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There was a very narrow and dark flight of stairs And that was it There was nothing shiny, nothing new and nothing unnecessary 'To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?' said Granny Weatherwax, taking a sooty black kettle off the fire and filling an equally black teapot Tiffany opened the sack she had brought with her 'I've co you your hat back,' she said 'Ah,' said Granny Weatherwax 'Have you? And why?'

'Because it's your hat,' said Tiffany, putting it on the table 'Thank you for the loan of it, though'

'I dare say there's plenty of young witches who'd give their high teeth for an ol' hat ofup the battered hat 'There are,' said Tiffany, and did not add 'and it's eye teeth, actually' What she did add was: 'But I think everyone has to find their own hat The right hat for theht one, then,' said Granny Weatherwax 'One of them Sky Scrapers With stars,' she added, and there was so much acid in the word 'stars' that it would've h the table and the floor and melted ical, do you? Stars?'

'I did when I bought it And it'll do for now'

'Until you find the right hat,' said Granny Weatherwax 'Yes'

'Which ain't mine?'

'No'

'Good' The old witch walked across the roo in the corner It turned out to be a big wooden spike, just about the size of a pointy hat on a tall stand A hat was beingconstructed on it, with thin strips ofand pins and stiff black doth 'I make my own,' she said 'Every year There's no hat like the hat you make yourself Take my advice I stiffens the calico andwhat you can put into a hat you make yourself But you didn't come to talk about hats' Tiffany let the question out at last 'Was it real?' Granny Weatherwax poured the tea, picked up her cup and saucer, then carefully poured some of the tea out of the cup and into the saucer She held this up and, with care, like soently on it She did this slowly and calmly, while Tiffany tried hard to conceal her impatience down the cup and saucer 'Child, you've come here to learn what's true and what's not but there's little I can teach you that you don't already know You just don't know you know it, and you'll spend the rest of your life learning what's already in your bones And that's the truth' She stared at Tiffany's hopeful face and sighed 'Coive you lesson one It's the only lesson there is It

don't need writing down in no book with eyes on' She led the way to the well in her back garden, looked around on the ground and picked up a stick 'Magic wand,' she said 'See?' A green fla Tiffany jump 'Now you try' It didn't work for Tiffany, no matter how much she shook it 'Of course not,' said Granny 'It's a stick Now, maybe I made a flame come out of it, or maybe I made you think it did That don't matter It was ht and you can make a stick your wand and the sky your hat and a puddle your icer, what're theoblet,' said Tiffany 'Right Magic goblet Things aren't i at Tiffany 'And I could teach you how to run across those hills of yours with the hare, I could teach you how to fly above them with the buzzard I could tell you the secrets of the bees I could teach you all this and ht here and now One si, easy to do' Tiffany nodded, eyes wide 'You understand, then, that all the glittery stuff is just toys, and toys can lead you astray?'

'Yes!'

'Then take off that shiny horse you wear around your neck, girl, and drop it in the well' Obediently, half-hypnotized by the voice, Tiffany reached behind her neck and undid the clasp The pieces of the silver horse shone as she held it over the water She stared at it as if she was seeing it for the first tiht All the time 'Well?' said the old witch 'No,' said Tiffany 'I can't'

'Can't or won't?' said Granny sharply 'Can't,' said Tiffany and stuck out her chin 'And won't!' She drew her hand back and fastened the necklace again, glaring defiantly at Granny Weatherwax The witch smiled 'Well done,' she said quietly 'If you don't knohen to be a hu, you don't knohen to be a witch And if you're too afraid of goin' astray, you won't go anywhere May I see it, please?' Tiffany looked into those blue eyes Then she undid the clasp and handed over the necklace Granny held it up 'Funny, ain't it, that it see it twist this way and that 'Well- O'course, it's not what a horse looks like, but it's certainly what a horse is' Tiffany stared at her with her , and then Granny Weatheras back Did she do that, she wondered, or did

I do itthe hat back,' she ht you a present, too'

'I' nored this, because her ain and handed over a sed shape in her hands 'I took -inthearht have aa use for this' The old woman slowly unwrapped the white paper The Zephyr Billow cloak unrolled itself under her fingers and filled the air like smoke 'It's lovely, but I couldn't wear it,' said Tiffany as the cloak shaped itself over the gentle currents of the clearing 'You need gravitas to carry off a cloak like that'

