I realize this is a strange way to work my plot to its completion, but this is what has to be done. Hermione is not in a good mood. She's slightly depressed.

In spite of that, she intends to honor a promise, which will come to light in this chapter.

Thank you.

- xHx

Finally, she had to face it and open her eyes. She pulled the covers tight around her and looked out the window at the round, full moon and spoke softly. "Legolas, le velui a hael. Galo Anor erin râd lîn. Oltho vê." She smiled, laying back down and closing her eyes, to remember the last few days she spent with Legolas.

"Final count," Legolas said, "forty-two."

"Forty-two? Oh," Gimli replied from where he sat on an Uruk's back, smoking, "that's not bad…for a pointy-eared Elvish princeling. I myself am sitting pretty on forty-three."

Hermione stood a small distance away from them, arms folded, a smirk on her features as she watched Legolas draw his bow and hit the corpse under Gimli.

"Forty-three," he said, his tone half-joking.

"He was already dead."

"He was twitching."

Hermione stepped in.

"Ahem," she said softly, her voice taunting. "Neither of you won the contest; I did, with a count of sixty-eight."

Gimli and Legolas stared at her. The Dwarf's expression was dumbfounded, while Legolas simply grinned. He was proud of her.

"I guess that's settled, then. Hísiven has bested us both," the Elf said. He looked like he wanted to laugh.

"Only the ones she killed without her magic count!" Gimli said.

"That is all I've counted, Gimli. With those counted toward my total, it would be almost two hundred."

That afternoon, the friends were leaving Helm's Deep on horseback with a small number of Rohirrim and Théoden King. They knew their destination – Isengard. They sought the truth from Saruman, who seemed to know almost too much about Hermione. It was more of a matter of figuring out what he knew than one of importance. She knew who she was.

"Hísiven," Legolas said, reaching out to touch her shoulder, "are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Legolas. Perfectly fine."

These words bore a different meaning for them. It meant she was nervous because there had been no hints of a dizzy spell since before the battle.

Things had been very weird involving Gimli and Aragorn since the battle's end, when she had disclosed her secret. Gandalf had already known, but Théoden, Éowyn, and Éomer, not to mention Gimli and Aragorn, had reacted as expected. Aragorn kept asking her if she felt secure with the choice she was forced to make, while Gimli just ignored the serious nature of her predicament.

Gandalf and Legolas were very supportive; the former kept offering up ideas as to how she might return, while the latter just wanted her to be happy with whatever choice she made. Hermione was finding it sickening. She knew he was trying to keep her happy, to keep her from worrying, but it only made it worse. Watching him pretend he'd be all right when she left made her worry more than it would if he'd admit the truth.

Finally, she decided to corner him, get him alone. She thought it'd be easy.

It wasn't, but she finally, finally, got him away from the rest of the group.

"Legolas," she began, toying with a leaf she'd caught in her hair, "why are you pretending you'll be perfectly happy after I'm forced back to the world I was raised in?"

"I am not pretending. What I am doing is practicing the act I will put forth when you have gone," he replied, touching her cheek faintly. "In absolute honesty, I will be sorrowful. And I will be hurting."

Hermione rolled over in the hospital wing bed, biting down on her pillow to muffle her sobbing. The sorrow in Legolas's eyes had hurt her then, and remembering it now was even worse. She could not stop the tears as they flowed.

A soft hand touched her shoulder, rubbing gently in comfort. The brunette looked up to meet wide, feminine blue eyes.

"Luna?"

The blonde smiled. "Who else would it be?" Her eyes now shone with infinite wisdom and suffering. A pair of scars, slightly off-kilter with each other, adorned either side of her neck.

"What happened to you?"

"An arrow through the neck, near the border of Gondor and Mordor," she said, fingering the round scar on the left of her neck. "You?"

Hermione looked up at the shining moon and smiled.

As the party of riders approached the edge of Isengard, they heard a laughing shriek. It was Pippin, with Merry, on a broken wall around a flooded Isengard.

"Sly little devils," Hermione muttered.

"Welcome," Merry said, standing up, "my lords, to Isengard!"

Is he smoking? Hermione thought.

"You young rascals!" Gimli shouted. "A merry hunt you've led us on, and now we find you…feasting a-and smoking!"

Pippin leaned forward as he spoke. "We are sitting on a field of victory, enjoying a few well-earned comforts." Merry, leaning as well, blew a little smoke from his mouth.

"Where's Ginny?" she asked aloud.

Pippin's face fell slightly. "She fell into the water and never came up," he said. "We thought it best not to dwell on losing her and instead enjoy the spoils of our victory." He leaned forward again, smiling once more. "The salted pork is particularly good."

Gimli spoke again, seeming shocked. "Salted pork?"

Gandalf scoffed. "Hobbits."

"We're under orders from Treebeard, who has taken over management of Isengard."

Hermione rode near Legolas, behind him, watching everything she saw intently. When the tallest tree-figure, assumed to be Treebeard, turned toward them, Hermione froze.

"Young master Gandalf," the figure said. "I'm glad you've come. Wood and water, stock and stone I can master. But there is a Wizard to manage here, locked in his tower."

