This was such a hard book for me to read and review. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it, but everything seems to be slipping further and further away from what made me fall in love with the series in the first place. Everything from Mark to Sins was amazing, I devoured all of them in no time at all. Since Touch, however, characters and themes that I enjoyed and being pushed away in favour of new things. 
 Ryan and Zack are practically non-existent, which is a big minus. Jill's still around, but her whole thing is basically to be pregnant. Eilahn is dismissed about halfway through the book. Rhyzkahl is busy acting a child with the flu because Zack broke their bond. That means we're left with all the new characters that were introduced in Touch and Fury, oh, and Pellini, who we discover has arcane senses thanks to Kadir. Kara investigating her cases which usually end up arcane in nature is over with because she's not a cop anymore, so instead she's running around with Idris and messing with valves. Like I said in Fury's review, if this had been a different series with new characters doing these things, I would have eaten it right up, but because it's still Kara Gillian, my enthusiasm falters. 
 (view spoiler)[The thing with Tessa really bothered me. She was the mentor figure to Kara, but now we find out she's been against Kara since the beginning? Sheesh, when I said I was expecting someone to betray Kara, I didn't mean her aunt! I really, really hope either Tessa's been massively brainwashed or there's a bigger picture here, because this just bites the big one at the moment, especially with zero explanation. Also, Carl is Szerain's ptarl, Xharbek. Huh, never saw that coming. (hide spoiler)] 
 The two big things I expected from this book (Jill and Zack's baby per the cover and Kara's legal woes per the blurb) were barely a sidebar. Kara's detainment is only a chapter, maybe two and 'the bean' is born within the last eighth of the book. Instead we get Kara and Idris running from valve to valve and Kara's powers being stripped from her. The book felt like filler almost, it raised a lot more questions than answers and shoved a lot more away to focus on... how messed up the demon realm is becoming? I don't know, it's not really clear. 
 Normally I'd give Vengeance of the Demon four stars, my default for all things Kara Gillian, but, like Touch and Fury, it loses a star for the drastic shift in tone and the loss of the characters I've enjoyed since Mark.