Chapter 10
Izzy read and reread the note twice before the microwave beeped that the set time had finished. She debated going down the stairs to confront Mrs. Venti to discover how much she knew about Jareth exactly.
Was it simply an old grandma's tale that had led her to imagine she knew more than she actually did? Or did Mrs. Venti really have some knowledge of Jareth's world? Izzy wasn't sure.
But first thing was first. She decided she was going to eat her onion piroshky and borsht before she did any confronting. Her stomach growled at the enticing smell of the thick beet soup and puff pastry. She plopped a dollop of sour cream onto the steaming borsht and sat down to eat.
Since the borsht was too hot to sip yet, she took a bite of the piroshky and began to surf the internet. What was that word she had heard Mrs. Venti use earlier? Oh, yes, folletto. That was it.
Izzy typed the word into an online language translator. After a second it had automatically translated the Italian word to English. The word meant "goblin."
Izzy stared, open mouthed at her laptop screen. How could Signora Venti know that Jareth was the King of Goblins? She didn't think Jareth was a goblin himself did she?
Izzy panicked momentarily. Then she remembered that Jareth had said the platinum in her bracelet had been mined in the mountains of the kingdom a King Ladon.
Izzy quickly typed the word Ladon into the translator. Two possible meanings for the name appeared. One was Old English, meaning a hill. The second was the ancient Greek name of a river god who was a hundred-headed dragon and the guardian of the garden of the Hesperides.
That could mean anything. Plenty of people named their children names with foreign or ancient meanings. Izzy's own name, Isabel, for example, was in fact the Spanish variant of the Biblical name, Elizabeth, or Elisheva in the original Hebrew. It meant "God is my salvation."
She mentally crossed off the possibility that this King Ladon was anyone particularly dangerous until she knew more about him from Jareth's description. Besides, she highly doubted there were such things as hundred-headed dragons from Greek myths in Jareth's world. Creatures from Greek mythology did not exist, right?
Then again, Izzy reminded herself that up until a few weeks ago she hadn't thought that goblins, or goblin kings existed either. Now she was engaged to be married to said, Goblin King. Izzy smirked. What were the odds?
She took another bite of piroshky, a small sip of borsht, and continued researching. The word goblin in English was originally barrowed from the Medieval French term, gobelin, according to , its meaning uncertain.
Gee, that was helpful, Izzy thought. She continued her search. Stopping on a dictionary definition website she searched the term folletto. She came up with a definition that read that the origin of the word meant "mad," or "foolish." It was a term loosely used to mean "goblin," "imp," or "fairy," especially a supernatural being who is a survival in popular form of an ancient Etruscan or Roman deity.
Hmm… interesting. It's a start, Izzy mused. The Etruscans were the ancient ancestors of the modern Italians from the Tuscany region of central Italy, right?
Signora Venti was born in Tuscany, she'd told Izzy on many a past occasion. Izzy took another bite of piroshky and placed it back on the white plate next to her laptop. She decided to narrow down her search to goblin legends of Tuscany.
A pink mountain goat leapt from rock to rock as sure-footed as anything Izzy had ever seen. Izzy tried desperately to keep up with the animal. Apparently he did not want to be kept up with.
"Wait! Good little goat, that's a good girl. Forgive me if you're not a girl, but I really need to follow you or I'll never get out of these mountains!" She called in as a soothing a voice as she could manage.
The lithe mountain goat stopped for a split second, turning to look at Izzy over its shoulder. It bleated happily and continued on its rocky path.
Izzy was scrambling over rocks as quickly as she could manage to find a steady rock to set her foot upon, which wasn't fast at all. She searched the side of the cliff face for jutting pieces of rock to grab hold of in order to keep from tumbling over the cliff's edge into the wide ravine below.
Whatever you do, do NOT look down, Iz! Her attempt to mentally reassure herself was an epic fail. She was petrified. The how and why Izzy had come to be stranded in this treacherous mountain pass escaped her. She only knew she had to follow the pink mountain goat to find a way out of the mountains.
A large bolder lay ahead, jutting out from the cliff face. The goat easily leapt on top of it, poised as if to jump. It turned back to check that Izzy was following and took a flying leap from the boulder. In mid air the goat vanished, bleating a horrible suffocating sound as if it had been squeezed too tightly. Izzy wasn't sure but it looked as if something had simply snatched the animal out of the air! But that wasn't possible, was it?
She hurried after the wounded animal, telling herself it must have fallen. Izzy's hands were shredded and bleeding from climbing after the goat. She didn't stop to investigate the sound of tearing fabric that seemed all the louder to ears in this mountain pass, but quickened her pace after the goat.
Her dress had torn on a naked tree branch that grew in a haphazard angle from the side of the granite cliff. The animal was her only hoping of finding her way home. If she stopped now she'd never make it home.
