The Last Unicorn by Beagle

Ref: Peter Beagle (1991). The Last Unicorn. Ace Publishing.

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Summary

The unicorn had lived since before memory in a forest where death could touch nothing. Maidens who caught a glimpse of her glory were blessed by enchantment they would never forget. But outside her wondrous realm, dark whispers and rumours carried a message she could not ignore: "Unicorns are gone from the world." Aided by a bumbling magician and an indomitable spinster, she set out to learn the truth. but she feared even her immortal wisdom meant nothing in a world where a mad king's curse and terror incarnate lived only to stalk the last unicorn to her doom (goodreads).

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“Love is generous precisely because it can never be immortal.”
“When I was alive, I believed—as you do—that time was at least as real and solid as myself, and probably more so. I said ‘one o’clock’ as though I could see it, and ‘Monday’ as though I could find it on the map; and I let myself be hurried along from minute to minute, day to day, year to year, as though I were actually moving from one place to another. Like everyone else, I lived in a house bricked up with seconds and minutes, weekends and New Year’s Days, and I never went outside until I died, because there was no other door. Now I know that I could have walked through the walls.” Molly blinked bewilderedly, but Schmendrick was nodding. “Yes,” he said. “That’s how the real magicians do it. But then the clock—” “The clock will never strike the right time,” the skull said. “Haggard scrambled the works long ago, one day when he was trying to grab hold of time as it swung by. But the important thing is for you to understand that it doesn’t matter whether the clock strikes ten next, or seven, or fifteen o’clock. You can strike your own time, and start the count anywhere. When you understand that—then any time at all will be the right time for you.”
“A naked girl who struggled in her body like a cow in quicksand.”
“Great heroes need great sorrows and burdens, or half their greatness goes unnoticed.”

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