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Disclaimer: I don't own The Hobbit and not even a smidge of BTVS, which is a terrible shame really, because if I did I'd be filthy rich and nobody good would die and everything would just be swell.

Rating: T for gore and violence, because The Hobbit wasn't exactly a picnic in the park, and Buffy isn't always such a nice lady.

Summary: Set during The Hobbit and immediately post BTVS Season 5- The Gift.

There is no word for Buffy in Sindarin so the elves call her Dagnirel, the Bane Star, for she fell from the sky and her eyes glitter with diamond light. But no-one can stand before her when she bares her blades in battle and death is her gift.

I. Of Endings

It is the Lady Galadriel who Sees her first.

The water in her scrying mirror ripples and she watches a star fall from the sky, a star clothed in blood and battle, with hair the colour of gold streaming behind her as she plummets to the ground from a circle of electric white and blue above the forest floor.

But it is Lord Elrond and his riders who find her- face down in the earth, arms and fingers spread like falling rays of sunlight- caked in blood that is not her own and no pulse beneath her skin. Except that as they turn her over and push back her hair she coughs and coughs, chest shaking, lungs heaving and finally…finally she takes a breath.

And then she screams.

She screams as if her whole world has ended, as if she had lost something very dear and so very irreplaceable and she will never get it back. She screams with her eyes shut and her head in her hands and she does not stop until Lord Elrond takes pity on her and with a swift press of his fingers to her temples renders her unconscious.

/*/*/*/

They wash the blood from her limbs and bathe her skin in the gentlest of soaps, perfume her body in soft lotions and clothe her in silk and satin. They brush her golden river of hair and plait it behind her back in one long braid and wipe the tears from her skin.

But she does not smile and her eyes are sad and she speaks no language Elrond has ever heard in Middle Earth.

She wanders restlessly around Imladris, face expressionless. Even as they feed her the choicest of fruits and teach her their language she remains quiet and the spark- the star spark that should light up her eyes – remains extinguished and Elrond fears for her. For what could have happened to her.

For what will happen to her.

They teach her soft music and dancing and poetry, but still the Star maiden remains distant. And even as her fluency in the language of the elves grows as the years pass by, Elrond wonders whether he will ever be able to truly understand what she means when she tells him she died for a sister who never existed and for a home she will never see again.

When age does not touch her in the way of Men, he wonders whether she is of the Dúnedain (and though short for the height of that lineage and indeed for the line of any breed of Man) he calls forth the Rangers.

But when faced with the woman dressed in white they confess they know her not when they meet her. For she is young in feature and small in stature and her eyes pierce through all flesh.

But the Star maiden looks not at their faces but at their weapons and when she holds out her hands and asks politely in perfect Sindarin for permission to handle the swords resting upon their hips they do as they are bid.

And with blades in both hands finally, finally there is a smile and the star spark ignites. But there are diamonds behind her eyes; hard and sharp and enduring.

II. Of Men

There is no word for Buffy in Sindarin so the elves call her Dagnirel, the Bane Star for her eyes glitter with diamond light and her fall from the sky is starting to become more legend than story as the years pass. But she wields the elven blades the Lord of Imladris gifts her with as extensions of herself and no-one can stand before her when she bares them in battle and death is her gift.

The name sticks until it is all that she is and she is The Dagnirel and she answers to no other name.

She leaves with the rangers and Elrond's blessing when the spring winds blow. For it has been years since she came but the comfort of the elves does not help her and he thinks that perhaps he must let her wander to find herself. To find a purpose.

The rangers teach her Westron and how to track a hare from a bent blade of grass. What species of bird sings from the slant of the sun and how to fish with nothing more than her bare hands. Which plants will heal and which will kill and how to read the stars and the wind for direction. They teach her of pipes and tobacco, hearth fires and inns. Of concealment and archery but most importantly they tell her the stories of men; tales of love and death and bravery, of honour and betrayal, of women and wine and crowns.

And for each tale a little piece of the coldness seeps away from her bones.

The sagas of men have more dirt and blood in them than the chronicles of the elves that they sang in Imladris, but it makes them no less beautiful. And every day she feels the slow chipping away at the place where her heart lies, callused with black diamonds.

In return she shares little of her previous life with them- the life she left back in a world no-one else remembers.

She does not tell them of her sister who glowed green when she bled or of her flame haired friend with magic at her fingertips. Does not tell them of her mother with her kind hands and her stern words and her oh so empty eyes and cold, cold skin that day she was found. Keeps to herself her dark haired best friend and his loyalty and her mentor with his glasses and ancient books and unfailing love.

And most importantly, she does not tell them her name, her true name. The name her mother gave her. For that girl died upon entering this world and has no place in Middle-Earth.

She locks these things up tight within herself, so tightly that they cannot roam free and hurt her anymore and instead she tells them the little things about herself.

Her favourite colour. The taste of cookie dough. Fairy stories from her childhood, snatches of radio jingles she remembers. Ice-skating. Her first kiss. Fourth of July fireworks. She hunts down their food and lights their camp fires and always keeps watch first. She revenges their wounds and fights her own corners and as the spring buds to summer and the leaves drop to autumn and then winter races in the rangers call her one of their own and she is Dúnedain in everything but blood.

For if it was the elves that had brought her back to life, it was the rangers who taught her how to live again.

III. Of Dwarves

He can't help but notice her as she walks by the town's smithy.

Striding with the Dúnedain men she goes by, the woman whose eyes glisten like diamonds and whose hair runs like gold, and for once he wants something other than revenge and to reclaim his grandfather's lost kingdom. Wants something more than a mountain and a throne and a place to call home.

He fears that his grandfather's illness has suddenly come upon him- the gold sickness- and he closes his eyes, but the longing forces his eyes open and makes his fingers twitch with the impulse to reach out and touch her as she passes. But he is Thorin Oakenshield, so instead he clenches his hammer and tongs and beats the feelings out of him with every blow that strikes the sword he is shaping.

She disappears from view and he releases the breath he doesn't realise he has been holding and wipes the sweat from his brow. Concentrates back on the sword he is hammering and loses himself in the rhythm of metal and heat.

But as the twilight darkens and the firelight grows low, she appears in the forge and the desire in his chest suddenly returns full force. She stands barely an inch shorter than him but her features are the features of men and in the firelight her hair flames to molten ore and he knows he is lost.

"They say you are the best," she greets him, her Westron accented with a cadence he has never heard before and she holds out her hands to him and in her palms rest a broken blade, cleaved neatly into two.

His hand closes over hers as he takes the pieces from her. "What did this?"

"I did," she replies and a smile plays around her lovely mouth. "Practice against another ranger. I forgot my blades were stronger and now I owe him a new one. Or a mended one." She shrugs gracefully and he follows the delicate bones of her shoulders that rise up and down beneath the fastening of her brown cloak.

"So, what's your price…" she pauses expectantly and he realizes she is waiting for his name.

"I am Thorin, son of Thrain, son of Thror," he offers, inclining his head.

"Dagnirel," she replies easily, "daughter of Joyce, daughter of Anne," and the ache in his chest sudden hardens to lead weight. He looks at her properly and notes the blades slung across her hips and over her back are no make of Men or Dwarf and the irony burns metallic at the back of his throat - that the one woman who should move him to feel something other than vengeance carries both elven weaponry and a name in their tongue.

Unknowingly he has dropped her hand and she looks down at her empty palm and back to his face and frowns. "You're angry," she says simply. "Why?"

"I do not work for elves."

"I'm not an elf."

"But you are a friend to them for you carry both an elven name and their blades and that is enough," he utters quietly and the words cost him more than he can say. "I cannot help you."

"No," she breathes. "You choose not to," and her eyes flash with disappointment. She takes her sword back sharply from him but her movements are too quick and the broken pieces slice her hands, blood welling up in rich ruby droplets across the skin of her palms.

He is reaching out to help her before he can catch himself but she brings her hands up against her chest protectively, shrugging away his help and backing away.

"You can't help me," she replies quietly, slinging his own words back in his face.

He watches her leave with her broken sword and her bleeding hands and something like regret settles over his chest and squeezes where his heart should be. For dwarves love once and she is walking away from him.

And in the morning he watches her leave with the rangers and she does not look back.

IV. Of Wizards

Gandalf knows little about broken hearts or spirits but he knows plenty about finding out those who wish to remain unfound. Seeking out Dagnirel is therefore an easier task than many suppose and when he finds her in a corner of The Prancing Pony with her hood up and her boots on the table and an empty glass of mead he sits down quietly beside her and orders another drink.

"Well," she asks after the mead has been brought and drunk and the silence has stretched on for an hour or so. "What do you want, Mithrandir?"

"Can a wizard not seek out and sit quietly with an old friend, without being asked such an impertinent question?"

"When said wizard is you," Dagnirel replies, "and he answers one question with another, the answer is a big fat no." She pushes her hood up and he takes note of the lines that have begun to settle around the corners of her eyes, and the thin white scar that runs from beneath the skin of her right ear to trail down her neck and beneath her collarbone. "I suppose Elrond sent you."

"He worries," he says simply, knowing the truth will work best for his purposes. "Nobody has heard from you for quite some years now and the last the rangers glimpsed of you was three decades before in the Green Wood. I had never supposed a simple rebuff from a dwarf prince could have caused you to hide away for so many years."

"I never knew you to be Ada's errand boy," she comments shortly, "and I am not hiding."

He smiles because her temper only flares when riled and his words have hit home. "A wizard answers to no-one but himself," he says gruffly, "least of all the Lord of Imladris. But now that we are speaking of errands, I have one I would ask of you."

Her mouth purses but he reads the affection lurking in her eyes, even as she raises an eyebrow and snorts. "The last errand you sent me on totally ruined all of my shirts and turned Radagast's hair blue. Not to mention that it took a month to pick out all of the bugs from my teeth. You already owe me, Mithrandir."

"Yes, well," he blusters. "Just this one small task and then I will repay all debts, with interest," he adds, seeing the look that crosses her face.

"Why do I have the feeling that I'm going to regret agreeing to this?" Dagnirel asks in resignation.

Gandalf, however, can read the interest she tries so hard to disguise and smiles slowly to himself. "It is just a small trifling job, my dear." And he sucks hard on his pipe and blows out a cloud of smoke rings and leans in closer. "Have you ever heard of something called a hobbit?"

/*/*/*/

The map to the Lonely Mountain has been brought out and spread upon the table when there is another knock at the door and all the dwarves around the table still.

Thorin turns to the wizard in the corner and scowls. "Gandalf," he warns, "who else did you invite?"

Gandalf sucks his pipe and schools his face into something inscrutable. "I hired a bodyguard for our burglar. You yourself agreed you could not guarantee his safety, so I asked someone who could."

He keeps one ear on the argument that begins around the table and another on Bilbo as the hobbit nervously goes to open the door and his hearing can just pick up on the conversation that the unexpected visitor and Master Baggins have.

"Hi. You must be Bilbo, I'm Dagnirel. Mithrandir sent me. Please tell me he told you I was coming?"

"Yes," he hears Bilbo reply uneasily. "He might have mentioned something. Won't you come in? Everyone's in the dining room-" but the hobbit's sentence draws to a halt and no doubt Gandalf thinks, he has spotted the blades strapped to her back and hips over the close fitting brown tunic and breaches she wears. The blades that are as almost as big as Bilbo and impossible for anyone but The Dagnirel to weild.

"Would you…would you like me to take your weapons?" he hears the hobbit ask hesitantly.

"Thanks but no. I always wear them."

"Always?" And Gandalf can hear the wonder in the hobbit's voice at the discomfort that must cause. "Even in bed?"

"Especially in bed," she replies smoothly. "Is Mithrandir this way?"

But Gandalf is already standing as best he can, head peering out of the dining room and he hides a smile at the sight of the Halfling blushing furiously from head to toe. "Dagnirel, stop embarrassing Bilbo and tell me why you're late."

"I ran into a problem on the way here and it took me a while to deal with it," she replies easily but her smile is dark and the wizard can pick out the slowly drying blood on her cloak even in the dim light of the hallway.

But before she has taken more than a few steps into the dining room she has stopped dead. Her fingers clench so hard into her palms that her knuckles turn white.

"Mithrandir," she grates out, "you never said anything about dwarves. How'd you forget to mention something like that?"

"Save me from the meddling of wizards," Thorin returns equally as heatedly. "She does not come with us. The hobbit was bad enough. But a friend of elf-kind is no friend of ours and has no place on our quest."

"She is right here and she's coming whether you like it or not." Her eyes pierce his and she raises an eyebrow. "I'm here to protect Bilbo so suck it up, Thorin."

The dwarf king's eyes narrow and his expression becomes as stony as the mountain he aims for. The other dwarves finger their weapons speculatively.

Dagnirel squares her shoulders and shifts her weight to the balls of her feet and the argument begins properly, raging back and forth until it becomes difficult at points to track who is shouting what. Or at whom. Or even what a lot of the insults mean.

But then there is a sudden silence and Balin is handing Dagnirel the contract.

And Gandalf sits quietly in the corner and gets his way without having to say a word.

V. Of Hobbits and Trolls

The expedition to the Lonely Mountain is long and uncomfortable and the fact that Thorin and Dagnirel are not on speaking terms makes the journey no easier.

The other dwarves are wary of her, shrouded as she is in her bloodied brown cloak and with her elven name and weapons. She speaks only when spoken to and her replies to Bilbo are short and to the point. But he senses her answers are honest ones and when he spies the glint of gold coins in the purse at her waist his heart eases at the thought she had believed in him before he had.

"Tell me of the elves?" he asks one day, as they trek down the side of another steep valley (for really one hill in this country looks much like another and already Bilbo is hopelessly lost). "Gandalf says you lived in Rivendell for a time and that you call the lord who lives there father. But you're too short to be an elf and…" he bites his tongue for Dagnirel's eyebrows have risen and her eyes beneath her hood glimmer and he realises he is being rude.

"Gandalf says, does he?" And her eyes are burning holes into the wizard's back as he rides before them.

Then she is quiet for a long time and Bilbo thinks she will not answer him when suddenly she opens her mouth.

"Once upon a time," she begins, "there was a girl and she was chosen to fight all of the darkness of the world…"

By the time evening has fallen and they stop to make camp. Bilbo's head is full of hell-gods and vampires and things he has never even dreamt of and he trembles and almost falls from his pony as the company dismounts.

There is a hand on his shoulder as Dagnirel steadies him and he feels the warmth of her skin and some of the fear fades from his expression as she holds him.

"But what happened," he asks, "in the end? To the girl and her friends and-"

"It was just a story, Bilbo," she interrupts gently, shrugging her shoulders. But her eyes glitter diamond hard in the night and he wonders. "But I'll protect you, always," she swears and slings an arm around his shoulder and leads him to the campfire.

With the heat of the fire on his face and Bombur's cooking in his stomach the fairy-tale recedes into the corner of his mind. Gradually, the other dwarves settle down for the night and as the distant noise of orcs fills the air, the tale of the fall of Erebor is told.

But in the dark Bilbo cannot help but watch as Thorin's eyes find Dagnirel's.

She does not look away.

And Bilbo does not forget that the story remains unfinished.

/*/*/*/

Perhaps it is the memory of the story but he does not let despair swallow him when he is captured by trolls and threatened with slow dismemberment.

Nor does he worry when he cannot see his bodyguard amongst the dwarves who have angrily cast their useless weapons aside and now wait the judgement of the trolls.

She has sworn to protect him and he believes in her utterly.

"Bilbo!"

And true to her promise Dagnirel explodes in a blur of motion from behind the trees. The trolls drop him to swat away this new threat but before he can even roll out of the way to safety, her sword has plunged between the eyes of one troll. The creature bellows and clutches his bleeding face before his eyes roll into his head.

He drops to the forest floor, dead.

She swings her sword, slick with blood at the next troll, but he is quicker than the first. His fingers close around her and squeeze her body between one mighty fist, whilst the other living troll grabs Bilbo back.

They are at stalemate again.

Later, as the trolls finish bagging some of the dwarves and begin to slowly roast the others, Bilbo can only watch helplessly as the first troll scowls at Dagnirel, who is still clutched in his thick fist.

"You killed our kin so you'll die first."

"Like I've never heard that one before," Dagnirel spits in his face and the troll shakes her so hard Bilbo can hear her bones rattle.

"We'll cook you slowly and painfully," the troll sneers, "but we're gonna tenderize you up to start with."

And then he hooks his fingers round Dagnirel's ankles and swings her upside down against the nearest rock, over and over again. There is a sickening crack as something breaks.

"Stop!"

Bilbo has opened his mouth but it is Thorin who has shouted. To the hobbit's surprise the troll does so, but Dagnirel hangs limply from his fist and the blood trickles down and drips from her dangling fingertips to wet the ground below.

His bodyguard is bleeding because of him and Bilbo screws up his courage. He recalls the stories of the previous night, of the chosen girl and the lonely, defiant prince and does what hobbits do best and spins a story to the trolls.

And by the time he has finished telling his lies the dawn is rising and Gandalf is here and the trolls become stone.

But Dagnirel lies unmoving on the ground and freed from their sack bindings Bilbo runs to her, and feels Thorin drop to his knees beside where she rests. His hand reaches for a pulse and Bilbo watches as the dwarf king's fingers shake ever so slightly.

They drop away. "She lives."

Gandalf pushes his way through the crowd of dwarves and muttering pushes his hands to her head. His fingertips have barely grazed her skin when her eyes shoot open, one bloodied hand gripping his wrist.

"Stay out of my head, Mithrandir," she growls but the wizard merely smiles and helps her sit up.

She coughs and coughs and something tears and she rolls to the side and coughs again. Thick globs of blood land on the grass beside her.

"I've punctured a lung, it's no biggie," she mutters, waving away the concern of the company. "Give me a day or two and I'll be fine."

Gandalf nods and helps her to her feet. "Dagnirel is as long lived as the Dúnedain and twice as hardy." He places an encouraging hand on Bilbo's shoulder, though the hobbit notes that Thorin looks less than reassured.

VI. Of Treasure More Than Gold and Silver

The treasure hoards in the troll cave seem to interest Dagnirel little and she waits outside, sitting down, back against a nearby rocky outcropping, letting Gandalf guide the others into the cave system.

Still Bilbo lingers, unwilling to let his rescuer alone and so vulnerable. "Go pick me something shiny," she tempts him, "and try not to attract anything else that wants to eat you whilst you're at it."

Bilbo shakes his head. "I will not leave you on your own."

"I'll be fine."

"I will stay with her," Thorin says quietly from behind Bilbo's shoulder.

If she is surprised by the offer, the look in her eyes is gone before Bilbo is even sure he has spotted it.

/*/*/*/

Treasure cannot distract Bilbo for long from thoughts of his friend and so carrying the elven made swords Gandalf has requested him to present to Thorin he makes his way back out from the stink and the gloom of the cave.

Except, at the cavern mouth he stops. Thorin's hands are around Dagnirel's neck and for a moment Bilbo thinks the king has gone mad and decided to murder her; his hands are large and calloused and could crush her throat easily.

But the gentleness with which his thumb caresses her skin speaks of another madness, far harder and more complex to understand. Bilbo closes his mouth and backtracks further into the shadows of the cave.

For Dagnirel's expression is hidden from him by the tilt of her head, but Thorin's is plain and he looks as though he holds the Arkenstone in his hand.

"You did not have this when first we met," he murmurs, his fingers tracing up and down the scar on her neck.

"Hazard of the job," she offers lightly and tenderly touches the strands of silver that run through his hair. "And these are new, though I thought grey hair was supposed to be a sign of wisdom."

"You think me a fool," the king replies flatly.

"I'm saying this quest of yours could end badly, Thorin. Apocalypse Tuesday and everyone dies and there isn't a happy ending kind of bad."

"And where was the wisdom in attacking three grown mountain trolls on your own?" Thorin retorts. "You could have been killed." He places a finger over her lips as she opens her mouth to protest and his voice softens. "You could have been killed and then what would I have done?"

Dagnirel tilts her head forward and Thorin's fingers drop from her mouth as her eyes drop to his lips.

"Thorin, I-"

But just at that moment the dwarves emerge from the cave beside Bilbo and Thorin and Dagnirel break away from each other as though burned.

Radagast chooses that moment to burst through the undergrowth, his face wild and his beard caked in bird excrement and twigs. In the distance wargs call and the dwarves unsheathe their swords.

"To arms!" calls Gandalf. "We must go."

The dwarves ready themselves to leave but Bilbo only has eyes for where Thorin is reaching down, palm open to Dagnirel, still seated on the ground.

"Let me help you."

There is a beat; a pause of breath as Bilbo watches, for something of significance seems to be happening though he seems to be the only one to have noticed the exchange.

Dagnirel slides her hand into Thorin's and their eyes meet and he pulls her up from the ground.

And once again they are running.

VII. Of Elves

Rivendell is beautiful and soothing to Bilbo but it is clear that a place crawling with elves makes the dwarven company extremely uncomfortable.

Thorin remains tense and alert to every movement around him and his unease is not lessoned by the fact that Dagnirel has disappeared upon their arrival, welcomed back into the halls of Imladris by smiling figures she calls by name and greets with clasped arms.

She does not appear at dinner nor when the moon runes are deciphered and Thorin's disquiet grows, for everyone present knows this is her home and that she belongs in a way the dwarves can never understand. If she should choose to stay…

Thorin leaves to brood and Bilbo goes wandering whilst he can, for he knows they are leaving soon and he wants one last chance to take in the beauty and the peace of the place.

That is when he hears the voices and against his better judgement runs for Thorin, who he locates, staring at the shimmer of a distant waterfall, his eyes shadowed.

"Halfling, what-"

But Bilbo shushes him and tugs him along and to his great surprise Thorin follows in silence as they wind their way through the snaking passageways of Rivendell.

And still the voices are coming to them on the breeze until they are almost upon the two figures standing in the garden below them and Thorin drags Bilbo behind two of the great white marble pillars that run along the balcony.

"Dagnirel, henig, you cannot fail to be aware of his feelings," Elrond is saying and his voice sounds pained, even as the young woman before him folds her arms and scowls. "I only wish to protect you!"

"Don't you see that you can't?" she replies impassionedly. "Maybe that's why I was sent here, to help do some good, to help them find their home, because I know what it's like to never be able to go home again."

And even from this distance Bilbo can see Elrond flinch as though she has hit him.

"I didn't…I…" Her words trail off and she sighs. "I know I'll always have a home, here, with you. But Thorin is a good man and a great king and in his company I feel more like myself than I have since coming here. Can't you be happy for me?"

"Not when you come back to me with broken bones and bleeding skin. How can I be happy when I know this decision to be folly-"

"Ada-"

"Stars cannot shine underground, Dagnirel. He will drag you down with him into his fortress of dirt and bury your light beneath the rock and stone of his home," Elrond pleads and his voice is quiet with grief. "I cannot bear to see it."

"A diamond shines just as brightly in the earth as it does in the sky," she replies quietly and leaves the Lord of Imladris desolate in his perfect garden.

Bilbo does not watch her go. Instead he fixes his gaze on Thorin, who watches her leave from his post in the shadows and in his cobalt eyes shines something like hope.

/*/*/*/

In the morning light Dagnirel re-appears as they leave.

She smiles at Bilbo and the other dwarves and Thorin's hand touches hers as he passes her the pack she bears, but her eyes are full as she leaves Imladris behind and they wind their way up the mountain passes.

She does not let herself cry until it begins to rain and nobody can tell the difference between the water that pours from the heavens and that which falls down her cheeks.

She never sees Lord Elrond again.

VIII. Of Goblins and Wargs

Dagnirel carves red ruin into the goblins as they run the gauntlet of the unsteady wooden walkways that crisscross the network of underground caverns they have found themselves in.

As Mithrandir runs ahead of them and Dagnirel picks up the rear she leaves nothing but a bloody swathe of death behind her, taking out her rage at losing Bilbo (he had fallen with them but where had he gone?) at losing her home, at losing everything and having to begin again on the unsuspecting goblins who believe because she is a woman she will be easy pickings.

But she is The Dagnirel and as she screams her name the goblins cower back in fear and then they run for they have heard her name whispered in aweful tones down in the deep and dark places of the world.

Blood coats her blades, her hair, her face and she is bathed in goblin blood. But it is not enough to appease her rage and the woman, the demon that moves within her, older than this world or any world begs for her to kill and kill until there is nothing left but ash and blood. As it has always been.

The dwarves and Mithrandir run towards daylight but she stays behind with a grin stretched hard and wide across her features and she dances.

Finally, when there is no-one left to dance with she runs to catch up with the others into the fading daylight of the world where they wait for her.

If they are taken aback by the star fire that shines in her gaze or the death that coats her like a second skin they say nothing. In fact, there is precious little time to do anything as Bilbo reappears and she crushes the air out of his lungs before shaking him for making her worry. She pulls back and wipes ineffectually at the blood that now covers him too, but his clothes are ruined and she can only offer an apologetic grimace before they are running again.

This time Azog and his wargs have come.

/*/*/*/

Thorin's eyes are full of rage and fire and she watches him walk to his doom with purpose in his gait and Orcrist bared in his hand, his oak shield in his other.

There is nothing Dagnirel can do as she dangles from her fingertips at the edge of the fallen pine tree, for it is only her demon given strength that prevents her from falling anyway. It is all she can do to dig her nails into the bark and ignore the fire in her shoulder blades.

So she does what she has not in a very, very long time. She prays and calls to anyone who will listen that someone, somewhere will save Thorin from the folly of his own pride.

And when Bilbo runs to protect him she can only close her eyes in despair and hope against everything she feels in her gut that things will work out in the end. That the Powers That Be had a plan when they sent her here. That everything has a purpose and a place and Thorin and Bilbo will not die.

For they had homes to claim and return to and she has a new place to carve out and she cannot do that alone.

The eagles come and finally she relaxes her grip on the branch. Falling and smiling she is caught by the great birds.

And the star that fell soars into the heavens once more.

IX. Of the Price of Victory

Of course not every fight is so easily won.

The Battle of Five Armies tests her to breaking point and as she sits in the tents of the King Under The Mountain and watches over his broken body she wonders what she could have done any differently.

Her dreams had warned her and she had heeded them. Had saved his nephews. Rescued her friends. Avoided the blades of all men. Yet, still she had not been able to reach Thorin in time and now he lay, swathed in bandages as his life bled from him.

The healers had shaken their heads and this time not even Mithrandir with all of his powers could offer any help. Instead they leave the king and his Dagnirel to sit quietly together as the evenings lengthen and his condition worsens.

Unheeding of her own injuries she eventually succumbs to sleep, one hand clasped in Thorin's.

She dreams of Dawn.

Her sister smiles and glows and when Dagnirel wakes she knows what she must do.

She looks at the ring on her left hand- a ring full of future promises that Thorin had given to her before the battle had begun. A ring of fine beaten entwined gold and silver, intricate and winding like rivers around her finger and woven in between a thread of shining, sparkling diamond that flickers in the light.

The ring he had offered with his heart and words of Khuzdul she did not know but whose meaning she could guess at.

She thinks of all that has happened. Of before, of home, of her family. She thinks of the after, of falling, of the people she has come to love as her new family. She thinks of Elrond and Mithrandir and Thorin. Of Bilbo.

She thinks of Dawn. Before she can think anymore she takes the blade at her side and slices open her wrist.

It feels like hours though it could be only minutes when there is a tap on the tent door and Bilbo enters.

"Dagnirel!" The hobbit cries in alarm at the sight of her blood spilling out, thick and dark like spilled garnets into Thorin's side where she has thrust her wrist, mixing his blood with hers. "What have you done? Gandalf! Anyone! Come quickly!"

