She turns the radio on and immediately changes the channel when the morning service theme begins to stream out of the speakers. It takes her few seconds to find a channel she can bear, but when she does, she turns the volume up and leans back. Drumming her fingers to the beat of the opening riff of ‘Start Me Up’, Karen accelerates, singing loudly enough to drown out Mick Jagger.

A feeling of freedom washes over her. Two months of imposed idleness, stuck at home with an aching knee and the aftermath of several broken ribs and a severe concussion has triggered thoughts and feelings that have bored her but also sometimes left her sleepless and afraid. In a matter of months her carefully controlled existence has been turned on its head. She has gone from leading a monotonous life of long workdays, the occasional visit to the local pub and solitary evenings, to dealing with the constant presence of others and a growing sense of being invaded. Sigrid hates her own house but pretends not to and Leo has never so much as hinted at when he might leave. She has avoided asking him because whatever the answer, she doesn’t want to hear it. She’s not alone anymore. She no longer knows if she wants to be.

For a few months now, her house has been filled with the sounds of other people. The clattering of plates in the kitchen, someone drawing a bath, music drifting across the yard from the annexe. Voices talking in the next room. And the smells. Fresh coffee she didn’t make, shampoo from someone’s newly washed hair. The presence of other people. Little pinpricks of joy. And then the crippling fear that follows. The constant reminder that she had all these things once before and lost them. That they can all be taken away again before you know it.

The call from Jounas Smeed had been a lifeline. Exhausted by her protracted confinement, she had welcomed the chance to return to work as though it were a sorely needed holiday. A concrete assignment, something she knows how to handle. She’s not worried about the investigation yet. What little information she’s been given about what has happened up on Noorö is too meagre to build theories or anxieties around. So far, all she feels is unadulterated, intoxicating relief.