Honored

Chapter 9: Bitter Bread (Part 1 - Part 4)

Part 1

The silence that followed my words clawed at my head. I'd messed up. I shouldn't have listened to Daniel. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything. I shouldn't have spoken. I should have left everything unsaid till later," My voice was rising, and I couldn't stop blabbing. "We don't have time for this now, and I just went and spoke what was on my mind. We'd even said we would speak later. If you want to pretend that I didn't say anything -"

Arms gripped me tightly and I stopped talking and looked up into his warm brown eyes. "It doesn't matter what is said, or not said. I love you too. You are my best friend, and I wouldn't want to face anything without you."

His warmth stripped my fear and doubt away. Yes. Best friends. I wrapped my own arms around him. Is this what love truly was? This comfort and strength that I found standing wrapped in his arms.

Someone coughed, and I pulled back slightly to see the three other men standing in the room staring at us. Dan slowly pulled away while still looking down at me with a soft and open expression. His right hand reached up and gently stroked the hair next to my cheek for just a second, his eyes wide, and then his hand dropped. He sighed, and as he was turning away to face the other men in the room, I could see lines drawing out from his eyes as his eyebrows closed in on each other and a frown formed.

"What do you want from us right now? We just survived being executed and running through a bunch of underground tunnels. I think a little break would be nice." His voice sounded rough and his shoulders slouched forward a bit.

Henry stepped forward and ran his hand through his black hair, "I know. I'm sorry, but as much as I would like to give you a break, there is war happening in this city and we have to keep planning or else we will lose. If we lose, we are all dead and I know as much as my wife wants me to win this war, she also wants me to come home to her at the end of this."

I sighed and walked forward toward the table. The map in front of me looked blurry, and I rubbed my eyes to clear them. Dan was right. It had been a long day, and now that fatigue was wrapping its cloak over my shoulders.

There on the table was a full map of the above ground city. It didn't just have the districts like most maps. Instead it was filled in with shop names, roads, warehouses, stacks, and most honored estates. All the way up to the road that led to the King's castle on the single hill in the center of the city. Place on this map were metal square rods with either a blue or a red splotch on top of them.

Henry pointed at a blue rod. "The blue are our fighters, the red are city guards still loyal to the king. We are trying to convince them to switch sides, but this is our current positioning."

There were many more red bars than blue bars. "Do the bars each represent the same number of people?"

Henry nodded, "Yes. Each bar represents about 100 souls fighting and dying for a cause."

"And we only have 5 bars?" How were we supposed to do anything against the city guard with our 5 bars against their 15 red bars spread across the city?

"That is why we are only holding a small part of the city. We have other guerrilla fighters loyal to us spread throughout the city that are attempting to sabotage the city forces, but we only have the 500 or so fighters." He pointed at the small area around the warehouses that he said the forces held, "We've built multiple barricades across the streets and can fall back to further in barricaded points. We also have superior equipment thanks to your wall supporters. "

It still didn't make me feel any better looking at the sea of red across the city and the small blue corner we held.

As if to echo my thoughts, Daniel stepped forward and tapped the corner our focus held. "It looks like a terrible situation on the map, but I think we can hold it. What I think our people need though is a morale boost. They need to be reminded of what they are fighting for and we need to try and recruit more of our guerrilla forces to do more actual attacks throughout the city to disrupt their guard forces more."