Thinking of the wide and open places of the plains, you realize that a unicorn might find the area pleasing.  You silently head down the path for it, a thoughtful frown on your face.  You enter the mists, thinking that you'll never get used to the way it hems you in so thoroughly, and in no time you find yourself beholding a great plain.  The trees here are sparse and look to be tough survivors.  It is rather warm, and the land is flat and covered with tall, drying grasses.  It's fall, you realize.

"Do you think the unicorn is here?" you query as you look around.

"Not at this time of the year," the Elven lady answers readily.  "The animals have migrated to more hospitible climates.  The rains will cease soon, to be replaced by cold and snow.  Though that does not usually bother a creature like that, some choosiness is allowed."

"Why is that?" you ask in slight wonder.  "Why should it be spoiled?"

She glances at you sharply.  "Because allowances must be made for the last member of any kind."

You find your mouth dropping open in stunned horror.  "The last....?  But how?!  A century ago they were as common as mice in a field!" you exclaim.

The lady's look becomes frigid as she stares across the waving grass.  "When humankind began to hunt the people of the single horn and swift hooves, they retreated back into the mists of Faerie from whence they'd come.  Only one stayed, seeing still the innate good in the hunters."

"There was no ill-will?"  You could not believe there wasn't, but her negative answer proves otherwise.  "And so the last unicorn came to your forest for sanctuary."

She smiles enigmatically.  "You say those words; not me."  She takes you by the hand and says no more, leading you on down the path and through the grass.

There are still some animals here.  A few antelope and deer remain, as do their natural predators.  You pass within touching distance of a large cat, tawny and obviously on the prowl.  As it seems not to sense you, you have a suspicion that not only are you invisible but also the path is unseen as well.

You and your guide finally come to a stately tree.  It rises up from seemingly nowhere and twists up into the sky.  The path leads right up to it, inside it, and so you continue on.  Just inside the tree are three branches to the path, mist-shrouded, with their signs.  The words are written in the dirt, and you step on one just out of curiosity.

It remains as it is, no smudging of the phrase "To the valley."  The other two read "To the falls," and "To the ocean."