Kiss of a Demon King & a meditation on Sabine's evil nature

Imprisoning a handsome, good-hearted demon for wanton purposes. Check.
This was another deliciously set up Immortals After Dark book. Thank you, Kresley Cole. In this one, we have sorceress Sabine keeping demon king Rydstrom in chains in a dungeon, in order to force him to have sex with her to fulfill a prophecy ... and he really wants to have sex with her, but the prophecy must not be filled! So he doesn't. Even though he really really wants to. Then he gets out and drags her across the wasteland as his prisoner. More fun sex stuff. Sacrifices, battles.

Sigh. I guess I am barely objective about this series these days. I have achieved lift off. Out of radio range.

Finding the book, on the whole, wonderfully badass. Check.

You know that game where you randomly open a book and find a line and write it down? Pulling this book out from under my bed, I was thinking, you can open this bad boy to any random line and chances are good that it will totally entertain. Wait! I'm going to play the game now:

Devious vampire. He rose another notch in Sabine's opinion.

Okay again:

"I can make you see your worst nightmares or your most coveted dreams. And I can control them."

Again:

"You still look unsullied," Lanth said when she and Sabine met upstairs. Sabine hated that word.

Loving evil Sabine
I really enjoyed how evil Sabine was. She came from a culture where evil ways were applauded and effective, and she grew up at war, more or less, with the "good" side. In a way, it was sort of like opposite world. What is bad is good where she comes from.

Question for the ages
So does that even make her truly evil? If you grow up in a world where bad is good, where bad is honored and rewarded, and you never know otherwise, are you bad for being bad? Or are you living up to the moral code you've been handed?

I suppose, when I think really hard about that question, at the end of it is the question of whether human beings supposedly have some innate compass of good and evil. But then, hey! Sabine is not even a human.

I love this exchange between her and Rydstrom (and can I just say, what is with these names? I say that in a loving way. Anyhow):

"Why do you have to steal?"

She blinked at him "How else would I get gold? Join the typing pool?"

"Maybe you could do without."

Impossible. You must have gold." Gold is life...

"You're hated by more than can be imagined."

"Do you hate me?" she asked.

"I don't yet, but I believe that it's inevitable."

She laughed softly. "Hating me is like hating a sharp sword that cuts you. It can't help the way it was formed."

"A sword can be refashioned, shaped anew."

"Only after it's broken down. Imagine how painful the forge fire and hammer blows would feel...

I think Rydstrom himself comes to that sense that this is a conflict of cultures rather than a conflict of morality with realizations like these:

The Sorceri worship gold, Sabine had told him. He'd thought it had been an excuse for greed, but she believed it was more.

To be honest, though, I really wouldn't mind an amoral heroine even when it's not cultural. But that's another post.

SLIGHT SPOILER BELOW:
And I was absolutely thrilled and refreshed that, though she ended with Rydstrom, Sabine didn't turn good in the end, but rather she seemed almost to relish a deception of his--one that I thought he'd get in trouble for.

I understand this book hit the NYT best seller list (I think). If so, I'm so very glad. I think this is the most imaginative and vibrant series in the whole paranormal and urban fantasy realm.