Demon Blood

must be shown like children that we can eat imported sugar without being enslaved.”
    A little more than two centuries ago, the Horde had hidden their nanoagents in the tea and sugar like invisible bugs, and traded it on the cheap. The Horde had no navy, and even though Europe had fled before the Horde, Britain was protected by water and a strong fleet of ships. And so for years, they’d traded tea and sugar, and Britain had thought itself safe.
    Until the Horde had activated the bugs.
    Now no one born in England trusted sugar unless it came from beets grown in British soil and refined in a British factory—and no one had enough money to pay for the luxury, anyway. The Horde hadn’t needed sugar from them, and had left few beet farmers and fewer refineries. Sugar was as precious as gold was to the French, and Horde technology was to the smugglers in the Indian Ocean.
    “You judge them too harshly, Mina. This ball itself is goodwill. And it must have been a great expense.” Felicity’s voice softened at the end, and she looked around almost despairingly, as if it pained her to think of how much had been spent.
    “Hartington can obviously afford it. Look how many candles.” Mina lifted her chin, gesturing at the chandelier.
    “Even your mother uses candles.”
    That wasn’t the same. Gas cost nothing; candles, especially wax tapers of good quality, rivaled sugar as a luxury. Her mother used candles during her League meetings, but only so the dim light would conceal the worst of the wear. Repeated scouring of the walls removed the smoke that penetrated every home in London, but had worn the paper down to the plaster. Rugs had been walked threadbare at the center. The sofa hadn’t been replaced since the Horde had invaded England. But at Devonshire House, there was no need for candles to forgive what brighter gas lamps revealed.
    “My mother will also make certain that each of her guests is comfortable.” Physically comfortable, at any rate. She supposed her mother could not help the discomforting effect that both she and Mina had on visitors. “Goodwill should not stab at scars, Felicity. Goodwill would have been desserts made with beet sugar or honey.”
    “Perhaps,” Felicity said, obviously unwilling to think so little of the bounders, but acknowledging that they could have been done better. “You look to find the worst in everyone, Mina.”
    “I would not be very good at my job if I didn’t.” The worst in everyone was what led them to murder.
    “You like to look for the worst in bounders. But they cannot be blamed for their ancestors abandoning us, just as we cannot be blamed for buying the Horde’s sugar and teas. It seems to me, the fault can be laid on both sides of the ocean . . . and laid to rest.”
    No, the bounders hadn’t abandoned England—and if that were the only grievance Mina had against them, she could have laid her resentment to rest. But neither could she explain her resentment; Felicity thought too well of them, and she was too fascinated by the New World.
    The bounders were part of that fascination—and they were part of the New World, no matter that they referred to themselves as Englishmen, and were called Brits by everyone except those born on the British isle.
    Damn them all, they probably didn’t even realize there was a difference between English and British.
    No matter what the bounders thought they were, they weren’t like Mina’s family or Felicity’s—or like those who’d been altered and enslaved for labor. Bounders hadn’t been born under Horde rule. And Mina resented that when they’d returned, they’d carried with them the assumption that they better knew how to live than the buggers did. This ball, for all that it celebrated victory over the Horde, was a reflection of what bounders thought society should be: They’d had their Season in Manhattan City and thought the tradition should continue here. It did not seem to matter that most of the peers born here couldn’t dream of holding their own ball. And although the ball provided a pleasant diversion, buggers had more important things to occupy their minds and their time—such as whether they could afford their next meal.
    The bounders had no such worries. They’d returned, their heads filled only with grand ideas and good intentions, and they meant to force them onto the rest of Britain.
    But their intentions did not mean they’d returned for the benefit of their former countrymen. Not at all.