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They did not trouble to differentiate between a glitter and a gleam, a glow and a glare. They were ignorant of the whole appreciation of brightness in all its forms. They lived by muted yellow lamplight, existing in an environment of dismal gloom. As though they were born and lived and died in veils or blindfolds.
    And the corresponding enrichment of their language, which should have adapted their speech to their environment, was simply not there. They knew darkness, and obscurity, and murkiness, and shadow. And that was all. Nothing new to allow them to be in closer harmony with their world. The entire culture seemed to me to be somewhat subhuman.
    Time to move, said the whisper, jerking me from my train of thought.
    I permitted myself a slight groan as I got to my feet. My arms and legs seemed to have seized up completely in belated protest against the long crawl through the narrow fissure by which I had come to this spot. I flexed my fingers and kicked my feet. My hands were torn and the wounds were filthy. They seemed to have no feeling in them at all while I held them still, but as I curled the fingers they burned with pain. The little finger of my right hand caught on my belt as I tried to clean some of the dirt from the palm by rubbing it on my equally filthy shirt. The flashlight which I’d lodged there fell from its precarious position, and clattered on the stone floor.
    Frenziedly, I dropped to my knees and began searching the floor with my injured hands. I found it, and flicked the switch anxiously. The light came on, and for a few moments it seemed abundantly strong. But as my eyes adjusted, I realised that it was very weak indeed, and could not possibly last more than a couple of hours.
    It’s not all that vital, the wind assured me.
    â€˜I’m not used to stumbling around in Stygian darkness. I come from a normal world, where people use their eyes.’
    I’ve lived without sight before now, he told me. It’s only a matter of using the other senses at your disposal. You have enough of them. With a little help from me, you can get by.
    â€˜I’ll drive my own body, thank you very much,’ I said. ‘There’ll be no more takeovers.’
    Your insistence on my maintaining a wholly passive role in this partnership is quite ridiculous. I can use your body more efficiently than you can. It makes no sense at all to be so determined that you and you alone should exercise control of it.
    â€˜It makes sense to me,’ I assured him. ‘And you can’t gain control if I don’t want you to, can you?’
    No.
    Actually, I had my doubts about that. I wasn’t sure exactly how far I could trust what the wind said about the limitation of his abilities. After all, he had never once mentioned the fact that he could assume control over my body until the occasion had actually arisen, at which point he had simply gone and done it.
    I moved off, walking briskly along the passage. I considered turning off the flash and making my way by feel, which would have been moderately easy. But I didn’t like the idea at all.
    â€˜I hope we’re going the right way,’ I said pensively. ‘I don’t really want to end up back in the capital with all those angry miners.’
    Don’t you know?
    â€˜Do you?’
    It didn’t occur to me to keep track, he said darkly. You’re driving, so I assumed you knew what you were doing.
    â€˜I hope I do,’ I said serenely. ‘My sense of direction hasn’t let me down before. Not often, anyhow.’
    Not, of course, that I’d ever been called upon to navigate in a place like this before. In total darkness, with no sky but only solid rock, orientating oneself could hardly be easy. However, I reflected, the tunnel only went two ways. If I had completely lost my sense of direction, there was still a fifty-fifty chance that I was going the right way.
    The passage curved right, and was joined by another coming