The strange thing we call life is an unusual mixture of fate and free will. Some things are meant to happen. Thanks to an ancient prophecy Jareth's birth as well as those of his friends and enemies had been set in stone as had some points of their lives. As long as it didn't interfere with Fate's design, they could do whatever they wanted with the parts of their lives that weren't set by Destiny.

Snape had been destined to save Jareth from a murder attempt by Quirrel, and Jareth had been destined to suspect him for it. It had been while Jareth had been limping out of the Hospital wing that Snape limped in and started stealing supplies. This incident made him suspect Snape even more. Trying to hide an injury from the local authorities or whatever was usually a clear sign that you had been up to no good.

Jareth spent a great deal of time recalling this event and wondering what illicit activities the Potions Professor had been up to.

That had of course been three days ago.

Jareth now had other things to think about, like whether or not he wanted to play Dumbledore's game. There really was no point in doing so. His studies and spending time with the few people who didn't stare at him as if he had two heads or insult him or try to cause him bodily harm took up a great deal of his time and he had little to spare on "Adventures". Chances were that whatever it was, it was dangerous and he could be seriously injured.

On the other hand, if he didn't play along he could end up on Dumbledore's bad side if he wasn't already. His grandfather had told him stories about what happened to people who had irked the man. He had also informed him that Dumbledore was a sneaky bastard, and that nothing had ever been tracked back to him. Crossing the Headmaster could be hazardous to one's health.

Coming to a decision, he wrote his grandfather, requesting any and all information he had on Nicholas Flamel.

The Weasley twins watched as the bushy haired Granger Know-It-All disappeared into an unused classroom with Potter and the Disappointment. Her friendship with those two marked her as fair game despite the fact that she was in their house. It wasn't as if the Ravenclaw wannabe belonged anyway.

"You know Gred, I don't think a person like her could be entirely human." Fred (at least for today) said.

"There's one way to find out my dear Forge. And it can be quite embarrassing in the right setting." George (they'd been using each-other's names for so long that even they didn't know which name belonged to which of them and as far as they were concerned it didn't matter) replied.

After consulting an ancient potions tome, they made preparations. Three days later their plan was ready to be implemented. After going down to the Kitchens and making a certain request of the House-Elves shortly before breakfast, they went up to the Great Hall to see what was about to unfold. Hopefully something would happen, but there was always a chance that the potion would have no affect on its intended target.

In the middle of what had previously been a rather uneventful breakfast on a rather wet Wednesday early in December, a certain Hermione Granger who was idly eating her porridge while her nose was stuck in a book became a very surprised Banshee. It was the quick thinking of one Severus Snape that saved the occupants of the Great Hall from having their eardrums shattered with a well timed silencing spell.

This event was swiftly overshadowed by the actions of an irate Leprechaun that had been Seamus Finnegan. His attack on the Weasley Twins was spoken of with awe for years afterwards. When he was finished with the two of them, there wasn't an inch of their bodies that wasn't black and blue, and they had to be rescued from a bit of ornamentation just below the ceiling by the professors.

In all of this commotion, it is understandable that nobody noticed that Neville Longbottom's ears went slightly pointed and Dean Thomas' eyes became a bit catlike.

King Jareth read the letter his grandson had sent him and wondered what the cursed Dumbledore was up to. An item that was purported to be the Philosopher's stone had been stored in a vault at Gringotts, but he had assumed that it had been a dark wizard trap as any idiot who made their way to the vault wouldn't make their way out again. Well, almost nobody, he reflected as he remembered the break-in on his grandson's birthday.

He decided to visit Nicholas and Pernelle to get an idea of what was going on. As he was on speaking terms with the two indefinitely prolonged mortals, a social call would not be out of place.

The next afternoon around teatime, he found himself at the home of a grieving widow. Nicholas Flamel had been killed several months before following a break-in. Only one item had been taken. There had been little doubt in Pernelle's mind about who was responsible, as Flamel had shown his stone to only one of his apprentices.

The silence in the large home that had been filled with the sounds of running feet and the laughter of children when he had last visited decades before became oppressive. After an hour, he had been unable to take it any longer and took his leave of the tearful Pernelle. If the Ministry hadn't declared the Flamels too old to care for children and threatened to remove any they took in from their home, he would have sent the next baby her way. She needed someone right now, and there was nobody as she had outlived all of her friends and family.

After he left Pernelle, he went to the small cemetery in which Nicholas had been buried to pay his respects. Nicholas had been a rather tolerable man, and had rather willingly taken a lot of children in in the decades when there was a surplus, since he and his wife had been unable to conceive. He had been a good father to all of the children he had adopted. Jareth wouldn't have handed them over otherwise.

As soon as he got home, Jareth wrote a letter to his grandson warning him away. Whatever was going on was undoubtedly dangerous, and he seriously doubted that the real Philosopher's stone was involved. This was a trap for someone and his namesake was either the target, a distraction, or the bait.

The letter winged its way to Hogwarts rather swiftly, and as with all letters that he didn't personally give the boy, this one was re-directed and perused by eyes other than those of the intended recipient. Rather than being re-sealed and sent along, this one was discarded.