Nightstone's Residents Come Home

After spending a second night in the woods, the party had some difficulty determining their next course of action. Thomas, Jade and Morak the innkeeper all wanted to march back to Nightstone with all the residents and evict the Seven Snakes from the town. Ruby was adamantly against this idea fearing the plan was destined to fail. It was eventually decided that Thomas, Jade and Ruby would go to the edge of the woods and scout the town to determine the difficulty involved in retaking it. After spending about an hour watching the town, no activity was noticed so the decision was made to take back the town. An advance group consisting of the party would proceed to the town first to secure the gate. When they arrived at Nightstone, they discovered heavy sled tracks leading out of the gates, found the town empty and the obelisk in the center of town missing. With the town being empty, Ruby returned to the refugees in the woods to escort them back to Nightstone. On the way back, she heard the war horns of orcs approaching Nightstone. Ruby hurried the group along, into the city and informed the party that some orc visitors were on the way. Thomas immediately went to the top of a guard tower to watch the road. He was joined by Jade on the other tower. After some time, the orc horde emerged from the woods, armed and ready to take the town. Their leader offered to let most of the residents escape with their lives if the town was turned over to the orcs. Thomas, understanding the party had the upper hand by holding the town refused any negotiations while Jade and the orc leader shouted insults at one another in orcish. As the orcs began to rush towards the town walls, Morprax joined Thomas and Jade atop the guard tower to help thin the orc horde before they reached the town.
 
Aside from lighting the walls and guard towers on fire with flaming arrows, the initial orc assault was futile as there was no way to gain access to the town via the main gate. The orc horde then headed away from the main gate area, where the town could be entered from the banks of the river where the bridge connect the keep and the town proper crossed. Our intrepid adventurers, along with Morak and the guards, all made their way to the keep's bridge to confront the orc there. This is where the real battle would take place. Fortunately, the opening in the walls was only about 10' so Ruby, Jade and Morprax were able to keep the opening blocked well enough that the orcs couldn't swarm in. Morak and two of the town guards rushed past the three party members to engage in battle with the orcs. Thomas remained at a distance but within sight of the bridge opening and sent volley after volley of arrows at the horde, sticking many orcs with them. The orc leader, realizing things weren't going well let out a battle cry to rally the horde and rushed into battle himself, forcing his way to the front line. This rush got the better of Ruby but not before Morprax dealt a massive blow to the orc leader, forcing his attention upon himself. Thomas was able to rush in and heal with Ruby with some magic while Jade continued to strike at orcs and Morprax engaged with the orc leader. Once Ruby was healed and back in the fight, Thomas quickly returned to his sniper position and using his Hunter's Mark upon the orc leader continued to pepper him with arrows, eventually sending one directly through the leader's throat, slaying him.
 
It was at this time, more horns were heard from the woods, this time it was Jade that recognized them as elven war horns. Seeing their leader slain and the party along with Morak dropping more than half the orc horde, the remaining orcs fled in the hopes they could escape the elven hunting party. With the orcs routed, the party could now focus on organizing the villagers to extinguish the many fires the orcs had set along the walls. With the villagers working feverishly at saving their town the best they could, Thomas went to the body of the orc leader to see if he had any worthy possessions. The only thing of note to be found was a book, written in orcish. Ruby was quite interested in the book and seeing that Thomas couldn't read it, he gladly handed the book to Ruby for her to peruse. It was decided that the party would take advantage of having a town to rest and recover for the night before setting out for Arcadia the following morning.