The Fox Hole

Chapter 2: Wizards and Stuff

-Haru-

A few more potential customers entered the Fox Hole…

Once again, they were humans, but these ones felt magical at least. They were even wearing magical looking robes. However, the strange thing was that none of them looked Japanese.

"Foreigners?" Kunou tilted her head cutely at them. "Hello, welcome!" she called out in English. I taught her the language myself and she was getting pretty good at it.

"Hello… little girl with fox ears and nine tails…" the only girl of the trio greeted Kuno awkwardly. She spoke in English with a British accent. From her confused expression, I suspected she had no idea what a Yokai was. Also, she might not have come in through the Kyoto door either. Before it closed behind them, I thought I saw a glimpse of a small village with other kids dressed like these three.

"Welcome to the Fox Hole. Feel free to sit anywhere," I told them.

"This is a… restaurant?" the girl asked, looking around curiously.

"Yes, it's a restaurant and bar. Although, none of you look old enough to drink. Sorry," I said, handing out menus. I waved my hand over them and used a spell to translate the text into English. I had forgotten about the possibility of foreign patrons. How much was I even supposed to charge them? I had no idea what the exchange rates were between countries. 

Meh, I'd just ask them to pay whatever they felt like paying. It's not like I was hurting for cash at the moment.

"Thank you." A boy with messy brown hair and thick glasses took a menu from me. "Not to be rude, but what are you three…?"

"We're Yokai, silly!" Kunou exclaimed while jumping up and down. 

The girl's eyes widened in recognition. "I've read about Yokai in the Hogwarts library. They're a race of magical beasts native to Japan," she stated as if she had read that directly from a book.

Kunou stopped her happy hopping and growled at the schoolgirl. "Take that back! We're not beasts! That's a very rude thing to say to someone!"

The girl looked flustered when she realized she just insulted all of us. "Oh! I'm so sorry! That's just what I read. I sometimes forget how prejudiced British magicals can be towards other magical races…"

Yasaka scoffed. "Humans always think they're so superior, forgetting they're the weakest race." That was the first time I'd ever heard her speak English, her accent was flawless though.

"We are?" the boy with glasses asked, clearly surprised.

It was sad but true. The amount of humans in the Ultimate Class could be counted on one hand. Unlike most other races, they also suffered from the curse of mortality. They would all grow weaker and die of old age. 

The ginger boy in the group sneered at us. His eyes lingered on my mother with a lustful gaze. "Oh, please. Everybody knows magical creatures can never be as powerful as proper wizards. I bet you can barely do proper wizarding magic! Why else would you be dressed like such a whore? How much for your services, slut?" the boy asked Yasaka crudely. His friends gasped in shock at his words.

"Ronald! How could you say something like that?!" the girl exclaimed. She immediately turned to Yasaka and started apologizing for her friend's words, but the damage had been done.

I felt my hackles rise. I wouldn't tolerate anyone harassing my family. How dare this little shit call my mother that! I should take him outside and tear him limb from limb–

I had to take a couple deep breaths to control my anger. Sometimes my Yokai instincts could overwhelm my rationality. Regardless of being a racist little shit, this boy didn't deserve to be killed because his parents probably did a very poor job raising him. That didn't mean he could stick around in my restaurant though. "You are no longer welcome here, ginger, get out!" I told him with no room for argument. He had his chance and he blew it.

Despite that fact, he still did try to argue. "I'm not going anywhere." The redhead reached into his robe and pulled out a wand. "This is a restaurant isn't it? I want some bloody service!"

He was really testing my patience. So, where were his survival instincts? Didn't anyone ever tell him not to take food from someone who couldn't really didn't like him? Spitting in his food was the least harmful thing I was currently thinking about. It was only my pride as a chef that kept those thoughts from becoming a reality. "You're not getting any service here, get out!" I pointed at the door behind him. 

He still didn't leave, or even realize his life was now in genuine danger. Kunou, my adorable little sister, didn't have the practiced self control that Yasaka and I had over our Yokai instincts. Her pupils were slitted, her canines elongated and her sharp claws were out. She was a few seconds from jumping on the kid and tearing into him.

