AN: new week, new chapter, same old disclaimer –that is to say that I own nothing here– but here's something different: some explanations! A couple of my readers found that Chandra & co. should have easily steamrolled Voldemort and his merry little friends. First of all, while some planeswalkers are indeed that powerful, not everybody is a one-man-army; planeswalkers are not living gods anymore after the Great Mending, they're just long lived spellcasters. And if Tom wasn't somewhat dangerous for Chandra it would make a very dull story. Nor can our walkers simply march across Britain trying to find and kill Tommy boy: alone it would take them a literal lifetime, and with the help of, say, an undead army courtesy of Liliana it would surely attract the attention of both the Ministry and the muggles. And last but not least, Voldemort still has some of his horcrux lying around, so killing him would actually do very little apart setting his plans back some.
Hopefully this clarifies my choices, have a nice read.
CHAPTER 23 - Fortuitous find
"What in the blazes? This thing bit me!" came an angry voice from outside before continuing after a brief pause "You could have told me sooner!"
The portrait of Walburga Black stirred back to its sort-of-life, listening intently. Whoever it was –a young woman judging by the voice– had just been tested for their blood by the doorknob and found to be the owner of the townhouse. That or the wards had thoroughly failed, but either way she was about to meet the screaming girl.
The front door opened and in came four people: three were teenaged girls –a redhead in chainmail armour and two brunettes, neither dressed as a proper witch should– accompanied by none other than Dumbledore himself. Warburga's expression soured visibly: she had no love lost for the elderly man and his liberal politics. Moreover, she could smell that of the three girls only one had some measure of Black blood and that the others weren't pure. Not that she had expected anything else from that old geezer. She decided to make her displeasure known.
As soon as she had laid her eyes on the dusty entry corridor, Chandra had thought the place was a dump. She had honestly seen ruins that were more homely. She hadn't been expecting a manor ready to house her when the headmaster had talked about her owning a house, but neither the disaster in front of her. Then some portrait started screaming at the top of its painted lungs about impure blood, old goats and "sullying the sanctity of her house", and the pyromancer's annoyance had peaked. She stomped closer to the offending piece of furniture –which incidentally was the only clean thing in the hallway, not that she particularly cared at that juncture– igniting a fist and placed it scant centimeters from the painted face. The portrait shut up pretty fast.
"I like animated portraits but I'm sure I can live without one so noisy in my house," the redhead had said in no unclear terms.
Once the painting didn't resume its shrill screaming, she nodded and extinguished her fist.
"Is it normal on this plane for people to argue with their furniture, Hermione?" asked the third female of the group, a thin, short woman in a dark green dress that exposed lots of pale skin crisscrossed by dark tattoos.
"No Nissa," replied the native witch with fond exasperation "But I guess if anyone can, that would be Chandra."
"You're probably right," chuckled the elf.
"Very funny you two," replied the redhead before turning towards the only male present "Since when has this dump been abandoned?"
"It's not abandoned!" protested the portrait with obvious indignation but a more appropriate tone of voice "Kreacher cares for the house perfectly!"
"Kreacher?" asked Chandra raising an eyebrow.
With a soft popping sound, a small, hunched, goblinoid creature with huge floppy hears appeared in front of the newcomers. He –or at least the pyromancer thought the creature was male– was dressed in rags as filthy as anything else in sight and looked to be in just as bad state himself. He briefly stared at her with his large, watery eyes filled with suspicion before turning towards the painting and asking in the broken common that goblin everywhere in the Multiverse seemed to speak if "mistress" had called him. The portrait explained that Chandra was the new owner of the house and, therefore, his too.
Meanwhile Hermione had been inquiring with Dumbledore about the unknown creature. The pyromancer heard Nissa's indignation at hearing that Kreacher was an elf and a slave, and that such arrangement was incredibly common amongst wizards in that plane. It got even funnier when the animist tried to hug the house elf, tears in her eyes at his situation, only for him to teleport out of her embrace screaming.
"Filthy half-breed assaulting Kreacher!" he said reappearing closer to the portrait before looking at Chandra, malice shining in his eyes "Should Kreacher expel the filthy half-breed, the blood traitor and the disgusting mudblood from the house, young mistress?"
That rubbed everyone present the wrong way, the pyromancer in particular. She fixed Kreacher with a hard glare.
"You should be caring for the house, yet I see only a filthy dump," she said gesturing around "To make it all worse, you insult my friends and hope I'll give you permission to kick them out? I don't think so. You're some kind of slave, right? Then go away, you're free. I don't want to ever see you again."
Kreacher started crying and pleading not to be dismissed. The portrait protested that the elf was a good servant and there was no reason to free him. Dumbledore explained that to dismiss an house elf one needed to give them an article of clothing, but also that they need the bond to survive. Hermione and Nissa didn't join the general din, saving Chandra from a far worse headache. Once fed up with all the noise, the pyromancer created a small detonation between her hands to silence the other three.
"What a mess," she commented once quiet had been restored "So if I free the little guy he dies?"
"Not unless someone else hires him," calmly replied Dumbledore "If I may-"
"No oneses hire disgraced Kreacher," lamented the pitiful elf holding his head in his hands and cutting the headmaster short "Kreacher is too old."
"Very well," said Chandra rubbing her brow "You may stay Kreacher, but I want this place cleaned up and I don't want to hear any more insults about my friends. Have I made myself clear?"
