For every battle plan, there a myriad of tiny tasks that must happen in proper time and sequence. Every novel is a collection of chapters, sentences, words. Any catastrophe is a host of tiny, personal disasters and tragedies.

So it is with all things...events accrete, and lead to much larger consequences than the actors involved ever dreamed of.

The Guilds' directions to the subjects of Amber City regarding the census were the first of them. The gulf between the suspicious, fearful subjects of the city and their masters had always been wide. The census, with the echoes of Jasra-era social reforms, aroused fears of another round of unwelcome interference and repression. The dictate of the Guilds and Guildmaster, the trusted voices that had given aid, succor, and direction to the people of Amber through the centuries and in spite of the may-fly epheremal changes of foolish Princes and Princesses, reinforced those old suspicions. The gulf was driven wider.

The city was primed, and awaited a spark...

"Clem! Clem! You hear about Roly and Big Jack? Arrested!"

"Heh. That'll put a crimp in their plans to join the Watch."

"They were arrested TRYING to join the watch!"

"Wha...?"

"The bitch-princesses running the city were talking treason! Executions!"

"No!"

"They settled on branding them the next hanging night! The Guilds were right! It's all a trick to oppress the city-born freemen! They'll make us serfs again!"

The word spread throughout the low districts of Amber City. People emptied into the streets, and collected in the squares, like streams of oil pooling in the low places. Oil awaiting a spark...

Little things...

Like a knot of street urchins adorning a fresh-cleaned wall with grafitti, who responded with rotten fruit when the city guardsmen began shouting. The guardsmen, operating under instructions to crack down on ANY disturbance, drew steel.

The urchins ran.

The guards chased...and turned the corner into a square, filled with muttering, angry, fearful citizens.

Little things...like people who are scared enough, and desperate enough, and angry enough to stand instead of cower, to fight instead of run...to tear up the cobbles and raise the barricades.

Pool of oil, meet spark.

By morning, the barricades were up, and half the city was ablaze.

IC - Zariya's troops crush the disturbance and life returns to normal

Plot Over.

This text is copyright © Craig Lucas; "Amber" is copyright © Roger Zelazny; "Amber" the diceless RPG is copyright © Phage Press. No copyright infringement is intended.

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