"What are you going to do, you weird-eared freak? I'm a pureblood wizard, and my dad works in the Ministry. If you attack me, you'll end up in Azkaban."

I didn't know what Azkaban was, but I wasn't threatened by him or his wand. In terms of magical power, he didn't even qualify as low class. He was barely a step above a regular person.

"Begone!" I raised my hand and sent a small telekinetic blast at him. He was thrown backward clear out of my restaurant. If he tried to come back, I would do worse to him. The squeal of terror he let out before the doors slammed in front of him brought me a tiny bit of satisfaction.

Yasaka growled at the door before settling down. "Hmph… another foolish child who thinks he's more special than he is."

"I'm so sorry about Ron," the girl apologized again in embarrassment. "He's always been a bit… brash. But I've never seen him act like this."

"It wasn't okay, Hermione," the remaining boy said. "Ron's been acting like a royal arse all year. He needs to go bugger off," He said before his eyes clouded over slightly, and he shook his head. "I mean, I'm sure he'll come around and apologize in a couple hours… He's a good guy after all."

Yasaka, and I exchanged a look. We both silently agreed that was weird. At least Kunou had calmed down once Ron was ejected. She started giggling, finding the remaining boy's choice of words to be funny. "BUGGER! That's a fun word!"

"Please watch your language around my 8-year-old daughter," Yasaka requested with a sigh.

"Oh, sorry…" he apologized and then turned to me. "Is this restaurant new here in Hogsmeade? I've never seen it before. I'm Harry… Harry Potter," he said with a small pause, as if he expected me to recognize his name or something. He let out a sigh of relief when I didn't.

"I have no idea what a Hogsmeade even is," I said, receiving looks of confusion from both of them. "We discovered earlier that my restaurant somehow connects to other places. We haven't figured out the 'hows' or 'whys' yet."

"REALLY!?" The girl's eyes lit up with excitement. "Where is your restaurant supposed to be? How does it work"

"It's based in Kyoto, Japan," I told her.

"Wicked," Harry said. "We're all the way in Scotland. We go to Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. On the weekends we get to visit the nearby magical town of Hogsmeade."

"A magical town? What makes the town magical?" Kunou asked.

"Um… A bunch of wizards and witches live here. The town itself isn't actually magical." Harry explained.

"Lame…" I could tell that her disappointment was immeasurable and her day was ruined…

"Are you two hungry?" I asked them while Kunou was distracted pouting to herself. "I've got a full menu of primarily Japanese food, but I'm also pretty well-versed in preparing dishes from other countries. If you don't see something on the menu, feel free to ask."

"I'd love to try some Japanese cuisine," Hermione said. "After three and a quarter years, the Hogwarts food is starting to get pretty bland. I wish the chefs would branch out the menu. Hm, now that I think about it, I don't even know who cooks our food…" she admitted. 

"I'm fine with trying anything… except raw fish," Harry requested. He and Hermione took a seat in one of the empty booths.

I went behind the counter and got to work on their meals. I didn't want to give them a full-on culture shock, so I stuck to something basic: hamburg steaks and omurice.

–Harry Potter–

Sitting down in the booth with Hermione, he had to hold back his blush. Without Ron with them, he couldn't help but feel like this was a date. Harry had secretly had a crush on Hermione for two years now. 

But… that was wrong. Harry knew that Ron liked Hermione. He shouldn't ever try to compete with Ron over anything! A freak like him shouldn't get in the way of his best friend!

"Hmm…" The older fox woman approached their booth. She was looking at him in a way that made him feel like she could see through him. Her eyes were also literally glowing… so that was a thing?

"Did you need something, miss…?" Hermione asked the fox woman.

"I am Yasaka. My son over there is Haru, the owner of this restaurant," she introduced herself.

"And I'm Kunou!" The little girl waved to them from the bar. She was sitting near her older brother, chatting with him while he cooked them up something.

"Nice to meet you, Yasaka. I'm Hermione Granger, and this is my best friend Harry Potter. Once again, we're sorry about how our friend Ron acted. We hope you don't take offense."

