Ch. 6 The Awakening

Detric looked at the battle waging around him. The fight had become truly desparate, with enemy forces nearly encircling their shrinking army, and closing in on three sides. The clerics were still deadlocked with the enemy clerics, as were himself and the other warrior bairds. The situation seemed utterly hopeless. The nearest reinforcements were at best a days march away in the forest, and the enemy seemed to have a nearly unending force of orcs, undead, and other evilkind.
He closed his eyes, and was suddenly in a peaceful clearing. A voice, just as before, spoke to him.
“Do you trust me?” the voice asked
Detric did not hesitate, he knew The Source was speaking to him “Yes”
“Would you lose your life for my gain?”
“Yes, my life is not mine to keep”
“Do as I tell you, and your friends will be saved”

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Jaci glanced towards where the bairds were, and noticed Detric almost in a trance, oblivious to the battle waging around him, seemingly in a different world entirely.
Then suddenly, he snapped to, ran over to Anshelm, got his attention and had a brief discussion with him, Anshelm nodded and Detric stepped away.
Suddenly, to Jaci's surprise, she heard Detric, in a commanding voice, proclaim
“Bairds, as one! Play as one!”
The bairds had all been playing individually, and though the music mixed and worked together, it was not one song, for each baird had a different true song. To Jaci's surprise, they all began to play as one, following Detric's lead. The song was magnificent, more powerful than had ever been known in the history of the land. Never before had so many bairds joined their powers together as one, Jaci did not even know it could be done.
Suddenly, the Silver clerics focused their attention on Detric, and he began to move out of the group and towards the enemy center.
The Red clerics switched their focus to Detric as well, but it seemed nothing they threw at him even touched him, fireballs simply passed through or came up short, bolts of lightning smashing all around him but he continued on. The enemy forces soon forgot entirely about the elven army, focusing fully on bringing Detric down. All ground troops that came near to strike at him were smashed away by a glowing golden sword that seemingly appeared from nowhere. The Song grew in power as Detric approached the gathering of red clerics. Jaci and the others watched in amazement as Detric walked into their midst unscathed, then suddenly, to her horror, a great fireball erupted from where Detric had once stood, engulfing all the enemy forces in sight, yet, where Detric had once stood, only a crater was visible.
Jaci was the first of the elven forces to sprint towards the crater, not caring if any enemy remained. Soon much of the army approached, and peered down at the body of Detric, laying quite still inside the crater. Many were amazed that his body was even intact, though they kept quiet near Jaci, who looked quite insane with shock.
Aloysuis climbed down the crater, and motioned for one of the clerics to follow. As they approached the body, Aloysuis called out in amazement
“He's...He's alive! He still breathes!”
Jaci half ran, half jumped into the crater, amazed her friend had survived the explosion, and arrived in time to see him sit up and accept a drink from Aloysuis.
She stopped short, looked again
“His...his eyes....his eyes are silver!”
As they helped him from the crater, the army began to talk about what they had just seen, and what they now saw before them. Had the human boy who had, months before known nothing of the power of music, magic, or The Source, just marched into and singlehandedly destroyed an entire enemy force? An an enemy force which, moments before had them nearly destroyed? And furthermore, survived an explosion of unseen magnitude, only to climb from the crater with the silver eyes of one touched by the Source?
The entire way back to the village, the army was abuzz, each telling his perspective of the unbelievable events.
Each that is, save Jaci, who would not be separated from her Detric. She knew he had died in that explosion, and praised the Source for returning him
Another remained quiet on the journey home. Anshelm sensed that Emil had somehow escaped with his life. He did not know how, and did not understand why the Source had allowed such evil to escape, but knew that todays battle was not the last. And then, he had a human Baird who, apparently, was also Source touched. In all his years, Anshelm had never seen a non cleric receive the touch of the Source. Of use to the Source indeed!