Not long ago in a small village not far from here, there occurred a long time of dryness or drought. The wind stopped blowing and not a single cloud crossed the sky above the parched fields. It felt as if the village were becalmed upon a baking plain. The sun seemed unconcerned and continued to crush everything with its bounty as if was dispensing a blessing. All the while the crops were wilting, the streams had become dry ditches and the animals had become thin and listless.
The people of the village met together each day to discuss their problem and try to work on some ways to improve their situation. They dug wells which soon ran dry and prayed to various deities in order to bring down some rain onto their land.
Then one day a cloud was seen to be drifting slowly in their direction and in due course it stalled directly above the village. The people quickly brought out buckets and pots to collect the precious rain should it fall, but as they sat there and no rain was forthcoming, their heads sank down and they retreated into their despondency. The cloud remained stationed directly above the town and looked for all the world as if contained enough rain to soak the land but nothing, it seemed, could induce the cloud to relinquish its burden.
Then, as the people sat in near silence, the stillness and tension intensified until they could almost feel the energy of their need in their bones. Suddenly a loud crack was heard and at exactly the same instant the rain began to pour down. The villagers all looked around to see what it was that had made such a powerful sound and caused the cloud to burst and there they saw a boy, maybe ten years old, sitting with a large stick across his knees. In the tension of the moment he had gripped his stick so tightly that it had snapped in two. The villagers clustered around the boy and thanked him for bringing down the rain. The boy, for his part, looked about in astonishment at the attention that he was demanding.
The drought was over but the reverence for the boy and his stick only grew, to such an extent that he could not go to school or do his chores outside or spend time with his friends without being singled out for, what had become, unwanted attention. As time passed, whenever the people thereabouts needed rain for their crops, they would visit the boy and ask him to break his stick again, and, when the breaking of the stick failed to bring down the rain, they would become angry with him and say that he wasn’t trying, or, on the other hand, when rain did coincide with the breaking of the stick, they would rejoice and praise the boy and the stick as if they were blessed with powers that they did not have.
His parents became worried and after waiting some time for the situation to resolve, during which time if anything it got worse, they decided to seek the advice of a Guardian of the Cave who, they had heard, lived near a village nearby.
They visited the Guardian and told him their story and the Guardian agreed to help. He told the boy’s parents to gather the villagers together so that they could witness his actions.
When the Guardian arrived, all the villagers had congregated in the centre of the village. The Guardian spoke loudly so that all might hear, saying ‘I have heard there is a stick in this area that has power over the skies and so I wish to view this wonder and pay homage to it.’ The stick, which was now in many pieces, was brought before the Guardian, he looked with disdain at the pieces and said, ‘What is this that you have set before me, this is only good for firewood,’ and with that he picked up all the pieces of stick and threw them on the fire that was burning there. The people were stunned into silence as they watched the stick disperse in a cloud of smoke.
The boy and his parents went home, knowing that they would not be troubled any more. The only artefact that commemorated the affair was a picture of the boy, holding the broken stick, which was hung at the inn, above the fireplace and, later, the inn came to be called the Boy and the Broken Stick. A sign depicting the Boy and his Stick was hung outside the inn in the rain.
The Guardians of the Cave 