"I've lived long enough to learn not to snap at every single man or boy who makes a disrespectful comment," Yasaka said. "That's not why I approached you two anyway. Are you both aware that you are under numerous enchantments?"

Harry's eyes widened behind his thick glasses. "Enchantments? You mean charms? Are you saying we're bewitched?"

"Without a doubt," Yasaka nodded. "I sense you have multiple charms placed upon you to alter your mental faculties. You also have a few that are suppressing your magic," she explained, her eyes glowing again as she examined him once more. She then turned her attention to Hermione. "You are under the same, except I can also see that you have been poisoned. Some type of loyalty… or maybe even a love potion has been administered to you. Recently, in fact."

Hermione gaped at Yasaka. "L—Love potion? A—Are you sure?" she asked. "I have been having strange thoughts lately… thoughts I would have never considered before. A—About R—Ron," she admitted. "Could he have slipped it into my goblet when I wasn't looking?"

Harry was shocked to hear that! He knew Ron had been getting worse lately, but had his first-ever friend really fallen that far? Once again, Harry felt his thoughts growing fuzzy.

She must be making a mistake, Ron would never do anything like that. He's a great guy, after all. She'd be lucky to be with a proper pureblood wizard like him.

"Hmph, I've been around a long time, child," the fox woman answered Hermione. "As the ruler of Kyoto, I have had numerous traitorous retainers try to manipulate or brainwash me. They all failed… and paid for their crimes with their lives," Yasaka said coldly.

Harry and Hermione both gulped at that insinuation. "What are we supposed to do?" Harry asked. Was someone really messing with his mind? For how long? Was that why his thoughts occasionally got fuzzy?

"You can either go to your people's healers… who are probably incompetent or traitors if they haven't discovered this yet, or you can go to one of our healers," Yasaka made the surprising offer to them.

Harry was surprised and a little suspicious that a woman he'd never met before would go out of her way to help him. The paranoid part of his mind told him not to trust her. Then again, the paranoid part of his mind might be under mind control, so he didn't really know what to think… He scratched his head in confusion and let Hermione decide for them. Even if she was being manipulated as well, she was still smarter than he was.

He was just plain boring Harry, after all. He wasn't supposed to think for himself. Thinking for himself was bad.

Hermione shot Harry a look of concern before she answered for them. "W-We'll accept your kind offer," Hermione said with a small stutter.

–Haru–

I brought two plates of food over to the table. Both the teens gulped when the smells hit them. I always loved seeing hungry faces. When they started digging in, Yasaka and I moved back towards the bar. Kitsune had very good ears, I had heard everything despite the loud sizzling of food cooking right next to me.

"That's messed up. what kind of sick fuck places mind control spells on two kids?" I cursed and received a small smack from Yasaka for swearing. We didn't need Kunou learning any more bad words today.

"BUGGER!" She was still running around the restaurant yelling that to herself…

I was glad that mom made the offer to get the two kids treated back in Kyoto. I didn't think she'd go out of her way to help two human teenagers, let alone foreign ones from an alternate dimension. I asked her about it.

"I don't like seeing kids taken advantage of like that. It reminds me of what happened to the Nekousho clan in the underworld," she said with a frown. "We can't help everyone in the world–or worlds I guess, but we can help the people in front of us."

I could get behind a policy like that. I had a similar policy in that I wouldn't refuse any hungry customer even if they didn't have enough money for a meal. 

Once Harry and Hermione finished their food, Yasaka took them out into Kyoto to get their minds fixed. Kunou was going with them.

"Good luck, you two." I sent them all off with a wave. The kids both waved hesitantly back at me as the door closed behind them. And then I was left alone in my restaurant. I sat behind the bar, drumming my fingers on the counter. I guess I didn't think this part through. "I should really find a couple other employees, at least so I can have someone else to talk to when there's no customers," I said to myself. I didn't like being alone. 

Foxes might be solitary animals, but kitsune we're more pack oriented.

My ears perked up when the door opened again! MORE CUSTOMERS!

