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.Though I'd be lying if I said I didn't wish you had thought of some other course of action.My point in speaking to you on this matter was only to make an observation."Anastasia wiped dirt from her cheeks and bent down to pick up the shovel.The dusk was coming on, night beginning to spread across the plateau.She was tempted to jump back down into the hole, but they both knew the digging was done for the day."Say what you've got to say," Anastasia muttered."He still loves you, but you know that.And now I see that he is not the only one who still lingers in the past.With all that is happening here, it would be quite easy for old habits to reemerge, for old feelings to come alive.""It was ten years ago!""Sometimes embers take only an errant breeze to ignite again."Her face flushed, and she was glad of the dark, hoping he didn't see how much the words affected her.Bruttenholm spoke the truth.He knew it, but Anastasia didn't want him to see that she knew it as well."Maybe you've forgotten," she said, half-turning away from him."Hellboy is the one that ended the relationship."Bruttenholm nodded slowly."And perhaps you have forgotten, Anastasia, why he felt compelled to do such a thing and why he has maintained a solitary life in the years since."She shivered, and it wasn't from the cold."He said it wasn't fair to me, all the attention we drew, all the things that were said in the media--""That was part of it, I'm sure," Professor Bruttenholm said, smoothing his lapels, dignified as always."But you know there is more to it.""You said all the things he's felt have made him more human," she protested, hearing the sorrow in her voice, the heartbreak, and cursing herself for showing such weakness in front of this stern old man."They have," Bruttenholm replied."But every time the media mentioned you and him together, every time he saw the expressions on the face of those you met in your travels.every time he held your hand, Dr.Bransfield, it reminded him that he is only human in his heart."With that, the old man turned and strode away.Anastasia could only watch him go, feeling bitterness welling up within her.Hellboy could not help what he felt, and nor could she.If he had never been the same after the time they had shared together, she could not regret that.She had never been the same, either.Some things weren't meant to be forgotten.The Island of Crete, 14 April, 1980Hellboy was dead.Anastasia staggered along the slope of Mount Ida, hands manacled behind her back, a thick gag in her mouth.The men behind her did not touch her, and the two in front--the sorcerers--did not so much as glance back.It sickened her to know how little they considered her.She represented no threat, so she registered only for what use they could make of her.She was only bait, the worm at the end of the hook.But she had been bait for a week, perhaps more.Locked in the wine cellar of some villa, gagged and blindfolded, she had wept, and she had cried out in pain.They had burned her for their pleasure with the tips of cigarettes.Some of them had pawed at her in the way that men did.They had taunted her in a dozen languages and spit upon her.But no worse.No worse.Anastasia had found that strange.For days she had pondered her good fortune.They hadn't raped her, or tortured her in earnest, or slit her throat.When they'd taken her out of the wine cellar, away from the rich, earthy aroma of that room, and paraded her outside, still blindfolded and gagged, she had not understood.At first she'd thought they were taking her elsewhere to kill her, but after an hour or so of this, they'd returned her to the wine cellar.They'd fed her and given her water.Kept her alive.And the next day, they'd paraded her again, as though showing her off to some unseen watcher.And then she'd understood that she was bait.They wanted Hellboy to come after them.They'd prepared for him, and for whoever else he might bring along.Twice, when her blindfold had been removed while she was allowed to use a filthy child's potty as a toilet, she saw the sorcerers at work, men and women who slipped in and out of shadows with a flourish, as though they were dancing in darkness.Sorcerers.Whenever they were there, she caught a scent that reminded her of burning plastic.Now she knew the odor of dark magic.Snatches of conversation she'd overheard spoke of the hammer and the anvil and the forge, none of which made any sense to her.A week.More
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