The magician was studying her face with his green eyes. "Your face is wet," he said worriedly. "I hope that's spray. If you've become human enough to cry, then no magic in the world — oh, it must be spray. Come with me. It had better be spray.

And what good is it to me that you're here now? Where where you twenty years ago, ten years ago? How dare you, how dare you come to me now, when I am this?

Unicorn. Old French, unicorne. Latin, unicornis. Literally, one-horned: unus, one and cornu,a horn. A fabulous animal resembling a horse with one horn.

Wisdom is finding joy in bewilderment

What happened instead was that the tree fell in love with him and began to murmur fondly of the joy to be found in the eternal embrace of a red oak. "Always, always," it sighed, "faithful beyond any man's deserving. I will keep the color of your eyes when no other in the world remembers your name. There is no immortality but a tree's love.

You were the one who taught me," he said. "I never looked at you without seeing the sweetness of the way the world goes together, or without sorrow for its spoiling. I became a hero to serve you, and all that is like you.

I fear it, for her sake. It would mean that she too is a wanderer now, and that is a fate for human beings, not for unicorns. But I hope, of course I hope.