Anya Amasova had the Soviet Embassy car stop a few metres from the main entrance. 
This was not a breach of protocol, but one of her rare strokes of luck.
“I’ll be right behind you,” she said to the commercial attaché sitting next to her. He merely nodded obediently.
 
Outside the Nordhavn Arena stood photographers, convoys of cars, sponsors and polite people. Anya had nothing against photographers. She even felt a certain affection for them, as long as they believed a face was more interesting than a door, a dress more important than a delivery run, and jewellery more meaningful than a security plan.
She walked round the corner of the building to the eastern side entrance. There, Copenhagen was less festive. The wind blew in sharper from the harbour, carrying with it salt, diesel and the smell of algae-covered quay walls. Behind the arena’s glass façades, red light glided across white surfaces. From this side, the building did not look like a charity venue, but rather like an attempt to force ice, money and a guilty conscience into a geometric shape. Anya noticed the two sluice gates just below the water’s surface. Even in the semi-darkness, she could see that water was being sucked in through one, whilst through the other—which was also fitted with a grille—water was flowing out.
Anya’s dark green dress lay calmly against her, with the expensive nonchalance of things that did not beg for attention because they received it anyway. Around her neck was a necklace of emeralds, so clear and cool that it looked almost black in the harbour light. To match, earrings, also emeralds, set in gold, long enough to create a tiny, controlled refraction of light with every movement.
A Danish protocol officer hurried towards her, young, blond, overly friendly and already slightly panicked. Anya showed him her ID, whereupon he tapped something into his data pad.
“Ms Amasova?”
“You’ve just checked my ID.”
“Welcome to Copenhagen. We were expecting you at the main entrance. A colleague will be here with your access card shortly. After the reception, the presentation is open to you; afterwards, as it will be late, Suite 365.”
“How thoughtful of you and the suite.”
He laughed, though he wasn’t yet sure if that was allowed.
“Of course. May I accompany you? The delegation from the Soviet Energy Commission has already been registered. We’ve prepared your documents for the tour of the energy efficiency presentation, with some delicious Danish canapés after the first third.”
“I’m not here for a presentation.”
The young man froze for a brief, priceless moment.
Anya left him standing there, then gave him a smile, just warm enough not to completely destroy him.
“I’m here for energy efficiency.”
“Of course.”
He held the door open for her.
Inside the arena, the warmth was immediate, but not cosy. It was calculated. Air curtains at the entrances, concealed heating strips beneath white wood, glass corridors with precisely set temperatures. The building wasted nothing; it staged efficiency. Anya noticed the sensors on the ceiling, the air vents along the red wall panels, the unusually narrow access hatches that didn’t fit with ordinary arena operations. Everything was too perfect to require explanation.
That was always suspicious.
In Buchanan, beauty had lied differently.
There, the air had been heavy, tropical, green, full of mangroves and damp promises. People had said ‘freedom of the press’ when they meant destabilisation. They had said ‘independence’ when they meant decolonisation and uprising. They had smiled whilst slipping political firebrands into glasses of rum.
Copenhagen was colder and smoother, but lies had the same pulse everywhere.
Anya paused for a moment. Below her, the arena opened up. The ice lay deep in the light, striped white and red, as if someone had turned the Danish flag into liquid and let it freeze again. The first guests were already seated in the upper tiers. Light-coloured suits, broad shoulders, gleaming jewellery, grey heads, young faces pretending they understood the world simply because they’d been invited.
Anya didn’t look at the ice first; she looked at the cameras, then at the guards, then at the unlabelled doors, and only then did she look at the ice rink.
The cooling was too good: there was mist over the ice, barely visible air turbulence, but none of the minor imperfections that even the most modern Soviet rinks betrayed. The surface seemed not to have been cooled, but persuaded to stay cold.
A second protocol officer approached her, older than the first, with a face that looked as though it had seen its share of committees, receptions and quiet exhaustion. He handed her a silver card with a small bear on it.
“Ms Amasova, it is a great pleasure for us. The cooperation between the Stromberg Foundation, the Danish authorities and international energy partners is of particular importance to us.”
“Significance is the precursor to results.”
He laughed cautiously.