After the debacle with Kreacher, the quartet continued exploring the house, which turned out to be much larger on the inside than one could have suspected from the outside. The only room free of grime and dust was the kitchen, where Kreacher had built his lair in an unused cupboard, all the others were completely uninhabitable, which didn't bode well for Chandra's summer perspectives.
They made an interesting discovery though: in the drawing room, amid piles of junk that the pyromancer was of the idea of torching, Nissa felt something she defined "so dark it's on par with Liliana's veil." It was a golden locket bearing a green snake effigy and one of the least tasteful accessories Chandra had ever seen –a list that included Bolas' false beard– but Dumbledore seemed really happy to see it though, so she guessed it was one of those phylactery thingies. The headmaster had stressed the importance of finding and destroying those things after Voldemort's resurrection, so his satisfaction was completely understandable.
Since Chandra's new house had plenty of space, was protected against uninvited guests by powerful wards and was much cleaner thanks to Kreacher's continued efforts towards not losing his job, the redhead found herself playing host to the secret meetings of the resurrected Order of the Phoenix, a clandestine group out to thwart Voldemort's plans
It was an heterogeneous group, but the vast majority of the members were pretty old; if one excluded the planeswalker herself, the youngest members were the two aurors, a teenager girl with pink hair and a tall, dark skinned man that could have been thirty or so. The members also seemed to come from various path of life: some were or had been in the law enforcement, others she recognised as professors from school, but there were also normal civilians and even a shady character that just had to be a criminal. Chandra felt almost like she was back on Kaladesh with her mom and the renegades, or on Amonketh helping Samut's dissidents.
Almost.
"You cannot really be suggesting we just wait and see!" protested Chandra as an halo of smoke was raising around her head for the frustration.
The meeting had been going on for a while and she could scarcely believe her ears: this wizards wanted to lie in wait while Voldemort was served the first move. Not only it was something Chandra found monumentally stupid, but it wasn't even tactically sound, especially considering that the dour potion professor was actually a double agent in the enemy camp. And all that right after she had to argue her way into the discussion in the first place: apparently some of those morons thought that since she was only a teenager then she had no business in a war. Fifteen she might have been, but she had more experience than half of those fools.
"I fought in the last war kid," said some incredibly old man sitting on Dumbledore's left, one of those advocating that fighting was only for adults "Almost all of us did, we know better than you how to face this threat."
Must not char the old coot! chanted the pyromancer in her mind trying to reign her emotions in Immolating your allies is Bad!
"Can it Ephias," barked a man with more scars than one could count and one visibly fake eye "The gal has a point, and we were losing that war."
"Intelligence must be the first step," insisted the corpulent matron of the Weasley clan in a pained tone "I lost my brothers to disinformation."
The argument only grew worse after that, with people from both camps criticizing anything and everything about the others.
From what Chandra could gather, both groups were apparently in agreement over just two points: Voldemort had to be stopped and killing the Death Eaters was a big no. The first point was fine, but while the pyromancer had never been a great fan of senseless killing –as opposed to people like Liliana who simply found it more efficient– she had also been in enough fights to know that some opponents had simply to be put down for good. Fanatics like some of those Death Eaters appeared to be fell squarely in that category.
She didn't bring it up though, she had already tried when she had been kidnapped by Malfoy and Weasley and the headmaster had been clear at the time he was a man who believed in second chances. Instead, she decided to use her own discretion once on the field.
The discussion wound down when the professor-turned-spy informed them that Voldemort had no plans of doing anything except some covert recruitment because lord Malfoy had convinced him to exploit the time afforded by the lies being spread by the Ministry about his return. Unfortunately, while the argument had calmed, it had remained unsolved.
"There is one thing I'm curious though," said professor Snape before the meeting was adjourned eyeing Chandra in a way she found mildly disturbing "While I'm sure Miss Nalaar's help would be invaluable on the field, she duelled the Dark Lord to a standstill after all, how can she intervene if she's at school?"
The question stumped the pyromancer. Not because she hadn't thought of that, but because she had had no plans of going back to Hogwarts. And why ever would she?
Unfortunately for her, she seemed to be the only one of that idea.
"She won't actually help with the fighting," explained Dumbledore in his usual far-too-jolly tone "Well, unless we deploy en masse, of course."
"What?!" she thundered as her hair went up in flames.
The headmaster's smile dimmed as his hand gripped his wand. Chandra held up a hand to stop him –she didn't like being doused– and took a deep breath to calm down.
"Who decided I'm not fighting?" she asked in a calmer tone once she had reigned herself in.
"I need you at Hogwarts my dear," replied the headmaster sounding a bit older and decidedly serious "Your and Miss Vess' help will be invaluable in a project I have, something that is, of course, vital for the upcoming war. I cannot say more, I'm sorry, but for that I'll need you in the castle."
This mellowed Chandra. Fighting was what she did best, but helping the headmaster was ok too. She also had a pretty good idea what he needed her and Liliana for.
She briefly wondered how the necromancer was: she and Gideon had departed for Dominaria shortly after the end of the school year to hunt down the last of the demons holding her contract. Chandra hoped both her friends were ok.
In the end, the meeting ended with only half of a plan, but the pyromancer decided it wasn't worth fighting over it anymore. She'd just tell the fools "I told you!" while saving their asses later on.