Then the Paladin was racing toward the unicorn and the wizard. But the Paladin could not reach them in time. The fire had engulfed Meeks, the magic too strong even for him. He shrieked one final time and exploded into smoke. The black unicorn was engulfed in the same moment, the fire all about. Stricken, it arched skyward, leaped into the air and was gone.
The Paladin, too, disappeared. It rode into a sudden burst of white light, the light washing away ash and dust and healing silver armor until it shone like new — all in an instant’s time — and knight-errant and light simply faded away.
Abernathy and Willow stared at each other voicelessly across the charred, empty forest clearing.
Then it happened.
They all saw it — Willow and Abernathy as they crouched upon the scorched hillside, still stunned from the fury of the battle just completed; Questor, the kobolds, and the G’home Gnomes as they struggled futilely to sit upright, still secured by the bonds that the demon imps had used to restrain them; and even Ben Holiday as he stumbled breathlessly from the forest trees after having run all the way from the place of his transformation, not knowing what had brought him, knowing only that he must come. They saw it, and they held their collective breath in wonder.
It began as a wind that disturbed the mountain stillness, just a whisper at first, then a rush of sound like the roar of an ocean. The wind sprang up from the earth upon which the pages of the broken books of magic now lay, stirring dust and ash, whipping at the few tiny shards of green flame that still flickered in the meadow grasses. It lifted skyward in the shape of a funnel, catching up those scattered pages in a snowstorm of white. The pages that were burned became suddenly healed, their ragged edges closing, their yellowed surfaces turning pristine white once more. The pages that were filled with the drawings of the unicorns mixed and joined with them until none was distinguishable from the others. A wall of pages rose up across the skyline, crackling and snapping madly as the wind whipped them through the air.
Then the pages began to change. The drawings began to shimmer and flex, and abruptly the unicorns came alive. No longer frozen in still life, they began to race about the funnel’s edge. There were hundreds of them, all white, all in motion, a blur of power and speed. The pages and bindings of the books of magic were gone now; there were only the unicorns. They flew through the air and cried out in ecstasy against the roar of the wind.
Free they seemed to be saying! Free!
Then the funnel broke apart and the unicorns scattered, flooding the skies above the mountain clearing in a rush of graceful, delicate bodies — like fireworks exploding in an impossibly beautiful shower. The unicorns spread out across the skyline — buoyed by the magic of their transformation — then soared into the distance. Their cries lingered after them momentarily, then faded into silence.
The mountains had gone still again.
Legend
“There never was any black unicorn,” Willow said.
“There was, but it was only a deception,” Ben said.
Questor Thews and Abernathy, Bunion and Parsnip, and Fillip and Sot looked at each other in confusion.
They sat within the shade of a great, old oak at the edge of the meadow clearing, the lingering smell of scorched earth a pungent reminder of all that had befallen. The last of the shards of green flame had flickered out, but trailers of smoke and particles of dust and ash still floated weightless through the sun-streaked afternoon air. Abernathy had been dusted off, the others had been freed of their bonds, and the six of them were gathered about Ben and Willow, who were trying to explain what had happened. It wasn’t easy because neither of them knew everything yet, so they were piecing the story together as they went.
“It might be easier if we start at the beginning,” Ben offered.
He hunched forward, legs crossing before him. He was ragged and dirty, but at least they all recognized him now. Removing his own deception of who and what he was had removed theirs as well.