"Oh, isn't that lovely?" Hermione said. Her voice seemed to startle the Ent.

"I thought the wind whispered of a grand return. It is a great pleasure to finally meet you, Hísiven Rhovanel, the purest heart born among the Elves in many years," he said.

"It is good to meet you as well, Treebeard," she replied.

Aragorn whispered something, to which Gandalf replied, "Be careful. Even in defeat, Saruman is dangerous."

Gimli, violent as ever, threw in his opinion. "Well, let's just have his head and be done with it."

"No. We need him alive. We need him to talk."

"You have fought many wars and slain many men, Théoden King," came the voice on the air, so like the one she had heard on the Pass of Caradhras, from somewhere out of sight, before the old wizard showed himself over the top of the tower, "and made peace afterwards. Can we not take counsel together as we once did, my old friend? Can we not have peace, you and I?"

"We shall have peace," Théoden shouted. "We shall have peace when you answer for the burning of the Westfold and the children that lie dead there! We shall have peace when the lives of the soldiers whose bodies were hewn even as they lay dead against the gates of the Hornburg, are avenged! When you hang from a gibbet for the sport of your own crows, we shall have peace."

"Gibbets and crows? Dotard! What do you want, Gandalf Greyhame? Let me guess. The key of Orthanc. Or perhaps the Keys of Barad-dur itself along with the crowns of the seven kings and the rods of the Five Wizards!"

"Your treachery has already cost many lives," Gandalf called. "Thousands more are at risk. But you can save them, Saruman. You were deep in the enemy's counsel."

"So you have come here for information. I have some for you." He lifted the very same black smoky orb Hermione had seen when she had fallen under the spell of some sort of vision. "Something festers in the heart of Middle-Earth. Something that you have failed to see. But the Great Eye has seen it." He lowered the orb. "Even now he presses his advantage. His attack will come soon. You're all going to die."

Hermione drew out her wand, laying it across her right thigh, watching the wizard.

"But you know this, don't you, Gandalf?" the wizard continued. "You cannot think that this Ranger will ever sit upon the throne of Gondor. This exile, crept from the shadows, will never be crowned king. Gandalf does not hesitate to sacrifice those closest to him, those he professes to love. Tell me, what words of comfort did you give the Halfling before you sent him to his doom? The path that you have set him on can only lead to death."

"You are lying, Saruman, and you know it! You know that something else stirs, a whispering sort of fate upon the wind! You have heard it!" Hermione moved closer to the tower, Orthanc. "It is the sort of thing that reshapes destiny itself in a slow but unyielding manner."

"Hísiven Rhovanel. I wondered when you would speak," the wizard said. "Just because you are surrounded by protectors doesn't mean I cannot touch you."

"I've heard enough!" Gimli said, quite loudly, before whispering to Legolas.

"You may have heard enough, but you have not seen enough," Saruman said.

And Hermione gasped in sudden pain. Her hand felt the shaft of an arrow protruding from her chest, buried in her heart. She glanced at the feathered end. Green. Saruman had done something Hermione had known was possible, but had not expected from the old wizard. He had used wind and matter manipulation to speed the arrow into her chest. An arrow from Legolas's quiver.

"Bastard," she muttered, blue eyes narrowed up at Saruman, before her grip on Cúron's reigns fell lax and she slid off of the black mare, into the water.

"Hísiven!"

"Hermione!"

The shouts of her name were muffled by the water, until Legolas pulled her out, holding her tightly.

"Hísiven, look at me. Please, look at me," he whispered, brushing her soaking wet hair away from her eyes, which opened slowly.

"Don't look at me like that, Legolas," she whispered, voice small, weak.

"Where's your bag?" he asked quietly.

"That won't help," she said. "Kiss me."

Tears slid from the inner corners of his blue, blue eyes, but he obliged. He kissed her lips tenderly, gently. "Not now," he whispered against her lips.

She laughed, smiling just a little, her lips shaping soundless words.

"Thus, with a kiss, I die."

Luna stared open-mouthed at Hermione, who was now blushing.

"If you say a single word to Ron or Harry, you will regret it."

"I know. I remember what you did to Boromir. I won't make the same mistake," the blonde said, pulling the brunette into a hug. "I won't say anything."

"We will tell them I was crushed by a boulder during the assault upon the Rohirric fortress of Helm's Deep. The wall exploded – it should be easy to make them believe it," Hermione said. "Now. Go back to your own bed."

Luna nodded and left the hospital wing.

Legolas pulled the arrow from Hermione's still, ice-cold body, his hands trembling and covered in her blood. He had to try. He had to be strong, honor her while they could not see each other. But just because he had no choice but to pretend did not mean he would not grieve.

"Remember her request, Legolas," Gandalf said.

The Elf nodded, lifting the lifeless form onto Cúron's back, laying her down. "I remember," he whispered. "May I now kill Saruman?"

Thus ends Part One!

Do not fret, my darlings. The next part will begin soon!

Sincerely,

xHx

P.S., here is a link to part 2! .net/s/7971548/1/A_Diamond_Heart_Wild_Star_Part_Two