The Nether Scroll - Lynn Abbey [7]
"Cut is cut," Druhallen muttered, but he led Galimer through the grass.
The scents of spellcraft and malice lingered on the hilltop, and something else: a palm-sized glass disk. The disk was dark, but neither black nor completely opaque. So smooth and slick that it slipped through Druhallen's fingers when he tried to retrieve it. The disk was colder than the claw of winter when he finally had it in his grasp.
Ignoring numbed fingers, Dru held it up to the risen sun. Gold flecks sparkled within the icy glass.
"There's something written on the edge," Galimer interrupted.
"I thought your eyes were bad."
"My body's eyes. My mind's eye sees clearly enough. That thing reeks of sorcery and there's writing on the edge."
Dru rearranged his fingers and saw the truth of Galimer's statement. "I don't recognize the script."
"Doesn't it tell you something through your fingertips?" Galimer asked.
"Only that it's colder than winter."
Dru balanced the lens in his left hand. It was an agonizing error. He gasped and the disk thumped to the grass. While Druhallen swore at himself and his pain, Galimer swept the grass with his hands.
"Sweet Mystra!" the gold-haired mage swore as he clutched, then dropped, the glass. "Cold's not the half of it!"
"Aye, but what is that other half?"
Galimer pinched his fingertips to the scripted edge and lifted the disk carefully. "How about a way to control their undead minions?"
Dru considered the possibility. "Did you see the robes they were wearing when they first appeared?"
"That was the last thing I did see. Their robes were red."
"Red robes. Red-robed wizards. The Red Wizards of Thay. They pool their magic and one wizard casts the spells for all of them. Nobody-nobody-knows how they do it. Until now."
Druhallen fumbled with his folded magic box. It would have been easier to manipulate with both hands, but he'd designed it for single-handed work. As the hidden locks opened, the box unfolded, increasing in size and complexity. Reagents filled the revealed compartments. Dru's traveling spells were etched into the compartment dividers. With the third unfolding, he found an empty compartment large enough to hold the disk.
Galimer squirted the disk into the empty compartment. "Being cold and dark, it's more likely a device for controlling the undead."
"It's the circles." Dru clung to his opinion as if it were one he'd held for a lifetime though, before today, he hadn't given more than ten thoughts to Thay in the last year. "Anyone can control the undead. You or I could, if we chose to learn the art. But only the Red Wizards rely on the undead, because their circles make it feasible to control whole bone-yards. The arrogance! They descend from nowhere, take what they want, leave everyone for dead, and don't even bother to collect their trash."
"Is it trash? How can you be sure? It didn't feel spent to me."
"It's cold and dark," he snapped. "If it's not spent, it's useless."
"Not useless," Galimer countered thoughtfully. "We can use it to prove that we were
ambushed by the Red Wizards. That ought to put the wind in the Zhentarim."
"Mind what you say," Dru said, sobering quickly though he had had similar thoughts a few moments ago. "Or we'll get caught between the Black Network and the Red Wizards." He folded the box and let it hang against his hip. "When we get to Elversult, we tell the Network that we were ambushed, but that we never saw what hit us. And we don't tell them about finding the disk."
"Mother…" Galimer protested. "The girl, the captain and his men, the damn carters… We've got to tell the truth, Dru. There won't be justice without the truth."
"What justice is there between Thay and the Zhentarim? We'll need a lifetime of luck just to clear our names of this disaster. Talk about red-robed wizards won't help us do that, and neither will a lump of rotten glass-"
"I can't accept that, Dru. Not for her."
"You don't have to. We'll avenge her ourselves. I swear to you right now and forever: We'll hunt those wizards down. We'll go