Ravenswood

The Story of Ravenswood

eep in the thickest part of the thickest forest in the land a mighty walnut tree grew. For a thousand years it stood.  And for more years than people could remember it was home to a single raven.  A raven of uncommon size and beauty.  Cunning, swift and powerful, it lorded over the forest from the highest vantage point of the ancient walnut tree, warning those who ventured near with a booming, raucous, “CAAW.  CAAW.  CAAW.”

                Not so long ago, as the Earth reckons it, there came a fierce storm.  The mighty walnut and its ebony winged sentinel, swayed to and fro, lashed by the gale-force winds and pelted by rain that rushed horizontally at them.  They nonetheless stoically endured as they had many times before; the raven gripping the tree with its oversized talons and the tree gripping the earth with its gnarled roots.

The trees demise came suddenly.  A bolt of lightning so large Zeus himself must have hurled it.   The tree shivered from top to bottom and then in reverse exploded in flame as a concussive thunder clap peeled through the forest.  The tree was split asunder and its two halves fell to either side with cracking, wrenching groan that ripped through the forest and was heard in villages more than a day’s walk away.  And yet above the sound of pouring rain, over the fury of the racing wind, louder than heaven’s cannon bursts of thunder came a plaintive and final “CAAW. CAAW. CAAW.”  For the Raven flew off, ringed in an electric-blue glow, and was not seen in those parts ever more.

                On examining the remains of the great tree, it was discovered that the knot of the largest limb (the hardest part of this already hard wood) had been shattered.  To the discerning eye, in the mass of kindling-sized sticks, there sat, fully formed, a certain number of wands of the highest caliber.   It is one of these rare objects that sits before you now.

                Mysteriously, as these wands came into possession of their rightful owners, there would be found, inside the sealed box, a single raven’s feather.  A mystery since no such feather was placed there by the wand merchant.  In time, as stories of the wand’s ability to foreshadow imminent danger emerged, the feather came to be understood as a sign from the great raven.  That he travelled the earth still, ever the ebony-winged sentinel for his friend, the giant walnut tree and all that remained of it on earth; the wands.

                This special wood is referred to now as “Ravenswood”.  Handle it with care, use it with noble purpose, know its innate strength and be guided by its inner voice; that of the great raven.