"Elaine seems like she'll be a fairly laisse faire sort of Emperor; her biggestobjective that I've heard is to get a bigger deck of trumps so she can finish building her house of trump."

In the several days after the discussion in Rebma, the various player characters pursue bits of personal business singly or in small groups. During this period, Mikele arranges meetings with Torquil, Keverian, and Felicia and one Dorian Noli, a professional investigator for the old Emperor, at his request. The meetings are allegedly to discuss the incident in which the three of them were assualted in shadow by a number of demons. The three gather with Dalamar afterwards for a debriefing and rapidly decide that Noli was realy after something else entirely. The four of them spend a fair bit of time speculating about what that might be.

Not long after that, Flora returns to Amber and throws a big party to which everyone is invited. Those attending include Caine and Derrista, Felicia and Keverian, Martin and Mikele, Katarina and young noble from the Golden Circle, Gerard, Torquil, Nikrowd, Dalamar, Rachel, and a host of Amber nobility. Dalamar's green tux with black shirt, white cumberbund and tie (and matching bird) are perhaps not quite the success he had hoped. Keverian, in red and black, manages to match the outfits of all his unattached cousins. Derrista, Mikele, and Rachel are introduced to all manner of nobles so that the locals may more adequately gossip about them.

In the intervening weeks, quite a stir is raised when it becomes obvious that every Amberite anyone had heard of had been invited to Elaine's coronation (including some allegedly dead and some currently renegade in addition to the general run of elders and PCs).

The day of the coronation arrives. A sextet of Dalamars is in supervising security, with some technical assistance from Nikrowd. An impressive list of notables is assembled, including all the Dukes, Suhuy, Jurt, Despil, Dara, Merlin, Mikele and Martin, Gilva and Evan Jesby, Dorian Noli, Niccola Noli, Reynard, Morgaine Chanicutt, Chinaway Hendrake, Phaedron, Sand, Katarina, Keverian, Felicia, Torquil, and a great number of the major and minor nobility of Chaos. There a minor stir when it becomes apparent that the full extent of the guest list was not widely known.

The ceremony begins. Elaine enters and a pair of officials run through a lot of very formal explanation, and after this progress for a good deal of time, Elaine is asked is she accepts this great responsibility and honor, to she replies, "Oh, sure." Elaine asks if she's Empress now, and when it is pointed out that there is still the small mater of the crown, she pick it up and puts it on her head. The Dukes all swear fealty and the then room becomes very silent, for this is the point whne it is customary for the new Empress to say a few words.

Elaine begins by saysing that there's been a lot of confusion lately, what with people living in Chaos and shadow and Amber, and she thought now might be a good time to clear that all up. She'd talked to Dalamar about all this, but he seem to think the same thing as Cannell and Cannell was 0a knucklehead (her word). "And besides," she continues, "Pattern is bad. So I think we should just wipe it all out. Any questions?"

Dalamar takes this opportunity to point out that it would "not be very nice" to kill people one has invited as guests to one's coronation. Elaine replies that letting them go and then killing them later seems a little bit dumb, and what did everyone else think? A voice from the corner shouts in favor of killing them all now.

At this point Felicia attempts to engage Elaine in a dialogue on the topic and Elaine starts moving down one of the aisles in the general direction of her and all the other Amberites, a path which passes right by Mikele, Martin, Merlin and Dara. Dalamar again repeats that it would not be very nice for Elaine to attack the Amberites here and now and furthermore, hadn't she asked him specifically to see to the safety of all the guests. Elaine replies that she never said anything about the safety of the guests.

A large trump gate appears directly behind Nikrowd, Keverian, Katarina Felicia, and Torquil, but nobody moves immediately. Suddenly a number of things happen almost at once: Martin stands up with a large grey dagger poised to throw and Mikele stands up next to him with an arm on him. Felicia appears between Martin and Chinaway shouting "Retreat!" and attempts to push both Mikele and Martin through the trump gate which has opened behind them, just as Chinaway moves in the direction of Martin. In the back of the room, Katarina and Keverian now have their pattern powered weapons: Eric's saber and Ajudicator.

A logrus wall appears between Mikele and Martin and the trump gate. Felicia and Chinaway vanish -- trumped to the other side of the nearby trump gate by Felicia. Dalamar shoots a lightning bolt at Martin's dagger to no effect. Keverian back through the gate. Katarina calls to Reynard, Phaedron, and Sand asking if they are coming and steps back trough the trump gate. The trump gate behind Mikele and Martin closes.

Elaine is now even with Mikele and Martin. She fires a Logrus bolt at Martin that is intercepted by Mikele, who falls to the ground. Martin lets fly the dagger. Dalamar attempts to shoot the dagger out of the air with a second lightning bolt, but misses narrowly. The dagger strikes Elaine square in the chest, who looks surprised and collapses. Mikele, Martin, and Merlin vanish in a trump effect.

Sand and Phaedron go throught the trump gate. A chaosite begins to charge Torquil. Torquil raises his arm, and a sound like grenade is heard. The chaosite falls over, and Torquil's arm is missing. Dalamar rushes over to Elaine and pulls out the dagger. Keverian and Katarina jump through the trump gate behind them somewhere in here, though Katarina shouts and offer of escape to Reynard, Sand, and Phaedron first. Sand and Phaedron accept and jump through at the first opportunity.

Chinaway suddenly reappears near the trump gate and charges full speed with Elaine. Dalamar stands up with Martin's dagger pointed straight at Chinaway and the two collide spectacularly and fall unconscious, just as Nikrowd pushes the injured Torquil through the gate and it closes.

Everyone now enters the clean-up phase of the combat, which involves a lot of talking in small groups, followed by a gathering in Amber of Felicia, Torquil, Keverian, Katarina, Martin, and Mikele. In the debriefing it comes out that Elaine has been taken to a secure location under Dalamar's control. Her prognosis is uncertain for the moment. Dalamar remains in Chaos. Nikrowd has left for Remba to "make sure of its defenses." The forces of Amber remain on alert. Chinaway, now free of Torquil's mind control, is apparently working on closing up the wound left by Martin's knife, at which point he is reportedly going to tack Torquil down and "rip him limb from limb." Felicia is battered and badly bruised from her encounter with Chinaway, but should be okay given a little rest.

The prognosis for Amber-Chaos relations looks far more dire; most people seem to be expecting all out war in the next few days to few weeks. The mood is serious as everyone splits up again to see to any urgent business before the outbreak of hostilities.