He is a demon, and his name is unpronounceable. There is no exact translation; the closest meaning is “the hottest fire,” but it misses the mark. He is not an awful demon, as demons go. His area of expertise is lust, but he is flawed; occasionally he allows just a hint of the softer emotion of love.

He rationalizes this by increasing the lust, and by the knowledge that the liaisons thus formed do not last very long. Most of them end in tears, and this keeps his supervisor looking the other way. Unhappy people make mistakes, many committing the more deadly sins. Ginger, as he has been nicknamed, is thus a very useful demon, with good results, and is working his way down the infernal ladder steadily.

Ginger is so competent, as a matter of fact, so experienced and good at his job, that it was a thirty-day wonder all over Hell when he apparently fell victim to his own sin.

The lady in question owned a bookshop. Ginger was there on business; he was attempting to pair the lady with a nasty, brutish, customer. Poor Ginger; he took one look at her sparkling black eyes – really black – and fell head over tail in lust with her himself.

He steered the nasty, brutish customer to a dungeon two blocks away, and set about seducing the lady.

She was no lady, though. She was a witch – a powerful witch – who had studied with great magicians and knew a demon when she smelled one. Ginger had an unmistakable scent, a kind of hot, ginger-cinnamon-cardamom odor surrounding him. It was very faint, and rather pleasing, to those who wished for seduction, for hot, mindless sexual encounters.

The lady didn’t.

She had a lover already, one of the aforesaid magicians, and was not in the market for another. The magician was powerful and cold; serving one of the greater Demons, and she was definitely not in the market for a demon lover. However good Ginger might be in bed – and to be fair, he was very good – he was Bad News to one wanting an orderly life. Demons brought chaos and upset with them, and sales in her bookshops would fall drastically; Ginger’s desperation and lovesick sights were already affecting customers.

She had to get rid of him, and being heartless herself, bypassed the polite method: No, thank you, I cannot possibly sleep with you.

She didn’t even try the firm method: No, thank you, I don’t care to sleep with you.

In fact, she never directly said. “No.” She wanted to test her powers over a demon, as she had tested her powers over people. She laid her plans, assembled her ingredients very carefully; and, with powerful words and gestures, trapped Ginger in a Black Mirror.

He was mortified, and very frightened. He hadn’t even seen it coming, and here he was, caught between the worlds, unable to escape. He was mortified, because the others would laugh at him, and he’d get a demotion. (Not much worse, because demons have had a hard time of it lately, and almost every one of them had been caught at one time or another.)

He was frightened, because Ginger hated small, dark places. His part of Hell was dark, but vast; there was lots of room. He couldn’t move in the mirror, couldn’t stretch out, couldn’t exercise his powers.

Ginger was in a very bad way, and the witch wanted to make it worse.

She had another business, a very lucrative business that offset the bookshop. (It is a sad fact that bookshops don’t make much money.) It was a bakery, a marvelous bakery, just across the street. In fact, it was the best bakery in town, and was patronized by everyone.

Her favorite customers, though, were the school children who pressed up against the window every morning, and swarmed through the shop like ants in the afternoon. The morning was for window shopping – they would look over the trays of cookies and cakes very carefully, marking what looked best.

The afternoon was for buying. The witch would mark the remaining items down, half price, and the children would buy what was left. There were no leftovers, and the children were happy. So was the witch; money is money.

She was not a very nice woman. Most of the children outgrew their need for the sweet treats fairly early. The witch, however, after their first encounter, had cast a spiteful spell on the magician’s unhappy daughter. The girl was eighteen, tall, and craved sweets horribly. Naturally, she was lumpy with it, with not very good skin and a sour attitude. Her name was Melissa, and all the other girls called her Messy.

She hated them. She hated herself, too, but was at the bakery window every morning and in the shop every afternoon.

One morning, in the place of honor in the shop window, there was a tray of gingerbread men. Each was decorated with royal icing, with pants and jacket; each had a royal icing face. The witch, very spitefully, had finished her spell with Ginger; baking him inside the very center gingerbread man, so he could see the children pointing and exclaiming. That had been an error; by releasing him from the mirror, he had regained a few of his powers. He was in shock, though, and it took a bit of time before he could think clearly.

