A Hat Full Of Sky

inside that can hardly be contained.
    “I’ve come back!” she announced to the hills. “Better than I went!”
    She snatched off the hat with stars on it. It wasn’t a bad hat, for show, although the stars made it look like a toy. But it was never her hat. It couldn’t be. The only hat worth wearing was the one you made for yourself, not one you bought, not one you were given. Your own hat, for your own head. Your own future, not someone else’s.
    She hurled the starry hat up as high as she could. The wind there caught it neatly. It tumbled for a moment and then was lifted by a gust and, swooping and spinning, sailed away across the downs and vanished forever.
    Then Tiffany made a hat out of the sky and sat on the old potbellied stove, listening to the wind around the horizons while the sun went down.
    As the shadows lengthened, many small shapes crept out of the nearby mound and joined her in the sacred place, to watch.
    The sun set, which is everyday magic, and warm night came.
    The hat filled up with stars….

AUTHOR’S NOTE
    The Doctrine of Signatures mentioned on page 67 really exists in this world, although now it’s better known by historians than doctors. For hundreds of years, perhaps thousands, people believed that God, who of course had made everything, had “signed” each thing in a way that showed humanity what it could be used for. For example, goldenrod is yellow and so “must” be good for jaundice, which turns the skin yellow. (A certain amount of guesswork was involved, but sometimes patients survived.)
    By an amazing coincidence, the Horse carved on the Chalk is remarkably similar to the Uffington White Horse, which in this world is carved on the downlands near the village of Uffington in southwest Oxfordshire. It’s 374 feet long, several thousand years old, and carved on the hill in such a way that you can only see all of it in one go from the air. This suggests that a) it was carved for the gods to see or b) flying was invented a lot earlier that we thought or c) people used to be much, much taller.
    Oh, and this world had Witch Trials, too. They were not fun.

About the Author
    TERRY PRATCHETT’s novels have sold more than thirty-five million copies and have inspired a devoted worldwide following. In addition to his best-selling books about Discworld, Mr. Pratchett has also written several books for young readers, including the Bromeliad trilogy: TRUCKERS, DIGGERS, and WINGS and the Johnny Maxwell trilogy: ONLY YOU CAN SAVE MANKIND, JOHNNY AND THE DEAD , and JOHNNY AND THE BOMB . Mr. Pratchett was awarded Britain’s highest honor for a children’s novel, the Carnegie Medal, for his first young adult novel set in Discworld, THE AMAZING MAURICE AND HIS EDUCATED RODENTS .
    Visit him online at
www.terrypratchettbooks.com
    Visit www.AuthorTracker.com for exclusive information on your favorite HarperCollins author.

Also by TERRY PRATCHETT
    The Carpet People
    The Dark Side of the Sun
    Strata

    T HE B ROMELIAD T RILOGY :
    Truckers • Diggers • Wings

    T HE J OHNNY M AXWELL T RILOGY :
    Only You Can Save Mankind
    Johnny and the Dead
    Johnny and the Bomb

    The Unadulterated Cat (with Gray Jolliffe)
    Good Omens (with Neil Gaiman)

    T HE D ISCWORLD S ERIES
    The Color of Magic
    The Light Fantastic
    Equal Rites
    Mort
    Sourcery
    Wyrd Sisters
    Pyramids
    Guards! Guards!
    Eric
    Moving Pictures
    Reaper Man
    Witches Abroad
    Small Gods
    Lords and Ladies
    Men at Arms
    Soul Music
    Feet of Clay
    Interesting Times
    Maskerade
    Hogfather
    Jingo
    The Last Continent
    Carpe Jugulum
    The Fifth Elephant
    The Truth
    Thief of Time
    The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents
    Night Watch
    The Wee Free Men
    Monstrous Regiment
    Going Postal
    Mort: A Discworld Big Comic
    (with Graham Higgins)
    The Streets of Ankh-Morpork
    (with Stephen Briggs)
    The Discworld Companion
    (with Stephen Briggs)
    The Discworld Mapp
    (with Stephen Briggs)
    The Last Hero: A Discworld Fable
    (illustrated by Paul Kidby)

Copyright
    A HAT FULL OF SKY . Copyright © 2004 by Terry Partchett. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether