Coyote Tricks: A Coyote at Hogwarts

This chapter is rated PG-13 for violence.

Meeting in a Diagon Alley

Kit had gotten to talk only a little with Harry on the ride back, just enough to decide he liked him. They hadn’t gotten to go in depth as Arthur Weasley talked on and on in fascination about the car, the street lights and the most common things.

“Excuse me for asking sir,” Harry said as they put Harry’s things in his room at the Leaky Cauldron. “I’ve never seen anyone do that many transfigurations at once.”
“No,” Kit said grinning. “You’ve probably not seen anyone like me.”
Harry watched as the shadows shifted around the sandy haired man. When they cleared, Kit was still the same but his ears had become a sandy colored set of coyote ears atop his head and a similarly colored tail with extended from the back of his jeans.

“This is the real me.” Kit said.
“Then you’re not Human?”
“I’m half Human, my mother was Human. My father was the Great Spirit Coyote. As far as I know, I’m one of a kind.”
Harry seemed genuinely interested and Kit found himself telling his story to the likable young man. How his father had assumed a mortal avatar to woo his mother, his birth, the death of his mortal parents and how Spirit Singer had adopted him after being contacted by Coyote, once again a spirit. He described his childhood home at Spirit Peak Resort in the Colorado Mountains, leaving out that the resort was also a gateway to Elfhame Spirit Peak and the home of the Sidhe that Dumbledore was seeking.

Harry in turn told Kit about his childhood. Orphaned as an infant when Lord Voldemort in his bid to take over the wizarding world had murdered his parents and had only been defeated when his murderous spell to kill the infant Harry had backfired onto Voldemort himself. Kit stared at the lightning shaped scar on Harry’s forehead the attack produced as Harry went on to tell how Dumbledore had placed him with the Dursleys who were his closest blood relations. But they had never loved him; only taking him in and raising him out of fear of Dumbledore.

Kit found himself feeling very sorry for Harry. None of his living blood relations wanted anything to do with him either; except for a father who lived on an unreachable level of the spirit world. At least, unlike Harry, he had a guardian that loved him like a father and the healing environment of Spirit Peak to grow up in. He resisted an odd urge to grab the boy up and hug him.
‘That would be awkward,’ Kit thought as he shook the feeling off. ‘The influence of the Sidhe and their love and need to protect children I guess.’

There was a knock at the door and a tall, lanky boy Harry’s age with bright red hair came in and immediately moved to greet Harry.
“Ron!” Harry said as he hugged the boy.
He turned with Ron to face Kit and hesitated a moment noticing that Kit had instinctively reacted to the entry of a stranger by resuming his Human appearance.
“This is Kit Coyote, from America. He helped spring me from the Dursleys. Kit meet Ron Weasley.”
“Pleased to meet you sir,” Ron said shaking Kit’s hand.
“And you,” Kit replied. “You’re related to Arthur Weasley I assume?”
“My father,” Ron said and then turned back to Harry.
“Come on Harry, Mom and the others are downstairs. Oh and there are these people from Japan of all places too.”
“They would be with me,” Kit said grinning. “Why don’t you go ahead Ron we’ll be right down.”