In the afternoon, he was the only gingerbread man remaining, and the children swarmed into the shop like so many bees. He was so frightened, he wanted to shake; he actually cracked a little bit. No one noticed, though, and there was such a shouting and clamoring to buy him that the witch decided to auction him.

The bidding went higher, and higher, and gradually the smaller children dropped out, opting instead to buy sugar cookies. Older children began to drop out, buying oatmeal cookies and chocolate chip cookies.

Melissa, who had a steady babysitting job, outbid everyone; she bid a whole $2.50. The witch, not thinking, picked Ginger up with a waxed paper, put him in a bag, and handed him over. Her smile was wicked, but Melissa didn’t notice.

Ginger made a desperate effort to calm down, and finding his remaining powers, looked into Melissa’s mind.

He almost cracked again, with relief. He would be able to fix this, without getting his superiors involved.

Melissa walked through the streets (trudged, actually), making her way home. She hated her home, too. Ginger could read her thoughts: her mother was bitter; her father indifferent; her father’s new lady was a shrew (Ginger agreed with that wholeheartedly). School was horrible, and she couldn’t stop the craving for sweets that kept her looking like a spotted cow.

Ginger did crack a bit, over one of the buttons on his jacket. There was such pain there, and so easily fixed. And, he thought, I’ll get even with that cold-hearted bitch . . .

Melissa stopped at a park on the way home, sitting on a bench under a tree. She pulled Ginger out of his bag, looking at him with a desperate loathing and affection combined. Ginger worked on that, the affection part, his royal icing eyes becoming soft, and dreamy, looking into her miserable – but rather pretty – sea-blue eyes.

A strange feeling came over her, relaxed, languid. She felt warm, and unbuttoned her coat, and the top button of her shirt, letting the breeze play on her neck. Her tongue flicked out, licking at the bottom of the royal icing trousers, licking up slowly, thoroughly, and Ginger shuddered with pleasure. If this worked, this girl had such potential . . .

She licked slowly, thoroughly, each scrap of icing, the last being his face. It didn’t matter then; the magic was done. She ate the rest of him slowly, carefully, each bite delicious, each – his gift to her – destroying the craving for sweets that wrought such havoc with her. She felt the warmth spread through her, enjoyed the last mouthwatering bite, and sat, sated at last, feeling the breeze on her face and neck, the magic coursing through her.

And what of Ginger? He was freed; it was his spirit, his essence that had been trapped. The body is just a shell, after all. He returned, posthaste, to his region, reported to his supervisor, and took the ensuing chewing out with some grace (the word is not favored in Hell, but the virtue is universal). It was a very mild chewing; after all, he had extricated himself with cleverness, and had opened the door to a wonderful revenge.

It was agreed that he could use a vacation after such an ordeal, and he made his plans accordingly. A moment later – though it was two whole earth years, he was back in the town, near the park bench, wearing the body of a young man, dark haired, with intense and sexy eyes. He was waiting, patiently, because he knew Melissa would come.

Melissa had spent a most productive two years. Having lost her craving for sweets, she concentrated on her studies and managed to leave school with some distinction, and her mother’s house with dispatch. She was attending the local college, studying literature, and had found gainful employment in a bookshop – not owned by the witch.

Ginger watched her walk toward him through the park; thinner but still curvy, clear pale skin, her arms full of books. He knew instantly that the books were all about witchcraft, and magic, and demons. He smiled to himself, thanked the Infernal Powers, and moved toward her, catching her sea-blue gaze.

He stepped in front of her, smiling, and offered to carry the books. She looked into his intense eyes, had a brief flash of warmth, a taste of royal icing, and the instant urge to kiss him. She handed him her books, though, and they walked to her home. She found his scent intriguing, and just knew how he’d taste.

Hotter than fire; spicy, like ginger and cinnamon. Sweet and creamy, like royal icing.

He walked with her, imagining her touch, her taste, and thinking there was nothing whatsoever wrong with love — especially when it was mixed with a lot of lust.

THE END