“Mr Stromberg sends word that he would like to greet you personally later. They are well aware in his household of the Soviet Union’s keen interest in energy efficiency.”
“The Soviet Union takes an interest in many things that remain stable.”
“Of course.”
“The Danish government and the royal family, for example.”
This time he didn’t laugh.
Anya took the folder he held out to her. Inside were the programme, guest list, seating plan and a brief technical summary. She leafed through it.
“Electricity consumption reduced by forty-eight per cent compared to similar facilities?”
“Verified by the University of Copenhagen and the World Energy Organisation.”
“With proximity to salt water, open harbour winds and event loads?”
“The architecture is very advanced.”
“I admire your architects.”
The man cleared his throat.
“It involves a novel combination of heat recovery, seawater filtration and load shifting.”
Anya looked further into the folder.
“Load shifting to where?”
“Pardon?”
She looked up.
“If you shift a load, there must be a place to shift it to.”
He said nothing.
Very good, thought Anya. The first place where nobody was lying, because nobody knew enough to be able to lie.
“The technical presentation will take place after the official reception,” he said at last. “For security reasons, it’s for accredited participants only. WEO, the Danish Energy Agency, selected funding partners and the five major power delegations.”
“Is the Soviet delegation already in the building?”
“Yes. Three gentlemen from the Commission for Socialist Energy Management are already in the upper lounge.”
Anya closed the folder.
“Union authorities. I speak only for Rosatom, the state nuclear organisation of the Russian Soviet Republic.”
She handed the folder back to him and walked on before he could find an answer that wouldn’t compromise his position.
The corridor leading to the main arena was made of glass. To the left lay the harbour, to the right the hall. In between, a red carpet ran across light-coloured wood, so immaculate that for a moment Anya thought of an operetta hall in the Danish National Theatre. At regular intervals, white hides hung on the walls—skinned polar bears. Symbolically, it was a stark statement: the tamed Arctic, nailed to a wall so that rich people need not fear the cold.
At the end of the glass corridor stood Ravn.
An ice-white suit, hair pulled back strictly, and not a single superfluous movement. Ravn was a woman who did not wait, but gave people the impression they were late the moment they came within her vicinity.
Anya felt an immediate antipathy. That was useful, for sympathy often clouded the details.
“Ms Amasowa,” said Ravn. “Welcome.”
“And you are?”
They did not shake hands. Both noticed it. Both decided not to explain.
Ravn glanced briefly at Anya’s necklace.
“Signe Ravn, project manager for tonight’s event. Emeralds are a bold choice for an evening about the seas.”
“I didn’t want to turn up as an iceberg.”
“That would certainly have made an impression too.”
“Making an impression isn’t the goal, just a side effect.”
Ravn smiled.
“Then you’re well suited to this evening. Because it’s about protecting the oceans as a global responsibility.”
“Responsibility is a lovely word. It sounds like power that’s tidied itself up.”
“We try not to put power at the forefront here. But we’re not so naive as to assume the oceans can clean and cool themselves. Your registration documents list energy efficiency as your main interest,” said Ravn.
“That’s correct.”
“So the Soviet Energy Commission is merely assessing whether our cooling technology might be of interest for larger maritime installations?”
“Officially.”
“And unofficially?”
Anya looked down at the ice through the glass wall. On the other side of the arena, Ilya Rozanov stood by a balustrade, a glass in his hand, his gaze fixed on the ice for too long.
Anya knew men who saw the ice merely as a stage. Ilya was not one of them.
“Unofficially,” she said, “I’m interested in people who can keep security zones secure at charity events.”
Ravn did not turn her head. But her silence shifted.
“You’ll find that in a building of this size, there are many areas that are off-limits to guests.”
“Of course I understand that. There are kitchens, technical rooms, staff corridors, just like in a Soviet nuclear power station.”
For a moment they stood side by side, looking down into the hall. Ravn’s tension had risen, but his mask remained unbroken. Down below, a camera crane was being positioned. Children in costumes meant to represent seaweed waited at the edge of the ice. A man wearing headphones gave a signal. Images of oceans played on the video ring, then of ice, then of the Stromberg Foundation logo.
Anya noticed a brief jump in the picture.
Just a single jolt. Not a glitch that anyone would have reported. But for a woman who had learnt that technology only failed when people were too lazy to look for the causes, it was enough.
