The Dragon Pool: The Dragon Pool by Christopher Golden

space within Anastasia's tent as though they were serfs and he their feudal master.
    Rich, uptight, English prig. It didn't help that he was handsome, and aware of it, and that he had a kind of proprietary air about him when standing beside Anastasia. From the way Conrad kept looking back and forth between Hellboy and Anastasia, it was obvious he was aware of their past relationship. It was also pretty clear how he felt about it. His nostrils flared with barely disguised disgust whenever he had to address Hellboy directly.
    Which meant Hellboy tried to force Conrad to address him directly as often as possible, just to bother the asshat, and to amplify his own desire to pummel him.
    They had all gathered in Anastasia's tent for the debriefing--Hellboy, Professor Bruttenholm, Dr. Conrad, Anastasia herself, and the man from Beijing, whose name was Lao. No first or last. Just Lao, like Madonna or Cher. As annoying as his superior smugness was, it didn't make Hellboy want to break him in two the way Conrad's attitude did. Maybe that was because Lao hadn't so much as flinched upon meeting him, had barely spoken to him or looked at him. Lao wasn't fazed by the presence of an enormous guy with sawed-off horns, bloodred skin, and a tail.
    Hellboy liked that. Flunky for insidious secret government masters he might be, but Lao didn't look down his nose at the red guy.
    The tent was huge. Given that it doubled as the command center for the dig, it had to be. Still, Hellboy had to crouch a little to stand inside, and he didn't like that. It made him feel foolish, so he tried not to meet Anastasia's gaze when he could avoid it.
    Professor Kyichu hadn't been brought into the briefing, and that was good. Hellboy had felt the urge to say something to the man, to offer him some comfort or reassurance, but he'd been unable to come up with anything that didn't sound hollow or insincere. Better to have the man elsewhere, at least for the moment.
    Conrad had finished giving them all a rundown of the discovery of the dig site and their operations up until now. Anastasia had asked him to do so, ceding the floor to him, and he took it as though he was entitled. Now that he was done, though, he looked up at Professor Bruttenholm, as if they were equals, and nobody else was in the tent.
    "It's late, Professor. What can we tell you that isn't in the documents you received?" Conrad asked.
    Professor Bruttenholm nodded, clearing his throat. "Thank you, Dr. Conrad. Perhaps you and Dr. Bransfield would be so kind as to--"
    "Shouldn't we wait for Abe?" Hellboy interrupted.
    His father raised a bushy white eyebrow. "Abe will be along shortly. Dr. Conrad is correct. It's quite late. Still, we ought to learn what we can."
    Conrad started to speak again, but Anastasia cut him off, both talking over him and stepping closer to the center of the tent.
    "What can we tell you, Professor? Where should we start?"
    Professor Bruttenholm cleared his throat. "Perhaps you could begin by telling me what you expected to find when you began the excavation."
    Conrad smiled thinly. "Surely, that's in the file, sir. Our mandate was to locate and restore the fortress city of an ancient warlord known in those times as the Dragon King, due to his symbolic use of the Asian dragon motif in his city and the temple he built to the gods. Dozens of references in scrolls from those times refer to the deadly power of the Dragon King, raining fire and destruction down upon his enemies and all of the villages in the area, whom he forced to worship him."
    Hellboy threw up his hands. "Yeah, yeah, pal, we read all that. But that's just a version of the story. You found this Dragon King Temple, and there's something about local legends of real dragons and the lake. Now you've got monsters rousting your camp, causing trouble, maybe taking this little girl away, trying to stop you. Gotta tell you, everyone's worried about the girl, Kora, but the way the report read, nobody seemed all that stunned