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‘What’s most amazing is that when some of these parasites reach your brain, they begin to take over,’ Prim said. ‘Control your thoughts. Your desires. And the parasite will command you to do what’s necessary for it to continue its natural cycle. You become an obedient soldier, willing to die if that’s what it takes.’ Prim sighed. ‘As so very often it does, unfortunately.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Oh, you think this sounds like a horror story or science fiction? But you should know that some of these parasites aren’t even rare. Most hosts live and die without knowing the parasite is present, as is likely the case with Boss and Lisa. We believe we struggle, work, and sacrifice our lives for our family, our country, our own legacy. While in reality it’s for the parasite, the bloodsucker ensconced in the headquarters of the brain deciding things.’

Prim refilled their glasses with red wine.

‘My stepfather accused my mother of being just such a parasite. Claimed she began turning down roles because he had wealth so she could just sit at home drinking up his money. Of course that wasn’t true. Firstly, she didn’t turn down parts, but they did stop offering them to her. Because she sat at home all day drinking and had begun to forget lines. My stepfather was a very wealthy man, so her drinking could never have rendered him destitute, to put it mildly. Besides, he was the parasite. He was the one inside my mother’s brain, making her see things the way he wanted her to see them. So she didn’t see what he was doing to me. I was only a child and thought a father had the right, could demand that sort of thing from his son. No, I didn’t think every six-year-old was forced to lie naked in bed with their father and satisfy them, or face threats about their mother being killed if they said a word about it to anyone. But I was frightened. So I said nothing, but tried to show my mother what was going on. I had always been bullied at school because of my teeth and... yes, the way a victim of sexual assault behaves, I suppose. Rat, they called me. But now I began to lie and steal. I started skipping school, ran away from home, and began taking money from men to wank them off in public toilets. I robbed one of them. Put simply, my stepfather was nestled in both my and my mother’s brains, destroying us bit by bit. Speaking of which...’

Prim pronged the last piece on his plate. Sighed. ‘But now it’s over, Bertine.’ He turned the fork while he studied the pale pink piece of meat. ‘Now I’m the one nestling in the brain and giving orders.’

Sung-min had to run to keep up with Kasparov, who was straining even harder. A sort of hacking cough began coming from the dog, as if he were trying to dislodge something stuck in his throat.

Sung-min did something he had learned as an investigator. When he was almost entirely sure of something he tested his own deduction by trying to turn everything on its head. Could it be that what he had thought was impossible was possible all the same? Could, for example, Bertine Bertilsen still be alive? She might have run off, gone abroad. She may have been abducted and was now sitting locked up in a basement or an apartment someplace, was perhaps together with the perpetrator at this very moment.

Suddenly they were out of the woods and in a clearing. The light from the torch glittered on water. They were by a small lake. Kasparov wanted to get to the water and pulled Sung-min with him. The light flickered over a birch tree standing bowed over the water, and Sung-min momentarily caught sight of something that looked like a thick branch reaching all the way down to the water, as though the tree were drinking. He pointed the light at the branch. Which was not a branch.

‘No!’ yelled Sung-min, yanking Kasparov back.

The shout echoed back from the other side of the lake.

It was a body.

It was hanging folded at the hips over the lowest branch of the birch tree.

The bare feet were just above the surface of the water. The woman — because he could see at once that it was a woman — had, like Susanne, no clothes on her lower body. Her stomach was also exposed, because her dress was pulled up, stopping underneath her bra, and was hanging down towards the water, covering her head, shoulders and arms. Only her wrists were visible below the inside-out hem of the dress, and her fingers were reaching down below the surface of the water. Sung-min’s first thought was to hope there were no fish in the lake.

Kasparov sat still. Sung-min patted him on the head. ‘Good boy.’