“Harry,” Kit said as Ron left. “Most of the folks with me are like myself, more than they seem to be. We’re strangers here and are uncomfortable revealing ourselves with people we don’t know. Understand?”
“Yes,” Harry said. “You can trust the Weasleys but I understand.”
“Thank you.”

~~~

They came downstairs to find a ‘pack’ of red heads intermixed with Shippo’s ‘pack’. Riding roughshod of the red heads was a short, plump and kind-faced woman who immediately descended on Harry like he was the prodigal son. Harry introduced her as Molly Weasley and they exchanged a few pleasantries before she ran off after the only daughter who was threatening a pub patron with something called a bat bogey hex if he wasn’t nicer. Kit watching Molly with her family quickly summed her up in one word, Mom. She wasn’t the stereotype loving mother that everyone thinks they want but the caring, pestering mother that everyone really wants and needs. Kit found himself thinking that regardless of Master Llewellen’s opinion a wizarding community made up of the likes Harry Potter and the Weasleys couldn’t be that bad a place.

He looked around for Hanako to find her being entertained by a pair of identical twins named George and Fred Weasley. The older boys were letting loose something that looked like gummy worms that sped around the table making whizzing noises as Hanako clapped and giggled.

"So are we ready?" Arthur Weasley asked the assembled family and friends.
"Where are you going?" Kit asked.
"Diagon Alley. The kids need to pick up their school supplies; which reminds me."
He reached into his robes and pulled out two brown drawstring bags and handed one each to Shippo and Kit.
"Professor Dumbledore felt you might want to go shopping with us and sent advance payment for your teaching services."

Kit, Shippo and the others gathered round as Arthur explained the denominations of the various coins and their respective values. It seemed the wizards had so isolated themselves from the human world that they had developed and maintained their own currency system.

After the money was distributed, both groups followed Arthur into the back of the inn. Stepping up to the back wall he pressed a sequence of bricks and the wall magically opened up to create a doorway. Beyond was a busy market place filled with wizards and witches. Kit looked up and down the street filled with shops obviously part of this magical world sitting in the middle of London and yet unknown to ordinary Londoners. He wondered about the spells that must cloak this area and what a helicopter pilot saw when he flew over.

They went to various shops with the kids buying books and supplies. In one shop Toshiro and Kit were looking at wilted looking rose floating in a glass bell jar.
“Oh do you like it?” The woman running the shop asked.
“It’s a looks almost dead,” Kit observed.
“Oh yes it doesn’t get enough love around here. It’s a love rose you see, it feeds on love itself.”
Kit looked skeptical.
“Sounds like something Yuki would like,” Toshiro said. “And even if it doesn’t work, a wilted rose would look just fine in that gothic museum she calls an art studio. How much?”
Kit looked on in amusement as Toshiro bought the half dead thing looking forward to Yuki’s reaction to being given a wilted rose. One way or the other it should be amusing.

It was but not in the way Kit expected.
“I love it!”
Kit’s jaw dropped as Yuki hugged Toshiro while juggling the jar.
“It’s the perfect symbolism of the fading illusion that so many of us call love. I know just the place to put it when we get home.”
Kit wondered off as the two of them hugged again mumbling something that sounded like ‘artists’.

Kit got separated from the group when he stopped to talk to a Mr. Olivander, a maker of the wands that Kit had noticed all the wizards and witches using. He was curious about this since his own magic while often requiring physical components wasn't dependent on such a wand.

His discussion helped him form a theory that Olivander seemed to agree with. The power these wizards and witches used seemed to be a natural talent, genetically passed on that allowed them to collect the energy of the mortal world within them. But that energy was unfocused and difficult to channel effectively. The wand, which contained an inner core made with an item from some naturally magical creature like unicorns, enabled them to channel and focus the energy to a productive end. The difference between working with and without a wand was so great that most wizards couldn't operate without one.

Stepping out of the shop Kit looked around to try and find the rest of his group. His eyes were immediately drawn to a figure standing in the shadows across the alley. Bright almost luminous green eyes, fair skin under blonde hair and distinctly pointed ears looked back at him. It was a Sidhe but not anyone Kit knew from Spirit Peak. Such a sight should have drawn every eye in the street but Kit could sense that a glamorie had been opened just enough to let him see through.

'Ok I don't know him but he obviously knows me and wants me to see him.' Kit thought.
The Sidhe turned and strode out of sight down a side alleyway. Kit followed quickly. This street was almost empty and fairly dark and dirty. Kit turned another corner out of sight of the rest of the street and found himself face to face with the Sidhe.

"Who are..." He started to ask but stop short when the Sidhe raised his hand holding onto a strange object. A dark metal item that expanded upward like a cobra rearing up to strike.
Then Kit's world dissolved into a glaring white light filled with pain. He collapsed to the ground twitching. Shadows shifted around him as he lost control of shape shifting abilities, his tail and coyote ears appearing as he instinctively shifted into his natural form.

“Ah, perfect!” A voice behind him said and a distinctly sharp pain in his shoulder added itself to the others. Kit struggled to hold on to consciousness. A Human would not have been able to but his spirit blood allowed him to hold on even if he couldn’t move against the pain. He might have done better if he was prepared but the attack came as a complete shock. He knew better than to be off his guard with a stranger as powerful as a Sidhe but he had guarded against a spell or elven blade. The energy that assaulted him was purely non-magical. Some energy weapon like a Star Trek phaser. Aside from the fact that to his knowledge such a thing didn’t exist outside TV shows, to find a Sidhe wielding such a thing was like facing off a Shaolin Monk expected a kung-fu chop and getting a kick in the balls instead.

He managed to focus through the haze of pain blurring his vision at the Elf standing over him raising the weapon again. The handsome face broke out in a very sadistic grin and Kit could swear his eyes seemed to flash with some inner light as he spoke.
“Time to die, Son of Coyote.”