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“We need to go,” I said.
He shook his head again. He worked his jaw back and forth.
“We can’t stay here. Believe me, Wendel, I know you want to hunt down every last assassin in Vienna. I do, too. But now really isn’t the time for revenge. Especially brutal soulless revenge that will get you killed.”
Grimacing, he spat blood on the ground.
“Besides, you owe me,” I said. “I saved your life again.”
He dropped to one knee in parody of the time he swore undying loyalty to me. He arched an eyebrow with wordless sarcasm, his eyes glittering.
I held out my hand. “Wendel.”
Never looking away, he clasped my hand and let me help him to his feet. His necromancy rushed over my skin, and I couldn’t help but shudder. Even now, the full force of his magic was an overpowering sensation.
I glanced at his minions. “Let them go.”
When he snapped his fingers, the dead men fell to the dirt.
Still in the Eisenkrieger, Konstantin climbed into the back of the truck. He lowered the machine to its knees, tucked in its arms, then killed the engine. He jumped from the cockpit and bent over the Eisenkrieger’s knee.
“For heaven’s sake,” he muttered. “That scratch won’t buff out. And the pneumatics?—”
“Konstantin,” I said.
“Right.”
Wendel and I had far more scars than the Eisenkrieger—not that the archmage seemed to notice. I helped Konstantin drag the tarp over the Eisenkrieger. He slid behind the wheel. Wendel and I climbed in beside him.
Konstantin twisted the key in the ignition. The truck coughed to life. “We can’t return to the Hall of the Archmages. Not tonight.”
“Why?”
“The Grandmaster is meeting with Margareta.”
Wendel tensed beside me, his shoulder pressing into mine.
“Where should we go instead?” I asked.
“My laboratory.” Konstantin shifted into drive. “I have a first aid kit and my temporal magic, so I should be able to patch up both of you.”
Pain panged through the scars along my arms. I wasn’t sure if I could ever look at temporal magic the same way again, after being tortured with it.
How had Wendel endured years of this agony?
“Do me a favor?” Konstantin asked.
“What?”
“Pray that Margareta doesn’t go looking for the prototype.”
I laughed bleakly. “At least we left no witnesses.”
Wendel had stopped bleeding, but he still hadn’t spoken. When he leaned against the window, it bared the double-headed eagle tattooed on his neck. Impossible to hide, now that his hair had been hacked off.
They had done this to shame him.
Tears blurred my eyes. God, he had suffered so much.
