The Dowser Knew

The old dowser had pointed his stick at that field on purpose. Aldo understood it the moment he carried the sword home and saw the man waiting at the gate, already weeping. "I'm sorry," the dowser said. "I'm so sorry, boy. I didn't want it to be you. I didn't want it to be anyone." "It's just an old sword." "It is the Tenth Sword." The dowser said it the way you say the name of a sickness. "The nine ended the war. The tenth was meant to end the world, if the world ever needed ending, and so the wise ones buried it where no army would think to look. Under a turnip field. Under sixty years of peace." Aldo looked at the blade across his arms. It did not look like the end of the world. It looked tired, and a little hopeful, and that was the part that frightened him. "Then I'll put it back," he said. The dowser shook his head. "It only comes up once. And it has already chosen who carries it down."