Satan's Affair

The henchmen in the novel are Mortis, Baine, Cronus, Jackal, and Timothy, and they are imaginary friends Sibby created to cope with her loneliness and trauma after leaving the cult. Each henchman has a similar backstory to Sibby, with Mortis having been abandoned by his mother and Baine being the victim of sexual abuse by his father. These stories mirror Sibby’s own childhood, and she crafted them specifically to assuage her own feelings of isolation and trauma. Rosie notes that after leaving the cult, Sibby had nowhere to go, and she found Satan’s Affair as a convenient location in which to remain hidden from the world. Like Sibby, herself, the henchmen all wear permanent make-up to look like demons and murderers. In reality, the makeup is part of the design of the mannequins. However, their demonic appearance allows Sibby to fantasize that they are all hiding themselves from the world while they carry out their duty of killing demons.

The henchmen are supporting characters in the text, but they also support Sibby’s fantasy and need for control. When Sibby is too excited, sad, or distracted, the henchmen re-focus her efforts, usually through sex acts. By pretending that she has a group of dedicated confidantes and assistants, Sibby manages to remain hidden and comfortable in the haunted house. In reality, scenes in which a henchman comforts Sibby through sex acts are merely Sibby masturbating with sex toys, but her delusion of companionship allows her to reinforce her own view of the world. In effect, the henchmen are an imaginary support group, with whom Sibby can explore her own trauma and continue her efforts at avenging her mother by killing her father repeatedly. This delusion places Sibby in a position of power, mirroring the position her father held in the church without perpetuating the cycle of abuse from which Sibby escaped. In a sense, masturbating under the fantasy of a group of loving men allows Sibby to reframe her sexuality from the abusive orgies of the cult into the supportive environment of the haunted house.

Zade is the leader of an organization known as “Z,” which tracks and disrupts human trafficking around the world. He comes to Satan’s Affair following Adeline and her friend, Daya, but finds Mark Williams, a senator involved in Eternal Rebirth, a cult that traffics children for sexual abuse. In pursuing Mark into the haunted house, Zade encounters Sibby, who initially wants to kill him. However, Zade and Sibby quickly realize their common goal, working together to interrogate and kill Mark and his three associates. Zade is considerably more patient than Sibby, however, and they clash over how to torture and murder the four men. Ultimately, Zade parts ways with Sibby, but he offers to help her escape from the police, showing his genuine interest in helping Sibby beyond their mutual effort to kill Mark. Zade escapes without Sibby, but he makes a lasting impact on her perception of her life and other people.

Zade’s purpose in the novel is to remind Sibby that real people exist outside of her fantasy. Though minor characters like Gary, Jennifer, and Sarah exist, Sibby sees them only through her own lens of good and evil, which filters everyone into simple categories that reflect her upbringing. Bad men become synonymous with her abusive cult-leader father, Leonard, while the women they abuse become synonymous with her mother. Zade, too, becomes Leonard in Sibby’s view for a moment, but she ultimately resolves that Zade is “like her,” meaning he falls somewhere outside the strict moral code Sibby follows. Sibby fantasizes about Zade becoming one of her henchmen, and she refers to him as the first friend she has ever had, implying that she knows the henchmen are not “real” in the way that Zade is. This friendship forces Sibby to look at her life, seeing that it is empty and lonely. Zade’s influence in Sibby’s life is short-lived, though, as she quickly reverts to her fantasy once she stops taking her medication in the Epilogue.

Zade is one of the main characters in H.D. Carlton’s Cat & Mouse Duet, consisting of Haunting Adeline and Hunting Adeline, in which he is more fully developed as a character.

Leonard Dubois is the former leader of the cult in which Sibby grew up, the Saintly Baptist Church. He is also Sibby’s father and the primary abuser responsible for Sibby’s trauma. From Sibby’s recollection, Leonard claimed to be a true prophet of God, following loosely in the Christian tradition; however, Leonard used his influence to abuse people, demanding sexual favors under the guise of spiritual leadership. Sibby remembers Leonard referring to his bodily fluids as “nectar,” forcing cult members to perform sex acts on him to achieve salvation. However, the reality of Leonard’s abuse was that he physically and sexually abused cult members, including children, one of whom was Sibby’s 11-year-old mother. Sibby’s childhood memories center on Leonard as a controlling, demanding abuser, who frequently took any excuse to punish Sibby in front of her siblings and other cult members, making an example of her. He also tried to convince Sibby that she was a demon, “freak,” or otherwise unlovable person, which had a lasting effect on Sibby’s perception of herself and others.

Though he is already dead when the novel begins, Leonard is the primary antagonist of the novel, as Sibby ultimately sees every minor antagonist as a specter of Leonard. For example, Gary briefly morphs into Leonard when Sibby pursues him, and Zade does the same in his fight with Sibby. Whenever Sibby identifies a man as a “demon,” she is associating the new person with the memory of Leonard and his abuses, which allows her to relive the experience of killing Leonard to find freedom. Critically, Leonard also taught Sibby how to use pressure points to disable people, which Sibby then uses to incapacitate the specters of Leonard that she finds in her victims. This reversal allows Sibby to take control over herself in a way that she could not under Leonard’s control, fueling the need for Sibby to engage in her delusions further. Leonard’s influence over Sibby remains long after his death, both emotionally and physically, as Rosie concludes that Leonard repeatedly kicking Sibby in the head caused brain damage that contributes to her delusions.