"WELCOME TO THE FOX–oh, it's you. I thought I told you that you weren't welcome here, brat." He got my hopes up for nothing…

The little ginger brat was back, and he had brought a couple tag-a-longs with him. An older Scottish woman and a heavily scarred man with a missing leg and a very large strange eye. 

"Weasley is right, there really is a monster in Hogsmeade. What have you done with Potter, foul creature?" The heavily scarred man demanded information from me. 

I snorted in response. "If you're talking about Harry Potter, my mom took him to get his head fixed. Someone put him under numerous mental enchantments. The poor kid could probably barely think for himself." 

"What!?" the older woman blurted out. "Someone placed enchantments on Harry Potter? How could that be!?"

"The freak is obviously lying!" The ginger brat pointed his stick at me for the second time today. "You caught me off guard before, monster, but it won't happen again! A proper pure blood wizard will never lose to a lowly creature!" he declared proudly. 

"Is that so?" I asked him sarcastically. I pointed my finger at him. "Burn." The stick in his hand immediately burst into flames!

"Ow! My wand!" he cried out in pain and dropped his stick. It turned to ash before it hit the ground. I was going to have to sweep that up later. 

The older woman and the scarred man both took a step back cautiously. "You destroyed a wizard's wand with a single word? What kind of dark magic is that!?" The scarred man asked me, his eyes brimming with greed. "Magic like that could change the entire wizarding world!"

That was a wand? Why was it so frail? A mage's wand is their life, what kind of dumbass mage doesn't bother placing protective enchantments on their own focus? What I just did should have been impossible. 

"You wouldn't be able to use my magic, human. That was foxfire Yojutsu," I said before once again dismissing them. "I told you what you wanted to know. Harry and Hermione will be back later. Maybe they'll even be able to tell us who put them under so many enchantments. Putting a developing mind under so much magic could have given them brain damage." 

"You are not lying?" The older woman asked me again. She introduced herself to me as Professor McGonagall, one of the teachers at Harry and Hermione's school. She struck me as a stern professor who had probably put up with a lot of bullshit in her life. That meant she could tell I was speaking the truth. She was surprisingly respectful despite the attitudes of her two companions.

"What are you doing, McGonagall!? You shouldn't trust the words of a beast! How did it even manage to open a shop on British soil? Just look at those inhuman ears and tails! There's no way the Ministry wont classify him as a dark creature!" the scarred man snarled in my direction. "Not to mention that dangerous magic it can use!" 

"I don't know or care what your ministry is. You are currently standing in my restaurant. Either you sit down and order a meal, or I'll kick you out," I told them. "One of you has already been kicked out once today, and I believe I told him he was never welcomed here again."

The ginger let out another squeal as I hit him with a second telekinetic blast. This time, it was slightly more violent. He went reeling through the front door and landed in the streets with a thud. "Owie…" His pained twitching brought a smile to my face. 

I don't usually enjoy bullying weak kids, but I make an exception for perverted little racists. "You're not welcome here either, scarface. Leave or I'll torch your wand and throw you on your ass next." I threatened him while holding up my palm. An orb of flames manifested in my palm.

Scarface glared at me before making the smart move and backing off. He knew his stick would burn otherwise. I might have also burned his peg leg while I was at it. Watching him hobble out of here on one leg would have certainly been funny. 

"...Dumbledore will hear about this," He declared and stormed out of my restaurant of his own volition. 

McGonagall let out a sigh as she watched her colleague go. "Something is seriously wrong with that man. I really need a drink…"

I smiled at her. "Well, it's a good thing for you that this is also a bar! Would you like to try some Sake? It's made by the Kappa Clan. They're experts when it comes to cultivating rice, especially considering they all live underwater." I could tell she was interested by my offer as I placed a large bottle on the counter. 

"It's been a while since I've had foreign alcohol. I'll give it a try." She took a seat at the counter. "How long will it take for Mister Potter and Miss Granger to return?" she asked me.

"A few hours," I said while pouring her a small glass. "You want something to eat in the meantime?"

She took a sip of the Sake and let out a pleased hum. "If it's as good as this, then I wouldn't mind trying some of your food. Oh, and keep the drinks coming!"

I liked her attitude!

XXX