“The video team is still calibrating,” said Ravn.
“That’s very prudent of the video team.”
Ravn looked directly at her now.
“Mr Stromberg hopes that the Soviet guests will see this evening as a sign of international cooperation. Just like the delegations from Japan, Britain, France and the Ottoman Empire.”
“Mr Stromberg certainly hopes for a great many things.”
“And Moscow?”
Anya smiled.
“Moscow never hopes. Moscow compares.”
Then music began behind them: strings playing Vivaldi’s Winter. The first guests were being led towards the seating areas. Ravn turned away with the perfect little tilt of the head that ended a conversation without having to end it.
“I’ll have you shown to the Soviet box.”
“No need, I can find my own way.”
Anya walked down the stairs towards the lower gallery before Ravn could stop her.
The arena smelled different down there. Less perfume, more ice. Less grog, but more electricity. Through a half-open service door, she saw three men in grey work jackets pushing a flat metal box on a trolley.
Anya didn’t stop. Stopping showed interest. She slowed her pace. The trolley disappeared behind a door bearing the neutral sign:
MAINTENANCE NORTH / STAFF
The card reader next to it wasn’t the same as the ones on the other doors.
Anya briefly placed her hand on her emerald necklace and twirled a stone between two fingers. From the outside, it looked like a vain gesture. The middle stone wasn’t quite secure because it wasn’t just a stone.
A tiny transmitter inside it was measuring the distance to the door. Then she heard a voice behind her.
“You are a long way from reception.”
Anya turned round.
Dr Kasper Lind was standing at the edge of the corridor.
She recognised his face from a file that officially didn’t exist and unofficially contained poor-quality photos. A Danish nuclear physicist who hadn’t taught at the university for five years.
He didn’t look as though he’d been looking for her. He looked as though he’d been fleeing from something else and had stumbled upon her in the process.
“I’m enjoying this impressively efficient building,” said Anya. “It helps you get to know its secrets better.”
“This building has no secrets.” Lind’s reply was quick and sharp. “And it’s private property, something that should command your respect, not snooping around in non-public areas.”
He looked at the service door, then back at her, then over his shoulder back at the staircase he’d hurried down. His eyes darted about.
Anya took a step closer.
“Anya Amasova, Rosatom, it’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr…?”
“Lind, Dr Kasper Lind. And I must admit I have no interest in speaking to communists.”
Lind took a breath. He wanted to say something else. Then he looked over Anya’s shoulder. Anya didn’t turn around. People often gave themselves away more by what they saw behind you than by what they said to your face.
His hand briefly moved towards the inside pocket of his jacket. Not for a weapon, but for an object. Round? Flat? Small enough for a pocket. Anya noted the movement. Could it be a hip flask? Then Lind forced his hand back down.
For a tiny moment, there was no diplomacy, no fear of Ravn, no fear of Stromberg, no fear of Moscow. Just a man who had realised something too big to remain clean.
“You and your comrades understand just as little as Stromberg!” he said, before walking away quickly with the stiff self-control of a man who had forbidden himself to run.
Anya stopped in the corridor.
Behind her, a door opened. Two security guards came out of the upper stairwell. They weren’t looking at Lind. They were looking for him.
Anya stepped into the beam of light cast by a wall installation, as if she were merely admiring the lines of the architecture there. The emeralds around her neck caught the red light and reflected it back as green.
One of the security guards nodded to her. Anya watched them go, then looked back at the maintenance door. Officially, she was here for energy efficiency. Unofficially, Stromberg might have built something that made security guards nervous, intrigued physicists, and kept an ice rink too cold with a tiny tidal power plant and plastic collectors.
That was enough for Anya for now. She headed back towards the main arena. Halfway up the stairs, she saw Shane Hollander standing down by the boards. Handsome, composed, already surrounded by cameras. On the other side of the ice stood Ilya Rozanov, who didn’t want to look at him but did so anyway.
Anya paused briefly. Sometimes technology was the wrong way into a story; sometimes it was desire. She smiled; the testosterone-fuelled ice hockey player wouldn’t pose a challenge to her if it came to that.
Copenhagen hadn’t defended itself against emeralds and enchanting smiles.