Hi. I enjoyed the story, world building and ending. I get people's different views on it, and your response.
If anything, I think cutting the first paragraph opening, and starting from the orc seeing the smoke trail would have been a good option/technique of how characters are slowly revealed; ellowin introducing himself to grog instead of the writer to the reader. Then you could have had more word count for other bits that you mention. Just a thought, not criticism, for future jams or similar. :)