Battle of Roford

The Battle of Roford was fought on the Cull of Zan, Andrum of 1221 between the forces and allies of Roford under the command of Lord Gyles Graphe and the forces and allies of Emersby under the command of Gaudwin "The Red" Rhodes. Most of the fighting took place when strike teams of both factions attacked important assets of their enemies. The strike teams were lead by members of the Crimson Covenant on the Roford side and by the Asshean Rolph on the Emersby side.

The battle started early on the morning of the Cull of Zan, Andrum of 1221 and ended before sunrise on the day after with more or less every single soldier on the Emersby side dead.

Background
The reason the battle was fought was because of a land dispute between newly made lord Gyles Graphe and Gaudwin Rhodes. Graphe, who had a few months before the battle acquired the rights to start building a keep and a town where Roford now lies. Gaudwin, the head of house Rhodes, a family that had been driven out of the region Fanosia a few generations earlier, wanted to reclaim the land that had once belonged to his ancestors. The wife of Gaudwin Rhodes, Anna Rhodes (formerly known as Anna Watercrest) along with her brother Walter and possibly the mother of Gaudwin had managed to find information regarding the location of the leyline foci (loci) under the town of Roford. The three of them, along with a select few of their subject, had set up a plan to use the power of the loci to conquer the city of Farund.

Some time after the plan was set in motion, the founding members of The Crimson Covenant, Eadric de Klerk, Ragnar Rödhake, Aloth Ephret and Bella Roda, decided to visit Roford to gain allies by helping the Graphe family to deal with local bandits. After a few days of investigation, fights against bandits and failed attempts to make peace between the people of Roford and the people of Emersby, the Covenant wanted to settle the dispute once and for all. The plan was to storm Emersby Keep and to take it over since the Rhodes family had temporarily fled to another region. This plan failed as Gaudwin Rhodes had left his best friend, lover and second-in-command Wolf to guard the keep along with the Asshean Rolph who managed to defeat and kill every member of the Crimson Covenant except Eadric de Klerk.

Some time after the events involving the Crimson Covenant the Rhodes family returned with a 1000-man army, dwarfing the forces of Roford. The size of the army was later revealed to be an illusion.

Just a few days before the day of the battle, criminal lord of Farund Rolas Finch was chased by Wolf to the headquarters of the Crimson Covenant. Wolf was promptly killed by Eadric de Klerk and the new members of the group. This made the forces of Emersby to act, starting by kidnapping an ally of the Covenant and then use the powers of the loci under Roford to hurl a gigantic ball of fire at the mercenary legion lead by Calorin Mench that was hired to protect Roford by the Graphes.

On the day of the battle, the Crimson Covenant had set up a plan that involved sneaking their way into Emersby Keep, rescuing their kidnapped ally, a spy and assassin called Ament, and killing all of the leaders of the Emersby forces. The group needed help to do this from the Graphe family and had decided to meet up with Gyles Graphe and his brother to set up their plan.

Lord Gyles Graphe and his brother Gavus met up with the members of the Crimson Covenant, Eadric de Klerk, Jasper Blackwood, Dhreken and Jenni Glassago in their mansion to discuss the plan to take over Emersby. During the conversation Gavus stormed out of the meeting room and returned not long after with some of his most loyal men, revealing himself to be working for the people of Emersby. This moment is what is considered the beginning of The Battle of Roford.

The Battle
The battle starts with the members of the Crimson Covenant quickly dealing with the immediate threat by capturing Gavus and killing most of his men. Meanwhile the forces of Emersby have sent out a strike team as a distraction while priests of Ash and Pyre are sent into the town to attempt to summon a fire golem from the depths below. The summoning is successful and a large portion of the keep is destroyed in the process. The members of the Crimson Covenant manages to push push back the attack from the forces of Emersby, kill a large number of the traitors present in town and finally destroy the fire golem that appeared.

Gavus Graphe was revealed to be a spy from the Watercrest family under disguise as the brother of Gyles Graphe. He told his captors about a potential attack that was supposed to happen the upcoming night and was then put under heavy guard for the remainder of the battle.

After the interrogation The Crimson Covenant decided to find the divine and arcane loci that are hidden under the keep of Roford in order to potentially regain their powers before the upcoming fight against the Emersby forces. Their mission was successful and the people of the Covenant returned to Roford before sunset.

At this point the four members of the group had seen visions a future none of them wanted to happen and decided to call in as many of their allies as they could. After sending for help they went to visit the leader of the mercenaries that Gyles Graphe had hired to defend the city, Calorin Mench, who resided in his war camp outside of the town. The group made a deal with Mench, giving him the rights to Emersby and it's surrounding area after the battle, and then left his camp. On the way back to Roford the Covenant was ambushed by Rolph the Asshean and his sons and was almost defeated by the assassins, one of their members, Dhreken, was captured.

For the next few hours the allies of the Covenant started turning up in Roford. The Grey Men and their White Stripes with Gwenth and Gallorin as their leaders, Rolas Finch and his scouts, the Crimson Guard with Captain Grok, Prince Alakil and his knights and the elven wizard Endrin with the minotaur Garuk at his side. A war meeting was called by the members of the Crimson Covenant when every one of their allies had gathered and a plan was set up. The Covenant along with Rolas Finch, Grok, Gwenth and two of his Grey Men were going to sneak into Emersby Keep, rescue any prisoners and then kill any leaders of the Emersby forces they can find in the keep.

The newly formed strike team started their journey by sneaking their way through the Stalks, an old forest to the south of the road to Emersby. Here the team encountered gnolls, corrupted by the magic of the forest, that was lead to the Emersby war camp by Gwenth in order to cause disorder among the troops. At this point the remaining people in the Stalks met up with Dhreken, who had managed to escape his prison with the help from Gaudwin Rhodes.

After their venture through the woods the plan was to storm the keep through a hidden entrance in the salt mines beneath the town. The entrance to the mines was protected however and a battle ensued where the Rolas Finch and Grok both died. What followed is that the prisoners of Emersby dungeon were all released but Gwenth had to be left behind to keep the keep guards from capturing the rest of the group.

During the time that the strike team was attacking Emersby, spies and assassins from Emersby had tried to infiltrate Roford while prince Alakil and his knights had started to disassemble the wall around town to give their horses enough space to ride on.

At the return of the strike team the Crimson Covenant discovered that the town had been infiltrated by members of the anti-magic group The Black Hand, who had started to set up a ritual to infuse a woman with powers from the loci. The Covenant dealt with the cultists quickly, but after killing the woman the energy that had been stored into her was released. At this point, the leader of the group, Eadric de Klerk, decided to step into the source of the energy. As he soaked up all power, he disappeared and a mighty thunderstorm started raging with lightning striking down in specific locations at specific people, instantly killing them. The storm continued for over an hour and at the end of it, all of the Emersby forces along with prince Alakil and his knights, had been killed and from the gates of Roford, the newly reborn form of Eadric de Klerk appeared. This marked the end of the Battle of Roford.

Aftermath
The upcoming weeks was spent rebuilding Roford and Emersby, as both towns had been severly damaged by the battles. Calorin Mench started calling himself the mayor of Emersby, he and Gyles Graphe helped each other with the rebuilding of their towns.