"Little goat! Goat!" She called after the mountain goat. Just as she made it to the boulder, a hulking brown figure stepped around the side of the boulder into Izzy's path.
The creature was rather short, about 4 feet tall perhaps, with a skinny frame and long, blackened finger nails. Its head was bald and it looked grimy and unkempt, wearing only a pair torn pair of breeches.
A mountain goblin! Izzy didn't have to be told that it intended to hurt her. This breed of goblin would take pleasure in watching her suffer.
She screamed a high pitch scream only one afraid for their life could utter. But the scream that came out of her mouth was distorted. Rather than an endless shriek, it sounded instead like an electronic beep!
Beep! Beep! Beep! The alarm clock in Izzy's bedroom was furiously announcing her wake up call.
Izzy's head jerked up in fright. She was disoriented. It took her a moment to remember where she was. She ran her fingers through her tangled hair and let out an exasperated sigh, realizing that she'd fallen asleep in front her laptop.
After hours of searching she still had gotten nowhere in her search for information on the goblin myths of Tuscany. The now empty borsht cup was turned on its side, the spoon hanging out. Piroshky crumbs littered the laptop keyboard.
Great. What a dope I am. How the hell am I going to get puff-pastry flakes out of the keyboard? She stood up to get a damp cloth and clean up the mess. Her legs and back were stiff from having been cramped, sitting in a kitchen chair all night.
She cleaned up the mess and went to turn off the annoying alarm clock. The clock was flashing 12:00 in an eerie green. The power must have gone out. Izzy flipped the light switch. No power. She checked the time on her cell phone. It was 3 am.
Her fuzzy brain was too tired to think anymore tonight. Not bothering to turn her "sleeping" laptop off, or change her clothes, Izzy climbed into bed. She pulled the eiderdown blanket up over head and immediately fell back to sleep.
The sound of her cell phone ringtone woke her the next morning.
"She works haaaaard for the money, so haaaaard for it hoooney. She works haaaaard for the money so you better treat her right." The Donna Summer song clip replayed twice before Izzy bothered to answer the phone. It was the ringtone that told her that her boss was calling.
"Hi, Joe." Izzy answered, speaking in a rush before Joe could get a word in. "Listen, I overslept and the power went out last night so my alarm clock didn't wake me on time. I'm really, really sorry. I'll be in as soon as possible."
"Izzy, don't worry about coming in today. I called to tell you that I gave everyone the day off today. The only people who will be coming to work today are the actors for the dress rehearsal for next week's performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream. The sets and scripts are finished. There's nothing more you need to do today. Kris is doing particularly poorly today so I'm taking the day off myself to be with her."
"Oh," Izzy breathed in shock. "Is there anything I can do for her? Can I bring something over, some soup perhaps, or something to ease her pain?"
"No, don't worry about bringing anything. But seeing you would put a smile on her face. Just bring yourself over and I'll order out lunch for the three of us. I'd cook, but I'm lousy at it so my wife won't let me." He laughed softly. "What do ya say, Iz?"
"Oh…uh. Ok then. I'll be there in about an hour or so. That alright?"
"Sure thing, Iz. You know how to get here. Kris'll be more than thrilled when I tell her you're coming for a visit. See ya then." The line clicked dead on the other end.
Izzy touched the "end call" button on her cell and pressed the sleek, black phone to her temple in momentary thought. She wanted to disobey Joe's orders and take something nice to Kris, but what? She decided she'd think it over whilst she showered, when the idea came to her.
Twenty minutes later, when she had showered and dressed in blue jeans and her favorite blue and white, nautical, striped sweater, and small, anchor necklace, Izzy sat down at the kitchen table to write.
Using her favorite floral stationary that she saved to use for thank you notes on holidays, she cleanly wrote out as many famous quotes on the topic of health as she could think of, from inspirational to humorous. When her memory gave out she searched quotes online, via her cell.
"A healthy attitude is contagious but don't wait to catch it from others. Be a carrier."Tom Stoppard
"I feel pretty good. My body actually looks like an old banana, but it's fine." ~ Mike Piazza
"I have the body of an eighteen year old. I keep it in the fridge." ~ Spike Milligan
"It takes more than just a good looking body. You've got to have the heart and soul to go with it." ~ Epictetus
"A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones." ~ Proverbs 17:22
"Doctors will have more lives to answer for in the next world than even we generals". ~ Napoleon Bonaparte
"Never go to a doctor whose office plants have died". ~ Erma Bombeck
When she had filled the large stationary sheet with as many quotes as she could fit cleanly on the page she folded the sheet in three's, much like a business letter, and placed it in an open envelope addressed to Kristen, leaving it unsealed. Then pulling on black leather boots, she grabbed her purse and walked out of the door to hail a cab.
