners, streaked with makeup like a stream running through sand. Marie saying, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, over and over in a whisper. And Peter wondering whether he could get away with breaking her fingers, just this once. The left hand, so she could still do her chores.

I’m not hungry, Kenssie said.

Downstairs the front door opened. Rak pointed and mouthed, Get down there.

I don’t need to. I’m fine, she whispered.

She started walking to the window, but Rak grabbed her arm and pulled her back. He looked deep into her eyes.

His voice was the murmur of gurgling pipes. I know what this is about. You’re too close to them. You’re letting yourself feel sorry for them. If you carry on like this, you’ll be no better than one of them yourself. Weak, pathetic, and any witch or mortal will be able to see you.

She opened her mouth to object, but he cut her off.

I order you to feed from her.

He beats her—

I. Order. You. This time he filled his words with a shot of will.

The magic shivered through Kenssie, filling her with its compulsion. She turned and walked along the landing, not looking at Rak.

Sometimes she got to mete out justice to the world’s villains, like a better-dressed Batman. Other times, she was just another hungry mouth.

Chapter 2

Kenssie shuffled her feet and smiled hopefully. Can I see it?

No, Rak said.

But I really believe we share a special connection.

Rak looked down at her through narrowed eyes. The afternoon sunlight glinted off the tips of his horns and she shivered.

Grimbo isn’t for the likes of you.

Kenssie wrinkled her brow. Grimbo? You named the book Grimbo?

For the time being, Rak said.

It really wasn’t that weird. The grimoire was alive, after all. The last time she had touched it, the tome had sent a jolt of energy through her, like a spark of psychic recognition. It had been soft to the touch, like skin. Now she came to think on it, Grimbo may have felt warm as well. He was a thrall like her, but he was also a book, and she wanted to know how that had come about. She needed to know.

She bit her bottom lip and gave Rak her most big-eyed, pleading look. Her master laughed.

I’m not sure that ham would even work on humans. I swear, if your acting were any worse you could open a butcher’s.

Her face dropped. "I can’t