She shakes her head and with her free hand clutches at Bilbo and whispers in his ear.

"It's always about the blood," she replies though her eyes never leave Thorin's even as her face whitens and her skin becomes pale as moonlight. "It's alright. I know what I'm doing. Trust me."

Bilbo looks at her searchingly and eventually he nods a little uncertainly. But it is a nod all the same.

Gandalf arrives, but it is too late and the bargain has already been struck.

/*/*/*/

An hour later Thorin's wounds have faded to scratches, his breathing once more free and easy, his skin a healthy pink and slowly he opens his eyes.

He counts the company of dwarves around his bedside, faces grim and eyes downcast. Notes with relief his nephews standing wholesome and unharmed. His eyes flick to Gandalf who suddenly appears so very old and Bilbo who sobs quietly to himself at the corner of the bed.

He wonders who has died.

The glitter of gold catches the corner of his eye and he turns his head, fingers closing around a cold hand clutched in his. Red stains the bedclothes and his bandages and golden hair spills out around the head pillowed against his side.

He strokes her cheek as his own tears fall.

But Dagnirel's eyes shut long ago and she does not feel them land upon her skin.

X. Of New Beginnings

They rebuild Erebor around her, until she is the heart of the mountain as she has always been the heart of its King.

His ring still sparkles on her finger and her body is clothed in that of a queen's as she lies in state in a room decked in every precious metal known to dwarf kind.

Bilbo would call it a tomb but she is not dead.

Her chest rises and falls with each soft breath she takes upon the bed she lies in. Her wrist has long healed over to nothing but a thin white scar but she does not open her eyes nor respond to the touch of hands or the voices of those who love her.

Bilbo cannot help but recall Elrond's words to Dagnirel as he gazes upon the sleeping queen buried as she is in the ground and as fiercely guarded by the king as Smaug had hoarded his gold.

He knows that this is what the Lord of Imladris had foreseen with aching clarity and he weeps for them both, for them all, for the woman and the King who Waits Under the Mountain.

For she sleeps and each new day there is no change he feels the hope run from his bones. She had asked him to trust her, but she makes it hard he thinks.

Today, like every other day Bilbo has come, Thorin sits beside her, his fingers clutching her left hand as if he can squeeze her hard enough she will wake up.

On this day, however, the king is asleep too, exhausted from his watch and Bilbo takes the free seat on her other side quietly and wonders what tale to regale her with today.

His tid-bits of tales from the city growing above her head he hopes grounds her in the here and now and stops her from floating even further into the deep sleep that fogs her mind. But when he opens his mouth today it is her words that come to him and burn brightest of all.

"Once upon a time," he begins, "there was a girl and she was chosen to fight all of the darkness of the world…"

The story takes hours in it's telling, as it did when first she told it to him but he keeps talking, words dropping from his lips and his memory works furiously to precisely remember each phrase, each expression she had used to utter the tale.

By the time the story draws to the point Dagnirel had left it at, Bilbo's muscles have cramped and his mouth is parched. "But you never told me how it ends," he utters softly and slips from the bedside chair, turning to leave.

Fingers close over Bilbo's wrist and from the woman in the bed there is a deep shuddering breath.

"Dagnirel?"

Slowly, oh so slowly her eyes flutter open and she turns her head to smile, her glittering diamond smile that is so wonderfully familiar to him.

"How do you think it ends?" she asks, and he flings his arms around her in joy and she laughs.

Bilbo realises, to his astonishment, that it is the first time he has ever heard her do so.

Their actions wake Thorin who stares, astonished, between the smiling hobbit and the laughing woman whose hand he still holds.

Shocked, he can do nothing but gaze at them both until finally Dagnirel leans over and kisses him soundly on the mouth.

Grinning wickedly she pulls away as joy, like a shower of gold, spills across Thorin's face. Lightening fast he pulls Dagnirel to him in an embrace none could break and she wraps her arms around him and sighs into his mouth.

And as the King under the Mountain kisses the Star maiden as though they have all of eternity before them, Bilbo turns away, smiling, and closes the doors behind him.

Because this, he knows, is how happy endings work.

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