**..Once Upon A Time…there were 2 hunters and a Unicorn**
One day it happened that two men with long bows rode through her forest, hunting for deer. The unicorn followed them, moving so warily that not even the horses knew she was near. The sight of men filled her with an old, slow, strange mixture of tenderness and terror. She never let one see her if she could help it, but she liked to watch them ride by and hear them talking.
“I mislike the feel of this forest,” the elder of the two hunters grumbled. “Creatures that live in a unicorn’s wood learn a little magic of their own in time, mainly concerned with disappearing. We’ll find no game here.”
“Unicorns are long gone,” the second man said. “If, indeed, they ever were. This is a forest like any other.”
“Then why do the leaves never fall here, or the snow? I tell you, there is one unicorn left in the world — good luck to the lonely old thing, I say — and as long as it lives in this forest, there won’t be a hunter takes so much as a titmouse home at his saddle. Ride on, ride on, you’ll see. I know their ways, unicorns.”
“From books,” answered the other. “Only from books and tales and songs. Not in the reign of three kings has there been even a whisper of a unicorn seen in this country or any other. You know no more about unicorns than I do, for I’ve read the same books and heard the same stories, and I’ve never seen one either.”
The first hunter was silent for a time, and the second whistled sourly to himself. Then the first said, “My great-grandmother saw a unicorn once. She used to tell me about it when I was little.”
“Oh, indeed? And did she capture it with a golden bridle?”
“No. She didn’t have one. You don’t have to have a golden bridle to catch a unicorn; that part’s the fairy tale. You need only to be pure of heart.”
“Yes, yes.” The younger man chuckled. “Did she ride her unicorn, then? Bareback, under the trees, like a nymph in the early days of the world?”
“My great-grandmother was afraid of large animals,” said the first hunter. “She didn’t ride it, but she sat very still, and the unicorn put its head in her lap and fell asleep. My great-grandmother never moved till it woke.”
“What did it look like? Pliny describes the unicorn as being very ferocious, similar in the rest of its body to a horse, with the head of a deer, the feet of an elephant, the tail of a bear; a deep, bellowing voice, and a single black horn, two cubits in length. And the Chinese —”
“My great-grandmother said only that the unicorn had a good smell. She never could abide the smell of any beast, even a cat or a cow, let alone a wild thing. But she loved the smell of the unicorn. She began to cry once, telling me about it. Of course, she was a very old woman then, and cried at anything that reminded her of her youth.”
“Let’s turn around and hunt somewhere else,” the second hunter said abruptly. The unicorn stepped softly into a thicket as they turned their horses, and took up the trail only when they were well ahead of her once more. The men rode in silence until they were nearing the edge of the forest, when the second hunter asked quietly, “Why did they go away, do you think? If there ever were such things.”
“Who knows? Times change. Would you call this age a good one for unicorns?”
“No, but I wonder if any man before us ever thought his time a good time for unicorns. And it seems to me now that I have heard stories — but I was sleepy with wine, or I was thinking of something else. Well, no matter. There’s light enough yet to hunt, if we hurry. Come!”
They broke out of the woods, kicked their horses to a gallop, and dashed away. But before they were out of sight, the first hunter looked back over his shoulder and called, just as though he could see the unicorn standing in shadow, “Stay where you are, poor beast. This is no world for you. Stay in your forest, and keep your trees green and your friends long-lived. Pay no mind to young girls, for they never become anything more than silly old women. And good luck to you.”
– Hunter scene in The Last Unicorn tale –
Credits : lostseattle.com/?p=728
Adra Braeden 