'What's gravitarse?' said Granny Weatherwax sharply 'Ohdignity Seniority Wisdos,' said Tiffany 'Ah,' said Granny, relaxing a little She stared at the gently rippling cloak and sniffed It really was a wonderful creation The wizards had got at least one thing right when they had made it It was one of those items that fill a hole in your life that you didn't knoas there until you'd seen it 'Well, I suppose there's those as can wear a cloak like this, and those as can't,' she conceded She let it curl around her neck and fastened it there with a crescent-shaped brooch 'It's a bit too grand for the likes of me,' she said 'A bit too fancy I could look like a flibbertigibbet wearing so like this' It was spoken like a statement but it had a curl like a question 'No, it suits you, it really does,' said Tiffany cheerfully 'If you don't knohen to be a hu, you don't knohen to be a witch' Birds stopped singing Up in the trees, squirrels ran and hid Even the sky seemed to darken for a moment 'Erthat's what I heard,' said Tiffany, and added, 'Fros' The blue eyes stared into hers There were no secrets from Granny Weatherwax Whatever you said, she watched what you ain so the cloak curve in the air 'It's always very quiet here'

'I should like that,' said Tiffany 'Shall I tell the bees before I coet the tea ready?' For a lared, and then the lines faded into a wry grin 'Clever,' she said What's inside you? Tiffany thought Who are you really, in there? Did you wantbad wicked witch, and you're not You test people all the time, test, test, test, but you really want theh to beat you Because itthe best You're not allowed to stop You can only be beaten, and you're too proud ever to lose Pride! You've turned it into terrible

strength, but it eats away at you Are you afraid to laugh in case you hear an early cackle? We'll ain, at the Witch Trials 'I'e not to think of a pink rhinoceros if soed to say aloud 'Ah, that's deep ic, that is,' said Granny Weatherwax 'No It's not You don't knohat a rhinoceros looks like, do you?' Sunlight filled the clearing as the old witch laughed, as clear as a downland streaht!' she said Chapter 15 A Hat Full of Sky It was one of those strange days in late February when it's a little warh there's wind, it seems to be all round the horizons and never quite where you are Tiffany climbed up onto the dohere, in the sheltered valleys, the early la around in a gang in that strange jerky run that la horses Perhaps there was so about that day, because the old ewes joined in, too, and skipped with their la winter fleeces bouncing up and down like a clown's trousers It had been an interesting winter She'd learned a lot of things One of them was that you could be a bridesmaid to two people who between the spinning on his head and his big spectacles gleaold pieces to 'our little helper', which es that she hadn't asked for and Miss Level couldn't afford She'd used soood brown cloak It didn't billow, it didn't fly out behind her, but it arm and thick and kept her dry She'd learned lots of other things too As she walked past the sheep and their laently touched their minds, so softly that they didn't noticeTiffany had stayed up in theof the year There'd been a lot to do there, and anyway it wasn't ive her leave now, though, for the la festival, which the old people called Sheepbellies It hen the shepherds' year began The hag of the hills couldn't miss that That hen, in warm nests of straw shielded from the wind by hurdles and barriers of cut furze, the

future happened She'd helped it happen, working with the shepherds by lantern light, dealing with the difficult births She'd worked with the pointy hat on her head and had felt the shepherds watching her as, with knife and needle and thread and hands and soothing words, she'd saved ewes froht You had to give theive the and bloody to the elbows, but it had been the blood of life Later, she had gone up to the Feegles' ht about this for soone prepared - with clean torn-up handkerchiefs and soiven her She had a feeling that Jeannie would have a use for these Miss Level always visited new mothers It hat you did Jeannie had been pleased to see her Lying on her stoet part of her body into the kelda's chaht of what she kept thinking of as the Roblets, born at the sa one another The eighth lay quietly, biding her tiht of her differently News had got around The people of the Chalk hadn't liked witches They had always coers But now here was our Tiffany, birthing the la witchery in the mountains! Ah, but that's still our Tiffany, that is OK, I'll grant you that she's wearing a hat with big stars on it, but sheand she's Granny Aching's grand-daughter, right? And they'd tap their noses, knowingly Granny Aching's grand-daughter Remember what the old woman could do? So if witch she be, then she's our witch She knows about sheep, she does Hah, and I heard they had a big sort of trial for witches up in theirl froot a witch now, and she's better'n anyone else's! No one's throwing Granny Aching's grand- daughter in a pond! Toain It had been a busy three weeks, quite apart fro Roland had invited her to tea at the castle It had been a bit aard, as these things are, but it was funny how, in a couple of years, he'd gone froot what he was talking about when she smiled at him And they had books in the castle! He'd shyly presented her with a Dictionary of Ah to bring hi knife made by Zakzak, as excellent at blades even if he was rubbish at ic The hat wasn't ot home she'd found a bookmark in the P section and a faint pencil underline under the words Plongeon: a small curtsy, about one-third as deep as the traditional one No longer used' Alone in her bedroo to be re about people, all knowing and superior, they're watching and thinking about you, right back at you