Heroes know that things must happen when it is time for them to happen. A quest may not simply be abandoned; unicorns may go unrescued for a long time, but not forever; a happy ending cannot come in the middle of the story.

The most professional curse ever snarled or croaked or thundered can have no effect on a pure heart.

What use is magic if it can't save a unicorn?

Great heroes need great sorrows and burdens, or half their greatness goes unnoticed. It is all part of the fairy tale.

I have been mortal, and some part of me is mortal yet. I am full of tears and hunger and the fear of death, although I cannot weep, and I want nothing, and I cannot die. I am not like the others now, for no unicorn was ever born who could regret, but I do. I regret.

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?

Men have to have heroes, but no man can ever be as big as the need, and so a legend grows around a grain of truth, like a pearl.