Chapter Two: The Voice and The End

They were riding up to the great, black tower that was the only building to be seen. Kendra had gotten off of Aragorn's horse to walk through the water next to the group. As soon as she got down, Pippin had been put on behind Aragorn. Kendra had gone on ahead and soon met the one she had heard of. She had always wondered who 'Treebeard' was and now she knew.

"Ah, young master Gandalf," he rumbled.

'Young master? How old is he?' Kendra thought as she watched Treebeard move forward to greet the group.

She looked around the ruins as Gandalf talked with Treebeard. There were a lot of ruined machines, most of which had nasty looking points.

'Were they creating torture devices or wheels?'

"Let's just have his head and be done with it," she heard Gimli suddenly say.

"No," Gandalf replied. "We need him to talk."

Suddenly, a voice seemed to come out of nowhere and yet everywhere. Kendra clutched her head in pain as the voice seemed to penetrate into the very core of her mind. Whoever this Saruman was, he held great power despite what Gandalf said.

'You are seeking your way home, are you not?' it said.

'What does it matter to you?' she replied.

'I can help you. All you have to do is help me.'

'How?'

'Convince them that I am not dangerous. You have the power to do that. You have immense power. If you silence Gandalf, the others will have to listen to you.'

'No, they are my friends. If I killed Gandalf, they would see me as the enemy.'

'You do not know what you can do.'

"SHUT UP!" she suddenly screamed.

The group looked to her. Gandalf quickly looked up towards Saruman and frowned. Kendra was on the ground, sobbing and trying to stop the throbbing in her head.

"Saruman, your staff is broken," Gandalf said.

To everyone's amazement, Saruman's staff shattered in his hand. After that, things quickly went wrong. Theoden saw Grima up on top of the tower with Saruman and tried to get him to come back to him as a man of Rohan. Saruman did not approve of this and quickly shoved Grima to the floor. Then, Grima suddenly attacked Saruman, stabbing a knife into Saruman's back.

An arrow flew and ended Grima's life. Saruman's body was not so lucky. It fell off the tower and soon met a bloody stop on top of one of his own wheels. A few seconds later, it started turning, taking his body under water.

"The filth of Saruman is washing away," Treebeard said. "Trees will come back to live here. Young trees, wild trees."

Kendra stood up, breathing slowly, trying to clear her head. She also got to see Pippin climbing off of Aragorn's horse.

"Pippin!" Aragorn called.

The group watched as Pippin walked over to something and leaned down to pick it up. He came up with a smooth, dark ball. Kendra looked at it, her curiosity growing. That was, until Gandalf came over and took it quickly from Pippin. If Gandalf took it from a curious Hobbit, then something evil was hooked with it. Something she didn't want to be involved in.